‘Oh no, definitely not. I’ve always suspected Vivien is of the Sapphic persuasion, if she’s anything at all. She’s lived at Creake Hall all her life, so her private parts have probably atrophied with the cold anyway. Viv’s certainly never shown any interest in men. Apart from Tyler, but theirs is a communion of the spirit. They share a passion for gardening but not - as far as I know - each other. But you never can tell. They say you have to watch the quiet ones, and Tyler is very quiet.’
‘Are you going to fill me in on the rest of the family before we get there? You haven’t really said much.’
‘I told you what to buy them for Christmas.’
‘That didn’t tell me much about them as people. As your family.
‘You want me to dish the dirt, you mean?’
‘No! I just meant I’d like to know a bit more… Though dirt is always fun.’
‘I can see I’m having a corrupting influence on you, Gwen.’
‘Oh, I never believe anything you tell me, on principle. But I’m sure an account of your family would be very entertaining, even it is a pack of lies. Which I assume it would be.’
‘Me, tell lies? I’ll have you know, I have a scrupulous regard for truth, just a rather cavalier attitude to the English language.’
‘The facts, Alfie. Just give me the facts.’
He raised one hand from the wheel and affirmed, ‘I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and,’ with a sidelong glance at me and a crooked smile, ‘nothing like the truth… I am the fifth child and only son of Rachael Holbrook, reclusive children’s author. Seventy-two. Eccentric. Difficult. Lucid on the page, rarely in person. She keeps to her room and communicates with the outside world through an intermediary: her eldest daughter, Vivien, fifty-one. She looks older, but then poor Viv has led a dog’s life. Except that the Holbrook dogs - two West Highland terriers called Harris and Lewis - are spoiled rotten and actually lead the life of Reilly. Who was Reilly, by the way? I’ve always wondered.’
‘I think it comes from an old music hall song… Mind that pheasant!’
We were off the main road now and Alfie negotiated the winding country lanes too fast for comfort, but with considerable panache. He continued in declamatory style. ‘Viv is secretary, PA, nurse, confidante, whipping boy, chief cook and bottle-washer to my mother. Viv runs the house, the garden and the gardener, for which she receives few thanks, but is allowed to live at Creake Hall, the only home she’s ever known. Vivien is the possessor of a fine brain and, I suspect, some writing talent, which Rae has done her best to discourage, there being room for only one writer in the Holbrook household.
‘Strangely, Vivien loves her mother, but that love is unrequited. Rae has no time for her eldest daughter. For any of her daughters, in fact. They are all bitter disappointments to her, for the simple reason they are daughters. Rae wanted a son and she made five attempts to produce one. The longed-for son and heir finally arrived - unexpectedly and some weeks premature - in 1979 when Rae was forty-three. Time had finally run out for her, so if she treats me as her little miracle, you must make allowances. She’d given up hope, you see. Resigned herself to the inevitable when - at the eleventh hour - I appeared on the scene, validating two marriages, five pregnancies and a stalled writing career. Eventually I became the muse, the consolation prize for four dull daughters and two dead husbands - one of whom was a bore and the other a philanderer.’ Alfie swerved suddenly to avoid another pheasant bent on suicide. ‘As you can imagine, the weight of responsibility lay heavy on my tiny shoulders. They’re a lot broader now, but my burden seems to have increased. Like that saint, the one who carries the child across the river. Which one is that?’
‘Saint Christopher.’
‘Gwen, you are a mine of useless information. I insist you’re on my team for Trivial Pursuit. Saint Christopher! That’s the one. Wading across the river carrying a little child who gets heavier and heavier and turns out to be Jesus Christ, bearing all the sins of the world. That’s me, carrying that little bastard, Tom Dickon Harry. He started out as a boy but now he’s bigger than me and I’m very, very weary. Frankly, I’d like to dump him in the river and leave the precocious little sod to drown, but for Rae’s sake - and my sisters’ - I curb my murderous tendencies.’
‘You’re too good to be true, Alfie.‘
‘Like Deborah. It must run in the family.’
‘Deborah?’
‘Deb is the nicest of my sisters. She’s also the dullest. The two characteristics are possibly connected. Deb is Deputy Head in a dustbin primary school in Great Yarmouth and she’s there till she retires now. She’ll never make it to Head. She’s forty-eight and been passed over so many times, she’s given up applying. So she’s stuck, dodging the flying flak, but maintaining her relentless enthusiasm. Though the last time I saw her, the smile had become a bit fixed.’
‘Is she married?’
‘Only to the job. She was married to boring Bryan - a social worker, even duller than Deb - till he upped and did a runner with his Tai Chi teacher, twenty years younger. Usual story. So we don’t talk about Bryan.’
‘Any kids?’
‘A son, Daniel, doing VSO. You see, altruism does run in the family. Daniel won’t be home for Christmas, so Deb will be thoroughly miserable, but she’ll put a brave face on it and organise the parlour games. You have been warned. Actually, you’ll be a nice distraction for her. She likes young people and she’ll like you. You might even like her.’ Alfie paused and sighed. ‘Deb deserves to be liked, but somehow I never quite manage it.’
‘Didn’t you like her even when you were a boy?’
He paused to consider. ‘She was eighteen or nineteen when I was born. By the time I was old enough to register her existence, she was away at university. Our paths barely crossed. And I only lived at home for the first five years of my life. Rae’s second husband, Alfred left her and took me with him.’
‘Rae just let you go?’
‘She wasn’t really in a position to object. How can I put this tactfully?… Rae has always been somewhat frail mentally. Apparently she was severely depressed after I was born. Postnatal psychosis is the medical term, I think.’
‘Oh, that’s nasty.’
‘She was never really right after that, I gather. And the marriage breaking down didn’t help.’
‘Your father was the philanderer, not the bore?’
‘Correct! As you’re aware, I don’t have a boring gene in my body. Rae put up a fight, but she wasn’t fit to care for a small child and Viv didn’t want to do it. So Alfred took me abroad with him, married again and my stepmother packed me off to boarding school at the earliest opportunity.’
‘So who looked after Rae?’
‘Vivien. Viv and Hattie were the only sisters still at home. Hat is six years older than me, so we were never exactly playmates. She lost interest in me once I started objecting to being treated as a doll. Deb - who’s really into Child Protection issues - said it wasn’t very OK for Hattie to keep removing my clothes and dressing me up in her old frocks. Though as I recall,’ said Alfie with a swift look at me, ‘I quite enjoyed all the attention. And the frocks.’
‘That must have been the formative experience of your youth: poncing about in dresses. You were doomed to become an actor.’
‘Indeed. And destined to have relationships with wardrobe mistresses.’
‘With a penchant for removing your clothes. Tell me more about Hattie.’
‘No, it’s Frances next,’ Alfie said firmly. ‘We must be systematic, Gwen, or you’ll get confused… Fanny is the youngest of my half-sisters. She’s beautiful - and doesn’t she know it! I suspect she became a photographer as a result of an unhealthy interest in photographs of herself. But she does have a wonderful eye. The house is full of photos, most of them taken by Fanny.’
‘Is she married?’
‘At the moment.’
‘At the moment?’
‘Yes. It’s sometimes possible to catch Fan betw
een husbands when she’s briefly single, or should I say unmarried, since she has a variety of lovers, some of whom become husbands and some of whom she runs concurrently with the husbands.’
‘That all sounds very complicated.’
‘She has a big, fat desk diary with coded symbols to keep her life and lovers organised.’
‘Children?’
‘No, that’s one complication Fan avoided. She’s always been a career woman. That’s why one marriage broke down. She’s just not maternal. Like her mother before her.’
‘You seem to know a lot about her private life.’
‘I do. And she knows a lot about mine. In fact we’ve got enough dirt on each other for a lifetime’s blackmail, but I’m too good-natured and she’s too lazy. In any case, we like each other. I suppose we’re close in a way. Not in age. Fanny was about fifteen when I was born. But she always took an interest in me. I was her protégé. She likes to think of herself as a talent-spotter. It was Fan who encouraged me to pursue an acting career. She took all my professional photos when I was at drama school.’
‘So she’s… early forties?’
‘Forty-four. But looks younger. She takes good care of herself, but then she has the example of her two elder sisters as An Awful Warning. Actually Viv is very like Fanny physically. I suppose they both take after Rae. But Vivien looks like a preliminary sketch - a rather dog-eared one - for the portrait that would become Frances. Fan’s features are refined and delicate versions of Viv’s. You’ll see what I mean when you see them side by side. You wouldn’t think it possible for two women to look so similar and for one to be drop-dead gorgeous and the other to be - well, plain.’
‘Poor Viv. Do you think she knows?’
‘Oh, yes. Viv may be a desiccated old dyke, but she isn’t stupid. None of my sisters is stupid, though Deb sometimes pretends to be, and Hattie can appear half-witted at times. No, there’s little love lost between Viv and Fanny. Viv doesn’t approve of Fan and Fan thinks Viv should mind her own bloody business. So Deb keeps the peace between them at Christmas. Between everyone. It’s Deb’s great talent. She should have worked for the UN. “Peaceful conflict resolution”, that’s her forte. And in case you didn’t know, that’s education-speak for what to do instead of murdering a sibling. Deb says it’s more important for kids to learn conflict resolution than reading or writing. She’s probably right. Let’s face it, some kids will never learn to read or write, but being able to resolve their conflicts peacefully is a really useful skill. Especially in prison, which is where, Deb says, a lot of her pupils are destined to continue their education.’
‘Well, despite your attempt to paint a black picture, I really like the sound of Deborah. She sounds intelligent. And a good person.’
‘Yes, she is,’ Alfie said gloomily. ‘That must be why we don’t get on.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’m allergic to do-gooders.’
‘Why?’
He exhaled, as if he was tiring of his commentary. ‘I think their motives are suspect. I never met one who wasn’t trying to ease their own conscience.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with that, surely, if they actually do some good? What would Deborah have on her conscience anyway? It sounds as if she’s led a blameless life.’
He turned and gave me a puzzled look. ‘Do you believe anyone leads a blameless life, Gwen? We all have secrets. Things we’ve done that we wish we hadn’t, things we’re ashamed of. Don’t you?’ I didn’t reply and turned away, to look out the window at the bleak and colourless landscape. Alfie resumed. ‘Oops. I’ve gone too far, haven’t I? Do I hear the sound of skeletons rattling in the Rowland cupboard?’
‘I think the only thing I’m ashamed of is… being ashamed. I was ashamed of my family. All of them. I told you about my aunt who was a drunk. And my mother… The only other member of my not very extended family was my uncle Frank. And he was a promiscuous and predatory homosexual.’
‘Oh… Well, not a lot to brag about there.’
‘I loved them all dearly and they were all I had for a family, but I was terribly ashamed of them. At times I even wished them dead. And now they are and I’m ashamed of me. They did the best they could and coped in ways that worked for them. I shouldn’t have set myself up as judge and jury.’
‘You were just a kid, surely?’
‘I suppose so. They were all dead by the time I was sixteen.’
‘Gwen, cut yourself some slack. You were a child, for God’s sake!’
‘In some ways, yes. Chronologically, I was a child. In other ways I felt middle-aged. My mother used to take me out with her when she went on her thieving sprees. She thought if she had a child in tow, people would be less likely to notice her nicking stuff.’
‘Probably true. What did she steal?’
‘Food mostly. All her money went on drugs. So we used to do Waitrose together. Only we really did Waitrose. Pay for some stuff, steal more. I never went hungry. There was always food in the house, good nutritious food. It just hadn’t been paid for. But in the end I couldn’t eat it. I felt so ashamed. Then I thought maybe I could blackmail Sasha into coming off drugs by starving myself. So I went through an anorexic stage when I was about eleven. She didn’t even notice. But Aunt Sam did. She said if I didn’t eat, she’d take me to our GP and tell him my mother was a junkie and a thief, then I’d be taken into care.’
‘She’d have shopped her sister?’
‘Well, she threatened to. And I believed her. So I started eating again.’
‘Brutal, but effective.’
‘Yes, I suppose so. Aunt Sam was a tough cookie. Well, she was with half a bottle of vodka inside her… Tell me more about Harriet.’
‘Batty Hattie.’
‘Oh dear. As bad as that?’
‘Fan coined the nickname. She’s not the most politically correct of women, as you’ll discover. My sister Harriet is - how shall I put it? - eccentric. But quite harmless. More sinned against than sinning, if you ask me. But I’m biased. Hat’s extraordinarily fond of me for some reason.’
‘Well, they say blood is thicker than water. She is your sister, not your half-sister.’
‘Maybe that’s it… She’s much younger than the other three, so she was something of an only child until I came along. Hattie was born nine years after Frances, so she never had anyone to play with. Rae regarded her as the last in a long line of disappointments - yet another baby who failed to be the longed-for son. So Hattie was pretty much neglected, I think. She grew up a bit wild and a bit… odd. But she wouldn’t hurt a fly. Literally. She’s a vegetarian and won’t even kill a wasp. She helps Viv and Tyler in the garden and one of her jobs is to collect up all the snails. Viv won’t use bait because it poisons the birds. Hattie’s supposed to drown the snails, but she refuses.’
‘What on earth does she do with them?’
‘Disposes of them in hedgerows and ditches around Creake Hall. Apparently she can be seen on a summer’s evening, sauntering along, like something out of Thomas Hardy, swinging her bucket, broad-casting snails. God knows what she’s doing to the ecological balance of the countryside.’ Alfie slowed down as we approached a crossroads. ‘We’re nearly there. Are you sure you’re ready for this?’
‘I’m looking forward to it! From what you’ve told me, I fully expect your family to be as entertaining - and exasperating - as you.’
‘You can have too much of a good thing, you know.’
‘On the contrary. As my late Uncle Frank used to say, “Too much is never enough.” And believe me, he would know.’
Chapter Five
Gwen
I don’t know what I’d been expecting. A ramshackle farmhouse. A Georgian rectory, perhaps. I certainly wasn’t expecting an Elizabethan manor house, a jumble of tall, barley sugar chimneys and crow step gables, red brick walls and a battery of mullioned windows, winking at me as the car struggled up the pot-holed drive.
It was love at first sight. I knew even
before I entered Creake Hall that it would be a House of Horrors, domestic, architectural and probably culinary, but I didn’t care. The house spoke to me, even at a distance. It looked neglected, wounded somehow - quite possibly by its present owners. The part of me that had considered textile conservation as a more worthwhile and lucrative career roused itself and scented challenge. But I determined to keep my eyes open, my mouth shut and my itchy, exploratory fingers to myself. I was not on a rescue mission.
I dragged my eyes away from the chaotic roofline silhouetted against the vast Norfolk sky and, as the car came to a halt in front of a massive double oak door, I turned to speak to Alfie, my excitement bubbling over. He sat braced, both hands still gripping the wheel, his chin sunk onto his chest. It occurred to me then that perhaps I was on a rescue mission after all.
His head shot up, he let go of the wheel and turned to me, a bright, artificial smile plastered across his face. He said, ‘Showtime, boys and girls!’ then leaned over, pulled my head towards him and kissed me hard on the mouth. Almost as if he was saying goodbye.
Alfie didn’t knock. It would have taken two hands to lift the iron knocker and he had a suitcase in one hand and a large bunch of flowers in the other. He set the case down, turned an iron ring and leaned against the door. It sidled open, protesting, revealing an enormous entrance hall. A gigantic dark oak table - clearly Jacobean - stood in the centre of the room, piled with unopened Christmas cards, junk mail, a flashlight, secateurs, a ball of twine, old newspapers and a pair of dog leads. In the middle of the table stood a scruffy arrangement of evergreens and berries in a jumble sale vase. Hanging from a laurel branch was one of those jokey wooden signs announcing, I’m in the garden, complete with robin perched on garden fork, for the benefit of those who didn’t read English. In the dust beneath, someone had written Please clean me.
I could hear hysterical barking coming from another room and I looked around, expecting someone to appear. There was an imposing, rather forbidding oak staircase, down which you could have driven a coach and horses. (The state of the threadbare Axminster suggested a previous generation had.) Coats and scarves lay heaped on a carved wooden settle, together with a tartan rug which, to judge from its noisome condition, belonged to the owners of the dog leads. A welcoming light was provided by a standard lamp with an exuberantly fringed and floral shade, but the fireplace - about the size of my bathroom in Brighton - was empty. It began to dawn on me that the hall seemed scarcely any warmer than the winter’s afternoon we’d left outside. I shivered and remembered Alfie’s dire climatic warnings.
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