‘Don’t ask,’ he says. ‘The wife’s relations. You’d know all about relations.’
‘Yes, indeed,’ Caroline says.
‘Grandpa Ghoul and Old Mother Dribble,’ Cat says confidingly to Caroline. Having recovered her confidence, she senses a felicitous bond. ‘That’s my mom’s parents,’ she says, and she giggles. ‘They’re real pains, aren’t they, Dad? Hey, Dad? Was that stinky old bergie really Mom’s brother? I mean seriously. Was that Unmentionable James?’
‘ “Was” should be about right, my skattjie,’ Herman says, with a somewhat harsh laugh. ‘Brother James won’t trouble us for long. I’d say that he was heading smartly for the great cardboard city in the sky.’
But Cat has just remembered something.
‘Hey, Dad,’ she says, in agitation. ‘I’ve left my portfolio in there. I need it. Please, Dad, I really need it. I’ve got to have it now.’
‘I’ll go,’ Herman says. ‘But, baby, what were you doing in there, all alone in the dark? Not trespassing, I hope?’
‘I was returning a book,’ Cat says. ‘And that’s the honest truth. It was for my art project. And then I needed to wee. And then I saw this, this – Dad! Don’t look at me like that! I’m telling you the truth.’
‘I’ll go,’ Caroline says quickly. ‘You two stay right here.’
‘You’re a doll,’ Herman says, without thinking, but Cat appears not to mind.
‘Great!’ she says. ‘It’s not very big. It’s A3-size. It’s kind of shiny black plastic with a red handle. I left it by that silver desk.’
‘I know exactly,’ Caroline says and she steps out once more into that magical garden, where the little earthbound stars of light click on wherever she treads. Then, having retrieved the item and returned with it to the house, she places the portfolio on the kitchen table and looks invitingly at the girl.
‘Now then, Catherine,’ she says. ‘May I take a look? You are “Catherine”, I take it?’
‘I’m Kate,’ Cat says.
‘Kate?’ says Herman, planting a kiss on the crown of his daughter’s head. ‘Since when did Cat become Kate, may I ask? And what’s with the short black hair? What happened to my beautiful blonde bombshell?’
Cat prances a bit and giggles.
‘Lettie helped me,’ she says. ‘Isn’t it great? And she bought me these jeans. Do you think I look thin? Say you think I look thin. It’s magic pants. Lettie’s got some too. Only it’s quite hard to hitch them up.’
Herman laughs. He watches with pleasure as his daughter brings up a chair alongside the lovely Caroline. Both are women who are right now tugging at his heart.
‘Takeout pizza?’ he suggests.
He is met with unanimous approval. Cat asks for bananas on hers; a local peculiarity that causes Caroline to blink. They order extra for Zoe, though the girl is still sound asleep.
Cat’s drawings are fabulous. Caroline is dead impressed. The girl has always been able to draw and these are the best she’s ever done. Plus the photocopies and the sections of calligraphy look great.
‘It’s for my art project,’ Cat says to her admirer. ‘It’s all about Dogon mask dances in Mali. It has to be African, you see. This one’s the tree mask and this is the antelope. And this fancy one here with the four figures is the healer. It says all about it in the text that I’ve done. I’m doing it all in handwriting, which is maybe a bit showy-off, do you think?’
‘Kate,’ Caroline says. ‘Shall I tell you something? I’m a headmistress, so I’ve seen a lot of projects in my time and this one is the absolute tops. It’s the best.’ And then she starts doing that ‘entering-into-the-spirit’ thing; that eagerness routine in the face of a project that has always driven Zoe up the wall. ‘I’ll tell you what,’ she says. ‘If I were you, I’d take one or two of these amazing drawings and I’d make them three-dimensional. Scanning them into your dad’s computer could be a good way to start. Have you ever done any 3D art work with folding and crumpling paper? And, do you know what? This project deserves really five-star presentation. Good paper, for a start. You want large sheets of handmade paper that you can bind into a book.’ She gestures something the size of the A3 portfolio. ‘Japanese bookbinding will give you a great look,’ she says. ‘And it’s terribly easy, you know. Have you ever had the chance to try it?’
Cat is staring at her in wonder. She’s thinking that being with Caroline is like having Lettie all to yourself, only combined with that brilliant guy on the TV who shows you how to do your own animation.
‘No,’ she says. ‘But will you show me?’
‘Sure,’ Caroline says. ‘How about we leave it until morning? Let’s put it all away for now and make sure none of it gets damaged. But, gosh, Kate, you could get some brilliant textures in here, and the quality of your drawings is just superb. You could always make a matching box file as a sort of companion piece, you know. That’s to accommodate any 3D construction. Oh, Kate, this is so exciting. Herman, I’m just mad about this girl.’
‘Me too,’ Herman says. He’s uncorking a bottle of sparkling Pinot Grigio that emanates from his brother-in-law’s estate.
That is to say, from the estate of one of his sister’s husbands. Not from that of the brother-in-law, who has, meanwhile, been conveyed to a nearby private hospital where Hattie has proffered her Visa Card at reception. He has been stripped of his stinking, peed-on clothes, tagged, bathed and diagnosed as having suffered no more than a minor fracture to his left forearm. The examining doctor is far more concerned about the mass of ominous lesions on the patient’s hands and face. The man’s breathing is terrible, he notes, and, furthermore, on the out-breath he can hear a whistle which is definitely emanating from the back of James’s chest. This is something the doctor has encountered before and he’s confident he knows the cause. James will have advanced lung cancer. And the cancer will have spread, beyond the lungs, into the flesh and bone of the upper spinal region. The whistle is quite literally coming from a hole in the back of the patient’s chest. This is an informed speculation, which, for the moment, he keeps from the patient’s sister. James, in the mean time, has proffered the DNA swab, which Hattie has requested in response to Jack’s request.
‘No problem,’ she tells him. ‘I’ll say it’s for me.’ To the doctor, by way of explanation, she says, ‘I haven’t seen my brother in nearly twenty years and, frankly, I’d like to be sure.’
The doctor is understanding and elicits James’s consent. She then reports back her success to Jack, who arranges for his own test.
Josh and Jack have been sitting for an hour, side by side in a corridor on matching plastic chairs, during which time the former has been striving to fill in some gaps.
But Jack is economical when it comes to autobiography.
‘Senegal,’ he says. ‘Via Mozambique and Dar es Salaam.’ Then, reluctantly, he adds, ‘Look. I couldn’t write. It would have blown my cover.’
‘Cover?’ Josh says, trying not to think of how Bernie and Ida died not knowing what had become of him.
Jack sighs as a prelude to having to state a thing so obvious.
‘I was travelling on a false passport,’ he says. ‘It was the passport of a dead French national. Jacques Moreau.’
‘Giacomo Moroni?’ Josh says. ‘So where does Milan fit in?’
Jack has little taste for personal disclosure. He feels no need to give account of his felicitous meeting with a kindly Italian art dealer and his two small sons, on a white beach made all of shells, beside a pink lake that, at sunset, turns to purple.
‘Dario Fo,’ he says. ‘And, no, I never heard from Gertrude. Well, you were about to ask me, weren’t you?’
Once Hattie returns from James’s bedside, she telephones Herman to say that she may well be at the hospital all night, causing Jack, on cue, to rise from his chair.
‘I ought to be getting back,’ he says. ‘Can I –?’
‘You go,’ Hattie says. ‘Really. Josh and I will arrange a cab.’
&nb
sp; On his way out Jack takes a brief look at James Alexander Marchmont-Thomas, who, sluiced and shaven, in laundered clothes, helped on his way by painkilling drugs, is deeply asleep between stiff clean sheets, having previously partaken of a little toast and tea.
A nurse comments, in a whisper, that the patient has clearly been managing quite impossible levels of pain.
‘Probably for years, poor soul,’ she says.
‘Marijuana,’ Jack says. ‘Lots of it, and often.’ He smiles his sweetest smile at her before making his way towards the lifts.
Marijuana would be the reason why his unlovely and addle-brained parent had come staggering into his private space for a way-back wad of stolen money he’d once secreted in the wall. Jack experiences a surge of pleasure as he reflects upon how far he has moved from either one of his dead-end parents. He sees that the pistachio-green Vespa is waiting for him in the moonlight. Way up; way out. Jack feels that his life is on the move.
Once Jack has gone, Hattie and Josh arrange for a cab.
‘Where to?’ says the driver. Neither is particularly keen to head back to Marchmont House.
‘South Beach,’ Josh says, aware that he still has rights to his hotel room for what remains of this one night. ‘Just off Gillespie Street,’ he says.
And then, next morning, as they’re about to enter the kitchen, what Hattie sees from just beyond the doorway is Caroline and Cat, who are sitting side by side at the far end of that long kitchen table with the brass measure running down one side. They are wrapped, after an early-morning swim, in two identical kangas got from the swimming-pool changing room, each fixed, halter-style, at the nape of the wearer’s neck. Before them, on the table, is the spread of Cat’s beautiful drawings, alongside which are scissors and paper clippings from Caroline’s demonstrations of three-dimensional effects. She has achieved these via damping, crumpling and folding, and Herman, who has been busy at the worktop, has approached to watch them at it.
‘Christ, babe,’ Hattie hears him say. ‘Where did you learn to do that?’
‘Paper engineering,’ Caroline says. ‘I learnt it from a book. There’s this guy at the art school in Tel Aviv. Paper artist. He runs origami workshops for Israeli and Palestinian children. His graduates make these amazing paper clothes for their degree shows. Ball gowns to die for. Beautiful puckered shirts.’
Herman has yet to appreciate that Caroline can teach herself anything from a book: upholstery and binomial equations; organic-vegetable growing; the Farsi language and pattern cutting; the preparation of gravadlax and the making of Roman blinds; drystone walling and how to espalier trees; advanced computer technology and how to make a boat; Japanese bookbinding and a range of electrical repairs.
‘Hi there,’ Hattie says, stepping into the room. ‘Gosh. I’m sorry we took so long. And I’m truly sorry about last night. All the yelling and carry-on. Say, Cat! Lovely drawings.’
But her daughter makes haste to scuffle her pages together before pointedly turning them upside down.
‘Coffee,’ Herman says. ‘So what’s the story with James?’
‘Well,’ Hattie says, ‘for a start, as you may have gathered, we’re pretty certain that your drama-department tenant is no other than my brother’s son – my parents’ first male grandchild. Do you suppose the shock might finish them off?’
Everyone at the table is staring at her, and none more so than Cat.
‘Giacomo Moroni is Jack Maseko,’ she says. ‘Got by James upon the housemaid. James has a minor fracture, by the way, but in general his health is pretty dire. They’re planning a lot of tests.’
‘Giacomo Moroni is –?’ Herman begins.
‘Jack Maseko,’ Hattie says. ‘My nephew. Cat’s first cousin.’
Cat leaps up in fury, pushing drawings and paper work before her. She’s glaring daggers at her mother, as red blotches spring up all over her throat.
‘Shut UP, you stupid thicko!’ she screams. ‘Why don’t you just SHUT UP! You mean bitch, I HATE YOU!! It’s all LIES and RUBBISH!’ Then she bursts into a flood of tears.
The heirloom china jingles in the dresser as she storms out of the room. They hear her footsteps resounding on the stairs. Then the slamming of her bedroom door.
Once inside, she flings herself on the bed, overcome by howls and snot. Her horrible mother is making a fool of her. It’s what she best likes to do. Her lovely, secret liaison with the beautiful dark boy. His classy black clothes. Just like hers. His black etchings; his Giacometti poster; the dream boy for whom she’s dyed her hair and her eyelashes. First all the awfulness of last night and now this. Her mother has sussed her secret. It’s what she always does. She’s like a horrible creepy spy. And it’s all a lot of rubbish. There’s no way that the beautiful boy could be that revolting James’s son. It’s all a lie. It’s that stupid cow and the stupid midget. And everything this morning was just so fab until they had to come back. Cat wishes that both of them would stay away for ever. She wishes that both of them were dead.
In the kitchen, Herman, biting down irritation, makes ready to go after his daughter. And just what, exactly, is the matter with Hattie that she should behave like this? Ten seconds in contact with Cat and there’s another bloody screw-up. And as for that pansified, two-foot Commie – Herman remembers him from their student days. Josh Silver. What the hell is he doing here? Hasn’t he been gone for decades?
‘Christ, Snoeks!’ he says, through gritted teeth. Then he says, ‘Excuse me,’ and he’s gone.
‘I’m afraid I’ve invaded your house,’ Caroline says. She is carefully returning Cat’s art work to the portfolio. ‘I ought to be . . .’ She sweeps up the scraps of paper clippings with her hands. ‘I’m Caroline,’ she says. ‘I’m Josh’s wife.’
‘Please,’ Hattie says. ‘No need to –’
‘Your daughter is very talented,’ Caroline says. ‘This project of hers –’
‘Yes,’ Hattie says. She sits down and rests her chin in her cupped hands. ‘Forgive me for last night,’ she says. She pauses and sighs. ‘Herman may have explained about my brother. He was always very handsome, you know. Always twice my size. Golden-spoon James who’d seemed so bright and yet he was always in trouble; always on the wrong side of everything. Useless and disruptive when he was at school. Drugs, cheating, stolen cars.’
‘Stolen guitars,’ Josh throws in.
‘Something came to me only last night,’ Hattie says. ‘In the hospital, sitting beside his bed. God knows why, as a family, we were always so obtuse – or was it just a sign of the times? If poor old James had been thirty years younger he would have been diagnosed dyslexic. He’s severely dyslexic, isn’t he? ADHD and dyslexic. It’s all so glaringly obvious. These days a child like that would be labelled “special needs”. He would have got help. I mean, aren’t half the people in prison actually dyslexic?’
‘Sixty-two per cent,’ Caroline says, who always knows these things. ‘That’s according to recent research.’
‘Gertrude as well, come to think of it,’ Josh says. ‘She could never get her head around the likes of Ladybird Book 1A; not for all my mother’s efforts. It was just that life expected nothing of her. That’s one advantage of low status.’
‘And then there’s Giacomo,’ Hattie says. ‘Life can be really amazing.’ She reaches for the coffee pot that Herman has placed on the table, along with a clutch of little white mugs. For a moment they all fall silent.
Then Josh looks cautiously at his wife.
‘Caroline,’ he says, almost as if in fear. ‘Please tell me about Zoe. Like where is she? Is she still in France?’
‘I’m here,’ Zoe says and the three of them look up to see that the child is standing in the doorway. Minus the Moschino jacket and jeans, she stands bare-legged, a slip of a thing, in ballet shoes and voluminous T-shirt; the T-shirt given to her by Gérard that says ‘Zizou’ across the front.
What Hattie sees is a sweet, dainty child with short chestnut curls and a small scatter of cinnamon f
reckles across the bridge of her nose. She notes the turn of the girl’s head, the line of her shoulders, the set of her back and her legs. She observes the poise of her out-turned palms and the insteps of her little size 4 feet.
‘Dad,’ she says, ‘I’m here.’ She crosses to place herself on Josh’s knee. ‘Where were you?’ she says. ‘And where are we? I fell asleep. You should come upstairs with me. Please, Dad. You’ve got to come upstairs. There’s this sort of magic place, with pointy windows all round. It’s got like ballet things and there’s this tutu. It’s all black and silver. It’s like being inside a dream. I dreamed I saw you in the garden last night and now you’re here. Dad, can I please, please do ballet. Please say yes. Pleeez. I know we’ve never had the money for lessons, but now that Gran’s died . . .’ She pauses. ‘I know that sounds terrible,’ she says. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Your gran’s died?’ Josh says.
‘Yes,’ Zoe says. ‘I’m sorry. It’s sort of why we’re here, I think. So we could tell you. Anyway, about doing ballet, Mum said not to say anything – and I know I’m most probably too old –’
‘Oh my darling,’ Hattie bursts out impulsively, before Josh can begin to speak. ‘You are most definitely not too old, not you. I can promise you that.’
Zoe turns and looks at her. She stares at a person who looks just like the Coppélia doll in one of the many ballet books Zoe’s taken out of the library. For a moment she’s caught up in the magic of it, but then everything that’s happened in the last few days comes surging to the surface and her eyes are filled with tears. She’s turned away from the Coppélia lady and she’s staring accusingly at Caroline.
‘She says I am,’ Zoe says, jutting her head towards her mother, and then she hears herself open the floodgates; hears herself spill out grievance, just as if she were somehow hovering above her own head and watching, as if some other force is switching on her voice. ‘And she deliberately stopped Gérard and me – just because we were dancing. And she’s most probably ruined Gérard’s life. Because what if he’s not allowed to come and stay? Like next year when it’s his turn to come to us?’ Then she’s turned her face to Josh. ‘You’ve got to phone him for me, Dad,’ she says. ‘Please, Dad. You’ve got to. You have to phone his mother’s house, because I don’t even know the code from here and anyway, she’d only scream at me. “Merde, merde!” like she always does. And there’s that horrible Véronique as well, who always treats me like dirt. I mean, I don’t even know for sure if he’s still there, after what she’s gone and done. I mean, what if he’s been taken into care? Then I’ll never know where he is, will I?’ And then she’s crying into Josh’s shoulder.
Sex and Stravinsky Page 28
