‘I think, watch your back, bro. She could be a fruit cake.’ He stands up and heads to the kitchen, rubbing his stomach. ‘Actually, that’s not a bad idea. Fruit cake.’
Deflated, Justin looks hopefully at his daughter. ‘Did she sound like a fruit cake?’
‘I dunno,’ Bea shrugs. ‘What does a fruit cake sound like?’
Justin, Al and Bea all turn to stare at Doris.
‘What?’ she squeals.
‘No,’ Bea shakes her head wildly at her father. ‘Nothing like that, at all.’
‘What’s this for, Gracie?’
‘It’s a sick bag.’
‘What does this do?’
‘It’s for hanging your coat up.’
‘Why is that there?’
‘It’s a table.’
‘How do you get it down?’
‘By unlatching it, at the top.’
‘Sir, please leave your table-top up until after take-off.’
Silence.
‘What are they doing outside?’
‘Loading the bags.’
‘What’s that yoke?’
‘An ejector seat for people who ask three million questions.’
‘What’s it, really?’
‘For reclining your chair.’
‘Sir, could you stay upright until after take-off, please?’
Silence.
‘What does that do?’
‘Air conditioning.’
‘What about that?’
‘A light.’
‘And that one?’
‘Yes, sir, can I help you?’
‘Eh, no, thanks.’
‘You pressed the button for assistance.’
‘Oh, is that what that little woman on the button is for? I didn’t know. Can I have a drink of water?’
‘We can’t serve drinks until after take-off, sir.’
‘Oh, OK. That was a fine display you did earlier. You were the image of my friend Edna when you had that oxygen mask on. She used to smoke sixty a day, you see.’
The air stewardess makes an oh shape with her mouth.
‘I feel very safe now, but what if we go down over land?’ He raises his voice and the passengers around us look our way. ‘Surely the life jackets are hopeless, unless we blow our whistles while we’re flying through the air and hope someone below hears us and catches us. Do we not have parachutes?’
‘There’s no need to worry, sir, we won’t go down over land.’
‘OK. That’s very reassuring, indeed. But if we do, tell the pilot to aim for a hay stack or something.’
I take deep breaths and pretend that I don’t know him. I continue reading my book, The Golden Age of Dutch Painting: Vermeer, Metsu and Terborch, and convince myself this was not the bad idea it’s turning out to be.
‘Where are the toilets?’
‘To the top and on the left but you can’t go until after takeoff.’
Dad’s eyes widen. ‘And when will that be?’
‘In just a few minutes.’
‘In just a few minutes, that,’ he takes the sick bag out from the seat pocket, ‘won’t be used for what it’s supposed to be used for.’
‘We will be in the air in just a few minutes more, I assure you.’ The stewardess quickly leaves before he asks another question.
I sigh.
‘Don’t you be sighing until after take-off,’ Dad says, and the man next to me laughs and pretends to turn it into a cough.
Dad looks out the window and I revel in the moment of silence.
‘Oh oh oh,’ he sings, ‘we’re moving now, Gracie.’
As soon as we’re off the ground, the wheels moan as they’re brought back up and then we are light in the air. Dad is suddenly quiet. He is turned sideways in his chair, head filling the window, watching as we reach the beginning of the clouds, mere wisps at first. The plane bumps around as it pushes through the clouds. Dad is agog as we’re surrounded by white on all sides of the plane, his head darts around looking at every window possible, and then suddenly it is blue and calm above the fluffy world of clouds. Dad blesses himself. He pushes his nose up against the window, his face lit by the nearby sun, and I take a mental photograph for my own hall of memories.
The seatbelt fasten sign goes off with a bing and cabin crew announce that we may now use electronic devices, the facilities, and that food and refreshments will be served shortly. Dad takes down the table-top, reaches into his pocket and takes out his photograph of Mum. He places her down on the table, facing out the window. He reclines his chair and they both watch the endless sea of white clouds disappear further below us and don’t say a word for the remainder of the flight.
CHAPTER TWENTY
‘Well, I must say, that was absolutely marvellous. Marvellous indeed.’ Dad pumps the pilot’s hand up and down enthusiastically.
We are standing by the just-opened door of the plane, with a queue of hundreds of irritated passengers huffing and puffing down our necks. They are like greyhounds whose trap has opened, the bunny has been fired off ahead of them and all that blocks their path is, well, Dad. The usual rock in the stream.
‘And the food,’ Dad continues to the cabin crew, ‘it was excellent, just excellent.’
He’s eaten a ham roll and a cup of tea.
‘I can’t believe I was eating in the sky,’ he laughs. ‘Well done again, just marvellous. Nothing short of miraculous, I’d say. My Lord.’ He pumps the pilot’s hand again, as though he’s meeting JFK.
‘OK, Dad, we should move on now. We’re holding everybody up.’
‘Oh, is that so? Thanks again, folks.’ Bye now. Might see you on the way back,’ he shouts over his shoulder, as I pull him away.
We make our way through the tunnel adjoining the plane to the terminal and Dad says hello and tips his hat to everyone we pass.
‘You really don’t have to say hello to everybody, you know.’
‘It’s nice to be important, Gracie, but it’s more important to be nice. Particularly when in another country,’ says the man who hasn’t left the province of Leinster for ten years.
‘Will you stop shouting?’
‘I can’t help it. My ears feel funny.’
‘Either yawn or hold your nose and blow. It will help your ears to pop.’
He stands by the conveyor belt, purple-faced, with his cheeks puffed out and his fingers over his nose. He takes a deep breath and pushes. He lets out a fart.
The conveyor belt jerks into motion and like flies around a carcass, people suddenly swoop in front of us to block our view, as though their life depends on grabbing their bags this very second.
‘There’s your bag.’ I step forward.
‘I’ll get it, love.’
‘No, I will. You’ll hurt your back.’
‘Step back, love, I can do it.’ He passes over the yellow line and grabs his bag, only to realise that the strength he once had is gone and he finds himself walking alongside it, while tugging away. Ordinarily I would rush to help him but I’m doubled over laughing. All I can hear is Dad saying, ‘Excuse me, excuse me,’ to people who are standing over the yellow line, as he tries to keep up with his moving luggage. He does a full lap of the conveyor belt and by the time he gets back to where I stand (though I’m still doubled over) somebody has the common sense to help the out-of-breath grumbling old man.
He pulls his bag over to me, his face scarlet, his breathing heavy.
‘I’ll let you get your own bag,’ he says, pulling his cap further down over his eyes with embarrassment.
I wait for our bags while Dad wanders around baggage claim ‘acquainting himself with London’. After the incident at Dublin airport, the satellite navigational voice in my head has continuously nagged at me to make a U-turn right now but somewhere inside, another part of me is under strict orders to soldier on, feeling convinced this trip is the right thing to do. Now I’m wondering what exactly this is. As I collect my bag from the belt, I am aware that there is not a clear purpose for this
trip at all. A wild-goose chase is all it is. Instinct alone, caused by a confusing conversation with a girl named Bea, has caused me to fly to another country with my seventy-five-year-old father, who has never left Ireland in his life. Suddenly what seemed like the ‘only thing to do’ at the time, has now occurred to me as being completely irrational behaviour.
What does it mean to dream about somebody you’ve never met, almost every night, and then have a chance encounter with them over the phone? I had called my dad’s emergency number; she had answered her dad’s emergency phone number. What message is in that? What am I supposed to learn? Is it a mere coincidence that an ordinary right-thinking person would ignore or am I right to think and feel that something more lies beneath this? My hope is that this trip will have some answers for me. Panic begins to build as I watch Dad reading a poster on the far side of the room. I have no idea what to do with him.
Suddenly Dad’s hand flies to his head and then his chest and he darts towards me with a manic look in his eyes. I make a grab for his pills.
‘Gracie,’ he gasps.
‘Here, quickly, take these.’ My hand trembles as I hold out the pills and bottle of water.
‘What on earth are you doing?’
‘Well, you looked …’
‘I looked what?’
‘Like you were going to have a heart attack!’
‘That’s because I bloody well will, if we don’t get out of here quick.’ He grabs my arm and starts to pull me along.
‘What’s wrong? Where are we going?’
‘We’re going to Westminster.’
‘What? Why? No! Dad, we have to go to the hotel to leave our bags.’
He stops walking and whips around, pushes his face close to mine, almost aggressively. His voice shakes with the adrenalin. ‘The Antiques Roadshow are having a valuation day today from nine thirty to four thirty in the afternoon in a place called Banqueting House. If we leave now we can start queuing. I’m not going to miss seeing it on the telly and then come all the way to London just to miss seeing it in the flesh. Sure we might even get to see Michael Aspel. Michael Aspel, Gracie. Christ Almighty, let’s get out of here.’
His pupils are dilated, he’s all fired up. He shoots off through the sliding doors, with nothing to declare but tempor ary insanity, and takes a confident left.
I stand in the arrivals hall, while men in suits approach me with placards from all sides. I sigh and wait. Dad appears from the direction he went in, seesawing and pulling his bag behind him at top speed.
‘You could have told me that was the wrong way,’ he says, passing me and heading in the opposite direction.
Dad rushes through Trafalgar Square, pulling his suitcase behind him and scattering a flock of pigeons into the sky. He’s not interested in acquainting himself with London any more; he has only Michael Aspel and the treasures of the blue-rinse brigade in sight. Finally, after we’ve taken a few wrong turns since surfacing from the tube station, Banqueting House is eventually in view, a seventeenth-century former royal palace, and though I am sure I have never visited it before, it stands before me, a familiar sight.
Once deep in the queue, I study the single drawer that is in the hands of the old man in front of us. Behind us, a woman is rolling out a tea cup from a pile of newspapers to show somebody else in the queue. All around me there is excited and rather innocent and polite chatter, and the sun is shining as we wait outside to enter the reception area of Banqueting House. There are TV vans, camera and sound people going in and out of the building, and cameras filming the long queue while a woman with a microphone picks people out of the crowd to interview. Many people in the queue have brought deck chairs, picnic baskets of scones and finger sandwiches, and canteens of tea and coffee, and as Dad looks around with a grumbling stomach I feel like a guilty mother who hasn’t properly equipped her child. I’m also concerned for Dad that we won’t make it past the front door.
‘Dad, I don’t want to worry you but I really think that we’re supposed to have something with us.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Like an object. Everybody else has things with them to be valued.’
Dad looks around and notices for the first time. His face falls.
‘Maybe they’ll make an exception for us,’ I add quickly but I doubt it.
‘What about these cases?’ He looks down at our bags.
I try not to laugh. ‘I got them in TK Maxx; I don’t think they’ll be interested in valuing them.’
Dad laughs. ‘Maybe I’ll give them my undies, Gracie, what you think? There’s a fine bit of history in them.’
I make a face and he waves his hand dismissively.
We shuffle along slowly in the queue and Dad has a great time chatting to everybody about his life and his exciting trip with his daughter. After queuing for an hour and a half, we have been invited to two houses for afternoon tea and Dad has taken note from the gentleman behind us on how to stop the mint in his garden from taking over his rosemary. Up ahead, just beyond the doors, I see an elderly couple being turned away due to having no items with them. Dad sees this too and looks at me, his eyes worried. It will be us next.
‘Eh …’ I look around quickly for something.
Both entrance doors have been held open for the flowing crowd. Just inside the main entrance, behind the opened door is a wooden waste basket posing as an umbrella stand, holding a few forgotten and broken umbrellas. While no one is looking I turn it upside down, emptying the few scrunched balls of paper and broken umbrellas out. I kick them behind the door just in time to hear, ‘Next.’
I carry it up to the reception desk and Dad’s eyes almost pop out of his head at the sight of me.
‘Welcome to Banqueting House,’ the young woman greets us.
‘Thank you,’ I smile innocently.
‘How many objects have you brought today?’ she asks.
‘Oh, just the one.’ I raise the bin onto the table.
‘Oh, wow, fantastic.’ She runs her fingers along it and Dad gives me a look, that if for any second I had forgotten which of us was the parent, I am quickly reminded. ‘Have you been to a valuation day before?’
‘No.’ Dad shakes his head wildly. ‘But I see it on the telly all the time. Big fan, I am. Even when Hugh Scully was host.’
‘Wonderful,’ she smiles. ‘Once you enter the hall you’ll see there are many queues. Please join the queue for the appropriate discipline.’
‘What queue should we join for this thing?’ Dad looks at the item as though there’s a bad smell.
‘Well, what is it?’ she smiles.
Dad looks at me baffled.
‘We were hoping you’d tell us that,’ I say politely.
‘I’d suggest miscellaneous, and though that is the busiest table, we try to move it along as quickly as possible for you by having four experts. Once you reach the expert’s table, simply show your item and he or she will tell you all about it.’
‘Which table do we go to for Michael Aspel?’
‘Unfortunately Michael Aspel isn’t actually an expert, he is the host, so he doesn’t have a table of his own, but we do have twenty other experts that will be available to answer your questions.’
Dad looks devastated.
‘There is the chance that your item may be chosen for television,’ she adds quickly, sensing Dad’s disappointment. ‘The expert shows the object to the television team and a decision is made whether to record it, depending on rarity, quality, what the expert can say about the object and, of course, value. If your object is chosen, you’ll be taken to our waiting room and made up before talking to the expert about your object in front of the camera for about five minutes. You would meet Michael Aspel under those circumstances. And the exciting news is that for the first time, we are broadcasting the show live, in, ooh let’s see,’ she examines her watch, ‘in one hour.’
Dad’s eyes widen. ‘But five minutes? To talk about that thing?’ Dad explodes and she laughs.
‘Do bear in mind that we have to see two thousand people’s items before the show,’ she says to me with a knowing look.
‘We understand. We’re just here to enjoy the day, isn’t that right, Dad?’
He doesn’t hear; he’s busy looking around for Michael Aspel.
‘Do enjoy your day,’ the woman says finally, calling the next person in line forward.
As soon as we enter the busy hall, I immediately look up at the ceiling of the double-cubed room, already knowing what to expect: nine huge canvases commissioned by Charles I, to fill the panelled ceiling.
‘Here you go, Dad.’ I hand him the waste basket. ‘I’m going to take a look around this beautiful building while you look at the junk people are putting inside it.’
‘It’s not junk, Gracie. I once saw the show where a man’s collection of walking sticks went for sixty thousand sterling pounds.’
‘Wow, in that case you should show them your shoe.’
He tries not to laugh.
‘Off you go to have a look around and I’ll meet you back here.’ He starts to wander away before he even finishes the sentence. Dying to get rid of me.
‘Have fun,’ I wink.
He smiles broadly and looks around the hall with such happiness, my mind takes another photograph.
As I wander the rooms of the only part of Whitehall Palace to survive a fire, the feeling that I’ve been here before comes over me in a giant wave and I find a quiet corner and secretly produce my mobile.
‘Manager, deputy head corporate treasury and investor solutions desk, Frankie speaking.’
‘My God, you weren’t lying. That’s a ridiculous amount of words.’
‘Joyce! Hi!’ Her voice is hushed and behind her, the stock-trading in the Irish Financial Services Centre offices, sounds manic.
‘Can you talk?’
‘For a little bit, yeah. How are you?’
‘I’m fine. I’m in London. With Dad.’
‘What? With your dad? Joyce, I’ve told you before it’s not polite to bind and gag your father. What are you doing there?’
‘I just decided to come over last minute.’ For what, I have no idea. ‘We’re currently at the Antiques Roadshow. Don’t ask.’
Cecelia Ahern 2-book Bundle Page 40
