A Very Big House in the Country

by Claire Sandy

  Stepping outside, Evie called to Paula, who was upright on a chair. ‘Remember when you were that age?’

  ‘Not really.’

  Conversation-killing skills like that are rare. Evie had no comeback as she took the next chair. ‘Still checking out the bushes?’

  ‘No,’ lied Paula, who scanned the horizon avidly, like a sailor’s wife waiting for his boat to appear out of the mist.

  ‘Good. Cos there’s nothing out there. Apart from our scoundrels, off to their treehouse.’ She wanted to go further, and say Miss Pritchett wouldn’t dare creep near them again, but that would open up a can of conversational worms. Spotting Shen tottering towards them in patent heels, her body-con dress outdoing Evie’s khaki and Paula’s Crimplene pleats, Evie said, ‘Bloody hell, are you off to a soirée?’

  ‘I’m sick of being a human wet wipe.’ Shen drank from a wine bottle without the customary glass middleman. ‘I need to feel human again.’

  ‘Very few humans look like that.’ Evie took in the sweep of hair, the translucent powder across Shen’s clavicles, the bling at her ears. ‘I couldn’t look like that if a crack team worked on me for six months solid.’

  ‘You could.’ Maybe there was truth-serum in the Chablis, because Shen added, ‘Well, no, you couldn’t.’

  ‘None taken.’ Evie was accustomed to Shen’s bare-knuckle honesty. ‘Did Fang go down OK?’

  ‘Yes,’ flashed Shen. ‘Christ – I can talk about other subjects, you know.’

  Less than twenty-four hours with her own child and Shen was reduced to a level of savage rudeness that Evie only reached on the evening of Christmas Day with the extended family. Evie understood: Shen’s experience of motherhood wasn’t half as hands-on as most women’s. Shen had never battled and sunk and risen again, to doggy-paddle through another day. She didn’t yet know that she would be fine, just fine, once she hit her stride.

  Evie had watched Shen dash upstairs with Fang each time the baby coughed up a gobbet of goo, returning with an immaculately groomed child, only to repeat the process within an hour. She’d watched her wipe Fang’s chin after each mouthful. She’d watched her wash Fang’s hair when Prunella got too licky. Fang had been camera-ready all day, but her mother had ended up crushed.

  ‘Do you think your priorities are a bit orf?’ If Evie hoped her comedy pronunciation would soften Shen’s reaction to what could be construed as a criticism, she was wrong.

  ‘Do you want to see me scream? Is that what you want?’ Shen was an inch from Evie’s face.

  Evie drew back. ‘What sort of person would want that?’

  ‘Your sort,’ said Shen.

  ‘Shen, shush.’ Evie smiled.

  ‘No, you shu—’ Shen slumped, gave up. ‘I can’t even argue properly. Just fight with yourself, while I get on with drinking this lovely, lovely, much lovelier-than-ever-before wine.’

  ‘I’ll happily make personal remarks about my clothes, if you’re too tired to do it.’ Evie relished Shen’s frazzled giggle and looked companionably to Paula, but the other woman wasn’t laughing. Instead, as ever, she stared out at the dark.

  ‘Go and snatch some zeds, Shen. I hate to be a party-pooper, but Fang won’t magically change overnight. Tomorrow will pretty much be Groundhog Day.’

  ‘No, I want to party.’ Shen wiggled her shoulders. ‘Be me for a few hours.’

  ‘Then let me help with Fang tomorrow. That’s what friends do. They pitch in.’

  Shen shook her head. ‘Christ, she’s just a baby. My baby. Why don’t we whack on some music and have a boogie? Find the guys and get them on their feet?’

  Evie knew Mike only danced when drunk. It helped if the onlookers were also drunk. ‘Paula,’ she said, to winch Paula’s attention from the Miss Pritchett-free gardens, ‘does Jon dance?’

  ‘Never!’ She almost laughed at the question.

  ‘Well, he’s gonna dance tonight.’ Shen made it sound like an ugly threat. ‘Where is Jon, anyway?’

  ‘Around,’ said Paula. ‘About.’

  ‘Get Mike. Get Clive. Get the bloody useless teenagers,’ commanded Shen, upending the bottle, savouring the last ambrosial dregs. ‘We’re going to get down with our bad selves. We’re going to start a disco inferno.’

  Within twenty minutes Evie had tucked Shen into bed and was downstairs again, to find herself alone. Jon’s car was missing from the forecourt and Evie’s own husband was also AWOL. With so many corners and hidey-holes in Wellcome Manor, Evie didn’t know where to begin looking for him.

  One spot more or less guaranteed some company.

  ‘Ah, there you are.’ Clive patted the bench beside him. ‘I’d almost given up. I brought supplies.’ An ice-bucket gleamed in the moonlight.

  ‘Clever old you.’ Evie left a healthy space between them on the slats. There was no other word for this than flirting: she hadn’t flirted since 1994, but she knew it when she saw it. If it stayed light-hearted, something to do with the long evenings, fine. Her co-flirter was a man of great experience in such matters.

  ‘Silence!’ Evie cocked her head. ‘The mighty Fang sleeps at last.’

  ‘That kid sure can cry.’

  ‘Welcome to the coal-face of parenting. You were present when she was conceived; It’s only fair you’re around to wipe her botty or let her stick her fingers in your eyes.’

  ‘Good point.’ Clive made a wry face. ‘If Shen put it like that, maybe we’d get somewhere.’

  The Ling-Littles weren’t a natural team. There was no harmony, just point-scoring. Even so, Evie had to say, ‘Don’t diss my homie.’ She felt Clive scrutinize her again, as if searching her face for clues. ‘Guess what I did this afternoon?’

  ‘I never guess. Why do women make men guess all the time?’

  ‘I had a cream tea.’ She spun out the words, lingering on them, gooey at the memory of the crème pâtissière, the compote, the – oh God – ganache.

  Clive’s weariness evaporated and he sat up. ‘And we all know how much you love a good cream tea, don’t we?’ If the lady diarist wanted to talk in metaphors, so be it.

  ‘Don’t I just!’ Elated to have found a fellow-enthusiast, Evie hugged herself, cooing, ‘I wanted to roll in it!’

  Clive licked his lips. ‘Were there . . . scones?’

  ‘So many.’ Evie winked.

  Clive let out a moan. ‘You’re driving me mad.’

  ‘I haven’t even started on the finger-sandwiches.’

  Looking as if he hardly dared ask, Clive said, ‘What . . . did you do with them, you naughty girl?’

  ‘What do you think,’ purred Evie, ‘I did with them?’

  ‘Knowing you,’ said Clive, ‘I can guess it was good.’

  Remembering how nicely seasoned the egg mayonnaise was, she had to agree. ‘Oh, Clive, there’s nothing better than a good, long cream tea.’ She could see that she had his attention. Time to exploit it. ‘Do you ever treat your women to cream tea?’

  ‘Endlessly,’ said Clive.

  ‘Your ladies get a lot more out of the affairs than you do.’ Evie saw how the change of topic side-swiped Clive, who looked confused. And disappointed. She pressed her point; these bench rendezvous were an unmissable opportunity to carry out light repair work on the Ling-Little marriage. ‘They visit nice hotels and swanky restaurants, with a handsome pay-off at the inevitable end, but you only get X-rated memories and another wedge between you and your wife. Stop seeking happiness out there.’ Evie waved her hands vaguely at the great outdoors. ‘Start looking for it nearer home.’

  ‘My home?’

  ‘Well, not my home!’ laughed Evie, nudging him.

  ‘No, obviously not. Not with Mike there.’

  ‘Concentrate on one woman.’ She hesitated, knowing from her family’s complaints that she could be preachy: Archbishop Herrera, they called her. ‘Aren’t we all searching for meaning?’ That question resonated with her. ‘Isn’t connection what we crave?’

  ‘Connection.’ Clive nodded rapidly
. ‘Plus a damned good cream tea.’

  ‘Absolutely!’ laughed Evie. Good old Clive. ‘Right.’ She slapped her lap. ‘I’d better find my husband and make up with him.’

  Clive was rueful. ‘I dropped you in it, didn’t I?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘Sorry. I should be more careful from now on. Make an effort. I’m sorry . . . darling.’ Clive scattered darlings willy-nilly, but this one had weight.

  ‘No probs, darling.’ Evie stood and kissed his forehead, moved by what she took to be real contrition on his face.

  ‘You’re right, Evie. I’ve ignored the special woman right under my nose. She deserves to be treated like a queen.’

  ‘That’s beautiful, Clive!’ Evie was better at this advice-lark than she thought; she might go professional at some point.

  ‘The only question is,’ said Clive, ‘does she feel the same?’

  When he went puppyish like that, when his face became a needy question mark, Evie saw Zane in Clive’s features. ‘You know the answer to that,’ she said quietly.

  ‘I do.’ Jubilant again, the old Clive was back. ‘Goodnight.’

  ‘Goodnight.’ Evie left him, calling over her shoulder, ‘I hope you dream of a damned good cream tea!’

  ‘What was that?’ Evie sat bolt upright, wide awake, all her senses flashing red. She prodded Mike. ‘Something smashed downstairs. Mike! Somebody’s in the house!’

  All urban males develop a finely honed fight-or-flight reflex and have, at some point, leapt out of bed ready to wreak hell. Mike felt for the baseball bat that lived among the dustballs under their bed, but came up with a towelling slipper. Realizing where they were, he said, ‘Evie, there are loads of “somebodies” in this house.’

  ‘It’s 4 a.m. Everybody’s asleep.’ She jumped at a loud crash downstairs, like somebody falling through a door. ‘It’s burglars!’ She concocted a small-hours scenario where they were imaginatively slaughtered.

  ‘They’re bloody clumsy burglars.’ Mike crouched, his ear to the door, at another clatter. He laid down his slipper. ‘And they’re happy in their work.’ Maniacal laughter echoed up the stairs. He opened the door and grimaced at something on the landing. ‘Great,’ he sighed. ‘Just great.’

  Scarlett staggered in, her hair in her face, her grip on a brandy bottle still strong. Falling to her knees, she whimpered, ‘Mum, I feel—’

  ‘Oh, yuck!’ Evie’s shoulders hunched to her ears as Scarlett bent over and added more swirls to the pattern on the rug.

  DAY 10

  Thursday, 20th August

  Hi

  Mental night last night. Think I’m dying. Quite like Devon now.

  Scar xxx

  pee ess there’s stuff to tell . . .

  Fang’s reign of terror had turned the master suite into the sort of room seen in blurry images on CNN, where hostages are kept without basic facilities. An armchair was overturned, towels lay around like corpses. Even the Picasso print seemed to be crying for help, with its one eye.

  Shen despaired of the bottles. They were reproducing. She kept washing and sterilizing, but dirty ones leaned against each other like drunks, on every flat surface. She shuffled to the four-poster – a chaste bed, despite its wanton untidiness – with a nappy wrapper stuck to her slipper, and asked her husband in the hushed tones they used in the rare intermissions when Fang slept, ‘Why did you turn away the cleaners?’

  ‘This room is beyond their powers.’ Clive’s fancy dressing gown was as dejected as a charity-shop buy. Settling himself like a dishevelled sultan against the bank of creased pillows, he whispered, ‘I’m starting to enjoy the anarchy. I mean, why let the clocks have it their own way? Why not stay up all night singing “Mary Had a Little Lamb”?’

  ‘You would say that!’ hissed Shen, ‘You can sleep all day. I have to get Miles up, feed him, scrape the mud off him, feed Fang, bathe her, while you take over for the easy bits.’ She dragged bedclothes over herself, too tired to arrange her limbs. The aikido session she’d planned was out of the question. ‘And today I have to scream at your son for leading the girls astray and getting pissed. Because, as usual, you’ll duck out of disciplining him.’ She closed her eyes. ‘Wake me up when Fang goes to university.’

  ‘Evie can help. She dotes on Fang.’

  ‘Don’t you talk to me about Evie.’

  Clive wouldn’t put it past Shen to bug the bench; his wife’s intelligence-gathering skills were beyond the CIA’s wildest dreams. ‘Don’t drop off, darling,’ he murmured. ‘I have calls to make.’

  Looking pained, as if somebody had stirred a knife in her gut, Shen sat up slowly. ‘I’ll have a shower. That might help.’ She rose like a statue coming to creaky life. ‘Don’t wake Fang,’ she ordered hoarsely.

  ‘Do you think I’m a bloody idiot?’ Clive reached for his mug on the bedside table, catching his dressing-gown sleeve on the tray. It plunged to the floor, along with the milk jug and teapot.

  The noise of the tray’s suicide would wake the dead, never mind a fractious baby. Fang’s wail propelled Shen into the bathroom, where she whacked on the radio as soon as the door slammed.

  ‘Oh, come here, you big silly.’ Clive negotiated Fang out of her cot, his ham-hands gathering her into his lap. He looked her in the eye. ‘Do what your daddy tells you. Sleep!’

  Fists at her chin, Fang stopped crying, her expression hard to read.

  ‘Sleep! You know you want to.’

  Fang stuck out her lower lip, a signal that Clive now recognized.

  A quick crossing of his eyes and Fang’s pout curved into a smile. She fidgeted, her plump feet cycling, and then she fell asleep – bam! – as if knocked out by an invisible cartoon frying pan.

  ‘Good girl.’ Frightened even to rock her, Clive held her to his chest. ‘Always do what your daddy tells you. Even though your daddy’s an imbecile.’

  Far from those inviting pillows now, but afraid to roam all the way up the mattress with his touchy little passenger, he sat on the edge of the bed and thought about last night. And Evie.

  As if their holiday was a Richard Curtis movie, the weather cooperated with the mood. The reliable dazzling sunshine had hardened into a heavy heat that lay over the house like one of Patch’s blankets. Out in the distant hills, a storm was on its way. According to the local news, it would be a humdinger.

  In the drawing room a storm had already arrived. Hurricane Shen.

  ‘I hope you’re all ashamed of yourselves.’ Shen paced, her face a mask of disapproval, before the teens lined up on a brocade sofa. In her arms even Fang looked stern, a by-product of trapped wind. ‘You’ve let us down, and you’ve let yourselves down.’

  The other adults backed her up, muttering and nodding from their positions around the room. Only Mike, suppressing his laughter, seemed unimpressed by the gravity of the situation. Evie silently thanked the hungover juveniles for distracting him from her white lie about the cost of the holiday.

  ‘You should be ashamed to look us in the face.’ Shen was an old-style teller-off. None of this Do you want to think about what you’ve done? She went for the jugular. ‘What example are you setting the little ones?’

  ‘Sorry.’ Scarlett’s head was down, her foul and matted hair over her face.

  ‘Ooh, it speaks,’ said Shen, at today’s preferred volume of Extremely Loud. ‘What was that?’

  ‘Sorry.’ Scarlett mumbled a little louder.

  ‘That’s fine then. You’re sorry. Let’s forget all about it. Not!’

  ‘My head hurts.’ Zane held his forehead as if it was made of bone china. ‘Could you keep it down?’

  ‘Why, of course,’ simpered Shen, before bellowing, ‘Did you keep it down last night when you were blind drunk?’

  ‘We’re very, very disappointed,’ said Paula, looking at Tillie as if she’d never seen her before.

  ‘And a bit jealous,’ murmured Mike. He turned to Shen. ‘Shall we get to the consequences of the kids’ actions, Shen?’


  ‘Yes! Let’s work out how many years they’re grounded for!’

  ‘Tillie,’ said Paula, with defiant meekness, ‘has never ever even sipped alcohol before.’

  ‘Oh, Mum,’ said Tillie. ‘Of course I have.’

  ‘What? Oh my God. Are you hearing this, Jon?’ Paula looked at her husband, one hand clutching her heart, the other around Amber. ‘What else don’t I know?’ Her voice cracked. ‘We promised. No secrets.’

  ‘No, Mum,’ said Tillie. ‘You promised. I had no choice.’

  Amber said jauntily, ‘We have loadth of thecrets.’

  ‘No, we don’t.’ Paula shook her. ‘We . . .’ The sentence fell on its knees and Paula relinquished the spotlight to Shen.

  ‘You.’ Shen pointed to Zane. ‘And you.’ The silicon nail picked out Scarlett. ‘And you, Missy,’ she included Tillie in her wrath. ‘All of you are in big trouble. Big. Trouble. Really big.’ She hesitated, nodding vehemently. ‘The biggest.’

  Even though her role was to look stern, Evie smothered a smile, all too familiar with Shen’s predicament. She too had often set off on a comprehensive bawling-out before deciding on the punishment to fit the crime; it left her opening and closing her mouth like a goldfish. Just as Shen was doing now. The truth was that it’s tricky to punish teenagers; there’s only so much the vengeful mum can do.

  Undaunted, Shen gathered herself. ‘First, you’ll replace the booze you stole from the drinks cupboard.’ The beautiful piece of Edwardian mahogany stood open, its interior ransacked. ‘I totted up the bill and it comes to . . .’ she hesitated. Evie knew the figure: a mind-boggling £500. (The Wellcome Manor drinks cabinet was in a different league from the Herrera one, which was a kitchen shelf supporting a small bottle of Tesco whisky and a green liqueur they’d never had the nerve to open.)

  ‘A thousand pounds!’ shrieked Shen. ‘What’s more . . .’ She wavered, before sticking out her chin. ‘Zane, you’re going home this minute!’