by Gaby Koppel
“Oh I don’t know.”
“I’m sure the Bar Council would welcome a visit. You could always pretend you need a lawyer, then go through the list of members, looking for suitable sounding names like Cohen, Levy and anything ending in ’stein.”
She flicks her head to the side, tapping ash into the wind. “I’m just trying to help. You know I only want you to be happy.”
“It would make me happy if you could accept Dave, and realise that he is the right man for me. What makes me unhappy are the constant suggestions of disapproval.”
“OK, OK.”
“And what are you going to do about Valentina? You know I’m not going to meet any of her eligible bachelors. Can you get the money back?”
“I don’t know.”
“So what are you really doing today?”
“I think the Victoria and Albert.”
Ah yes. The costumes, the Ming vases, and the whole edifice a tribute to a happy, fruitful marriage, which I seem to recall involved a controlling mama somewhere along the line. So, why don’t I believe her?
When I get to the office, it’s almost empty, the only person around is Sarah’s assistant Millie, guarding the entrance to the boss’s office.
“Where is everybody?” I ask her.
“It’s studio day.”
“Oh Christ. So it is.” That’s a near miss. I’m supposed to be on phones. “I suppose Sarah wants to see me?”
“Yeah. You may not want to see her though. She was ready to eat you alive yesterday.”
“Oh Jeez. What can I say to make it better?”
“I think you’ll need to prostrate yourself on the ground uttering repentances. Sacrificing some kind of small animal as an act of contrition might also help.”
When I get there, the rehearsal is in full swing. I creep into the back of the darkened gallery, trying to pretend I’ve been there for ever. I can see the presenter’s image refracted across a bank of monitors, showing him from five different angles. Down in the studio he’s perched on a desk with a wad of scripts in his hand. As the camera cuts, he looks up, and explains about a disturbing series of stranger rapes in different Dorset towns. On his last word, the director cues in the video, but stops it after thirty seconds.
“OK everyone, from the top. Bit static on the read, Jim darling. Can we try making it a walk?” There’s a lot of business on the studio floor. A spark uses a big pole to adjust some of the lamps, and as he does so, Sarah swivels round in her chair next to the director, and gives me one of her most cutting looks.
“Thanks for gracing our humble premises today, Elizabeth,” she spits. “I was beginning to think that the attractions of London N16 were so overwhelming that you were going to open a satellite office over there.”
“I’m sorry I missed the meeting,” I mumble.
“Missing a meeting is not the problem. A bit of notice would be nice. I believe that in some circles it is even considered polite to send one’s apologies.”
“I’m really sorry. I got, kind of, caught up.”
“So I hear.”
“You did?”
“Look. Your failure to keep us in the loop with what the hell you are up to – that would be enough in its own right to make me question your judgement.”
“Yes.”
“But that you have absolutely disregarded a clear instruction I gave you.”
“Sorry.”
“Have you got amnesia?” I say nothing. “Well, have you?”
“No.”
“Did I or did I not tell you that you are not an amateur sleuth? You work with the police, alongside them at all times. We rely on them for everything. We don’t go freelance, off-piste, as the whim takes us.” The whole gallery is now looking at me. The vision mixer has stopped mixing. The sound ops have taken off their cans. The director is looking at me with undisguised pity.
“Hello folks, is anybody listening. How’s this?” It’s Jim, from the studio floor. He’s suddenly realised that he’s not the centre of attention any more. The gallery crew re-focuses, except for Sarah who is still glaring at me. How does she know I went to Stamford Hill yesterday?
“Look, I’m really sorry. But whose toes did I step on?”
“Does the name –” she looks puts on her glasses and looks down at a yellow sticky attached to her notebook, “– Rabbi Stern – mean anything to you?”
“Ahh—”
“Because his description of you was uncannily accurate.” Tevye. Seems that the principal tradition he’s brought over from the shtetl involves grassing me up to the police.
“I met some guys in the area who introduced me. It all seemed very – above board.”
“Don’t be so fucking innocent, Elizabeth. These guys may dress like they are still living three hundred years ago the backwoods of Poland, but that doesn’t mean they rely on a man on horseback to pass a message. Your pal Stern was on the phone to DI Jenkins before you’d even got back through his garden gate. There’s been a snowstorm of electronic messaging. You might as well have put up a Wanted poster with your photograph on every billboard in Stoke Newington.”
After the programme I get home late to discover where Mutti’s been, and surprise, surprise, it isn’t the Victoria and Albert. She’s been hunting round Kilburn for information to kick-start her compensation claim. Her source is the owner of a small grocery shop that serves the needs of London’s émigré Hungarian community. As a consequence we’ve now got enough salami to open our own Magyar deli. But when I try to find out what she’s actually learned from Mr Gabor, it’s disappointing in its vagueness. His friend applied for compensation, and got something. No names, dates or other details. Just a lot of salami. Despite the lateness of the hour, I call Dave.
“Call me old fashioned,” I say, “but isn’t the mother of the bride supposed to take a teeny bit of interest in our forthcoming nuptials? Instead of which she’s obsessed by two other things – finding me an alternative groom, and spending the limited wedding budget on this hopeless quest for compensation.”
“Can’t you interest her in something else?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. How about the Women’s Institute or voluntary work in a charity shop?”
“Mmm, I don’t think you’ve quite got the hang of my mother.”
“How about knitting booties for the gorgeous grandchildren we’re going to produce?”
“Even she’s not that optimistic.”
“Optimistic is the word if she thinks there’s any real chance of getting money out of the Hungarian government. And to be honest why should she after all this time?”
“Well,” I say slowly, “I think there is a moral case for it. When you think of what her parents went through. How much they lost.”
“Don’t forget, people in this country suffered too in the Blitz and all that. My grandparents gave free board and lodging to Land Girls for years. But they aren’t about to start asking for back rent forty years later. It’s perverse, as your father would agree.”
“What’s my father got to do with it?” I pause, “And how on earth do you know what my father thinks about it?”
“We spoke on the telephone. Is there some kind of unwritten rule that we can’t?”
“No. No, of course not. So what exactly is it that you and my father agree on in your cosy tête-à-têtes?”
“Calm down, we’re not forging some kind of pact behind your back. The matter in hand is the compensation claim. And the one thing we can agree on is that it’s a waste of time and money. You’ve got to stop your mother obsessing about it.”
“Really?” OK, I know he’s right, but it’s none of his business. I bang the phone down, and go back to Mutti and the salami mountain. It’s well past midnight now, but she’s still up and at it. I sit down at the dining room table facing her.
“Look, if you want to pursue this compensation thing, you need to take it seriously. Treat it as you would a proper business interest.” She looks like a
schoolgirl who is about to get told off for not doing her homework.
“Don’t put on that face. It’s serious. We need to put together a case. Trying to corner the market in salami may be a bit of a distraction.” I get a cardboard file out of my room, and write COMPENSATION CLAIM on it in black marker pen. Mutti looks very satisfied with this, even though we haven’t got anything to put in it yet. Except a leaflet advertising the Hungarian salami shop, and some kind of émigré news sheet. Well, it’s a start.
In the office the following day I’m on menial tasks with a work experience girl whose Daddy is a Labour MP. She’s Tony this and Cherie that all afternoon and at four o’clock I snap and tell her that unless she’s got a hotline to Number Ten, can she just shut up and get on with it.
I get home to find the flat spotless. And empty. There’s a smell of multi-purpose spray everywhere, with a note of bleach in the bathroom and a hint of lavender in the bedrooms. Mutti’s never gone as far as commenting on my levels of household cleanliness, but as soon as she’s feeling at home, she’s whipped out the Marigolds.
And, leaning against a vase of fuchsias in the middle of the dining table is – the card from Valentina’s dating agency. That’s straight for the bin. But then half a glass later, I fish it out again and have another look.
At nine o’clock Dad phones to say he’s picked Mutti up from the station. They’ve kissed and made up, and everything is getting back to normal. I wonder how long that can last.
Not long at all. By the following day when I talk to Mutti, she’s focusing on the Hungarian compensation claim with renewed vigour. And I can tell it’s starting to wind Daddy up. Over the next week, she’s revving the engine. She’s been to the library and got a pile of books about Hungary. She’s dug up a file of old papers, and a lot more old photographs. The dossier is beginning to fill up. Every time I talk to her, she sounds more and more excited, rattling on about how many people her father’s factory employed, how big it was; how large the apartment, and how near to the river, how lavishly it was furnished and decorated.
She’s been to the travel agent’s to get prices for flights to Budapest, and has come back with a detailed itinerary for a two-week trip. My father calls. He sounds like a man being pulled along by a big, bouncy dog. The lead is pulling his arm off.
“Really Lisbet, I would have thought you’d know better.”
“About what?”
“Encouraging your mother to pursue this fantasy about compensation.”
“I didn’t encourage her.”
“Then how do you explain this – this dossier? She’s obsessed with it. And we can’t move for salami.”
“I’m innocent of anything to do with sausage acquisition.”
“I think you’ve been egging her on. How come she suddenly knows so much about it?”
“Look, we talked it over a bit…”
“Ja, genau. Exactly. You have to watch what you say. She thinks you are serious. Now I hear you’ve hired some kind of specialist, a hot shot lawyer.”
“Whaaat?”
“I don’t know where she thinks we’ll get the money for this, Lisbet. I’m ticking over with the translating work now. But it’s not enough to pay for a trip to Hungary yet, let alone the deluxe tour your mother is planning.”
The following day Mutti calls, with an excited rundown of the capsule travel wardrobe she has acquired. It’s all in practical, drip-dry, manmade fabrics. Did I know that these can be hand washed and need no ironing at all?
I give her one of my lectures. I tell her to stop pushing her luck. Does she know how lucky she is to have Dad? If she doesn’t want to push him over the edge, she’s to stop her spending right now, and get back to the bridge table. There is silence from her end of the line. And sniffing.
Saturday night. Dave and I haven’t seen each other all week because I’ve been busy with Mutti. It’s his turn to choose, so we see a three-hour Iranian film about incest, shot in black and white. The father is forging a dangerous alliance with his daughter’s fiancé, and after that a tragic ending seems inevitable. It’s all a bit too arty for me. Not that I’m pushing for a romcom with Hugh Grant, but I’d love some popcorn. Apparently my crunching would ruin his appreciation of a subtle (slow) and nuanced (boring) film, because it would detract from the essential auteur/director’s vision.
In the gloom, I sneak an occasional sidelong glance at Dave, but he’s absorbed in the movie. Let’s not even think about holding hands. By the end, there’s a lot of grinding sex on the banks of a river and far too much masochistic self-harm including the leading male castrating himself with a saw. To look on the bright side, this is probably better viewed in monochrome. As we’re coming out, I venture,
“So, what did you think?”
“Mmm.”
“Did you like the film?”
“I can’t come out with pat answers straight after the end credits. I’m still digesting it.”
“OK,” I say. “He could have cut out at least half of that wedding scene, it went on for ages. But it looked fabulous. Apart from the, er, you know.”
“I said it’s too early to discuss. I’m not going to play Radio 4 with you, like some fatuous, so-called intellectual with an opinion ready at the drop of a microphone.”
“So you mean that you’d rather go to the cinema by yourself.”
“That’s not what I said.” He puts his arms around me. “Don’t be so touchy, will you? Not everybody moves at your frenetic pace.”
“OK, what do you want to do now? I’m hungry. If we go out to eat will you insist on separate tables and refuse to discuss whether the food’s delicious or not?” There’s just a moment when I think he doesn’t get the joke. He looks at me all angry and misunderstood before the smile breaks through.
We go for a pizza. But the conversation is halting. It looks as though all the people at the other tables are having a better time than us. After a night out, we usually end up at Dave’s place. I’m getting bored of having to choose. God forbid he’d give up living in that draughty studio. Fitted carpet may be a hideous middle class indulgence, but it’s also very soft on the feet.
As we get out of the car, I’m thinking through the script for making my excuses. But I can’t get it right. There’s no way of saying I don’t want to spend the night with you that doesn’t sound like the beginning of the end of a relationship.
Once we are home, Dave puts on the TV. He opens a bottle of red wine, even though we didn’t finish the Chianti at the restaurant. He pushes a glass towards me, and I take a gulp. It tastes sour. He puts on Match of the Day and sits down next to me on the sofa. Without taking his eyes off the television, Dave reaches for my hand and raises it to his lips. I slide closer to him, but whatever feeling moved him has evaporated. He’s still holding my hand, but it might as well be a football rattle. I could read the match with my eyes shut.
“I’ll get ready for bed,” I announce, and he nods, without taking his eyes off the screen. Though it’s late, I have a shower. A few months ago I treated myself to some expensive body lotion. It’s still there in his cupboard. I unwrap the towel on the bed and massage some of the rich cream into my freshly shaved legs, making them sleek and soft. My nightie is vintage Victorian lace, picked up from a stall in Camden Market. It feels crisp and clean as slip it over my head and do up the pearl buttons, leaving the top two open. His bed hasn’t been made, and is covered in this morning’s toast crumbs so I pull everything off and give it a shake. The sheet gets stretched flat and anchored with hospital corners. On top I arrange the bedding like they do for magazine shoots, artfully plumping the pillows, and folding down the edge of the duvet. And the finishing touch, a dove grey mohair blanket across the foot of the bed. With both sidelights casting a warm glow, it’s bed perfection. I slide into my side, trying my best not to disturb the covers.
I must drift off over my book, because the next thing I know is that Dave’s weight is on top of me and his hands are pushing in between my legs. He�
��s coming on all strong and sultry, and though this is exactly what I’ve been waiting for, suddenly I just want to escape. I untangle myself from his arms, ignoring his protests and make for the bathroom, where I sit on the lid of the toilet for what seems ages, trying to work out what to do next.
When I creep back, Dave is dozing. I find my clothes, in a neat pile where I left them on a wicker chair. I’m dressed in seconds, dumping the nightie on the floor and with one last backward glance at my snoring man, I grab my bag, and shut the door behind me. It’s past two in the morning when I get home. Comfort is a clean pair of old-fashioned men’s striped pyjamas and a milky drink. Sitting on the sofa, I pick up my copy of Vogue. A card falls out of it onto my lap. Valentina’s card. A line-drawing of a man and a woman, with the strapline, “Out there, someone is looking for you.” Yuk. I think about Dave and what’s just happened. It’s hardly the first time we’ve had a bad night, of course. But after all this time I’m beginning to suspect my parents are right about him.
For all their faults, and despite all appearances to the contrary, they are trying to accept Dave, and I can see what it’s costing them. I try to imagine the conversation they’ve had about him. About us. “He’s not Jewish – so what?” would almost certainly be Dad’s line. “As long as he makes her happy,” would be Mutti’s, trying to deny both gut instinct and fundamental beliefs. Experience, upbringing and everything they know has taught them that it matters, nothing to do with religion and everything to do with who you are at heart. Money would play a big part of their thinking – and watching their struggles now I can see why. But she would definitely be on the lookout for something else. I don’t know a word for it in English, but I think hers would be “gemütlichkeit”. And her surprisingly accurate powers of perception would be telling her it isn’t there between him and me. And the Jewish thing is a kind of proxy. It’s all about the quality of connection.
