Wilt in Nowhere

Chapter 4

Next day while Eva was busy in Ipford trying to decide what new clothes to buy for the quads Wilt made his own preparations. He knew now what he was going to do: go on a walking tour. He had found a rain cape in the form of an old army groundsheet, a suitably shabby rucksack and a water bottle from the Army & Navy stores, and had even considered buying a pair of khaki shorts that came down over his knees only to decide that his legs weren’t the sort to expose to the world and he didn’t want to go round the West Country looking like a superannuated Boy Scout. Instead he chose blue jeans and some thick socks to go with the walking boots Eva had bought for their family holiday in the Lake District. Wilt wasn’t sure about the walking boots. They were purpose-built for fell walking and he had no intention of going anywhere near anything resembling a fell. Tramping was all very well for them that liked that sort of thing but Wilt intended sauntering and not doing anything too strenuous. In fact it had occurred to him that it might be a good idea to find a canal and walk along the tow-path. Canals had to stick to the flat and when they came to anything resembling a hill they very sensibly made use of locks to get over them. On the other hand he couldn’t find any canals in the part of the world he had in mind to walk across. Rivers were his best bet. On the whole they took even easier ways than canals and there were bound to be footpaths beside them. And if there weren’t, he would take to fields provided there weren’t any bulls in them. Not that he knew anything about bulls except that they were dangerous.

There were other contingencies he had to take into account, like what would happen if he couldn’t find anywhere to sleep at night. He bought a sleeping-bag and took the lot back to his office and crammed it into a cupboard before locking it. He didn’t want Eva bursting in unexpectedly (she did this every now and then ostensibly to collect something from him like the car keys) and finding out what he really planned to do while she was away.

But Eva had her own problems to concentrate on. She was particularly worried about Samantha who didn’t want to go to America because the cousin of a friend at school had been to Miami and said she’d seen a man shot in the street there.

‘They’ve all got guns and the murder rate is terrible,’ she told Eva. ‘It’s a very violent society.’

‘I’m sure it’s not like that in Wilma. And besides, Uncle Wally is a very influential man and no one would dare do anything to make him angry,’ Eva told her.

Samantha was not convinced.

‘Dad said he’s a bombastic old bugger who thinks America rules the world…’

‘Never mind what your father says. And don’t use words like that in Wilma.’

‘What? Bombastic? Dad says that’s the operative word. Americans drop bombs in Afghanistan from thirty thousand feet and kill thousands of women and children.’

‘And miss the real targets too,’ said Emmeline.

‘You know perfectly well what word,’ Eva snapped before the quads could really get going. She wasn’t going to be drawn into using ‘bugger’ herself either.

Josephine didn’t help.

‘All bugger means is anal intercourse and–’

‘Shut your mouth. And don’t ever let me hear you using language like that in front of…well, anywhere. It’s disgusting.’

‘I can’t see why. It’s legal and gays do it all the time because they don’t have…’

But Eva was no longer listening. She was facing another problem.

Emmeline had just come downstairs with her pet rat. It was a long silver-haired tame rat she’d bought at a pet shop and had named Freddy and now she wanted to take it to Wilma to show Auntie Joanie.

‘Well, you can’t,’ Eva told her. ‘That’s out of the question. You know she has a horror of rats and mice.’

‘But he’s ever so friendly and he’d help her get over her phobia.’

Eva doubted it. Emmeline had trained it to make itself comfortable under her sweater and move about. She frequently did this when people came to tea and the effect on visitors was one of horror. Mrs Planton had actually fainted at the sight of what appeared to be a pubescent breast moving across Emmy’s chest.

‘In any case it’s illegal to take animals out of the country and bring them back again. It might have rabies. No, it’s not going and that’s my final word.’

Emmeline took Freddy up to her room and tried to think which of her friends would look after it.

All in all it was a harrowing evening and Eva was not in a good mood when Wilt came home looking rather pleased with himself. Eva always had the feeling that when he looked like that he was up to something.

‘I suppose you’ve been drinking again,’ she said to put him on the defensive.

‘As a matter of pure fact I haven’t touched a beer all day. I have put my past excesses behind me.’

‘Well, I wish you had put a lot of your filthy language behind you too instead of teaching the girls to talk like…like…well, to use filthy language.’

”Troopers’ is the word you were looking for,’ said Wilt.

‘Troopers? What do you mean ‘troopers’? If that is another filthy word I–’

‘It is an expression. Talking like troopers means–’

‘I don’t want to know. It’s bad enough having Josephine talking about buggery and anal intercourse without you coming home and encouraging them.’

‘I’m not encouraging them to talk about buggery. I don’t have to. They pick up far worse expressions at the Convent. Anyway, I’m not going to argue. I’m going to have a bath and think pure thoughts and then after supper I’m going to see what’s on TV.’

He stumped upstairs before Eva could get in a crack about the sort of thoughts he’d be having in the bath. In the event the bathroom was occupied by Emmeline. Wilt went downstairs and sat in the living room looking at the book on revolutionary theory and wondering how anyone in his right mind could still think bloody revolutions were a good thing. By the time Emmeline had finished with the bathroom it was too late for him to have his bath. Instead he washed and went down to supper where Eva was finding it impossible to persuade the quads to accept the clothes she had chosen for them to impress Auntie Joan with.

‘I’m not going to wear a silly dress that makes me look like something out of an old cowboy movie,’ Penelope said. ‘Not for anyone.’

‘But it’s gingham and you’ll all look so nice…’

‘We won’t. We’ll all look ridiculous. Why can’t we go in our own clothes?’

‘But you want to make a good impression, and old jeans and bovver boots…’

Wilt left them still arguing and took himself off to the spare bedroom which he used as his study and looked at an Ordnance Survey map of the West Country and the route he would follow on his tour. Brampton Abbotts, Kings Caple, Hoarwithy, Little Birch and up to Holme Lacy by way of Dewchurch. And beyond that over the Dinedor Hills to Hereford and the great cathedral there with the Mappa Mundi–the map of the known world when the world was young–and then on again following the River Wye through Sugwas Pool, Bridge Sollers, Mansell Gamage to Moccas and Bredwardine and finally to Hay-on-Wye and the little town of bookshops. He thought he would stay there for two or three days depending on the weather and the books he bought. After that he would head north again by way of Upper Hergest and Lower, which seemed to be above it in the map. It was an old map with a cloth back to it and it was difficult to read the names where it had been folded. It didn’t show the motorways or anything built after the War but that too suited him perfectly. He didn’t want the new England, he wanted old England and with names like those on the map he was bound to find it. By the time he went to bed the dispute downstairs had burnt itself out. Eva had given way on the gingham dresses and the quads had agreed not to go in their oldest and most patched jeans. Bower boots were out too.