The Colonel's Daughter (21 page)

‘Watch out for the books,' said Beryl.

‘I want to get you in, and just a suggestion of the balcony view . . .'

George's bottom rammed the bookcase. Beryl's mouth, composed primly for the photograph, fell open as she saw George and the books behind him begin to turn and revolve and finally disappear almost out of sight into a dark hole in the wall.

‘George!' she yelped.

George tipped. The camera was jolted out of his hand and fell to the ground. He clutched at the books, recovered his balance, found himself inside a clean cupboard, smelling of airwick, completely empty except for one bulky, familiar object, propped up in a corner, safe, intact and still radiating its extraordinary newness – his bag of golf clubs.

Beryl was now at George's side. ‘My God, George,' she said, ‘you looked like a person on the Paul Daniels Magic Show!'

‘Look,' said George, ‘just look.'

George picked up the camera and handed it to Beryl. He reached out for the leather strap of the golfing bag, hauled the bag out into the room, and let the false cupboard door revolve back into place behind him. Beryl said nothing, just watched as George touched the clubs in disbelief, examining each one, brushing a thin film of dust from the bag.

‘My God!' he said.

‘Well . . .' said Beryl.

Then George sighed, let the bag fall, walked very slowly to the balcony window and stared out. There was no wind on this day. The palm leaves hung limp and dry, the fringe of the parasol wasn't moving. Gentle, tropical air filled the room with warmth, the sun dappled it with sprigs of bright light. In two days, George thought, we will be in Suffolk and the calendar on my office wall will say November.

‘At least we found them,' said Beryl.

‘Yes,' said George quietly.

‘Now we can go back with everything we came with.'

‘Yes,' said George, but smiled a wide, astonished smile that Beryl never saw. She's wrong, he thought. We won't go back to England with all that we carried with us to America. There's a part of me which has been replaced.

The Stately Roller Coaster

I always say to the press, if you want me to blab, send me a pretty woman. You'll do. How old are you? Twenty-eight? You're not more than thirty, are you? Got a family, have you? Figure like Eleanor Roosevelt when she was thirty. Nice breasts. But too tall. How tall are you? Five ten? If more women had good breasts, they wouldn't need brassières. Can't stand to see the things curdling round their waists! One in seventeen of you get breast cancer. Know that, did you? I read it somewhere. P'raps you wrote it in your newspaper. One in seventeen.

That's it. You sit there. Lady Bressingham used to like that chair. My wife. She used to perch there and pat the dogs. Potty about those dogs! Let them clamber all over her, kiss their faces. She prefered them to our daughter. Women! Mothers, the lot of you. But my wife wanted to be mother to the spaniels. Let them into her bed. Turfed me out. Shooed me out into the dressing room and called to the dogs: Chuppy, Bimsie, Mac! Mac was short for Macassar. Lady Bressingham had an experience in Macassar, so she called the bloody dog after it.

Nice view from that chair. Think so? Used to be a bowl of flowers in front of the window, on that marquetry table. You could look out beyond the flowers if you wanted, or just look
at
the flowers. Lady Bressingham always looked
at
the flowers. Quite often she'd get up in the middle of a sentence and go and fiddle about with the flowers, rearranging them. But if I ever sit there, I look out of the window.

See the cedars? Planted by Gordon of Khartoum when he stayed here. Odd fellow, Gordon, they say. Mad as a hatter! The East does that – and the heat. If Lady Bressingham had stayed in Macassar, she'd have gone potty. But the cedars are jolly good. I like them. That was where it was going to begin – just beyond the cedars, just far enough so you couldn't see it if you sat in that chair. Can't remember the layout exactly, but I know the funfair was going to start there. Want to see the plans? Got them somewhere. Somebody called Curry did them: landscape man. Said he was ‘in' with the county council. Said there'd be no fiddle-faddle. Formality, he said, just a formality. But he was wrong. Had to go m'self, in the end, to see the council people. Half of them women. First meeting we had I was told the toilet provision was inadequate.

Like a glass of sherry? Bloody cold, these winters. Told Mrs Baxter to light the fire early today, but she didn't. Chuck another log on, will you? Pull the chair nearer, if you like. Lovely smile, you've got. Always thought newspaper people were a humourless lot. Lovely smile and breasts. Tell at a glance you're a hit with the chaps. Children, have you? Husband? Did I ask you that? Can't remember a damn thing these days. Lucky man whoever he is. Sherry's behind you. Help yourself.

Tell you a bit about the place, shall I? Built 1612. High Jacobean. Been in my family since 1789. Passed to the Bressinghams from the Villiers via the female line. Called Villiers Hall till 1901. Name changed by my father after the death of the Queen. Bressingham suits it better: stronger word. Lived here most of my life. Got to know it as a boy. Knew every inch of it then. Every birdsnest. No wireless. No TV then. You made your own life up. We had cricket out there on the lawn. And a camp in the spinney. Made a tree house with my cousins. Called it The Flat.

Curry wanted to chop down part of the spinney, stick the aviary there. I said no. I said, put the aviary where Lady Bressingham's rose garden used to be and stick the bloody toilets behind it. Then you'd have had a walkway straight from the aviary to the funfair. It made sense. You can let a spinney go wild and it's still a spinney, but rose gardens won't do unless they're tidy. Hate rose gardens, anyway! Tea roses! Disgusting fatty blobs. Don't like them, do you? Well, it's all overgrown anyway. Covered in convolvulus. Not worth saving. I'd have liked to hear parakeets there. Much better idea. So I convinced Curry. And I told poor old Flannery, my head gardener, just forget about Lady Bressingham's rose garden, Flannery, let it go, let the weeds get it, because that's where the aviary's going to be. He's older than me, Flannery. Live long, the Irish, if they don't kill each other. But he's getting like the house now: corners falling off him!

Blabbing enough for you, am I? Saying the right things? Tell you the best thing I thought up with Curry – the lion pit! We were going to have lions anyway, but I said, why not a pit? Get a lion-tamer – someone who'll make the brutes go docile – dress him in an anorak, give him a folding pushchair to hold, make him look like a one-parent family, then throw him in. Gladiator of the Week, we'd call it – every Sunday, sharp at three. Curry wasn't keen. Said we'd be contravening some Protection of the Public act, but I said, Curry, I know a good idea when I smell one. Take feeding time at any zoo across the country; it's the danger element people are dribbling for: the man going into the cage with the raw meat. And the trick was, they wouldn't know he was a lion tamer. I love tricks. They'd think the man was a social worker.

Never liked the winter. Gets dark too early. Sherry keeps me going. Top me up, will you? Nice ankles you've got, too. Remind me a bit of Daphne. Got a son have you? Daphne had a son. Can't remember the boy's name. Derek or Daren or something. Shouldn't be talking about any of that anyway. Often think Lady Bressingham's listening in from the Quinta San José – if she's still alive. We don't communicate, you see. She's there in the Quinta San José near Lisboa as she calls it. And I'm here. Dreadful name, Daphne. Don't you agree? Terribly common name. Daff, I called her. Make me a naughty boy, Daff! Lock the bloody door and get hold of me quickly! Sixty-two I was when Daphne came here, and randy as a trick cyclist. God, I was randy! Hadn't had sex for years with Lady Bressingham, but when Daff arrived I couldn't control myself. Like a sixteen year-old, I was. Called it charvering when I was young. Odd bloody word for it. Day and night I'd dream of it – in my Bentley, down at the spinney, on the floor behind this bloody desk – charvering Daff. Don't print it, will you? Not meant to blab about any of that, but my God, it's lonely here. That's why I was all for the funfair. And the lions, and the aviary. Bring a bit of life in. Friends of mine said, don't do it, old man. Ruin Bressingham, you will, destroy its character. But I said what the bloody good's character when the place is crumbling? I'll show you round when we've had the sherry. You can see for yourself what needs doing. Hasn't been touched, any of it, since Lady Bressingham left for Portugal. No money. Sold off a hundred acres to buy Lady Bressingham the Quinta San José. I heard she grows oranges. Mac must be dead by now. But I'd know if my wife was dead, I dare say. Some letter in Portugoose. Have solicitors out there, don't they? Lady Bressingham's name was Fidelity Belcher, before I got her. I seem to choose women with disagreeable names.

Like it on your newspaper, do you? Interesting life? On the road a lot, chasing scandals and people with breast cancer? They loathe a scandal in these parts. Want life to run flat, like a motorway. But I don't agree. I've always liked ups and downs. Look like a stick-in-the-mud, I know that, but I was the one who thought up the lion pit. It's the council who won't play. Curry said point nought nought fiddle-faddle, but what do we get in the end? Vetoes. You write that down, young woman. You put, ‘Lord Bressingham, 75, owner of Bressingham Hall, is being denied his chance to confront the world of today.'

My daughter would have approved. I thought of writing to her, to get her to come and talk some sense into the county council, but I don't know where she lives. The last I heard she was in Hackney. I grew up thinking all the poor of the nation lived in Hackney. Too bloody poor to breathe the sooty air! In the war, they sent evacuees out from Hackney, but we never took any in. Lady Bressingham disliked children. If they'd evacuated dogs, we'd have been over-run! We'd have had open house! Funny woman, Fidelity Belcher. Often hoped she'd tell me what happened in Macassar. Something damned odd. Something she never forgot. She's probably going round her orange trees in her sunhat, this very afternoon, remembering Macassar. Imagine that! My daughter could be with her, but I doubt it. She didn't like us much, either one of us. Left us the minute she could. Lived with an Indian in Hackney. I said okay, good for you, no harm done, forgive and forget. I'm a tolerant man for a Peer. House of Lords is jam-packed with intolerant men, but I'm not among them. I said, bring Simon to Bressingham. He was called Simon, this Indian chap, not Vindaloo or Biriani, as you might expect. Simon. So I said, you bring him down and we'll kill the fatted calf! Forgot calves are sacred! Put my foot right in it there, eh? No harm intended. But she never forgave me. Worse than that, she tried to punish me.

Ever had children? Didn't ask you before, did I? Daff had a son. I wrote to Daff when this funfair scheme got going, took the liberty of reminding her of certain afternoons in my Bentley, asked her to come and see me and see Curry's plans. But I never heard a word. Shame, really. Beautiful buttocks, Daff had. Marvellous little fanny. Don't mind me talking like this, do you? Open-minded girl, are you? I'd have married Daff but for Lady Bressingham's Catholicism. Daphne was willing. I was a very potent man at sixty-two. She used to scream and tear at me.
Women
! My wife in bed with the dogs; Daff yelling her head off in the back of the Bentley! I thought my life had gone potty. No, I did. She was thirty-four. Not much older than you. Marriage hadn't worked. Left landed with her son. Came to me as a secretary. Had me going the minute I clapped eyes on her. I was well endowed then. I banged her all the time, better than an undergraduate. And she wanted me to marry her. She pleaded. So I thought, why not? What a wife to get at sixty-two! My God, I thought, my life's going to be a bloody miracle. So I went to Lady Bressingham. She was in bed with Bimsie and Mac, tickling their tummies. I sat on her bed and said, I'm in love with Daphne and Daphne's in love with me and I want a divorce. She was in her nightie. She said, pass me my bedjacket. So I gave her the bedjacket and she said,
never.

There was a stink in the village, I can tell you. Lady Bressingham told them all – all the servants, all our friends, even the tradesmen and shopkeepers – my husband is unfaithful to me: my husband is betraying his name and mine. And poor Daff just couldn't take it. Those lovely screams of hers turned to hysteria. I did my level best to comfort her. I said, Daff, I may not be able to marry you, but I'll leave Bressingham and live with you in a flat. But no, she wanted marriage and that was that. She told me she was pregnant. What a to-do! Thought Bressingham would fall down round my ears! Never heard parakeets screech like Lady Bressingham screeched then. She began to break things, too. China ornaments. Vases. Hundreds of pounds she must have smashed. Terrifying! Then she went away. To Lisboa as she calls it.

Just by the by though, all that. The filling in life's pie – the colourful part. Most people hide those bits. But I'm quite fond of colour. I said to Curry, if we've got to provide toilets, let's do them orange and red striped like circus tents, let's make a feature of them. And if we're going to have a funfair, let's for heavens' sake have a good one, with fast machinery and all the thrills. I think I overdid it. Got carried away. But don't tell me people wouldn't have liked it. And the lion pit. Cracking idea. Better than anything Bath has at Longleat. Outdo 'em all!

Lovely view from that chair, don't you think? Like it, do you? I agree. But if it all goes on crumbling and sinking, you won't be able to sit there any more. They'll have to pull the old house down. Stick me in some geriatric establishment. Breaks my heart. A flat with Daff I wouldn't have minded. Far from it. But I dislike institutions. People fart a lot in institutions. Top me up, will you? Plenty more sherry in the cellar. Never run short of that. Don't suppose you could track my daughter down, could you? Wrote to that Hackney address, but my letter came back. My daughter could have a go at the council. She's a strong character. Told you she tried to punish me, did I? She wrote to Flannery and Mrs Baxter and all the staff, telling them what I should be paying them, telling them I was robbing them blind. Flannery showed me his letter. I was paying him half what my daughter told him he should be getting. So of course, he's never been happy since. I upped his wages a few pounds, but that didn't do. He threatened to leave. Leave, I told him. You leave, Flannery! You're too bloody old to work, anyway. But he never will. He eats practically free. He's got his cottage. He'll die there, or in the spinney poaching pheasants.