Wild Grapes

by Elizabeth Aston

  “Guilty conscience?” Fergus, who had been feeling a heel, sat up in bed like a jack-in-a-box, and roared at Charlotte.

  Zoe, across the way, woke from her sound slumbers, lifted her head from her pillow, sent a telepathic message of sympathy to Fergus, covered her head with the sheet to shut out the noise, and went back to sleep.

  “No, I don’t care if I finish that bloody thesis or not. It doesn’t matter. I’m not going to have a university career, nor am I going to go and stew my life out in the City.”

  “What are you going to do, then?” Charlotte asked peevishly. She had dragged her nightdress on, feeling at a disadvantage when naked, and its white, ruffled prettiness annoyed Fergus intensely.

  “Why can’t you sleep in an old shirt or a T-shirt or something, like Zoe does?”

  “How do you know what Zoe sleeps in?” demanded Charlotte.

  “Oh, come on, we share a house, she potters round in her night things.”

  “Well, I’m glad you like looking at her in tatty things, but I’m afraid I’ve always worn these, and I shall continue to do so. Now, and when we’re married.”

  Fergus put his feet on the floor and buried his head in his hands. Then he gave himself a shake, leant back, and took Charlotte’s hand.

  “Look, Charlotte, I don’t want to get married. I’m not ready to get married.”

  Charlotte was quite unmoved. “No, of course not, not until you’ve got a job and are earning a good income.”

  “I’m not going to get a job, at least, not the kind of job you mean. And I doubt if I’m going to earn much money for the foreseeable future.”

  “Don’t be silly, darling. You’re just tired, and you’re never at your best in the middle of the night. Try and get some sleep and we’ll talk about it in the morning.”

  “No, I want to get things straight now.”

  Charlotte arranged her pillows behind her back, and then arranged herself, a helpful expression on her face.

  “Go ahead, then, tell me what’s worrying you.”

  Fergus didn’t want to tell her anything. He chiefly wanted to go to sleep, but on the other hand, perhaps it would be better to get it over with. Clear the air, he thought hopefully and mistakenly.

  Another shriek rent Zoe’s dreams. She stirred again, grumbled, “Oh, shut up in there, whatever you’re doing,” and drifted off into her happy sleep.

  “America? Australia? France? Learn about wine-making? I’ve never heard anything so ridiculous. Fergus, grow up, these are adolescent fantasies. You know perfectly well that you’re an economist. You’ve got the world at your feet, with your degree and qualifications, or you will have, once you’ve got your doctorate. And then, with Daddy’s help...”

  “Bugger Daddy,” said Fergus.

  Wilf and Madge had spent a pleasant evening, gossiping with locals and eavesdropping on Harry and Fergus.

  “That Jackie, she gone off with her young man.”

  “About time.”

  “He give her a good what for when he found out what she been up to with his dad.”

  “She need telling how to behave.”

  “Anyway, he said he’d forgive her, this once, but it weren’t to happen again. And he’s upped and offed with her, reckons he can make a good living somewheres else, don’t want to see his dad no more.”

  “I don’t see Bob’s dad giving up his little pleasures.”

  “Won’t find it so easy, now. Try it on one of Jackie’s friends, he did, got slapped good and proper. Sue Bunting, her whose husband ran off five years back with a black girl from the circus, she’d have him. For the farm and a tidy roof over her head. And she’s still a cosy armful, she’d keep him off the young ones.”

  Wilf ran a cloth over the bar, and nodded towards the garden where Fergus and Harry were deep in talk. “Listen to them. Harry’s telling that Fergus he’s going to marry that cousin of his, Gina.”

  “Don’t look like that Fergus is too keen on that.”

  “Harry want him as best man.”

  “That Fergus have got a young lady of his own. Good-looker, too, but bony. Coathanger in bed, I’ll be bound.”

  “I hear they don’t get on so well together. Fergus aren’t none too keen to be around with her.”

  “So this Gina be right for Harry?” Madge pulled another pint, pleased at the thought of a wedding at the Hall; could be good for business.

  “I don’t reckon. I don’t see no real liveliness in them.”

  “Many a slip,” said Wilf. “Pass that glass along, then, if you’ve finished.”

  Meanwhile, Gina was sleeping the sleep of the damned. She dreamt that she was awake. The curtains were drawn back, and flapping in a wild wind. The moonlight poured into her bedroom through bars at the window, filling the room with strange shadows. She went to the window, looked out between the thick black bars on to endless lawns. There were huge figures moving about on them, casting grotesque and threatening shadows.

  The figures were the Cordovan family, playing a slow-motion game of croquet. Giants, with giant mallets, Gina thought, and then she found herself outside, on the lawn, looking up at the great house bathed in moonlight. Bars were across every window, and voices whispered in her ear.

  “Gina, here,” said a voice behind her, with an eerie and unpleasant laugh. Gina turned to see who was speaking, and found it was Harry, strangely elongated, and dressed in a skin-tight version of his black leather gear, silver wings glittering on his boots and helmet.

  Gina began to run, round the side of the house, away from those menacing figures. Then the owls began to hoot, closer and closer. A white, feathery body flashed across her face, another buffeted her with its wings as it flew down. Huge, pale owls, all hooting with sad relish.

  The pool, thought Gina. The owls won’t come to the pool. In she plunged, to find that the crystal blue waters were dark and opaque. A figure beside the dolphin moved, how could it? What was it doing?

  Simply drowning you, it said in a high voice, with a silly giggle, and she felt her head being pushed down, down into deep black darkness.

  Gina woke with a start, drenched in sweat, and completely terrified. The room was indeed full of moonlight, but it was a pleasant, tranquil moonlight, coming in from an unbarred window, with the curtains hanging motionless on either side, where she had pulled them back before going to bed.

  Her throat was dry. She made herself sit up, still shaking from her bad dream, and reached out to turn the bedside light on. The soft light banished the shadows, showed Gina a familiar, friendly room.

  I must have eaten something that disagreed with me, Gina said to herself, to have such a dreadful dream. She opened the biscuit box and took out the ginger biscuits which Hester thoughtfully put in all the rooms. She couldn’t go back to sleep, not after such a dream. There was a radio by her bed, and she switched it on. The soothing tones of the World Service wafted into the room, and Gina settled back on the cushions to listen to a talk on political change in Hungary.

  Ten minutes later, the light still on, and the voice still speaking, Gina slipped gently down into her bed. The programme must have finished, she thought, with the last vestiges of consciousness, as the voice changed to that of her mother, imparting invaluable advice to a sullen teenager, years before.

  “Always listen to your dreams, Gina, because they tell you the truth.”

  “What nonsense,” thought Gina, as she fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.

  Charlotte left first thing in the morning, in a taxi.

  “I’ll drive you to the station,” said Fergus. “Please, Charlotte, it’s the least I can do.”

  “You’ve done enough,” said a steely-faced Charlotte. “I wouldn’t drive as far as the end of the road with you, thank you very much.”

  “Ouf,” said Zoe, as her taxi drove away. “Well done, Fergus.”

  Fergus looked dreadful. “Not well done at all,” he said morosely. “I’ve treated her very badly, but she’s much better off without m
e.”

  “I’m sure she is,” said Zoe soothingly. “Let me make you some coffee.”

  Fergus began to laugh. “Coffee, yes,” he said. “I’m spared a lifetime of faddy diets, do you realize that? Goodness, how did I put up with her for so long?” He stretched and plonked himself down in the armchair.

  Zoe looked at him with affection. “Just this once, I’ll wait on you,” she said. “How about sausages for breakfast?”

  “Great,” said Fergus. “First, I must ring the Hall and tell them I’m partnerless, I expect that’ll mess up the dinner arrangements. No, hang about, Zoe, why don’t you come with me? I’ll fix it with Aunt Julia.”

  “I’d love to,” said Zoe slightly wistfully, “but I haven’t got a dress.”

  “You have,” said Fergus. “I shoved one or two Jessicas in when I packed up her things. I thought you and Gina were as much a deserving cause as Oxfam.”

  “Which ones?” said Zoe.

  “A grey thing, and that dark blue one you like.”

  “You are clever,” said Zoe. “I’ll come; what a treat.”

  “That’s settled, then,” said Fergus, pleased. He picked up Zoe’s book which was on the table next to his chair, and his eyebrows rose. “This looks good,” he said, opening it and settling down to read. “Three sausages, please; no, four. I’m suddenly feeling very hungry.”

  CHAPTER 24

  As dawn broke on Midsummer Eve, a fine white mist wafted over the lawns and terraces of Heartsease Hall and hung about the great trees in the valley below.

  A yawning Guy was up at five, speeding about the silent house, shirtsleeves rolled up with matching precision, a grey apron round his waist.

  Esme was up soon after, full of beans, dressed in a huge pair of jeans and a sweatshirt which had seen better days. “If I’ve got to wear that black outfit and an apron this evening, then I’m going to be comfortable during the day,” she announced cheerfully. And off she slopped to check the pavilion, and throw back the flaps to let some air in.

  By eight the mist was gone, dissolved by a sun shining in a clear blue sky. Efficient men arrived in a large van with an artificial floor to lay on the grass in the sunken garden.

  “A brainwave of Nicky’s, that,” said Victor, expansive and authoritative as he strolled towards the fountain. He saw her in the distance and waved to her to come over.

  Not what Nicky wanted. Up all night with her itching, poorly son, and bothered this morning by signs of her daughter also throwing out a rash, she simply wanted to get on with everything before she collapsed in a heap.

  “It would be pretty,” Victor said, “if the fountain had coloured water.”

  Nicky sighed. “Yes, Victor. All seen to. And Harry’s fixing up extra lights, it will all look most attractive.”

  “Ah, might have known you’d have thought of it,” said Victor, slightly peeved that she had.

  “Is that all?” asked Nicky. “Because I have a lot to do.”

  “Of course, of course,” said Victor benevolently. “What would we do without you? Run along.”

  Grr, thought Nicky, as she walked at a deliberately slow pace towards the house.

  Hester was in a frenzy of airing and room rounds. Every bedroom in the house had been pressed into service, even the King’s Chamber, which, being small, dark and lit, for historical reasons, only by candles, was rarely used.

  “Who have you put in there, Hester?” asked Julia. “It will have to be someone sober, we can’t risk a fire through carelessness with candles.”

  “Family,” said Hester. “Gray and Cora. And I’ve put some battery-powered camping lamps in there which I found in Heartsbury last week.”

  “Which bathroom will they use?” Julia asked with a frown. “Gray might be family, and therefore obliged to put up with a certain amount of inconvenience. But we must remember that he is a very important and distinguished man in his own field.”

  Hester sighed. Gray could be as big a cheese as he liked, but to her he was still her tiresome younger brother. “I do, Julia,” she said. “I do remember it. And I think if the room was fit for a king, it will do for Gray. And they will use the blue bathroom, on the floor below.”

  Julia pursed her lips. “Sharing with Aimee?”

  “And several other guests,” said Hester. “Better than Marcus sharing with Aimee, you will agree, and I can’t make bathrooms when there aren’t any.” Then she whisked herself away to scatter more pot-pourri and unwrap more delicious little bars of soap before Julia could start on her hobby-horse of building a new wing, which would, one gathered, consist almost entirely of bathrooms.

  In the kitchen, all was organized chaos. The caterers, who would work under Maria’s directions, were due to arrive at eleven. Meanwhile, Maria was preparing vast quantities of strawberries. Gina was helping. “I must do something,” she said. “Nicky’s got everything under control, and there’s not much else I’m good at.” Tray after tray of glistening strawberries were laid out in a pantry on wide stone shelves, cleared especially for tonight. There was something blissful about the scale and the lusciousness of it all, thought Gina, as the dairy arrived with gallons of the thick cream which the county of Heartset was famous for.

  Guy was supervising the wines, chosen weeks before in consultation with Victor. This was the wine for the family and thirty other guests who would sit down to dinner in the Great Hall before the ball began officially at half past nine. Drinks for the ball itself had been delivered days before; white and sparkling wines were chilling in the gloomiest and coldest of the cellars while the bottles of red wine were stored in cardboard boxes across in one of the stables.

  Nicky flew into the kitchen. “The saxophone band will be here by six,” she said without preamble. “Twelve of them, and they’ll want dinner as well as supper halfway through the dance. And there’s the string quartet.”

  Maria nodded calmly. “I know this. The caterers will see to it.”

  “I’ve put them in the old dining-room,” went on Nicky.

  “Good thinking,” said Guy, as he went past with a trayful of silver. “They can leave their cases there and use the cloakroom under the stairs to change in. The disco team can go in there as well.”

  Maria poured a coffee for Nicky.

  “No time,” said Nicky.

  “Sit down, I insist,” said Maria, giving Nicky a firm shove. “Also some cake, you have had no breakfast, I can see, and you will pass out if you go on like this. How are the little ones?”

  “Don’t ask,” said Nicky, disposing of the coffee and cake at lightning speed; she had indeed needed them, she told Maria.

  “Good for her to be so busy,” observed Maria as Nicky whirled out of the kitchen to still more tasks. “This will take her mind off Don, and then she can think about her husband and children, which is much better.”

  “What a moralist you are,” said Guy.

  “The only one here, in that case,” said Maria with some asperity. “Now, take that tray from here at once, immediately, because otherwise I become angry.”

  At Heartwell House, Lori was in another great bustle of activity. She had Dr Aumbry and three other couples staying, and then more guests would be coming for dinner.

  “Thirteen,” she moaned. “It’s so unlucky. What can I do?”

  “What’s thirteen?” asked Gareth.

  “People, for dinner. You’ll have to help, Gareth, it’s too much for me to do.”

  “I have to work, surely you can understand that. While Alwyn’s here, we’ve got to use every available minute. I’m sure you can manage.”

  “With no Mrs Slubs, and bedrooms to get ready, quite apart from dinner. And we’ll be thirteen,” she wailed, returning to her first theme.

  “Put Melissa’s bear on a chair, for heaven’s sake,” said Gareth. “And why no Mrs Slubs? God knows, we pay that woman enough, the least she can do is be here when she’s wanted.”

  “Busy at the Hall,” said Lori crossly. “And no, there’s no o
ne else who can help; they’re all busy at the Hall.”

  “I’m sure you’ll cope,” said Gareth, his mind on eighteenth-century royal scandals. He removed himself swiftly, leaving Lori fuming in the kitchen.

  Lori felt like sitting down at the table and screaming, but that wasn’t her way. First, she’d finish the bedrooms. Then she’d find a bear, that was a good idea of Gareth’s, a witty touch for blase visitors, and enough to calm those who didn’t care to sit down as one of thirteen.

  Cold cherry soup, already made, reposing in the fridge. Vegetables to prepare, she could do those while listening to a favourite radio programme, if she got a move on with the bedrooms. At least Mrs Slubs had managed to make the beds when she made her last appearance a few days before. A brief air, a quick dust, towels, soap and all those little touches recommended for the well-run household... No, it shouldn’t take too long.

  Good thing she had decided on noisettes of lamb rather than fish, she told herself. Much less trouble. And then apple tart from the Hungarian patisserie in Heartsbury. She had planned strawberries, but Gareth had pointed out that they were bound to be serving strawberries at the ball. He didn’t particularly like them, and once in an evening would be quite enough.

  Don was quite unconcerned about playing host to a fair-sized party. One of his devoted attendants was seeing to it all, with a clutch of fellow admirers all too willing to troop up to his house and wait on him. He knew exactly what wines they would have at dinner, had agreed a menu with the delightful blonde from Heartsbury who was always more than happy to rush out to Heartsease and cook for him, and he thought no more about it.

  Fergus was struggling with an iron, under the amused eyes of Zoe and Sybil.

  “Do the sleeve, now,” said Sybil helpfully.

  Fergus wished he were a long way away, or that Charlotte had ironed his shirt before she flounced off.