The Cornish Affair

by Lockington, Laura

  I glanced over at Olga. The difference between the two sisters was vast. Olga was definitely mousy, but this girl gazing out so brazenly from the photo was a tiger.

  Bea took a deep breath, “OK, no problem! We can have you looking like this real quick! No, I know what you’re going to say – like, why should you? Well, I don’t know about you, but all this hogwash about looking’ good for your man went out with the ark. But, and I do say but, men are damn fool creatures and they look first and fall in love later… besides Richard doesn’t exactly look like that, you know!” she said, pointing to the picture of Oliver on the book.

  We were all caught up with the idea of making Olga over, I could see. Perhaps we can blame too much daytime TV shows? Anyway, whatever it was, the idea caught fire.

  “Look, first thing tomorrow we go and buy a colour hair wash, and some clothes…”

  “No need, I brought so many with me from Canada, honest, you’d be doing me a favour…”

  “I’ve got loads of make up,” Nancy added helpfully.

  Well, that was certainly true. She’d brought back from London with her the whole counter from Harvey Nicks.

  “But, you know, it’s attitude that’s going to count here, do you think you can do it?” Bea asked her.

  I could see that Olga was struggling with this, I had a pang of guilt, after all, why should she go to all these lengths? After all, Richard had lied, too… Before Olga had a chance to answer I thought I’d better break it to her that Richard didn’t actually live here. I mean, maybe that would influence her? I would imagine that coming from a flimsy, crap apartment block where she had to share a bathroom with nine other people, it would. Well, it certainly would me.

  “Olga, you know that Richard lives near here, but not actually in this house? He has a cottage down in the village that he lives in with his mother,” I said carefully.

  “I would like to live with a mother again,” Olga said simply. Then she smiled, “So we both have lied, no? This is good… and do not forget we have spent many, many hours chatting, I think he is a good man, no?”

  We all agreed that on the whole, Richard could certainly be considered to be a good man.

  I saw Olga staring at something the other side of the kitchen. I followed her eyes and saw that she was practically drooling over the sight of the freshly glazed ham.

  I jumped up, and began to carve slice after slice of the succulent pink meat. I made a huge pile of sandwiches, and Olga and Bea fell on them.

  “Oh jeez, this is good!” Bea said between mouthfuls, “You have no idea how bad airline food has got!”

  Olga looked puzzled, and I bet that the only food she ever saw in a plane was something she’d taken herself.

  She was soon yawning over her empty plate, and I asked her if she’d like to go to bed. After a lot of disagreement, where Olga said that she’d sleep in a hotel and proudly showed the bundle of money she had (about fifty quid, I reckoned) and we had explained that there was no hotel and we would be delighted to put her up, she agreed and followed me upstairs.

  “Put her in the Daisy room,” Nancy called after me. It was a snug, sunny little room at the very top of the house, papered in a hand blocked wall paper of cheerful white and yellow flowers.

  As we went past the library, I saw that Olga steadied herself against the wall with one hand, she looked pale, and I guessed that she must be very tired.

  “Are you OK?” I asked.

  “Oh yes… This house! It’s so big! But then I think so many people live here, no?”

  “No, not really. Only Nancy and me,” I said, starting to climb the stairs, and wondering when, if ever, the sheets had been changed in the daisy room. Oh god, supposing the bed was damp? I really hoped not.

  “But… the other people?” Olga enquired, pointing to the library door.

  I glanced in through the open door, and saw the library as Nancy and I had left it, ready for the party. Empty and expectant.

  “No, just us.” I said.

  She looked through the door with me and shrugged, “Yes, I see that there is no one there, forgive me, I thought I saw… but I am very tired, you are sure?”

  I shrugged.

  Chapter Twenty Six

  I heard Nancy and Bea come to bed long after I had said goodnight. They spent a long time together talking in the drawing room. They had a lot to catch up on. I tried to calculate the last time we had seen Bea. It must have been years ago.

  I couldn’t get over how different she was. Not just her appearance, which had changed drastically, too. Her whole manner had altered.

  I climbed into bed, and turned the light out. I heard the damn rain start again, just as Nancy and Bea shut their bedroom doors. I didn’t know why I was still awake. I was tired, but sleep didn’t come easily. I had restless thoughts, involving the sudden visit from Bea, and Olga, the thoughts of seeing Oliver again, the party… oh, everything. I switched the light on about one in the morning and started to read. Maybe that would get me off, but all it did was make my hungry (it was after all a lavishly produced Moroccan cookery book, with mouth-watering pictures of tagines and pigeon pie.) I then realised I hadn’t slathered on Nancy’s damn tanning cream, and I lay there listening to the rain trying to work up the energy to get up and do it.

  I struggled out of bed and into the bathroom. What had I got to do? I read the label carefully and it seemed that exfoliation was strongly advised. OK, then, I would.

  As I carefully applied the goo, and let it dry on me, it occurred to me that it wasn’t only Olga who was going to go through the motions of making herself something she was not. What the hell was my excuse? Oh well, I reasoned, I was just following Nancy’s orders. Maybe the soothing warm bath, followed by the smoothing into the skin of unguents helped. By the time my head hit the pillow, I was fast asleep. Even the worry of the ever falling rain didn’t keep me awake.

  Nancy was shaking me and calling my name in the morning. I struggled up on one elbow and looked at her, she was wearing her kimono and was holding a silk scarf to her mouth.

  “What is it?” I asked in alarm.

  “Oh Fin… It’s awful!” she wailed.

  “What?”

  “You’ll smell it very soon…”

  I sniffed cautiously. Nope, nothing unusual going on that I could tell. Nancy motioned me over to the window, and wrapping a dressing gown round me, I approached with caution.

  I drew the curtains back, opened the window wide and leant outside taking a deep breath.

  It hit me at once.

  I practically gagged, and slammed the window shut quickly.

  I knew exactly what it was. It was the bloody cess pit.

  Nancy and I looked at each other, not knowing what to do. The normal course of action would be to have called someone, but knowing how busy every plumber in the county was after the floods, the chances were pretty slim. But it was still worth a try.

  I raced downstairs, and grabbed the phone. Olga was sitting at the kitchen table, holding a handkerchief over her nose. Have you noticed by the way that handkerchiefs are definitely a thing of the past? Like hats or summer gloves.

  “I’m sorry!” I said, frantically dialling a number, “It’s the-”

  “Yes, I know,” she mumbled, “We too had this in the country and this I regret to say happened often.”

  The number I dialled was engaged. But of course it was. I darted into the office and grabbed a phone directory.

  Olga followed me in there, and said, “You are calling a man to fix?”

  God, I hoped so.

  “Yes, that’s if I can find one!” I said, glancing down the page at the reams of tiny black numbers, knowing that none of them would come out here. Most of the numbers were in Plymouth, and that might as well have been London.

  “But, I can fix.” Olga said, then added diffidently, “If you like… you have tools?”

  I nodded, thinking that a Russian education was a fine thing. How the hell did she know how to fi
x this?

  “At home, we have to fix everything ourselves,” she said.

  Oh.

  The only tools I knew with any certainty that I had was a hammer that I used to bash crabs and lobsters open with and a screwdriver that I kept in the kitchen drawer to tackle oysters with (much better than a knife, that you are liable to break – I speak from experience.) But my father had some in the garage.

  I ran upstairs to dress and to find something that Olga could wear. She was reluctant to put on the old jeans and sweat shirt I handed her, saying that they were too good to use.

  I assure her they weren’t.

  She followed me into the garage, both of us holding scarves and hankies to our mouths that I had drenched in perfume. Her face lit up when she spotted the wall covered in un-nameable things. She pointed to what looked like a set of fishing rods, and said, “That! That is what I need,” I unhooked it for her, and she set off with purpose. There was no need to ask where the cess pit was, you could just follow the smell.

  She stopped in front of me and said, “I think it is better if I go alone. I think you know very little about such things, no?”

  Hit the nail on the head there.

  I made noises of dissent, but she firmly pointed me back to the house, and I very willingly escaped.

  Nancy was pottering in the kitchen with a scarf wrapped around her face, she looked like Mrs Tiggy Winky in a yashmak.

  “Awful, isn’t it?” her voice was muffled from under the scarf.

  I nodded, “Olga is doing something unmentionable to it, I hope to god it works, what are we going to do about tonight?”

  This was so not the atmosphere for the party I’d been planning.

  “Where’s Bea?” I asked, closing the window in the vain hope that I could keep the vile smell out of the house.

  “She borrowed the car and went into the village to get Olga some hair dye, failing that she’s going into to Truro…oh god, I think I’m going to be sick!”

  Nancy rushed from the room her hands clamped to her mouth. I had every sympathy for her, it was truly terrible. Perhaps I could offer everyone tonight a clove of garlic, like they did in the old days. Pressing it under their nails, they’d bring their hands to their nose to sniff when they encountered a putrefying plague ridden body on the street. Or I could chuck rosemary and bay leaves on a fire so that the sweet scented smoke drifted around…Or maybe I could buy up the entire stock of Miranda’s ‘langee langee’ scented candles and light them up in every room? Oh god, there had to be something I could do.

  I heard the car draw up, and saw Bea stagger out with carrier bags and run towards the house as quickly as she could. She burst through the door and slammed it quickly behind her. Nelson gave a half hearted screech, but subsided very quickly. Baxter was nowhere to be seen, probably under my bed with a clothes peg over his nose.

  “Jeez!…” Bea said, dumping her bags on the table, and fanning the air in front of her face. (Not that it made any difference)

  “I know, it’s so bad isn’t it?” I said sympathetically, “I’m sorry, but the bloody cess pit-”

  “It’s not your fault!”

  We grinned at one another. This new Beatrice was turning into someone I liked.

  She asked me where Olga was, and I explained.

  We regarded one another with amused resignation.

  “Really makes me feel useless, doesn’t it you?” Bea said finally, unpacking cans and cans of air freshener.

  “I smelt it this morning and woke Nancy, I was up real early, I guess I’ve got a bit of jet lag…I couldn’t think of anything else to do, so I bought up the entire supply of these from the village shop. Oh, and I saw Doris and she loaded me up with the pasties for tonight. I paid her as well, I hope you don’t mind?”

  I shook my head. Hell, she could pay for whatever she wanted.

  “Port Charles has had it rough, huh?” Bea said, uncapping a delightful can that had unnaturally vivid lemons on it, and spraying the room vigorously.

  We both choked a bit on the fumes, but trust me, artificial lemons was a lot easier on the nose than, well, the smell of a cess pit bubbling and flooding over.

  Nancy re-appeared looking pale, “Oh that smells better! I wasn’t actually sick, but I must say I feel exactly like I did on that boat up the Ganges years ago. I really think I must have an extra sensitive nose or something… Poor Olga, is she alright, should we go and look?”

  “No!” Bea and I shouted together.

  There was a tapping on the window and Olga was waving to us outside. She had her thumbs up and was grinning, which I must say is more that I would be capable of if I was covered in what she was covered with, if you know what I mean.

  “Do you have an outside water tap?” she shouted through the window.

  I pointed her in the right direction, and we watched her trudge off through the mud.

  The three of us ran from room to room armed with the cans of spray. Soon the whole house really did smell as my late lamented papa would have affirmed just like a Turkish brothel.

  I unpacked the gleaming rows of pasties from Doris, they looked delicious, with the pastry glaze shining a golden brown. I thought I should wash the glasses ready for tonight, and Bea helped me.

  It was surprisingly easy working with her and we fell into a rhythm of washing and drying.

  “Well, you haven’t changed at all!” Bea declared, rubbing a tea towel round and round the inside of a glass.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, wiping a soapy sponge around the rim of a glass to get rid of definite traces of lipstick – frosted pink, very nasty.

  “You still hate drying up!” Bea laughed.

  I joined in the laughter. It was horribly true, I really did.

  “Look, Fin, I wanna get this outta the way, so can you just listen?” Bea said.

  I nodded, and concentrated on the hot water. I’ve noticed that when people want to tell you something that they think is important, sometimes it’s best if they don’t see your face. The reaction is not always what they are after. She had the confiding tone in her voice, and I really wasn’t sure what to expect. I managed a sneaky glance at her sideways, before she started to talk though, and was freshly surprised at what I saw. The old Bea might have worn jeans, but the sensible sort, the sort that you iron with a crease in. In the old days it would have been topped off with a snowy white cotton shirt, tightly tucked in and discreet row of pearls. Her nails would have been short and manicured and other than a wedding band, there would have been no other adornment.

  This new Bea was completely different.

  Huge gold loopy earrings dangled against her darkly tanned skin, a pair of baggy ripped jeans, clenched in with a huge leather belt that had a wonderful silver and turquoise buckle on it held them up, and a skinny black ribbed top completed the rather rock chick outfit. Oh yes, and she had on a pair of stack heeled very scruffy cowboy boots on.

  I heard her nervously clear her throat, and my hands moved more slowly in the water. What was she going to tell me?

  I held my breath. Perhaps I was going to find out now who her father was? I glanced quickly at her, she looked Mediterranean, Greek maybe or Spanish. Her black hair was gleaming in the pale morning light.

  “OK, here goes… and you promise to keep quiet?”

  “Cross my heart and hope to die,” I said, crossing my fingers under the hot soapy water.

  “Right… well, I guess Nancy has told you about me, right?”

  I shook my head. “I think she was going to, but the time wasn’t right she said…” I trailed off. Then it hit me, Nancy, she called her Nancy! She never, ever called her that. It was always mummy. When did Nancy spring into the language with her?

  “Jeez… she promised me that she would! Shit!” Bea sounded exasperated. She breathed out heavily, and glanced down in irritation.

  We both jumped as there was a banging on the window, Olga was miming her need for a towel, and I went to fetch her one. As I handed it
to her, I glanced over at Bea, a second ago she reminded me so strongly of someone, but now the look had gone, and I couldn’t place it.

  “Later Fin, we’ll talk later, OK?”

  I nodded and dragged Olga inside. With half a mind I listened to Olga’s stilted explanation of how she had rodded through the cess pit, and that it was rapidly dispersing… I felt as if I was struggling to remember a dream. Who had Beatrice looked like? It was just like fighting for the details of a very vivid dream that seemed so real that you were sure you would never forget it as long as you lived, then only moments later it had slipped through your fingers, never to return.

  “Thank you Olga, thank you so much,” I said absently, patting her dry with the towel.

  “I think that if you keep all the windows shut closed it will be alright soon, no?” Olga said, obviously pleased with herself.

  I made breakfast for us all as if in a trance. The nagging feeling of half recognition haunted me, try as I might, I couldn’t catch the fleeting resemblance that Bea had had a minute or two ago. Give it up, I urged myself, it will come, or it won’t. I tried to shove it to the back of my mind and let my subconscious get to work on it – if it had the inclination to do so.

  After breakfast, Nancy and Bea swooped on Olga to give her the Port Charles makeover treatment. I watched on agog, it looked quite torturous. They were going the whole hog, waxing legs, plucking eyebrows, hair colouring and manicure. Olga was putty in their hands, although she did seem doubtful when Nancy told her that all English women did this every month.

  I could see Olga eye me up and down doubtfully, and I laughed. That did it, they then turned their attentions to me.

  I too, was plucked and dressed for the oven.

  Every time the kitchen door went, Nelson and Baxter were the only ones to take charge. Nancy and I took it in turns to screech down from upstairs, “We’re up here! No, we can’t come down… leave the eggs/fruit/crabs/lobsters/watercress/bread/ in the fridge! See you tonight!”

  The phone didn’t stop either, with various messages from people who wanted to know if the dolphin party was on. In the end I recorded a message saying, ‘Thanks for calling, I can’t get to the phone right now as I am having my eyebrows plucked ready for the dolphin party tonight, I look forward to seeing you all about eight o’ clock…ouch!’