by Daisy Waugh
‘Well I was going to have a bath…’
‘You can have a bath later. Come round. I’ll get dinner in. We can do an application. And I’ll send my own letter in with it, Alice. They’ll remember me. Lady Tode and me used to get along well, in a manner of speaking. We did. She’ll be happy to hear from me.’
‘Can I think about it, Gran?’
‘No you can’t. And before you say again that you’re not qualified, I’ll tell you this, Alice – you’ve been running your own extremely successful business these past however many years…’
Alice didn’t correct her.
‘… Whilst also looking after your old granny and those three naughty boys. Keeping everything shipshape. If that doesn’t qualify you for being boss of the most beautiful house in the country, nothing does. And it’s not like you had the easiest of starts in life either. So. You’ve got a lot to be proud of Alice Liddell. And I’ll tell her – I’ll tell Lady Tode, because it’s true – that you already know your way round the Hall upside down and backwards. Plus you know all about the history, don’t you Alice? I’ve talked enough about it all these years.’
‘I do,’ Alice agreed. She had many happy memories of the place. In fact, all the happiest memories of her childhood were at Tode Hall, far away from her mother and the mayhem at home. She and (Mad) Ecgbert were the same age exactly – to the day – and for years they’d used to be inseparable: More than that (this was something she would never tell her grandmother) on their fourteenth birthday, they had shared a stolen spliff and kissed each other, up by Africa Folly. It was the last time she stayed at Tode Hall, and the last time she and Ecgbert ever laid eyes on each other. Not that it mattered. But it was funny. The memory made Alice smile.
‘So buck up and get your bum round here, Alice my love. I’ll be expecting you in ten minutes.’
‘But Granny—’
‘What’s that?’
‘I can’t just move to Tode Hall. Even if they wanted me to and I don’t know why they would! I’m not leaving you. I wouldn’t want to. Not in a million years.’
‘I never thought you would, Alice my love,’ she said.
‘Well then—’
‘But I can’t last much longer, can I? We both know that.’
‘Yes you can!’
‘I bloody hope not, Alice. I’m ninety-six and ready to go. With luck I’ll be dead by winter. And if I can die back at Tode Hall, believe me, I’d be the happiest corpse in Yorkshire. So. Don’t you go worrying about that, my love. If you get the job, which you will, I’ll be coming along with you.’
CHAPTER 10
Some time needed to pass before any of these plans could become reality.
For Alice there was a question of remembering to post her reply to the job advertisement, which she and her grandmother had spent several evenings putting together. A week after she claimed to have done so, Violet spotted the envelope, along with her own handwritten letter to Lady Tode, folded away at the bottom of Alice’s handbag. Alice would have claimed the oversight was unintended: a simple failure to remember to buy the correct stamp. But Violet knew better. She said nothing about it. She just took the envelopes back from Alice’s bag and posted them herself.
Egbert and India Tode were much more efficient. It took them only two months to pack up, find tenants for the house, find a nursery school for the children, say goodbye to their friends and move their lives to Yorkshire.
On their last day in London, with the children farmed out to India’s parents in Pimlico, the young couple gazed out of their bedroom window, onto the convoy of tightly packed removal trucks below. It was astonishing, as Egbert observed, how they’d managed to accumulate quite so much stuff in quite such a short married life together. Especially considering they must have dumped at the least two trucks’ worth of junk at the local charity shop during the pack-up.
‘How did we fit it all into this little house?’ he exclaimed.
India grinned. ‘Amazing isn’t it?’ she said.
‘Actually, you’re amazing,’ Egbert said. ‘That’s what’s amazing.’ He kissed her.
‘We packed the bikes, Egg, didn’t we?’ she said.
‘You bet!’
Then he turned around, rummaged under his jacket, which was lying folded on the floor, and produced with one hand – ‘Te-dar!’ – proudly and a little shyly, a bottle of India’s favourite champagne, and with the other hand – ‘Te-dar!’ – two of their finest wedding present champagne glasses. ‘I think we should drink,’ he said, popping the cork, ‘to a new chapter.’
‘To our smart new status!’ India said. They clinked glasses. (Lady Tode would have thought it was common.) ‘Isn’t it hilarious?’ she said.
Egbert didn’t quite agree with that. He thought it was pretty serious. He said, ‘To all the amazing challenges ahead!’
India said, ‘And to us. Being so posh.’
‘To us,’ he said.
‘Being so posh,’ she said again.
He smiled. ‘If you insist. To us being so posh.’
And that was the end of their life in Wandsworth.
CHAPTER 11
Another month passed before Alice was at last able to make it to Tode Hall for her interview. It had been difficult to finalise the date, because Lady Tode was always busy. She had also already arranged to spend November and December in Capri. In the end it proved impossible for her to squeeze in a meeting before leaving for Italy, so, sometime in early-mid November, knowing they would only be meeting Egbert and India, Alice and her grandmother headed North. Violet was bitterly disappointed she wouldn’t be seeing her old employer again. Lady Tode indicated that she was bitterly disappointed, too, although not enough to alter the date of her departure.
It was almost forty years since either Alice or Violet had been back to Tode Hall and as they pulled in to Todeister station that morning, both, in their own ways, were struggling to manage their emotions. Violet would not stop talking. Alice, on the other hand, preferred not to speak at all. She was regretting very much indeed having been cajoled into coming back here. She realised – too late – that it was likely to awaken memories she’d spent most of her adult life learning to avoid. Returning to Tode Hall, Alice realised – too late – reminded her of the death of her mother; not because she had ever been here with her mother (on the contrary, she’d always been sent here to escape her) but because her mother and Tode Hall had both been expunged from her young life at the same time. They were inextricably linked. Alice kept this uncomfortable realisation to herself, just as she kept most things, and focused her mind on getting her grandmother’s wheelchair off the train.
* * *
Mr Carfizzi, smiling warmly, was waiting on the platform to greet them. A short man, chubby and swarthy, he gleamed, among the Todeister anoraks, with continental elegance and self-care. He smelled good too. Violet and Alice caught a whiff of him even as they stepped down from the train.
‘Meessis Violet Dean!’ he cried, with his Italian accent. ‘After so many years! You don’t look a day younger!’
Violet, who was adamant she remembered every small detail of her old life at Tode Hall, claimed not to remember Mr Carfizzi, and was quite rude (Alice thought) in her insistence that they’d never met. Nevertheless, he seemed to remember her. It was thanks to Violet Dean, he told her, as he wrapped two stout arms and a fog of cologne around her frail, wheelchaired body, that he had accepted the job at Tode Hall, so many years ago. He reminded her (she remained unconvinced) that he had joined the staff as butler/caretaker just a few months before Violet herself had left. He said he would never forget how welcome she’d made him feel, how much trouble she had taken to show him the ropes.
‘Is that so?’ she said stiffly.
Violet Dean didn’t like men who wore aftershave. She didn’t like men who hugged her. And she didn’t like men who wore yellow sweaters.
‘Yes that is so!’ he laughed. The haughtiness of the English never ceased to tickle him. ‘Y
ou were very kind to me,’ he said. ‘Whether you don’t like to remember or not.’
It was a blustery afternoon. He had offered to help with the wheelchair, but she insisted on Alice pushing it so, with what Violet considered to be a flashy Johnnie-foreigner shrug, Mr Carfizzi led the way to Lady Tode’s Range Rover. He’d chosen it over his own little Fiat, the better to fit in Violet’s chair. He’d brought a blanket for the journey, too, in case she got cold; and a Thermos of tea with sugar.
‘How am I going to drink that?’ she said. ‘It’ll spill all over the seat.’
Mr Carfizzi laughed.
‘But I suppose I should thank you,’ Violet added.
‘Prego, Mrs Dean,’ he said, smelling of cologne, and carefully, ignoring her protestations, he arranged the blanket over her knees.
Climbing into the back seat behind them both, Alice thanked him loudly. She was embarrassed by her grandmother’s rudeness, not that Mr Carfizzi seemed to care. He gave another of his flashy shrugs, and started the engine.
‘Everyone ready?’ he said. ‘Are you comfortable, Mrs Dean?’
Violet, having talked incessantly from the moment their train pulled out of King’s Cross to the moment she smelled Mr Carfizzi’s aftershave, had welded her mouth into a thin, mean line and would not reply.
‘Are you comfortable?’ he asked again, laughing merrily.
She nodded, waved her skinny hand beneath her nose and opened the window.
‘I used to come up here a lot,’ Alice said, still trying to cover for her. ‘Every holiday. I used to love it so much. I don’t think we ever met?’
But his attention was focused on Violet.
‘Mrs Dean,’ he said, ‘your daughter had just passed at that time, and you were in no state for new friends. But I am telling you, Mrs Dean, I have always remembered how kind you were to me. I will never forget it…’
‘Very nice of you to say,’ said Violet. ‘Maybe I do remember you a little bit…’
‘Ah ha ha, you see?’ Mr Carfizzi grinned at her, waggled his finger playfully.
The car fell silent. Alice and Violet gazed out at the passing suburbs of Todeister: the new roads and new roundabouts, new little Lego-style houses… Nothing was quite as either remembered it.
‘Everything changes outside the Hall,’ Mr Carfizzi said, reading their thoughts. ‘But you will see – nothing changes inside! Or not so much. You will be happy, Mrs Dean, when you see. It is still so beautiful.’
Violet nodded. The view outside the window grew prettier, less cluttered and more familiar. It wasn’t very long before Violet’s curiosity won out. There was so much news to catch up on she couldn’t sustain her disapproval of his warm Italian manner and nice aftershave any longer.
‘And how is the family?’ she asked, stiffly.
Mr Carfizzi said, ‘Of course you know the tragic news of Sir Ecgbert passing?’
‘I was aware of that. Yes, indeed.’
‘The household – everyone – we are only just beginning on our recovery. Such a shock. Such a terrible shock…’
‘But wasn’t he into his nineties?’ asked Alice, politely, poking her head between the two seats.
‘A dreadful shock,’ Mr Carfizzi said, and kept driving.
‘And how is Lady Tode coping?’ Violet wanted to know. ‘I should think she’s pleased to see the back of him, is she?’
Mr Carfizzi pursed his lips, but he didn’t, Alice thought, look entirely displeased.
‘… And young Ecgbert,’ Violet continued. ‘I read in the Mail he’s been a tad under the weather. Not quite “all there” in the top storey as it were. He never was, mind. But I was sorry when I read that. I always had a soft spot for that boy…’
‘Ah, Ecgbert – Sir Ecgbert, of course, as he is now. The Twelfth Baronet Sir Ecgbert Tode. He is very well! He is currently engaged in writing a marvellous game for the computer, he tells me. It’s a children’s fairytale story. I look forward to playing it one day.’
‘That’s nice,’ said Violet. ‘How long’s he been working on that for then?’
‘Ah! Many years, Mrs Dean! E un perfezionista, quello.’
‘And the other two? – I was never so fond of them,’ she added unnecessarily.
Carfizzi didn’t answer.
‘… Esmé’s gone to Australia, I read in the Mail,’ she continued, happy to answer for herself. ‘He’s done very well for himself. Turned into quite an Aussie. I should think he’s got a pet kangaroo in the garden, has he?’ Violet rocked with delight at her own funny joke. But Mr Carfizzi wasn’t amused. He stared at the road ahead, stony-faced.
‘… And Nicola,’ continued Violet, ‘I don’t tend to read much about her in the newspapers. She was always a tricky one. Very “argumentative” is my opinion. I don’t know what she’s up to now. She seems to keep a bit of a quiet profile?’
Still, Carfizzi said nothing.
‘… What’s she up to now, Mr Carfizzi?’ Violet asked him. ‘I saw a photo once, and I wondered, maybe she’s one of these “lesbians”…?’ Violet chuckled again. ‘You never know these days, do you?’
‘Nicola and Esmé are both very well,’ Carfizzi replied at last. ‘Unfortunately they do not make her ladyship’s life easy. Lady Tode has many burdens in her family life. She is a brave lady. A lady of exceptional courage and grace, do you agree Mrs Dean?’
Violet said, ‘I don’t know about that. I always thought she should stand up to that husband of hers more than she did… but then again you never can be sure what goes on between two people, behind closed doors.’
Mr Carfizzi fell back into angry silence.
Not that Violet minded. She was warmed up now. She had plenty to say and the less anyone interrupted, the better.
‘You know I’ve not been back here since they did the big TV show, Mr Carfizzi. But you must have been here for all the filming, were you? What a laugh! We used to watch it, didn’t we Alice? Every Sunday night. We loved it. I must have watched it a hundred times. What did the family think?’
Mr Carfizzi said (as if there could have been any doubt): ‘You are talking about Prance?’
‘Of course I am talking about Prance! What else would I be talking about? I used to say to Alice, didn’t I Alice?, I used to say, “Shame the real-life Todes aren’t a bit more dashing, like that Tintin chap with the teddy bear.” By comparison I used to say the Todes were a bit ordinary, didn’t I say that, Alice?’
‘Yes, you did,’ said Alice.
‘Ord-in-ary?’ repeated Mr Carfizzi.
‘So I missed all the fun of the filming. But it must have been very special, Mr Carfizzi. Was it special? Being surrounded by all the stars? That’s something I regret. If I regret anything, and I don’t, then I suppose I do regret not being here when they were doing the filming. What was it like, Mr Carfizzi? Meeting all the stars? Laurence Olivier… Did you meet him?… I adored that chap. What was he like then? I expect he was a dreadful disappointment, was he?’
‘Lord Olivier was a remarkable man. Very, very gracious,’ Mr Carfizzi replied. ‘Not a disappointment in any way. The most gracious and generous gentleman I have ever been fortunate to meet. And so natural! The most natural gentleman I ever met. We got along very well. He used to call me “Mr Car Fixy”.’ Mr Carfizzi chuckled richly at the memory. ‘A lovely, special man,’ he said. ‘Lord Olivier would have been happy to stay with us at the Hall. But you may remember Sir Ecgbert wasn’t entusiasto about the actors.’
‘Miserable old sod,’ said Violet.
Carfizzi didn’t respond.
A longer silence fell: Violet, brooding on her missed chances with Olivier, Carfizzi brooding on Violet’s inappropriate attitude and language, Alice wondering whether Carfizzi was slightly insane, and then thinking, probably not. She’d been mixing with the drab, well-behaved home-owners of Clapham for far too long.
Mr Carfizzi, his bald head barely peeking above the dashboard, his back ramrod straight, and his speedometer never moving above twen
ty, looked, it occurred to Alice, like a small, angry undertaker. ‘What about the other actors, then?’ she asked for the sake of it, to break the silence. ‘Did any of the stars ever stay in the house? The one who played Tintin? I always fancied him. Did he stay at the house? I bet everyone adored him.’
But her innocent question seemed only to push Carfizzi further into his dark mood. He said: ‘No.’
Which wasn’t strictly true. But Violet and Alice didn’t know that.
Alice tried again: ‘So – I understand Sir Ecgbert’s widow – Lady Tode – has moved into the cottage in the Rose Garden?’
‘That is correct. The Gardener’s House,’ agreed Mr Carfizzi. He seemed to prefer this line of questioning. He chuckled. ‘She has always used it as her own little hideaway, but now she is making it her home. When she is not in Capri, of course… But your grandmother will tell you – it is not quite a “cottage”, is it Mrs Dean?’
‘Certainly not!’ chuckled Violet. ‘Alice, don’t you remember the Gardener’s House? Oh it’s beautiful! Like a little toy mansion. The prettiest, most miniature mansion you’ll ever see. And with a rose garden laid all around it. I used to dream of that house, you know. Long after I left, I used to dream about that house. It was perfect. Alice, how can you not remember it?’
‘Well I think I do—’
‘It’s only across the grass from the Hall. You and young Sir Ecgbert, as he is now, you must have played together in the Rose Garden a hundred times.’ She sighed with contentment. ‘Oh! I must say, it’s good to be back!’
The temperature in the car warmed considerably after that. Violet and Mr Carfizzi chatted quickly and happily about changes in the household, who still lived or worked at the Hall, who was alive and who was dead…
There was Oliver Mellors (son of the previous gamekeeper Brian Mellors, now dead) whom Lady Tode seemed to think walked on water, but Carfizzi thought was a ‘nasty conceited little man’. There was Mrs Danvers, the office manager, whom Carfizzi was certain had been at the Hall when he started in 1983, and Mr Friday, who—
