by David Nobbs
Timothy hasn’t thought of that. He phones John Parkin.
‘He’s with a client,’ says his secretary snootily.
‘It is rather urgent,’ explains Timothy. ‘It’s about the big reunion tomorrow night. There’s been a suicide.’
‘Oh, dear.’ Her tone suggests that she means, ‘How very inconsiderate.’ ‘I’m just accessing his diary. He has a small window at half past four.’
‘Thank you.’
He parks in the almost empty car park of the Mulberry, and enters the cavernous pub, quiet in the afternoon except for four tattooed men playing pool and a Polish couple snogging under the extractor fan.
When Dave Kent enters, they find themselves hugging each other. They take their pints to a far corner.
‘Poor old Tommo,’ says Timothy, ‘and what a dreadful thing for his wife to come home to find.’
He still can’t remember her Christian name.
‘He must have been pretty desperate to expose her to that,’ says Dave.
‘I know. That’s what’s so awful. But why? Why, Dave? And why today of all days? To cast a shadow over the event? Could he be that bitter about something? And about what? Anyway, I don’t see how it can have been premeditated or surely he wouldn’t have invited me to stay?’
‘Well,’ says Dave, ‘I don’t think it can be coincidence that he just happens to do it the day before. Maybe he was dreading it. I mean, the drink issue would have been a problem.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, how would he have explained not drinking at such an event? To say it was because he was driving wouldn’t make sense. It would be so easy to get a taxi. He might have thought that people would discover his secret, and he was so ashamed of it, as we know.’
‘I’m sorry, Dave. I’m not with you.’
Dave Kent stares at him in amazement.
‘Well, you knew he was an alcoholic?’
‘No.’
‘He could never touch another drop in his life. That’s why he always drove on our piss-ups and never drank. That’s why he never drank at work. He thought nobody knew, but of course everybody did. They put two and two together.’
‘Except me.’
‘Yes, except you. You do have a slightly naive streak, Timothy.’
‘Oh, my God. Poor old Tommo. But he was always the life and soul of the party.’
‘Exactly.’
‘You mean…because really he didn’t want to be part of the party?’
‘Sort of, yep. I think he felt a complete and utter failure.’
‘But he was very successful.’
‘Well, to a degree. I mean, you’ve gone away, you wouldn’t know, but they’ve laid a few off. They haven’t kept up with the market. They’re perceived as old-fashioned. There are rumours that they’ll fail. Who knows how bad things are? Who knows what trouble he’s in personally? And Mandy’s an expensive woman.’
Mandy!
‘Another thing about Tommo. He hated biscuits.’
‘What?’
‘Well, he always wanted to be a gynaecologist.’
‘I thought that was half a joke, because he liked women’s bodies.’
‘Don’t we all? But no. I think he really wanted to be a doctor, any kind of doctor. I think he wanted to hear people say, “Good morning, doctor,” and “Ask Tommo what he thinks. He’ll know. He’s a doctor.” Nobody ever said, “Ask Tommo what he thinks. He’ll know. He’s in biscuits.” He was a disappointed man.’
‘But he was always handing out tins of biscuits.’
‘Well, there you are. What was it Shakespeare said?’
‘Me thinks he doth hand out tins of biscuits too much?’
They feel rather ashamed about laughing.
They find that they have finished their pints. There’s just time for one more before visiting John Parkin. They shouldn’t, but they’re shaken, so they do.
While Dave Kent is buying the drinks, Timothy studiously avoids looking at the long legs of the Polish girl, whose skimpy dress is almost up to her crotch as she and her partner continue to be entwined. Today he may see Naomi. Today is not a day for fantasy.
He thinks about Naomi for the first time since the terrible discovery. His stomach sinks into a pit of tension.
‘Cheers, Timothy,’ says Dave, raising his glass rather glumly. ‘My God, just look at those Poles. Have they no respect for the decorum of English pub life? Isn’t darts good enough for them?’
‘How do we actually know they’re Poles?’ asks Timothy.
‘They broke off briefly from kissing to take a drink. I saw their bone structure.’
They discuss Tommo’s death, and whether they should cancel the reunion. They discuss Tommo’s life, and whether they could have done more to help him. But how do you help someone whose whole life is based on a strategy of concealing the fact that he has problems?
Dave tells him that Steven Venables has been sacked from the railways, and has received another substantial pay-off in reward for his failure.
‘To get paid off by three different forms of transport takes some doing,’ he says.
‘He’s a hero of our times,’ says Timothy.
Dave seems to know everything, and Timothy feels that he knows almost nothing. He wants to ask Dave if he knows whether Naomi is coming, but he daren’t.
They drive off to see John Parkin in Timothy’s car. There’s a space in the reserved parking area outside the grand but gloomy Victorian offices, and this stroke of luck enables them to arrive five minutes early.
John Parkin makes them wait eight minutes, even though nobody emerges from his office during that time.
His office smells of dust and dignity. It’s very dark.
‘He does have a small window,’ whispers Timothy behind his hand. There’s something about John Parkin that impels him to be childish. Dave glares at him, because he feels it too, and he wants to giggle. They both want to giggle. It’s not only John Parkin’s humourlessness that brings this out, it’s the tension. They have a terrible tale to tell, and they just mustn’t giggle as they tell it.
They tell him the bad news. He goes white.
‘Poor old Tommo,’ he says. ‘But what a time to do it.’
‘I know. Utterly selfish,’ says Timothy drily, but John Parkin clearly fails to detect his tone. He remembers John Parkin now. Hoity-toity even at school. So lacking in humour that he was the only person called Parkin never to be referred to as Ginger throughout his whole schooldays. Born to be a solicitor. He imagines the midwife coming up to Mrs Parkin’s bedside and saying, ‘It’s a solicitor. Isn’t that wonderful? You’ve got a bonny bouncing little solicitor, Mrs Parkin.’ This is awful. He’s in danger of giggling again. Oh, Tommo. My poor poor Tommo. The giggles are banished by a wave of compassion and sorrow.
‘The thing is,’ says Dave, ‘do we cancel out of respect?’
‘We can’t,’ says John Parkin. ‘One girl has come all the way from New Zealand. Besides which, we’ve paid a hefty deposit to the Balmoral.’
Timothy suspects that the deposit weighs more heavily on John Parkin than the plight of the girl who has come all the way from New Zealand.
They decide that it’s not feasible to cancel. Too many people have travelled too far. Too many people are looking forward to it too much. And, besides, there is the question of the deposit.
They discuss the option of saying nothing to anyone about Tommo, just having one less chair and one less place setting at one of the tables.
‘I’m sorry, but I just don’t think that’s respectful,’ says Timothy. ‘We have to announce it. It’s an inconvenient and awkward thing to do, and it’ll be a very difficult emotional lurch for everyone, especially those who knew him, but I think it’s unavoidable. Somebody will have found out, and by the end of the evening everybody will know.’
‘At what stage do we announce it?’ asks Dave.
‘Either the beginning of the meal or the end,’ says Timothy. ‘No other po
ssibilities.’
‘The beginning, I think,’ says John Parkin. ‘It’ll be too much of a shock at the end.’
‘I agree,’ says Dave. ‘Besides, things’ll be too raucous by the end. Respect will be too difficult to achieve.’
‘Do you really think so?’ John Parkin is shocked. ‘It’s the Grammar School, not some comprehensive.’
‘Well, I hope it will,’ says Dave.
‘And who will make the announcement?’ asks Timothy.
‘I think I should,’ says John Parkin, colouring slightly. ‘I am the main organiser. I am—’
He stops in mid-stream. He realises that whatever he says next will sound like boasting.
‘True,’ says Timothy, ‘but you didn’t really know him. It would be extraordinarily difficult for you to strike the right note. Very difficult for anybody, but I knew him well. I’m prepared to volunteer.’
They can see all too clearly, in John Parkin’s face, his struggle between self-importance and cowardice. Cowardice wins.
‘Thank you, Timothy. Very much appreciated,’ he says.
Timothy drives back to the Mulberry, drops Dave off beside his car, and sets off towards…Peregrine’s.
This is definitely not a day for nicknames.
Peregrine and his parents live in a big Georgian house at the foot of the moors. Huge, rusting gates lead onto a long drive, bordered by massive rhododendrons. The drive emerges onto a gravelled area with a statue of a Greek god in the middle. Half his prick has fallen off. It seems symbolic. In front of the gravelled area is a large lawn, only a small segment of which has been mown.
Timothy feels as if he’s playing a bit part in a low-budget production of Brideshead Revisited. He doesn’t wish to make the thing even more downmarket, so he parks his dirty estate car round the side.
He crunches round to the front of the house, acutely conscious of the inelegance of his scruffy overnight bag.
He climbs the front steps, between two stern lions, one of whom has lost three-quarters of his tail. He pulls the bell, and hears a faint somnolence which sounds half a mile away.
It’s a while before the door is opened, giving Timothy time to note the decrepit state of the window frames.
At last he hears the sound of approaching asthma. A frail, elderly man in blazer and grey flannels opens the door, which squeals its annoyance at being disturbed. An absence of WD40 replaces Sniffy in Timothy’s remembrance of things past.
‘Hello,’ enthuses the old man, who has hanging jowls, deep-set eyes and straggly white hair carefully arranged to hide as much of his baldness as possible. ‘You must be Timothy. I’m Hamish Arkwright. Welcome to Green Acres. Let me take your things.’
‘No, no. I’m fine.’
Timothy clings onto his things…well, his thing. The plural is inaccurate. He doesn’t want Peregrine’s father to defile his upper-class hands by contact with his germ-infested bag.
‘Peregrine is still at work, I’m afraid. Wednesday is their late evening.’
Timothy realises that he has no idea what Peregrine does.
‘I’ll show you to your room, and then we’ll take tea.’
Hamish has a struggle climbing the stairs. It occurs to Timothy that he is falling apart at much the same rate as his house. He follows slowly in the elderly man’s wake.
Timothy’s room is large, cold, damp and shabby. He unpacks listlessly, washes perfunctorily, and goes downstairs reluctantly.
The drawing room is also large, cold, damp and shabby. No hint of July penetrates it. The house has seen better days and so has Lavinia Arkwright. But there is still a certain elegance about her, a lined and slightly haggard beauty. She looks…no, not glamorous, which might have moved Timothy, but as if she must once have been glamorous, which moves him far more.
She is, however, distinctly more sprightly than her husband, as so many elderly women seem to be. She pours the Lapsang Souchong with a steady hand, and cuts the Battenberg cake with mathematical precision.
‘Battenberg is a family tradition,’ she announces.
There’s a large brown stain in one corner of the moulded ceiling of the drawing room which is decorated in a medley of dark and light greens. Two sections of the wallpaper are peeling slightly from the top, and there are significant cracks in the ceiling.
Timothy senses that both Hamish and Lavinia are shrinking as they enter old age, and he feels unnecessarily large and extremely inelegant as he sips his Lapsang Souchong and eats his Battenberg cake daintily with a tiny fork. He’s certain that he will drop at best crumbs, at worst the complete contents of his cup, onto the threadbare Wilton, which looks as though it might fall to bits if cleaned once more.
‘We are so pleased to get a chance to talk to you,’ says Lavinia.
‘You’ve been such a good friend to Peregrine,’ says Hamish.
‘Such a good friend,’ echoes Lavinia.
What??
‘Peregrine is not blessed with a plethora of close friends,’ says Hamish.
‘We blame ourselves sometimes,’ says Lavinia. ‘We should have pushed him. But he so enjoyed his outings with you and your chums.’
Timothy tries not to look too blank. What outings are these?
‘Your trips to Pennine hostelries,’ explains Hamish.
‘He’d come home so excited,’ exclaims Lavinia. ‘He’s not supposed to get excited, it brings on his insomnia, but it was good to see.’
‘We used to stay up late, just to see the smile on his face,’ says Hamish. ‘So…may we say…thank you.’
‘Thank you,’ echoes Lavinia.
Timothy has believed that he has made great strides in overcoming embarrassment in recent years, but he doubts if he has ever felt as embarrassed as this. Shame at the gang’s treatment of Sni—Peregrine, he cannot think of him as Sniffy under this decrepit roof. Guilt at their casual cruelty. Even as he accepts a second cup – ‘It’s delicious’ – and a second slice – ‘I shouldn’t’ – he longs to say, ‘I am unworthy of your hospitality. Please let me leave.’
But maybe tonight, belatedly, he can begin to make amends.
‘Lavinia and I have decided to reveal something to you, Timothy,’ says Hamish.
‘Before Peregrine gets home,’ says Lavinia.
Timothy can hear his Spode cup rattling daintily in its saucer. He is trembling.
‘We have felt…we still feel…a certain guilt over Peregrine. A certain shame,’ says Hamish.
Good Lord. We are united in shame and guilt. What a strange tea.
‘I was in business,’ says Hamish. ‘You are not in business, I understand.’
‘No. I’m in wildlife preservation.’
‘Splendid. How splendid. In business, Timothy, the best of us have our ups and…um…’
‘…downs,’ contributes Lavinia unnecessarily.
‘We were blessed with two sons. Peregrine, whom you know, and Marmaduke, whom I don’t know if you know.’
‘No. I don’t know him.’
‘Though no doubt Peregrine has often spoken of him.’
Never mentioned him.
‘Often.’
‘Marmaduke is the elder by some eight years, and at the time of the need for his education to commence, things were very buoyant in the world of foam.’
‘Foam is the line Hamish is in,’ contributes Lavinia, again unnecessarily. ‘Was in, I should say.’
‘I see.’
‘Very buoyant. We put Marmaduke down for Eton, and we sent him there. He’s no genius, but he’s found a very good position at the Foreign Office.’
‘Almost entirely due to going to Eton,’ adds Lavinia.
‘Almost entirely. By the time Peregrine was to take up his educational cudgels, the world of foam had become very difficult. I made an error or two of judgement…’
‘I think it was three, actually,’ says Lavinia. ‘So easily done.’
Hamish gives her as dirty a look as he can manage without ceasing to be a gentleman.
‘I also made a rather unwise investment. To cut a long story short, I lost a lot of money. I could not afford to send Peregrine to Eton. More tea?’
‘Thank you. It’s delicious.’
Oh, I said that last time. Damn.
‘I think I should make it clear at this point that we had realised that it was unlikely that Peregrine would be the sort to go on to university. We had a choice – let’s be frank – between selling Green Acres, the family home to five generations of Arkwrights, or of abandoning private education for Peregrine, and settling for Coningsfield Grammar, which had a fine reputation and indeed was and is a fine school, as witnessed by its production of alumni such as yourself. We also did persuade ouselves that it might be an advantage for him, a shy boy, to be in the company of girls.’
‘Although, in the event, he seems not to have garnered much from this opportunity.’
‘No. Sadly. Peregrine has never glittered socially. Which is why we value your kindness to him so much.’
‘Have another slice of Battenberg cake.’
It’d stick in my gullet.
‘Thank you. It’s delicious.’
Oh, I said that about the tea. Damn.
How the minutes drag as he waits for Peregrine to arrive home. Timothy is left on his own with a pile of back numbers of Country Life. He seizes them eagerly, hoping they will help him forget about his treatment of Peregrine. He looks at the frontispieces, golden girls, English roses, either with a Labrador or on a horse. None of them can hold a candle to Naomi. Naomi. Naomi. Why didn’t he have the courage to ask John Parkin if she was coming?
Supposing she doesn’t want him any more.
Supposing he doesn’t want her any more.
Supposing she doesn’t come.
He won’t know whether she would have wanted him any more.
He won’t know whether he would have wanted her any more.
He puts the magazines down. They have helped him to escape one torture, only to plunge him into another.
‘Timothy!’
Peregrine’s pleasure sends Timothy back into paroxysms of shame.
