by Nicola Slade
She described her first meeting with Margot Delaney and agreed with Charlie that whatever their own relatives might get up to, at least it was preferable to public nudity and incontinence.
‘Have you met Miss Buchanan?’ he asked, pouring her another glass of Merlot. ‘No, go on, somebody’s got to drink this and I’m driving.’
‘Is she the little furry one?’ Finn was aware that the wine was beginning to get to her. Must be mixing with the fumes from Hedgehog’s puff she thought, mildly confused and increasingly conscious of an unwilling attraction to the man opposite her. Remember Luc, she told herself, and your broken heart, you’re not a teenager for God’s sake. But Luc’s image was fading as fast as her orgy of grief over him had done.
‘That’s the one, she lives with her sister or something; an old dragon, apparently, who bullies Ursula. I think there’s some story or other about Miss B, some kind of injury in the war. I know she’s not quite right, but she’s harmless. Anyway, according to Pa she announced recently that she’s started getting visits from an angel.’
‘What? That’s seriously weird! Anything else? Anybody think they’re Napoleon? That old Polish guy would do for that, I should imagine; he was bossing Julia about when they shifted furniture.’
She described the new living arrangements at Forge Cottage and Charlie was loud in his envy.
‘You’re so lucky,’ he moaned. ‘I can’t wait for Pa to move over to the Old Parsonage. It’s like being a kid, having to explain where you’re going and making sure you aren’t late or he’ll start to worry. Not to mention worrying about him in case he has another fall or breaks his other hip or something.’
‘When’s he likely to move?’ Finn was sympathetic, grateful to Julia for the way she had so enthusiastically leapt on to the idea of converting the garage. Although she had laughed in fellow feeling with Charlie about ringing her sister, tonight had been a one-off, the arrangement was working well.
‘Not more than four weeks tops,’ he said hopefully. ‘They exchanged contracts on the flat the day before yesterday so it’s just a question of waiting. Anyway, about the gang or whatever they call themselves, have you any idea what they’re up to? I’m worried in case they might be getting up to something illegal, don’t ask me what?’
‘What?’ she asked automatically and grinned as he laughed in response. ‘Notice I didn’t immediately say you’re imagining it, because Ju’s been unaccountably shifty about the gang herself. But illegal? What makes you think that?’
‘It’s hard to say.’ Charlie’s screwed his face up in exasperation and she felt another flash of sympathy, then the dark face lightened in that rare, gleaming smile and she felt, yet again, a ripple of excitement that was only too familiar. Oh no, once more she spoke to herself firmly, not again, you’ve scarcely drawn breath since you found out about Luc. You are definitely not falling for this one, Fionnuala Fitzgerald, he’s moody, screwed-up and probably believes all that Pretender stuff in spite of what he says, just what you don’t need.
Oh come on, replied her inner self, the wimpy, eager-to-please one, the one who believed so strenuously in happy-ever-after, think what he’s had to put up with by all accounts? Julia said his mother was ill for years and now he’s worried about his dad, that’s not much fun. And what’s the story about a wife, hmm? Something very wrong there.
‘Finn? Finn? Are you all right?’ Charlie Stuart was trying to catch her attention, an increasingly irritable expression on his face. ‘You okay?’ he repeated as she came to. ‘The wine hasn’t gone to your head, has it?’
‘Of course it hasn’t,’ she snapped, then smiled sheepishly. ‘I’m fine, just thinking about something stupid. Look at the time, I think I’d better be getting home now.’
They divided the bill scrupulously between them, exchanging suddenly shy smiles as they walked to the car. The car journey back to Bychurch was rather silent until Charlie drew up at Forge Cottage.
‘Can we do this again?’ he said, eagerness and diffidence mingled in his tone.
‘I’d like that,’ she said, aware that she was blushing like a teenager.
‘Good,’ he said. ‘I’ll drop by the shop tomorrow.’
Still awkward and diffident he reached out an arm and pulled her towards him.
As kisses went it was just what she might have expected from a man like Charlie Stuart: firm, warm and full of urgency. After her first startled gasp she found herself responding in kind, melting into his arms and kissing him right back, their bodies nestling together, fitting – oh God, not again! – fitting as though they were meant for each other.
Chapter 5
Julia called an emergency meeting of the gang, to be convened at Forge Cottage, rather than their customary meeting place at Rosemary’s bungalow, Church View. Today however was one of Margot’s day centre visits and Rosemary was only too glad to get out of the house.
‘It’s getting worse,’ she confided to Julia as they set out cups and biscuits before the others turned up in their usual dribs and drabs. ‘She’s started playing with matches.’
‘Oh Christ!’ Julia’s cry of sympathy was heartfelt.
‘Uh-huh.’ The other woman’s voice was dull with despair. ‘Luckily I caught her, but I’m bloody terrified, Julia! What if she tries that at night? We could be fried alive.’
‘You’ve got to tell that social worker woman,’ Julia urged firmly. ‘They need to know what you’re up against. Margot’s a menace to herself as well as you. In the meantime, coffee’s not strong enough for this kind of thing. Here, get a slug of scotch down you and I’ll join you so you don’t feel like a lush.’
Just then the doorbell rang and the rest of the club began to arrive so Rosemary blew her nose, wiped her eyes and downed her drink with a nod of gratitude to her friend.
‘Right,’ announced Julia when they were all settled, ‘I’ve got some brochures here and you can take a look at them in a minute. I’ll just let you have the gist of it as a start and we can have a discussion when I’ve done.’
She picked up one of the colourful, glossy brochures and smiled faintly as she noticed Ursula Buchanan gazing with wistful yearning at the photographs of brilliant blue sky, turquoise sea, white sand and glorious, technicolor flowers.
‘Everybody with me?’ Julia counted heads, all nodding, in Ursula’s case involuntarily with her slight tremor. ‘Okay, well, Rosemary and I have trawled through the holiday brochures and the internet – now, you did all say you wanted to go to the Caribbean, didn’t you? Rosemary’s found a low-season special offer, two weeks for a smidgen under £1600 each.
‘I know, I know …’ she held up her hand at the murmur of dismay that filled the room, ‘… it’s a hell of a lot of money for each of us to find, but that’s the point, isn’t it? That’s what we said right from the first?’
It had been the night Finn descended on her, Julia recalled, that she and Rosemary had challenged the others to come up with something to enliven the gang’s existence. Ursula Buchanan had made the first, and only, suggestion, all other, unarticulated, ideas paling into insignificance at the daring and grandeur of her idea.
‘There’s something I’ve always wanted to do,’ Ursula had announced, in her fluffy, woolly voice, peering round anxiously at the rest when she realised she held the floor. Meeting nothing but encouragement and a measure of relief that someone, anyone, had something to say, she had gone on. ‘I’d like to do something completely self-indulgent; I’ve always longed for real heat, real sunshine, to feel like a castaway on a desert island, but a luxury one, all mod cons. I’ve always wanted to go scuba dancing.’
There had been a moment of pure, silent astonishment, Julia recalled now.
‘Oh, scuba diving.’ Rosemary, trying desperately not to laugh, had gushed instead. ‘How marvellous, what a brilliant idea, Ursula.’
‘I couldn’t afford to go really,’ Ursula had warned, pleased with the success of her venture. ‘It’s only a dream.’
The bab
ble of voices had assured her that it was a marvellous dream and one that most of them shared, now it was dangled in front of them, but again and again had come the same comment, regretful but resigned: no, they couldn’t afford to go to the Caribbean either, and yes please, would Julia and Rosemary look into it.
Now, Julia held up her hand again.
‘Look, it doesn’t have to be the West Indies. We could have a marvellous holiday in the Mediterranean somewhere, the Greek Islands maybe, Malta, or Majorca. It must be possible to find somewhere that does scuba diving.’
‘Well, some of us can afford it.’ Delia Muncaster’s clear voice cut through the noise. ‘Let’s see how many that is, then we can try to find ways of raising the money so the rest can come too.’
‘I don’t know.’ Julia was still extremely doubtful. ‘We really ought to look for something cheaper; it’s a ludicrous amount of money.’
No. They were united in dismissing the idea and were already devouring the brochures. Surprisingly, it was Jonathan Barlow who voiced the group’s feeling.
‘It won’t do, I’m afraid,’ he said stoutly, even as he shivered in his shoes at his own audacity. ‘You see, it’s only a holiday to some of you, albeit an exciting one, but to the rest of us it’s the fulfilment of a dream, an adventure we would never otherwise dare to imagine, still less achieve. If it’s humanly possible, that’s where we want to go.’ His sad spaniel eyes gazed at them all. ‘I haven’t dared to dream for more than forty years,’ he said.
He sat down to loud cheers from the others and Julia yielded gracefully, holding up a hand to cut short the buzz of excitement.
‘How can we argue with that?’ She smiled at Jonathan and carried on. ‘Let’s do a count, shall we? Remember, we’re talking here about a luxury holiday and that’s the price for July. Naturally it’s even more expensive in the winter when everyone wants to get away from the cold. How many of us think they can raise the cash? And how many know they can’t? No false modesty now,’ she warned. ‘We’re all in this together, don’t forget. If we go ahead we must all agree to join in the fund-raising even if we have the fare ourselves; it’s a group effort or it’s nothing.’
She counted hands. She herself, Delia, Jamie, Sue Merrill, pitifully few of them who could cough up the total amount. Rosemary stood up, slightly pink and apologetic.
‘I can raise just on half of that amount,’ she said bravely. ‘If I hadn’t spent so much on the bungalow it wouldn’t be a problem but I’m having to draw my horns in for the next year, to make sure I don’t get in a mess and eight hundred is the absolute top I can manage.’
She looked round the group and found only sympathy and in several cases relief at her frankness. ‘I expect some of the rest of you are in much the same boat, aren’t you?’
‘I can contribute about five hundred pounds.’ Marek was very stiff, very formal, obviously hating any admission of weakness.
‘Oh dear.’ Jonathan Barlow was wringing his hands in embarrassment. ‘I would so love to go, but I don’t know what Pauline would … No,’ he straightened himself and spoke with obvious determination. ‘I’m sure I can put down three hundred, that’s definite, and with a bit of jiggling about I could probably scrape up another two later on, but that’s the limit, I’m afraid.’
Julia smiled kindly at him and he sat down, comforted.
Bobbie took heart from the foregoing conversations and stood up eagerly, hands gripping the table in front of her, eyes wide with excitement.
‘Me too,’ she whispered. ‘I mean, I know I can put down five hundred, and it might be more, it depends how long we have to save up. If you’re talking about July and it’s now early October; that means there’s about nine months, doesn’t it?’
Ursula Buchanan stood up, as usual scattering her belongings about her, a scarf here, handbag there.
‘Oh dear,’ she twittered. ‘I seem to be the only one who can’t pay anything at all. I only have my old age pension and there isn’t much left after I pay Henrietta for my keep.’
‘What?’
‘You’re kidding?’
‘Oh come on, you can’t be serious?’
There was an outcry at her remark. Rosemary looked carefully at the older woman to make sure she wasn’t fantasising. No, the doughy face looked just the same as usual, except that it sagged with disappointment.
‘Let’s get this straight, Ursula,’ she said gently, waving a peremptory hand at the rest. ‘Do you honestly mean you have to pay for your board and lodging to your sister-in-law? But surely she ought to be paying you, as her housekeeper? That’s monstrously unfair, you really mustn’t do such a thing.’
Ursula Buchanan’s hand shot to her mouth in terror. ‘Oh goodness, dear, I can’t argue with Henrietta. She would be most distressed and the doctor says she must be treated with extreme delicacy lest any upset bring on a stroke or a heart attack. And it is most kind of her to give me a home, you know, most kind.’
Seeing her obvious distress Julia motioned for quiet and changed the direction of the discussion.
‘All right, settle down for now. We’ll talk about that some other time. What it boils down to is that there are nine of us and we can only manage to pay something like half the amount needed, so we need to rustle up an additional five thousand, nine hundred pounds!’
She sat down rather quickly and drew her coffee mug towards her. You might as well say five million, she thought despondently, then she looked up as Rosemary Clavering stood up, clutching a sheaf of notes.
‘It’s not all doom and gloom,’ Rosemary announced hopefully. ‘Sorry, Julia, I didn’t have time to fill in all the details earlier. For a start, it’s a resort hotel; that means it’s all-inclusive, paid for up front so there are no other costs unless you want to go on outside excursions. Then, there are only nine of us and if we could find three other people to join in, particularly if they could pay their way – in fact they’d have to be able to pay their way. If we could get them we could call ourselves a group and this company here has a special offer for the later holidays, when the weather is likely to be unsettled, still hot but short bursts of torrential rain. It has to be before the school holidays start though, so we’re looking at the very beginning of July. I know it’s an awful lot of money but actually it’s a very good price, you know; it’s a new hotel and a new company and they’re prepared to do special deals, offer last-minute prices even this far in advance if we book now. They offer one free holiday for the group leader, but the group must consist of twelve people in total. More free holidays if there are more people, obviously, but that needn’t concern us.’
She was talking eagerly, trying to press the point home.
‘Don’t you see?’ she urged. ‘If we get those three extra people, we can cut down the outstanding balance, then all we have to find is something under four thousand pounds and, as Bobbie says, we’ve got nine months. It isn’t impossible.’
Her voice faltered a little on that last wildly optimistic note and she sat down to the accompaniment of muted applause.
Jamie Stuart took the floor now, bowing with his customary grace towards his hostess, Julia, who considered for the umpteenth time, how astonishing it was that a man of his age should still be so sexy.
‘Delia, Ursula and I have already put some thought into the matter,’ James Stuart explained. ‘We anticipated something of the sort; in fact it was obvious that we wouldn’t raise the whole sum straight away. We’ve come up with a few ideas as a start.’
‘Yes,’ Ursula interrupted eagerly. ‘Jumble sales and bring-and-buy sales, then maybe a raffle? And with Christmas coming up we ought to do quite well.’
She sat down smiling complacently and Julia’s heart sank at the thought of disillusioning the poor creature.
‘That’s all very well,’ she began gently and Rosemary nodded too, reluctantly. ‘But, Ursula, we can’t go around raising funds for West Indian holidays for ourselves! Think about it, nobody in their right minds would give us any
money for something like that.’
‘I’m not stupid, my dear,’ Ursula responded with hurt dignity, looking round in an appeal for support, which came at once in the form of an encouraging nod from Jamie. ‘I know that. What we thought was that we should announce our fund-raising as being for the “Old Folks”.’ She spoke in obvious capitals, and continued in the face of their stunned silence. ‘What we need to do is call ourselves something official-sounding – Evergreens or something similar, – and say we’re collecting to give older people some comforts. Apart from Sue and Bobbie we are Old Folks, and it’s perfectly true,’ she added defensively. ‘It would certainly be a great comfort to me.’
To her surprise Julia and Rosemary, after a moment of total, shocked amazement at the audacity of the idea, burst into hysterical giggles and collapsed together on the fat settee under the front window. Sue Merrill, who usually wore an expression of extreme gloom, cast a scandalised eye at them as she exclaimed: ‘But that’s immoral!’ Then, as Julia agreed, saying: ‘Of course it is,’ she gave a wry grin, which was followed by a guffaw from Jamie. Bobbie let loose a timid tee-hee and Marek uttered a series of short barks, presumably denoting mirth. There was even an outbreak of her characteristic cackle from Delia Muncaster who was seated in the big armchair, snuggled up in close companionship beside the sherry bottle.
Only Jonathan and Ursula herself looked bewildered.
‘It’s brilliant!’ Julia assured them. She and Rosemary had conducted a rapid whispered discussion on whether the plan was definitely illegal, dishonest or just blatantly immoral and decided, in view of the general approval, to shelve their scruples for the time being. ‘Utterly and completely brilliant, though whether it would come off is another matter. But of course you’re right, with Christmas on the horizon, nobody will be able to resist helping out the poor Old Folks. What should we call ourselves? I’m not too struck on Evergreens, I must say.’
‘Me neither,’ agreed Rosemary, still chuckling in spite of her nagging misgivings. ‘Any ideas, gang?’
