Guppies for Tea

by Marika Cobbold

  ‘You are a dreadful man.’ Her chubby shoulders heaved with laughter.

  It was, Amelia thought, as if the atmosphere at Cherryfield was too thin to sustain real life and that now, back in the world, Selma and the Admiral filled out and coloured in, ceasing to be old people, and becoming just people.

  She looked up to see Henry smiling at her. ‘How long are you home for?’ she asked him.

  ‘Most of the summer, then we deploy to the Gulf for six months. At least my father will have had a chance to settle in at Cherryfield first.’

  ‘I wish I wasn’t so far away,’ Amelia sighed. ‘My mother lives in Exeter but without a car it’s no good staying with her.’ Amelia didn’t say that the thought of spending time alone with her mother in the flat made her feel like an escaped convict hauled back to prison.

  ‘… and of course they couldn’t believe their eyes at the High Commission when I dived into the pool in tropical mess dress.’ The Admiral laughed loudly at the memory as he raised a spoonful of cherry-topped trifle to his lips. Suddenly there was silence and the Admiral’s long face turned pink, then purple. Amelia stared as he gave a strangled cough, his pale blue eyes bulging, tears rising. Henry leapt from his chair.

  At the table opposite, a young girl stared and nudged her mother, and the lunching family at another, carried on their conversation in carefully loud voices, as if to show that they at least were minding their own business.

  The Admiral sat rigid in his chair as Henry prised his lips apart. He had stopped coughing and was making rasping, staccato noises, his face turning a bluish hue.

  Selma didn’t move but sat silent, gripping the table edge with both hands.

  ‘An ambulance, quick!’ Amelia called to the waiter.

  Beads of sweat appeared on Henry’s face as he pushed his fingers inside his father’s mouth. Suddenly the Admiral yanked free and, with a loud belch, disgorged his dentures on the plate of trifle.

  Henry dabbed his father’s face with a napkin dipped in mineral water. ‘It’s all right Pa,’ he whispered, ‘I’m here.’

  The guests at the next table left, gingerly carrying their cups of coffee, and, opposite, the teenage girl dissolved in giggles.

  ‘It’s not funny,’ Amelia whispered near to tears, ‘it’s not funny.’

  ‘He’ll be fine now,’ Henry said, looking up at her. ‘I don’t think we need the ambulance. Don’t worry he’ll be fine.’

  Chapter Five

  The Admiral had Rested a while on a chaise-longue in the Ladies powder room, a pink towel, with ‘For Our Guests’ embroidered in gold thread, dampened and placed across his forehead. Now he sat in the front seat of the car, next to Henry. His head was resting against the seatback and the sun, shining though the car window, showed up little patches of colourless stubble on his chin, where he had not seen to shave.

  To make room for Selma’s bad foot, Henry had pushed the driver’s seat forward, almost as far as it would go, and, as he was driving, his knees were pressed right up against the wheel.

  Amelia was chatting, thinking it the best thing to do. ‘Oh look,’ she exclaimed, ‘just look at those lambs. Aren’t they adorable? Spring really is wonderful, so full of promise, a new beginning …’ She stopped. I’m being tactless she thought.

  ‘I mean whatever one’s age,’ she tried again, ‘spring is … well sort of promising.’ She caught Henry’s face in the rearview mirror. A smile flickered in his eyes.

  Back at Cherryfield, the Admiral was put to bed. Downstairs, Selma said, ‘Don’t go,’ and she took Amelia’s hand. As Amelia said nothing, she added as if she had just thought of it, ‘Why don’t I come and stay with you for a few days?’

  If Selma had been ten years old, Amelia thought, she would have had her fingers crossed behind her back.

  ‘I do feel I need a holiday,’ Selma continued, in the same pretend-nonchalant voice. ‘I can’t remember when I last had one.’

  ‘Grandma, I’d love you to come, but,’ she paused, ‘well just at the moment, things are a bit difficult at home.’

  ‘Oh, I shouldn’t worry,’ Selma said cheerfully, ‘I’m sure Henry wouldn’t mind, he seems such a nice boy.’

  Amelia breathed in deeply. She was tired, it had been a difficult day. Then she remembered how all through her life, Selma’s door had always been open to her. If it had ever been inconvenient to have Amelia to stay at Ashcombe, Selma and Willoughby had never said so.

  ‘We’d love you to come, of course we would,’ she said, firmly. ‘I’ll arrange a day as soon as I get back home. I’ll see you tomorrow before I go, anyway. Mummy’s coming too.’ And she freed her hand and walked quickly to the door, feeling Selma’s gaze on her every step.

  The next morning at ten, Amelia met Dagmar outside the hotel. ‘You’re looking well.’ Dagmar held Amelia at arms length for a moment, studying her face, then, with a pleased smile, pulled her towards her and gave her a kiss.

  ‘So do you,’ Amelia said, smiling back, surprised to find her mother’s presence comforting. Dagmar did look well too; tall, blonde and elegant in her grey slacks and navy blazer, it was hard to think she was well over fifty. Constant obsessive worrying must agree with her, Amelia thought.

  ‘It’s such a nice day,’ she said, ‘I don’t think we need a taxi.’ On the walk, she told Dagmar of the disastrous lunch party and about how confused and unhappy Selma seemed.

  ‘I agree, I agree,’ mumbled Dagmar.

  ‘And,’ Amelia said, thinking, this will get a reaction from her, ‘Robert lied to get her to agree to move to Cherryfield. She still thinks she’s got Ashcombe to go back to. He must have used his power of attorney.’

  ‘Dear, oh dear. That’s too bad.’ She heard her mother’s voice suddenly a little way off. When she turned, she found that Dagmar had stopped a couple of yards further down the hill and was busy checking the soles of her shoes, balancing precariously first on one foot, then on the other.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Amelia snapped. ‘You haven’t walked in anything, if that’s what you are worried about. I would have smelt it.’ And all the irritation accumulated over years of being her mother’s daughter rose up in her, making her cruel. ‘Concentrate on something other than yourself for once, will you. You have not stood, walked or sat in dog shit, no passing seagull has relieved himself in your hair …’

  ‘Please darling,’ Dagmar interrupted her, ‘don’t speak to me like that. I just can’t help myself, you know that.’

  Amelia felt like hitting her. Slap! Right across the cheek. Slap! An angry red mark across that pale, smooth skin. She could not remember a single time when she had had her mother’s undivided attention, not had to compete for it with dog’s mess, germs, worms and things that need wiping down in the night.

  ‘I’m sorry, tell me again.’ Dagmar’s reddened hand touched Amelia’s arm. And, as always after unpleasantness of any kind, whether with Dagmar, or Gerald, a friend, or the man in the shop who tells her fourteen months is a good innings these days for a washing machine, there lurked, deep under layers of righteous anger, a voice that whispered, ‘It’s really all your fault Amelia.’ It was a triumphant little voice and Amelia constantly feared it was the voice of reason.

  ‘No, I’m sorry,’ she said, and she went on telling her mother of the lunch with Admiral Mallett and Henry.

  As the door was opened for them at Cherryfield, Dagmar stood aside to let Amelia pass, then she wiped her feet on the doormat, six times for each foot.

  Selma was in the lounge. ‘Do sit down, Mrs Lindsay,’ Nurse Williams said to Dagmar before breezing out to answer a bell.

  Dagmar said no thanks, she felt like stretching her legs, then she bent down low, kissing Selma on the cheek, careful not to touch the armrest of the chair. Dagmar always said that she wasn’t worried about germs on her own account, what filled her with panic was the thought of passing them on to others. Amelia thought it might be psychologically sound to point out to her mother that by worrying about ge
tting her hands contaminated by the chair, she risked toppling over and crushing her fragile, old mother. She put her hand under Dagmar’s elbow and said, indicating the chair next to Selma, ‘Why don’t you sit down?’

  ‘Yes darling, do,’ Selma insisted. ‘You make me feel you are about to go any moment and I do so love having you here.’

  Dagmar, looking pained, perched on the armrest. ‘You sit,’ she said to Amelia. Her voice was light but her look implored Amelia not to argue.

  ‘Has the Admiral been down today?’ Amelia asked, doing what she was told.

  ‘What’s that darling?’ Selma looked politely alert.

  ‘Admiral Mallett, how is he this morning?’

  ‘He wasn’t down for breakfast. But of course neither was I.’ Selma smiled expansively. ‘Oh look, there’s your young man,’ she nodded towards Henry who had stopped in the doorway. ‘Why don’t you ask him? He seems to know Admiral Mallett better than any of us.’

  ‘Gerald, is Gerald here?’ Dagmar looked pleased. ‘That’s very sweet of him, coming all this way to see Mummy. Quite unlike him too.’

  ‘Good morning everyone.’ Henry joined them.

  ‘That’s not Gerald,’ Dagmar hissed in Amelia’s ear.

  Amelia leant her head in her hands.

  ‘Let me get you a chair, Mrs Lindsay.’ She heard Henry’s voice. ‘You can’t be very comfortable perched like that.’ She looked up to see Henry carting a small chintz-covered armchair across from the other side of the room. Dagmar kept smiling as her eyes homed in on the uneven stain that spread across the rose-patterned seat. Henry too was smiling as he held the chair out, waiting. Slowly, Dagmar sank down on to the seat.

  ‘I saw such a lovely wedding dress in Vogue the other day.’ Selma looked meaningfully at Amelia. ‘Just your sort of thing too, darling. Simple, but beautifully cut.’

  ‘You’re about as subtle as a tank,’ Amelia said.

  ‘I wonder where the bathroom is,’ Dagmar mumbled.

  ‘When are you getting married?’ Henry looked at Amelia with interest.

  ‘That’s a funny question coming from you?’ Selma gave a disapproving little laugh.

  Amelia turned to Henry, who was beginning to look confused, and said firmly, ‘Not at all as far as I know,’ and she felt like shaking her grandmother. Alzheimer’s will only protect you so far, she thought furiously. Then her eyes fell on Selma’s right hand which, even when resting in the grip of the other, kept on shaking. Like dancing feet on lame legs, she thought. What a swine I am to get angry.

  She smiled across at Selma. ‘It’s my fault, Grandma, I keep changing my mind.’

  Dagmar shot up from her chair, rather like someone who had sat with her hosts’ farting dog at her feet for about as long as she could stand it. ‘Where did you say the loo was, Amelia?’ she demanded.

  Amelia told her. And her mother would go there, she knew, not because she needed a pee, but to check her slacks, make sure there was no stain from the chair seat and no smell. Then she would soap her hands, scrubbing right up the wrists, before rinsing them in scalding water, careful all the while not to touch the edges of the basin.

  Amelia had seen it all often enough. Dagmar would utter little phrases like ‘Oh that bun was sticky,’ or ‘I don’t know why they can’t make newsprint that doesn’t come off the pages.’ People on the whole did not think her behaviour odd. If you were good looking and well dressed, Amelia had come to realize, it took stranger acts than Dagmar’s for the world to see that you were mad as a hatter.

  Dagmar returned relaxed and smiling, all the tension gone from her body. ‘Why don’t I take Mummy for a stroll, it’s so lovely out there? Coming darling?’ She asked Amelia.

  Amelia said she’d catch them up. ‘I’ll just finish my coffee.’ A nurse came and helped transfer Selma into her wheelchair. Whilst they shifted and hauled, Amelia chatted all the time with her grandmother, trying to take her mind off the undignified procedure, just like a gynaecologist, she thought.

  At last Selma was ready and Dagmar pushed her outside in the wheelchair, gripping the tips of the handlebars gingerly.

  Henry leant closer to Amelia. ‘Just go ahead and yell.’ He smiled encouragingly at her.

  ‘Is your father better today?’ she asked instead, but she thought Henry very perceptive.

  ‘He’s not too bad, thanks, but he’s spending today in bed. I left him asleep.’

  ‘Amelia! AMELIA!’ Selma was calling from the terrace where she had been parked. ‘Darling, I’ve just had a lovely idea.’ She leant forward in her wheelchair, peering at them through the open French windows. Across the path, Dagmar stared dreamily at the blossoming cherry tree. ‘I shall give a party for my birthday, like we always used to.’ Selma held out her hands for Amelia to come over.

  ‘I’ll be home well in time for August. I know it won’t be the same without darling Willoughby,’ for a moment the pleasure was gone from her face, then she made an effort to smile, ‘but life must go on, we have to make an effort.’

  Amelia took the handlebars and began slowly pushing the wheelchair along the terrace, and down a wooden ramp on to the lawn. She waved at Henry, who sat flicking through a magazine.

  ‘I’ll ask Admiral Mallett. You’ve met the Admiral, haven’t you?’ It’s the repetitions that get you down in the end, Amelia thought, as Selma went on, ‘And we mustn’t forget little Mrs Finch, and Sheila and Mark, of course, and Tony Bellamy …’ Dagmar joined them as they rounded the corner back towards the terrace.

  ‘… and then there’s Violet. We’d never hear the end of it if we left her out.’ Selma was smiling happily.

  Through the French doors, Amelia noticed that Henry had disappeared.

  Later, as lunch was being served, she said goodbye to Selma and, turning to Dagmar, she said sternly, ‘You’re staying the day, aren’t you Mummy?’

  Dagmar nodded, a glint of martyrdom in her eyes.

  ‘I have to get back to Devonport,’ Henry came down from his father’s room. ‘I can give you a lift to the station.’

  They drove for a while in silence. It took time always, Amelia thought, to shake off Cherryfield. Then as they turned on to the Plymouth road, she said to Henry, ‘Would you mind if I raged against God, just for a minute or two?’

  ‘Dig out.’ Henry smiled. He was driving rather fast on the outside lane.

  ‘Seriously though,’ Amelia said, feeling hot and pushing her hair from her face, ‘it’s the way God seems to have of giving with one hand, whilst taking with the other. Just look at life. We’re given it, great, hurrah! But there’s always a sad ending. I mean, who’s ever heard of a happy death?’

  Henry said nothing but seemed to be listening as he overtook a stream of heavy lorries swaying along the inside lane.

  ‘You would think that birth, at least, would be a completely happy affair, but oh no. Even these days when it’s fairly safe, it’s still painful and essentially, humiliating. It makes a mockery of what every nice girl since Eve has been taught. “Keep your fanny to yourself, dear,” the cry has echoed through the ages, and then the poor girl has half the world staring at her …’ Amelia stopped. ‘I’m doing it again,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry. I’m just hopelessly coarse.’

  ‘Don’t worry. Really.’ Henry turned a sharp left where it was signposted, ‘Station’. ‘You carry on.’

  ‘It’s just a small example of course,’ she suggested meekly, ‘but I feel it would have been helpful if the things we like to keep private and the things that have to be public had been more equally divided between the organs. Not concentrated higgledy-piggledy in one area,’ Amelia finished lamely.

  ‘I think,’ Henry said, ‘that you’re a little bit unfair to God. He gave most of us perfectly good, effective, reproductive organs that also happen to take care of other, equally important functions. That’s all. So you can hardly blame him for us losing our innocence and getting all coy and refined, can you now?’ He drove up in front of the entrance. ‘Anyway,�
�� he said, ‘you’d need awfully big ears.’ And he walked round and opened the car door for her.

  Chapter Six

  The Neck of a champagne bottle periscoped through the ice that was melting inside a red, plastic bucket. It stood in the middle of the kitchen table and was the first thing Gerald saw as he came in, two hours late from the office. ‘What’s this in aid of?’ He threw his briefcase on a chair and loosened his tie.

  ‘In aid of? Oh, nothing in particular.’ Then Amelia smiled and threw her arms round his neck. ‘I just felt like celebrating, that’s all.’

  ‘I don’t expect you’ve noticed, but there is a recession on. Anyway,’ he made his voice patient, ‘felt like celebrating what?’

  ‘That we’re not old and incontinent – all right so I go to the loo four times a night, but at least I get there – that we’ve got our own place where we can please ourselves, sit with our feet on the table drinking wine and reading, stay up all night, sleep all day, throw a party.’ She flung her arms out. ‘Anything.’ She put a tall-stemmed glass in front of him.

  ‘Do you realize what a luxury it is just to be able to go into your own kitchen and cook whatever you want to eat, maybe bring it into the sitting room in front of the television.’

  ‘You know I hate TV dinners,’ Gerald said, sitting down with a sigh.

  Amelia tried again. Looking quite serious now, she said, ‘Most importantly of all, we’ve got each other.’

  She hauled the bottle from the bucket, dripping water all over the front of her khaki skirt and white cotton shirt. One of his shirts, Gerald noticed. And he wondered, how does she do it? How does someone as vague, as fragile as Amelia, cling on to an illusion with such strength? Wearily he accepted the glass she handed him, she had over-filled it of course. He sipped the champagne and thought how much he preferred a really first class Chablis.

  Earlier in the day, Gerald’s father had come into his son’s office for a chat. ‘Gerald, old chap,’ he had begun, touching Gerald’s shoulder rather in the manner of someone being told to caress a pet snake, ‘I know things have changed since my day, we’re in the nineties after all. I mean to say, you can hardly put on the television these days without being reminded of the fact.’