The Country Life

Chapter Ten

The back of the house was quite different from the front; although like a revolving door, some frustration in its design made it impossible to get a sense of both sides at once. Indeed, for some time as we made our slow progress up the lawn I was unable to articulate what constituted this difference, great though it was. The rear of the house seemed far older and more frail, and gave the impression of being ignorant of the monolithic grandeur of its façade, like a rich old aunt tucked out of view. It had a number of flowering vines and other greenery creeping up its walls in patterns of invasion, giving it that sprawling, colonized look which constitutes rusticity: an air of monitored decomposition, as if the house were being held on the brink of an elegant faint before it sank into the garden’s arms. At the very centre of the back wall was a glass appendage, like a prosthetic ear, in the shape of a beehive; a conservatory, I soon realized, within which I could discern a muffled profusion of fronds.

The garden which surrounded this fragrant heap consisted mostly of a large expanse of lawn, although to one side I could see the municipal architecture of the swimming pool, its undisturbed, unnatural blue lying flat on the grass like a fallen piece of sky. The lawn itself curiously sported a pattern of stripes — a piece of horticultural frivolity, I guessed, related to the cutting of hedges into the shapes of chickens or dogs — which rolled out towards us in a fan from the distant point of the conservatory. At the far end of the lawn was an arrangement of tables and chairs, upon one of which I could just make out the familiar form of Pamela. On another of the chairs sat a woman I did not recognize. From that distance the scene appeared very small, and the oppressive heat gave it an atmosphere of calcification which reminded me of the little plaster figurines which had populated my doll’s house when I was a child. It was odd and not entirely pleasant to remember this object, having not thought about it for years. The feeling that one’s own memories have become unfamiliar can give rise to the suspicion that one’s identity is malfunctioning and inefficient, like a badly run office. I had a sudden picture of pink plaster hams, and tiny plates to which coloured food was glued. Mr Madden appeared from the side of the house, as elliptical as a butler. Roy trotted heavily behind him. He was carrying a tray and when he reached the table he bent stiffly with it from the waist, distributing glasses which winked in the sunlight.

‘Look who’s here,’ said Martin from below. I was surprised to hear his voice, for although I had been pushing him along all of this time, I had grown so used to the action that the wheelchair, and to some degree Martin’s presence, seemed to have become a part of my own physical remit.

‘Who?’ I said, my voice lower than his, for we were now within fifty yards or so of the group.

‘My fucking sister,’ Martin volubly replied. ‘Come to see her mummy. Can’t keep her away.’

‘Does she live far?’ I enquired, toiling up a slight rise in the lawn.

‘Just a stone’s throw,’ said Martin in a fluting voice. ‘She wanted to stay near her mummy. I had hoped Dewek would take her away to Papua New Guinea so that they’d both be eaten by savages. Or at least as far as Tonbridge.’

‘Who’s Derek?’

‘Dewek,’ amended Martin. ‘Dewek is Caroline’s damp face flannel of a husband.’

‘There’s no need to be unkind,’ I said.

‘What do you know, anyway?’ said Martin, drumming his hands abstractedly on the arms of his chair. ‘Stel-la.’

Pamela had caught us in her sights and raised her hand in a salute of acknowledgement, using the other hand to shield her eyes, as if we were travellers sighted across a lonely reach of desert.

‘Hi-i!’ she called from afar, stretching the word in her customary fashion, her face split by a smile.

‘Hi!’ I called back.

Pamela was wearing a pea-green bikini and a pair of gold sandals. Around her neck glittered a thick gold chain, like a rope. The effect, as she sat glass in hand, was odd, as if she were at a party but had forgetfully come out in her underwear. The other woman — Martin’s sister, as I now knew, although she did not resemble him at all — was wearing a dress patterned with vivid tropical flowers. She was fairly plump, not in the dense, landscaped fashion of Mrs Barker, but rather as if she had been filled too full and had spilled over. She had straight fair hair cut in a kind of thatch above her forehead, the colour, if nothing else about her appearance, favouring Pamela. She watched our approach closely through dark glasses, like a secret agent. Even from a distance I took a more or less instant dislike to her. There was something despotic about her solid, suspicious face and bulk. I was beset by an image of her in army uniform, setting about some cringing cadet with a truncheon.

‘How did you get on?’ said Pamela, as we drew up to the table. The skin about her eyes looked very wrinkled in the sun, and her pupils glinted like tiny jewels kept in a crumpled handkerchief.

‘Fine,’ I said.

‘Mar-Mar?’ Pamela leaned forward slightly and concentrated her gaze on Martin. She was not, I decided, speaking in some alien dialect, but rather was deploying, or even inventing, a nickname. I was irritated by her concern, implying as it did a certain untrustworthiness or even outright menace on my part. ‘How about you?’

‘I’m fine,’ said Martin crossly, screwing up his face at her. He looked unwell in the strong light, his face as bleached and savage as a piece of rock.

‘Hello, Martin,’ said Caroline deliberately. Her voice startled me, for despite her looming presence her inertia had caused me to forget her, as one could forget a large mountain. ‘How are you? I’m fine, how are you, Caroline? Oh, fine, thank you, kind of you to ask.’

This surprising monologue was rapidly and sarcastically delivered, and rather knocked the stuffing out of any politeness which might have been on the agenda. All eyes turned to Caroline, who remained enigmatic and brutish behind her sunglasses.

‘Say hello to your sister, you scoundrel,’ said Pamela.

‘Hello, sister,’ said Martin.

‘I’m Caroline,’ said Caroline, evidently to me. She precipitated herself forward in her chair and extended her arm. The movement was unexpected, and the unpredictable shifting of her mass caused me instinctively to draw back, as if from the path of a landslide or falling boulder.

‘Stella. Nice to meet you,’ I added gamely, shaking her hand.

‘What will you have to drink, Stella? Martin?’ said Pamela. ‘We thought we’d have lunch out here, as it’s so glorious. If you’ve had enough of the sun just shout and Piers will put up the umbrella.’

Nobody said anything, and Pamela looked about with the bright, nervous movements of a bird.

‘I’ll have whatever you’re having,’ I said awkwardly, indicating their glasses. It sounded rather demanding, as if I were placing an order with a waitress.

‘Right!’ said Pamela. ‘I’ll go and rustle up Piers and see what’s happening with lunch. You lot just sit here and enjoy the sun.’

She stood up abruptly, as if she were upset, while the rest of us remained guiltily seated. I was surprised by the sight of Pamela’s body in her swimming costume. Her skin was brown and shrunken, like dried meat, and running up the pot of her belly was a seam of raised flesh, like a geographical feature on a relief map.

‘Do you want a hand, Mummy?’ said Caroline.

Martin made a strange noise beside me. When I looked at him, he was mouthing Caroline’s offer with an idiotic look on his face, his lips flapping like wings.

‘No, no, I don’t think so,’ said Pamela wearily. She hesitated for a moment, hand to her forehead, as if contemplating a landscape of strictures and duties by which she suddenly realized herself to be surrounded. Eventually she turned and trod lightly off, the soles of her sandals slapping against her feet.

The three of us were set adrift in uncertain silence. Pamela, the focus of our attention, being gone, it was required of us to re-form in a new constellation, and as it soon became evident that neither Martin nor I was equipped to set this orbit in motion, Caroline gathered herself up in her chair and took charge.

‘Mummy tells me you’re from London,’ she said, to me.

‘That’s right,’ I replied. I could see that I was to be interrogated, and felt that no more was required of me at this stage than to give clear and correct answers.

‘And you worked as a secretary, is that right?’

‘Yes.’

‘At a law firm.’

‘Yes.’

I should add that while these enquiries were being made, Caroline was indulging in a shameless inspection of my physical appearance, running the beam of her gaze up and down my body like a minesweeper. Despite keeping my own counsel in so far as I possibly could, I sensed that a deeper, unauthorized method of extraction was at work which I was powerless to prevent. Her appraisal was as penetrating and objective as an X-ray; and yet I felt that I was being sized up as a threat, although to what precisely I could not gather.

‘That sounds very respectable. Why did you leave? Did you feel there was no future for you at the firm?’

I deduced from the insinuating, indeed the downright challenging, nature of this question that I was being tested for the weakness of my character, and understood that this was the point at which I must establish my boundary; that if I did not, Caroline would invade and conquer, certain of victory.

‘On the contrary.’ Caroline’s sunglasses were beginning to unnerve me. They appeared to give her an advantage, shielding her from my remarks while at the same time preventing me from monitoring their effect. ‘The certainty of my future there was the very thing which enabled me to reject it. I dislike having too clear a view of what lies ahead. It lacks,’ I finished rather triumphantly, ‘adventure.’

Caroline seemed surprised and, for the moment at least, repelled by my reply. She retracted her interest as an animal would a probing tentacle and appeared to be reconsidering the situation. Martin gave a snort of laughter.

‘If adventure is what you want,’ she said presently, head held high, ‘then you must find things very quiet here. In fact, it is usually for its lack of adventure that people come to the country. We don’t really go in for that sort of thing here.’

‘Oh, I’ve had more than my fair share of excitement,’ I said. Keeping my eyes fixed on Caroline’s sunglasses was proving to be quite a strain. I was beginning to feel very uncomfortable from sitting so still in the heat, and longed to get up from my chair and move around. ‘By adventure I mean the unknown, really. I wanted to see a different side of life.’

Caroline snorted, evidently a family trait.

‘I’d hardly call Buckley a different side of life. Or Martin, for that matter.’

‘Thanks,’ said Martin.

‘You make it sound so dull here, and yet I find it interesting.’ The sun was getting at the side of my neck, and I was forced to unlock my gaze from Caroline’s and shift around in my chair. ‘I’ve only been here a day or two, but I feel that I’ve already learned a lot.’

‘Such as?’

Mercifully, at this point I heard the warning rattle of a tray behind me, and turned to see Mr Madden bearing down on us.

‘Hello!’ he said, looking from Martin to me and back again with stunned cheerfulness. ‘How did you two get on?’

‘Oh, fine!’ I said; a trifle too warmly, perhaps. The sight of Mr Madden, after the tension of my exchange with Caroline, had aroused in me a bounteous, doglike affection for him. ‘Martin showed me around. The rose garden is wonderful.’

‘Good, good!’ said Mr Madden vaguely. He seemed lost in thought for a moment or two. ‘Fresh air will have done you the world of good, old chap. Get some colour in your cheeks.’

‘I’m amazed you got him out of his room,’ chimed Caroline unexpectedly. Her next comment was addressed more generally to the group. ‘Mummy says it’s an absolute pit in there. It took Mrs Barker the whole morning to set it straight. It’s a bit selfish of you, Martin, wasting Mrs Barker’s time when there’s so much else to do. Why you can’t tidy up after yourself I don’t know. Mummy’s been at it all morning and she’s absolutely exhausted.’

It is difficult to convey the speed at which all of this was pronounced. Caroline’s diction was high-pitched and rapid, and when she delivered it her mouth moved extraordinarily quickly, as if she were gobbling food. The effect was not very attractive — we were all, I felt, watching it with equal fascination — for her lips were thin and downturned above the piston of her chin, whose motion was so automatic that it seemed possible that it would never stop. I was anticipating, half-gleefully, a vituperative response from Martin, and was surprised to see that he seemed to have fallen asleep in his chair.

‘Don’t be too hard on him, Caro,’ said Mr Madden, laden tray still in hand. ‘It’s difficult for us chaps to remember to tidy up. We’ve got other things on our minds, fighting wars and running things and suchlike, what?’

I laughed enthusiastically at this, and was mortified to hear my laughter make its solo flight across the table.

‘It just seems unfair on Mummy,’ said Caroline sullenly. ‘She’s got so much to do already, and only Mrs Barker to help her.’

I immediately regretted my rhapsodies about the rose garden, which in retrospect gave substance to the accusation that I was no help at all.

‘You’re giving me a headache,’ said Martin plaintively, opening one eye in a squint.

‘Take an aspirin, then,’ retorted Caroline.

‘Take one yourself,’ muttered Martin, sinking his chin into his small, puffy chest. ‘Not that it would make you less of a pain.’

‘Oh, I’m dying!’ said Caroline, melodramatically clutching at her heart with her two plump hands.

‘Right!’ blustered Mr Madden, intervening with his tray and dealing the drinks one by one. ‘That’s enough, you two. Lunch’ll be ready any minute, so let’s clear some space here, shall we, and I’ll give Mummy a hand bringing it out.’

I jumped to my feet as if at a starter’s pistol and began collecting the empty glasses strewn about the table. I could feel Caroline’s eyes on me again behind her sunglasses; or rather, on my body, measuring it as exactly as if she were fitting me for a garment. After a while she folded her arms and looked away across the garden, her lips as pursed as if there were a drawstring threaded through them.

‘Shall I take them inside?’ I said to Mr Madden.

‘No, no,’ he replied. ‘Just sit down, why don’t you?’

I sensed the mildest irritation in his reply, and had an indistinct memory of annoying him before with a similar display of keenness. Searching for this incident, the recollection of Pamela’s unfortunate remarks concerning my feelings for Mr Madden — overheard from the cottage garden — returned forcefully to me instead. I snatched my hands away from the table and held them trembling behind my back. I felt myself dangerously capable of directing some obscenity, or even a punch or kick, at Mr Madden, merely to prove my lack of fondness for him. I sat down again; and when I saw the look of affront on Caroline’s face felt my situation to be rather miserable. Caroline evidently thought it inappropriate that I, a paid domestic, should sit with her, the daughter of the house, while its owners were scurrying about in the effort to serve us. Mr Madden had, however, spoken; and with the question of my fancy already so publicized, I was not about to confirm it in full view of witnesses by pestering him further.

‘What do you do, Caroline?’ I sociably enquired instead. My comment had been automatic, an embarrassed reflex, and I was rewarded for my heedlessness by a glacial stare.

‘What do you mean?’ Caroline eventually replied.

‘I was asking whether you worked,’ I hastily amended. This sounded in some way rude. ‘Or whether…’ For some reason I could think of no alternative, and was compelled to trail off.

‘I am a housewife.’

My lips formed the reply ‘Oh’, but my voice failed to follow it through, leaving us in silence.

‘You disapprove of that, do you?’ said Caroline. ‘Are you one of these feminists?’

‘Well,’ I began. My skin was now in torment, and I wished that I had been in a position to ask Mr Madden to hoist the umbrella.

‘I personally don’t feel the slightest need to compete with my husband,’ continued Caroline. ‘I am not insecure. Were we desperately short of money, then that would perhaps be different. Of course I would do everything I could, but I would regard it as a misfortune. It would be embarrassing for my friends, and above all for Derek. As it is we are very comfortable.’

‘Good,’ I said, placing one hand surreptitiously upon my cheek.

‘There is a woman, for example, in our village,’ said Caroline, entrenching herself deeper in her chair, ‘who has been driven by necessity to take a job in some kind of shop, ladies’ fashions I believe, in Tonbridge. She used to live in the Rectory with her husband, but then he walked out on her, ran off with his secretary or somesuch, and she had to go it alone. Sold the house, put the children in the local school.’

‘That’s awful,’ I said, sympathetically.

‘We’ve all tried our best to support her, but it is difficult. At one point, Derek and I thought we might buy the Rectory from her to sort of help her out, but she had it on at such a ridiculous price and wouldn’t consider selling it for less, even to friends. Personally, I think she should have moved right away from the village. We all used to knock about together, you see, but it’s harder to invite a single woman to things, and she obviously isn’t entertaining any more. I mean that in both senses of the word.’ She smiled, surprised at her own unintended cleverness. ‘She’s so down these days that one ends up just having her to supper in the kitchen, lest she bursts into tears or something. Some of the wives say they won’t even have her in the house any more because she gets very aggressive with the men after she’s had a drink or two. And of course the children have turned into savages at that dreadful school. The others don’t want to play with them.’

‘Poor woman!’ I cried, my own problems for the time being forgotten.

‘I suppose so,’ said Caroline after a pause. ‘But you shouldn’t feel too sorry for her. Things could have gone very differently if she had acted with a little grace. I’m afraid to say that she has behaved — inappropriately. Working in a shop!’ She shook her head. ‘One or two of the wives went in, not realizing, of course, and said it was quite dreadful when she came from behind the counter. Doing the hard sell, you know.’

‘Surely it’s not her fault if her husband left her?’ I objected. ‘What else could she have done?’

‘Well, whose fault could it be?’ said Caroline, amazed. ‘She can’t have been doing her duty to him.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘There are certain things,’ said she mysteriously, ‘that a woman is expected to do for her husband. You might not always feel like it. But you do it. I don’t think Miriam quite saw it like that. She used to say as much. It’s no wonder, really, that he went elsewhere in the end.’

I was quite shocked by Caroline’s remarks, and by the assurance with which she made them. The fact that her sympathies lay so far from my own was perhaps to be expected, given the evident differences between us; but it was the confidence of her views rather than their substance which disturbed me. It surprised me to feel a strong and in some way reciprocal identification with Miriam, as if we were two lighthouses telegraphing flashes of sympathy to one another across a dark and treacherous sea. This identification did not please me. It suggested that Miriam and I belonged to some form of minority, with its attendant dangers of exclusion and victimization.

‘Martin!’ called Caroline suddenly. ‘Don’t just go off! We’re about to have lunch.’

During our conversation, Martin had been edging his wheelchair further and further away from the table. So subtly had he moved that I had not really been aware of it; but when I looked round, I saw that he had materialized beside a far-off flower bed. He was throwing a stick for Roy, who jogged slowly off to retrieve it, his black belly heaving. He did not return smartly to the table on Caroline’s orders, but rather affected not to have heard her, and once Roy had been dispatched seemed engrossed by his inspection of a small bush. To my dismay, all at once Caroline dislodged herself violently from her seat and rose in such precipitate anger that the entire doll’s arrangement of table and chairs lurched as she thrashed among them, seeking an exit. She displaced an obstructing chair with one powerful hand, and stormed across the grass towards the inadvertent Martin, whose neck seemed visibly to bristle at her approach behind him. With alarming speed she reached him and, disengaging the brake with her foot, whirled him around so that his hair positively flew and began to propel him back towards the table. I could see her mouth moving, although I could not hear what she was saying.

‘Now just stay here!’ she panted, bringing him to an abrupt halt at the table and slamming down the brake with her foot. Martin looked so fragile beside her, and so crumpled by his brutal journey, that I genuinely feared for his health; but it was not a good time to be making solicitous enquiries, which would undoubtedly be taken as a form of insurrection by our general. ‘You’ve got all of us running around after you in this heat!’ she exclaimed, suitably glistening and red-faced. ‘You can’t bear not to have all the attention, can you? You can’t bear the fact that other people can sit and have a perfectly nice conversation without your help.’ I was flattered, but not reassured, by this. ‘No, you’ve got to make everyone stop what they’re doing and give all their attention to you. You can’t bear it if—’

‘Shut up!’ said Martin, putting his large hands over his ears.

‘No I won’t shut up!’ shrilled Caroline. ‘How dare you speak to me like that? I’ll tell Mummy—’

‘Just shut up!’ shrieked Martin, his small body puffing like a pair of bellows. ‘You stupid fat cow! Do you have any idea how your fat voice sounds, nya, nya, nya’ — he worked his chin in an admirable imitation — ‘Mummy this, Mummy that, it’s no wonder Dewek’s such a zombie, it must be like living with a fucking pneumatic drill!’

‘MUMMY!’ hollered Caroline in panic, her mouth opened so wide that I could see her pink and trilling tonsils, ‘MUMMY!’

‘Da-da-da-da,’ said Martin, apparently drilling, but in fact sounding, more menacingly, like a machine-gun. ‘Da-da-da-da.’

‘JUST STOP IT!’ she roared, her body writhing.

‘What on earth is going on out here?’ said Pamela, arriving at the scene with the accuracy and effect of a missile, bringing a sudden and deathly silence. ‘What can you possibly be thinking of, making all this noise?’

She pushed her way through to the table and stood, to my dismay, glowering at me, hands on her hips. I shrugged and looked at Caroline.

‘He’s doing it again!’ moaned Caroline. Her face was a wreck of emotion, awash with tears. I felt rather sorry for her. ‘He’s said the most awful things!’

‘Oh, for God’s sake, Martin.’ Pamela put her hand to her forehead. Caroline cried out again in fresh agony. ‘Get a grip on yourself, Caroline, for Heaven’s sake. What must Stella think?’

All eyes turned to me. At that moment, there was a jostling around my legs beneath the table, and something wet and viscous impressed itself on my knee. I gave a yelp of horror and looked down to see Roy’s dripping muzzle nosing between my thighs.

‘If you two can’t get on, then we shall just have to stop doing things as a family. Do you hear? I won’t have it! I won’t!’

I forced my thighs together so powerfully that Roy’s head jerked back and impacted with a thud on the underside of the table. I wiped the damp flesh of my leg surreptitiously with my hand.

‘Sorry,’ mumbled Martin, magnanimously.

‘Caroline?’

‘Well, I really don’t see why I should apologize, when—’

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ said Martin.

‘Martin! I’m bloody well warning you! One more word! Caroline, get on and apologize.’

‘Mummy.’

‘Do it, or you’re going home.’

‘You’ll be sorry for this,’ said Caroline, apparently to all of us. Martyred tears streamed down her cheeks. ‘Just you wait. You’ve spoilt everything. This was supposed to be a wonderful day, and now it’s all been spoilt.’

‘Nonsense,’ said Pamela briskly.

‘It’s not nonsense!’ wailed Caroline, stamping her foot upon the grass. ‘Oh, you’re all so awful, I don’t see why I should tell you anyway! I’m just going to go home!’

‘Tell us what, darling?’ said Pamela, in a more conciliatory tone.

Now that she had recouped some sympathy, Caroline struck an attitude at once sullen and composed, her head hung low.

‘I just wanted to tell you all,’ she said, generously including me, ‘that Derek and I are going to have a baby.’

Pamela shrieked so loudly that I started from my chair, thinking her to be in pain.

‘My darling girl!’ she cried, flinging her arms around Caroline. Even in that moment of high emotion, I could not help noticing how slim, eager Pamela looked more like Caroline’s daughter than her mother. ‘Oh, well done you! Oh, how absolutely wonderful!’

Thus deluged by appreciation, but still not wanting her injury to be forgotten, Caroline was faced by the difficult task of appearing pleased and hurt at the same time: she achieved this with an attitude of weary vindication, like a plaintiff emerging from a courtroom to a cheering crowd after a long but successful fight against injustice.

‘Oh, where’s Daddy? Piers! Piers! Come out here!’ called Pamela. ‘I’m delighted, darling! Oh look, I’m crying now.’ Pamela swiped at one or two crystal beads about her eyes. ‘What marvellous news.’

You may think me horribly small-minded, but the fact that Caroline had avoided — albeit in style — making her apology to Martin preyed upon my mind. I found myself watching her, in much the same way as she had observed me earlier, and was rather gratified to see her grow self-conscious beneath my gaze. She turned her head this way and that, and once even placed her hands across her belly and made rubbing motions, as one would rub a lamp to conjure a genie.

‘Martin?’ she said finally. ‘Haven’t you got anything to say?’

I was most interested by this development, it being evident to me that Caroline had vowed, as far as she was able, to resist giving any further attention to Martin by eliciting his response to her news. A confrontation would undoubtedly ensue, and Caroline, I saw, had wanted to capitalize on her current sainthood by being seen not to provoke one. She had, however, failed in this resolution, thus proving, to my mind, both that her feelings for Martin were deep and complex, and, perhaps consequently, that she cared more for his opinion than for that of anyone else.

‘I’m very pleased for you both,’ said Martin, quite the gentleman.

‘You don’t sound it,’ snapped Caroline; giving me, at least, the satisfaction of believing that my diagnosis had been correct.

‘It’s great news,’ said I, heroically. ‘I’m sure you’ll make an excellent mother.’

‘Thank you, Stella,’ Caroline replied, nonetheless making it disdainfully clear that her ability at motherhood had never been in doubt.

‘Golly!’ said Piers, whom Pamela had by now retrieved from the house. He kissed Caroline on the cheek, smiling so hard that the rest of his features retired in defeat. ‘Well done, Caro!’

‘Isn’t it great?’ beamed Pamela. ‘Goodness, we haven’t even asked you when it’s due to land!’

‘February,’ blushed Caroline.

‘Ah!’ cried Pamela and Piers, in unison.

‘I was born in February,’ said I. I had not really considered what I hoped to gain by this announcement, but the fact that I knew Caroline so little made any other kind of contribution difficult. As a coincidence it was not, admittedly, much; and it struck me that by promulgating myself as an advertisement for a February birth, I could be seen to be issuing a threat rather than a consolation. ‘It’s a good month,’ I continued, as the others seemed rather nonplussed. ‘You don’t get depressed after Christmas because you know there are more presents on the way.’

‘True, true,’ mused Mr Madden.

‘Right!’ said Pamela. ‘Shall we all drink to Caroline’s baby? Has everybody got a glass?’

‘And Derek’s,’ pouted Caroline. ‘It’s his baby just as much as it is mine.’

‘Sorry, darling. Caroline and Derek’s baby. Everyone got something to drink? Caroline?’

‘I’m not drinking,’ said Caroline bashfully, her hand on her stomach again.

We raised our glasses, which had become warm in the sun. Afterwards, nobody seemed to have very much to say. The congratulations having been exhausted, still it seemed rude to change the subject.

‘I think I’ll bring out the lunch,’ said Mr Madden finally.

‘Oh, would you?’ said Pamela. ‘You are a dear. Have you thought of any names, darling? I might be able to suggest one or two if you’re stuck.’

‘We thought we’d call it Hugh if it was a boy,’ said Caroline. I was perplexed, thinking her to have said ‘you’. It seemed to me a confusingly renegade feminist stand, considering Caroline’s earlier remarks. ‘If it’s a girl we’ll probably call her after Derek’s mother. Margaret.’

‘That’s rather an elderly name for a little girl, isn’t it?’ said Pamela, after a pause. ‘Don’t you think?’ she coaxed, when Caroline did not answer.

‘Obviously we don’t,’ Caroline coolly replied, ‘otherwise we wouldn’t have chosen it.’

Tension had entered the scene stealthily and without warning. I wondered if Pamela was offended that the baby was not going to be named for her, and then thought that perhaps Derek’s mother had died.

‘Well, Maggie will be delighted, anyway,’ said Pamela grimly. Derek’s mother was evidently still with us. ‘Have you told her? About the baby, I mean?’

Caroline hesitated, which of course made what she said next sound like a lie, although whether this was deliberate or not I could not tell.

‘No,’ she said finally. ‘We thought we’d pop down to Hastings this evening.’

‘Ah,’ said Pamela, nodding energetically. ‘Piers!’ she called to Mr Madden, who was by now making his laboured progress back across the lawn towards us. ‘You couldn’t be a darling and put up the umbrella, could you? It’s utterly scorching out here.’

Mr Madden nodded heavily and, depositing the tray upon the grass, turned obediently on his heel. I was pleased by this news, for I had been driven by now to place a hand over either cheek, which I was concerned was giving an impression of theatrical dismay. Martin had been so quiet that I had assumed him to be asleep, but when I glanced at him I saw that his eyes were wide open. I had the feeling that he had been staring at me.

‘Are you all right?’ I said, all at once remembering my role in this family drama. ‘Do you want a hat or something?’

Martin shook his head.

‘Are you overheating, darling?’ intervened Pamela. ‘Daddy will have the umbrella up in a minute.’

‘I’m fine,’ said Martin impatiently. A look of resentment was fired off at me. I gathered that Martin, contrary to Caroline’s theories, disliked having attention directed towards him.

‘Goodness,’ said Pamela, looking at her watch. ‘You’re due at the centre any minute. We’d better get on with lunch.’

The mention of the centre naturally brought the driving issue once more to the foreground, and I wondered if, with the element of change Caroline’s announcement had introduced, Pamela’s offer to drive Martin herself would still stand. I had a discomfiting sense of having let go of the situation somewhat. I could not remember any of my plans for negotiating the difficulty, and indeed felt that it had regained all of its former complexity and more. Like a child trying to recall how to tie its shoelaces, I found it hard to believe that I had ever mastered the method of this particular deception, having now forgotten so completely how to do so. Were Pamela to ask me now to drive, I would, I knew, undo myself utterly.

‘Stella, are you ready to shoot off with him as soon as lunch is over?’ said Pamela.

The lawn and sky went briefly out of focus in the ensuing silence.

‘Yes,’ I said, nodding my head with confidence.

‘Actually, I could drop him off on my way home,’ said Caroline, whom I thought I would never learn to love. ‘I go right through Buckley.’

‘He’ll need to go straight off,’ said Pamela doubtfully. I was tempted to reach across the table and bludgeon her over the head with my heavy crystal glass. ‘Don’t you want to stay and have a swim?’

‘No,’ said Caroline, rising ever higher in my estimation. ‘No, I’ve got to get back. I’ve got such a lot to do. And Martin and I can have a nice chat on the way.’

My betrayal of Martin was regrettable, I can admit; but my instincts of self-preservation were in this instance too forceful. I risked a glance at the condemned and was met by narrowed eyes. He mouthed something which I could not decipher but which I took to be an explicit promise of revenge. Much as I longed to offer him some apology, under the present circumstances it was impossible. Now committed to a selfish course, I wondered instead whether Pamela would offer me a swim during the afternoon; and if not, how I could tempt such an offer from her.

‘Dig in, everybody!’ cried Pamela, as Piers discharged his freight of laden bowls and platters upon the table. He produced a large parasol and began to wrestle with it. ‘Come on, Stella, don’t be shy.’ She looked around at us all. ‘Oh, what a happy day!’