A Tangled Summer

by Caroline Kington

  ‘For once, Vee, I don’t share your optimism. Why should the Merfields change their minds?’

  ‘Because the Tuckers are in even more of a mess now, and that must be as apparent to the Misses Merfields as it is to the rest of the village. I can’t imagine they feel any particular loyalty to people like the Tuckers, particularly Charlie Tucker. He’s hardly a pillar of our community, and now he’s made such a fool of himself…’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘I was magistrating today. I got it from Guy. He was chairing Court One; said he’d had a chap in yesterday, by the name of Tucker, charged with being drunk and disorderly. You know that pub in Bath, The Bear, the one with the big white bear over the porch? Charlie Tucker was so drunk, he climbed up onto the porch and tried to mount it.’

  Hugh let out a crack of laughter.

  Vee smiled maliciously. ‘Then he couldn’t get down again and had to be rescued by the fire service. What a fool! Anyway, darling, I put a call into Richard G and asked him if he’d be running the story. ‘Too good to miss’, he said, particularly as an onlooker had provided them with a splendidly compromising pic of our Charlie. Go and see the ladies, and take a copy of the paper with you. You know how straitlaced they are, I’m sure they would be most interested!’

  If only Anthony and Cordelia weren’t home for the holidays. Vee, sobbing and screaming, guaranteed his climax, which had become more elusive of late. Still…

  ‘What a little schemer you are,’ he said admiringly. ‘Clever girl!’

  ‘I must go,’ she said crisply, ‘or I’ll be awfully late. We’ll talk more this evening. Cordelia is having an overnight with friends and I don’t expect Anthony will join us for dinner.’

  ‘Who are you playing tennis with?’ Hugh asked curiously, getting up and following her out.

  ‘Gordon White...’

  ‘That little turd. Why on earth are you playing him?’

  Veronica was impatient. ‘Really Hugh, I don’t see how you can shout at Anthony for swearing when you use such words yourself. He’s a creep, I grant you, but he could be very useful to us.’

  ‘How?’

  They walked across the gravelled courtyard to Veronica’s bright red Porsche. Veronica slung her racquet and bag into the back of her car and turned to Hugh, looking ever so smug, and rather like a picture he had once seen of a shrew consuming a worm. ‘I‘ll tell you later, darling. It’s a long shot and he might not play ball, but if he does…’ She let out the clutch and as the car moved slowly off, called out, ‘Paula’s in the kitchen; go and speak to her about Lenny. This time next year, I promise you, Marsh Farm will be ours.’

  Hugh did speak to Paula, and Paula, much, much later, remembered that Mr Lester wanted Lenny to give him a ring about possible employment. But Lenny, tired out from the day’s labours and having consumed a six-pack, as well as two meat feast pizzas, let out a loud snore and would not be woken.

  5

  Elsie Tucker brooded through Thursday and Friday. Her displeasure hung over the house, more insidious than the smell of the green tomato chutney. Charlie made himself as scarce as his work allowed, while the others speculated about who, or what, could have provoked Gran in such a way, and did their best not to aggravate the situation.

  Jenny finally finished the sweater she had been knitting and proudly showed it to Alison.

  ‘Oh Mum, it’s beautiful! You’re so clever!’ Alison was genuinely impressed and Jenny glowed. Alison rarely paid her any compliments. ‘Why don’t you sell your jumpers yourself? You’d make a fortune. I bet Mrs Whatsername will sell it for a couple of hundred at least.’

  ‘At least.’ Jenny agreed, burying her face in the soft wool garment in a fond farewell, before wrapping it carefully in white tissue and placing it in a flat cardboard box. ‘But you have to remember, dear, Mrs Moorhead is a very successful designer. Someone will buy this for that price because it’s designed by her, not because Jenny Tucker knitted it.’

  ‘But she pays you peanuts and makes a fortune out of your work. It’s exploitation, Mum.’

  ‘No it’s not. I enjoy doing it, and I’m very grateful for what she pays me.’ Jenny had been working for Mrs Moorhead for some years, and she meant what she said. The wool and the designs were sent to her, and it gave her the opportunity to work, not only on interesting patterns, but also with the most wonderful wools, the colours and textures of which far surpassed anything she could ever afford. She was forever pointing this out to anyone who might listen – usually Stephen, who was the only one happy to help her wind the skeins into more manageable balls.

  Jenny finished wrapping the parcel and glanced at the kitchen clock. ‘Good, if I hurry I’ll be just in time to catch the post. Ali, love, would you mind starting on those potatoes, or lunch’ll be late again, and with your Gran in such a funny mood…’

  ‘I’ll take the parcel. I could do with some air and I’m a faster walker than you.’

  Jenny counted out some change, and, encouraged by the pleasant half-hour they had spent together, took the risk of asking her moody daughter if she was planning to go out with her friends that evening, it being Saturday…

  ‘What with?’ Alison snapped. ‘I can’t spend the whole evening sponging off them.’

  ‘Well, now the jumper’s finished, love, I’ll soon have some cash. Mrs Moorhead’s always so good with her payments. I could let you have a little…’

  Alison, looking at her mother’s tired face, softened. ‘Thanks Mum. I don’t know what my plans are yet, but if I do go out I might borrow a bit. I wish Gran wasn’t in such a mood. Normally I’d ask her. Hey, I’d better dash if I’m going to get to the shop in time.’

  Jenny moved to the sink to watch, through the kitchen window, the slight figure of Alison, in tight-fitting jeans and sun top, her hair scraped into a bobbing pony tail, as she walked quickly across the yard and out of sight along the track to the road, the parcel under her arm.

  ‘Poor Ali,’ said Jenny softly to herself. ‘It’s not easy for her. Not for any of us,’ she added gloomily, looking down into the sink at the brown and muddy water, with scum and little bits of debris floating on the surface. Stephen had dug the potatoes earlier. He was very proud of the crop he grew for her, and Jenny hadn’t the heart to tell him she’d rather buy them, ready-washed, from the supermarket. She hated scraping potatoes; she would rather have gone to the post office and had a quick chat with her mate, Rita, who as village post-mistress was a good source of all village gossip. But Alison was right. Jenny had never learned to drive so she would have had to walk, and being overweight and slow, she would probably have missed the post. The sweater was already overdue and she had been anxious to see it off by the weekend.

  ‘You would think,’ she thought crossly, ‘that not driving and having to walk everywhere would give me enough bonus points to eat a Mars a day, or at least guarantee I lose an extra pound a week.’

  Encouraged by Rita, Jenny had secretly been going to Weight Watchers. It had not been an unmitigated success. She had hoped the family would notice the pounds falling off her, but they hadn’t noticed anything, and, truthfully, the pounds hadn’t fallen off that easily. Rita had given her the enrolment fee as a birthday present. Only she knew of Jenny’s secret dreams concerning the local vet.

  Jeff Babbington had been Jim Tucker’s oldest friend; he had been best man at his wedding to Jenny; and was godfather to Alison. Jenny had gone unexpectedly into labour at a time when Jeff was on the farm, helping a temperamental cow give birth to twin calves. He had then helped in the delivery of Jenny’s baby, Alison. His wife had died of cancer some thirteen years ago, and with no children to worry about him, he led a comfortable bachelor life, which he appeared to be in no hurry to alter. Jenny knew he was fond of her, and he spent a lot of time in the Marsh farm kitchen, very much part of their family.

  She had fancied Jeff Babbingt
on for a long time, as only her friend Rita knew. ‘But he doesn’t see me as a woman, Rita, not as, you know, anything he might fancy. Plump and comfortable, that’s me’.

  Once the first flush of lust had given way to childbirth and routine, sex was not the first thing that Jenny missed when Jim died. There had been times over the last ten years when she had been physically disturbed by strange feelings, tinglings in her groin, strong desires to fondle her breasts and rub her hand over her belly and touch herself in places that she was so ashamed to mention she had no name for them. But she tended to dismiss these feeling as hormones, time of the month, or menopausal. However, as she confided to Rita, ‘ It seems a shame that I might live another forty years and never, you know, have IT ever again.’ Ruefully, she had added, ‘But Rita, I’d die of embarrassment if I ever took my clothes off…all that flab!’

  So the drive to lose weight had an added urgency. But at least, she consoled herself, he had seen her naked when she was at her most vulnerable. Not that he ever referred to that occasion without laughing and making jokes about those two stupid calves.

  Jenny sighed and plunged her hands into the muddy spume. Perhaps she should give up potatoes…

  * * *

  Alison walked rapidly down the track towards the road. It was a warm day. The sun was high in the sky. The track was dusty, the hedgerow was dusty, the fields were brown, and the trees were dressed in a dull green crepe, uniform and lustreless, the vibrant colours of early summer long gone. The horse chestnuts were showing signs of an autumnal shift, and ripening blackberries had appeared, as if overnight, on the straggling bramble bushes.

  ‘God, this summer’s gone quickly!’ Alison reflected. ‘I can’t believe Gran isn’t out here after those berries for her cordial. Maybe I’ll pick some for her this afternoon and find out what’s bugging her…’

  As she walked, her thoughts drifted from her grandmother’s bad mood to the conversation she’d had with Hannah on the phone that morning.

  Alison had been keen to find out from Hannah what she knew of the biker who had joined their group on Thursday evening. There had been too many in the group for Alison to exchange more than a couple of words with him, but she was interested and wanted to know more.

  Hannah’s boyfriend, Nick, worked part time in a motorbike shop in Summerbridge and Hannah told Alison that the boy, whom they knew as Al, had bought bits for his bike there. He had an old re-conditioned BMW that Nick particularly admired, so the two had fallen into conversation; Nick liked him, and had invited him to join them that evening. That was all Hannah knew about him. Then it was her turn to be curious.

  ‘Why the interest, Ali? Don’t tell me you fancy him? Didn’t think you liked bikers. Wouldn’t it be fantastic if you and he became an item? We could go off on the bikes somewhere and I could tell my Mum I was going out with you, and it’d be the truth. Brilliant! She gives me such stick if she thinks I’ve been on Nick’s bike… Shall I tell Nick to get him to join us – are you coming out tonight, by the way? He did seem cool. A bit posh for a biker, maybe, but I could see you and him together…’

  Alison laughed. ‘I only wanted to know who he was, Hannah. Yeah, I thought he seemed pretty cool. But that’s as far as it goes.’ But just the possibility of seeing him again excited her and had put her in the good mood that had taken her down to the kitchen to chat to her mother.

  Hannah’s rosy vision was easier thought of than done, though, Alison reasoned. From what she had told Alison, Nick had no idea where he lived, or how he was to be contacted. If – and it was a big if – he came into the shop when Nick was working there, then Hannah would make sure that Nick invited him…and if that happened, it could be excruciating, with both Hannah and Nick watching their every move…that was supposing he did fancy her…and if he didn’t come…or didn’t make any move towards her, then how would she feel?…

  ‘Oh bugger it! Bugger, bugger, bug…’ She broke off in amazement and stood for a moment, staring, not able to believe what she saw in front of her.

  Outside the village Post Office was a distinctive, rather battered, motorbike.

  As she stood there staring, trying to unscramble her brain, the boy about whom she had been fantasising, walked out of the shop unwrapping a packet of cigarettes.

  For a moment, he looked as startled as she felt, then smiled and walked up to her.

  ‘Hi. This is a surprise. Didn’t expect to see you here. Alison, isn’t it?’

  Her brain desperately trying to instruct her to behave in one way and her body determined to act in another, Alison smiled at him, trying to appear cool and unconcerned, hoping he’d put the redness of her cheeks down to the warmth of the day. ‘Oh, hi’, she laughed. (God, how stupid her laugh sounded! Don’t laugh, don’t simper; he’ll think you’re a moron…) ‘Yes, I’m Ali; and you’re Al, aren’t you? A friend of Nick’s; mad on bikes…’ (Talk about stating the obvious. Now he’ll be convinced you’re a moron. Got to do better than this or he’ll be off in a flash…) ‘I noticed it last night. A 1965 BMW, isn’t it?’

  If he thought she was a moron, he didn’t let it show.

  ‘Yep, my pride and joy. I bought it last year. It was a real wreck, but I’ve been rebuilding it. D’yer know about bikes, then?’

  ‘Me? No, not really. Why?’

  ‘Well, not many girls I know would know either the make, or the year, or be interested.’

  Alison, having spent the greater part of her childhood listening to Charlie enthuse about bikes of every description, tried to look interested. ‘My brother’s keen. He was always tinkering with an old BMW when I was little – he’s older than me – and he used to give me the odd ride.’ (The last time, when she was eight, had been the last one ever as far she was concerned, for, careering round an impromptu obstacle course he’d created in the farmyard, the bike had hit a rusty piece of concealed machinery and she had sailed over his head to land in the muddy remains of the duck pond.)

  Al unwrapped his cigarettes and offered her one. Regretfully, she shook her head – she’d tried smoking and hated it, but it would have been so cool to take one…to have him bend over her and light it. He was quite a bit taller than her, lean rather than thin, with a longish, pointed nose, short dark spiky hair and an earring in one ear. She liked that. She watched him light his cigarette. He was not exactly good-looking, but he had strong features and she liked what she saw.

  He exhaled some smoke and looked at her curiously. ‘So what are you doing here? You’re the last person I expected to bump into. I thought you lived in Summerbridge?’

  ‘I could ask you the same question. As a matter of fact, I live near here, but my mates are all in Summerbridge, so that’s where I tend to hang out. So what are you doing here?’

  ‘Just passing. I was testing the bike and needed some fags. Luckily the shop was still open.’

  An alarm went off in Alison’s brain. She wheeled round in time to see the blue blind in the shop door, with its ‘closed’ sign, firmly pulled down. Simultaneously, the post office van pulled out from the side of the shop and sped off.

  ‘Oh no! Oh shit!’

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘I’ve gone and missed the post, that’s what. Bloody hell, and I knew I didn’t have much time. Shit, shit, shit!’

  ‘Can’t it wait till Monday?’

  Alison was really fed up and all self-consciousness evaporated. ‘No, it can’t. Or rather it shouldn’t. It’s late enough already and I said I’d post it. Bumping into you put it right out of my mind. How bloody stupid! Oh bugger!’

  ‘Is there somewhere else still open?’

  ‘Not round here. I’d have to take it to the main Post Office, in Summerbridge.’

  ‘Well, let’s do that, then.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ll give you a lift on my bike. Can you borrow a helmet from your brother?’

&n
bsp; Her vow, never to have anything more to do with bikes, forgotten, Alison’s excitement at his offer was immediately tempered by the thought of what he might make of Marsh Farm, and worse still, that they might run into either one of her brothers. For a moment she stood, an indecisive bundle of conflicting emotion. Then inspiration struck.

  ‘Wait here, that is if you really don’t mind. Here, hold my parcel. I’ll be right back. It would take too long to get to mine. I’ve got a better idea.’ And she tore off down the road, leaving Al gazing after her.

  By the time she returned, he had stubbed out the cigarette and was sitting astride his bike. Alison, somewhat apologetically, showed him the helmet she’d borrowed. It was pale blue, covered with silver stars and on the back, a huge, decorative pair of black-lashed, lustrous eyes.

  Al gave a crack of laughter. ‘That’ll set BMW fans goggling. Jump on. Wedge your parcel between us – I haven’t got any panniers – and hold on tight. You know to lean with me, don’t you, but not too much or we’ll be over, and keep your knees tucked in.’

  With a kick and a roar, they were off, and Alison, her arms round Al’s waist, was the most excited she could ever remember being. Fleetingly, she thought of her mother expecting her back for lunch, and of the anxiety her non-appearance might engender; but, she thought, she would only be late, at the outside, by an hour; the flak would be worth it and anyway, the parcel had to be posted, didn’t it?

  In the event, it was nearly two hours later that Al dropped her off outside the village shop.

  The spin through the leafy back lanes to Summerbridge was all too quick and she got there in plenty of time to post the parcel. But then he had persuaded her to go and have coffee with him in a little Italian café that she didn’t know existed. Alison’s family didn’t drink coffee and her experience of this particular beverage had never extended beyond Instant, which she endured with a shudder when she couldn’t get tea. But having turned down the cigarette, she wasn’t going to jeopardise the opportunity of prolonging this adventure by being so wet she wasn’t prepared to drink coffee, or because she had to be home for her dinner.