A Proper Family Christmas (31 page)

“Are you sure he said ‘
her
'?” said Frances gently.

“Of course. …Oh, did you think he was gay?” Kath chuckled, as if this was the funniest joke in the world. “No, I can put you right on that score! Oliver Leafield is definitely all man, - even if I didn't go all the way to proving it, if you get what I mean.” She winked at Frances. “I did tell him how I find older men so much more attractive than younger blokes, especially nicely-spoken, upper class types, - and a bit of substance behind them doesn't go amiss either. He got the message! He said he'd probably be popping down to Haseley again to finish off his article, and I don't think it's just old William he'll be coming to see. …Shall I take that, if you've finished?”

“Oh, - er, thank you.” Frances came back to earth as she handed Kath her empty bowl. It wasn't just food she'd brought her, - but food for a great deal of thought!

“It really isn't fair, - poor little Tobias had never played before! The children should have been given a start.”

“They should have been given a handicap, if you ask me! Quite unfair to pit their nimble little fingers against these stiff old hands.”

God, were they still arguing about that game?

“Oh come on, Gran, you very nearly won, from what I heard! If Oliver hadn't got that last minute King…”

“Yes, and that King of Clubs was mine,” Margery glared at the offender, who was heedlessly stirring the pan of soup. “I had it only three cards further down! …Mind you,” she went on generously, “if William had been here he would have beaten the lot of us. I don't know what possessed those three to sneak off like that!”

Hilary too had been a bit surprised that Julia and Tony had seen fit to disappear, just as everyone was about to start a game.

“Yes, we all might have liked to go to the pub, if we'd been invited!” complained Stephen, who had never been known to set foot in the White Hart. She saw his point though. If it was suddenly so essential to go for this drink, why take William along, and not the rest of them? …What, in short, were those two up to?

“I don't know whether we should wait for the others, or go ahead and have lunch,” she said doubtfully. The children had been fed some time ago, and persuaded to play in the garden under Shelley's reluctant guardianship. The rest of them were rather hungrily contemplating a plate piled high with crusty bread and slices of turkey.

“It is only sandwiches,” said Lesley, disregarding the exotic soup that Oliver had of course conjured up out of nothing.

“And this'll stay hot,” he said, without rancour.

“I suppose we'd better wait a bit longer then,” sighed Hilary, pretending not to see Leo's face fall.

Kath came back with Frances's bowl. “Well, that went down a treat, Oliver love!” So he was ‘love' now, was he? “…Just what the doctor ordered, you clever old chef, you!” She went up and gave him a squeeze as he stood by the stove.

“Thank you, Kath. I'm sure you'll be wanting to get off home now,” said Hilary. …Not that she showed the slightest sign of wanting to leave, but Hilary felt that she'd had about as much as she could take of Kath's company for the moment! …At least, to be fair, it was Oliver in Kath's company she found so trying, - the constant innuendoes and little jokes suggesting that whatever happened between them last night had made them the most intimate of friends, - lovers, even, the way Kath was behaving, - and Oliver seemed to encourage, rather than doing anything to dispel this impression.

“Oh! I thought Frances might fancy a cup of tea.”

“I'll make it. We really mustn't keep you hanging around any longer. …No, that's fine. We'll do our own washing up.”

Kath had finally departed, with a lingering look, but not quite kissing Oliver good-bye, when they heard Julia's voice in the hall.

“Hello, what are you all doing in the kitchen? I thought you were playing a game.”

“We finished that ages ago,” Margery told her.

“Really? Who won? …Oh, well done, Oliver darling! Daddy'll be ever so jealous. He loves Racing Demon.”

“If we'd known something else was being planned, we could have postponed it for another time,” said Lesley pointedly.

“Oh, - you didn't want to come with us, did you? We only popped down for a quick one before lunch.”

“Well it's ready now,” said Hilary. “Where's William? He must be hungry. You know how early he eats as a rule.”

“That's okay,” said Julia, “he's had his, - we all have. They do such nice meals at the pub, that we thought we might as well eat there. …Oh dear, I hope you weren't waiting for us!”

There was a pained silence. Margery rolled her eyes, and began to hand bowls out. Hilary did the same with the plates. Daniel grinned, and helped himself to one of the sandwiches. “I'll take this up and have it with Frances. Is that her tea?”

“How sweet! They can't be parted for a minute, can they?” cooed Julia, as he disappeared upstairs.

“What do you mean?” Lesley paused in the act of spooning soup.

“Oh darling, didn't you know?” Julia glanced round mischievously, as if they all shared a secret. “Daniel and Frances have got a thing going!”

“You mean, - they're romantically involved?” Only Stephen could put it like that.

“It seems so.”

“Isn't that nice?” said Hilary, knowing the Shirburns wouldn't agree.

“Darling Hilary's being very understanding.” Julia treated her to a sympathetic little smile, which set her teeth on edge.

“Rubbish! I've a lot of time for Frances.”

“Oh, of course, - she's a sweet girl.” A ‘but' hung in the air.

“Daniel's having a relationship with our
nanny
?” Stephen struggled to take it in. “Oh dear, I'm afraid that won't do.” He turned to Lesley for confirmation.

“No,” she came back to life, “no, I'm afraid it would be most unsuitable. …One has to think of Tobias, after all. He's at a most impressionable age.”

“Why? Are you afraid it might corrupt his morals?” Oliver couldn't help enquiring.

Aware of his amusement, Lesley glared nastily at him. “Yes, well, - you'd know!”

Oh God, - stupid woman! So
that
was why she and Stephen had always seemed so anxious to keep him at arm's length from their precious son. It was nothing to do with the damp patch in the pantry.

Oliver glanced round the table for enlightenment as to this unprovoked attack, but Margery could only give a mystified shrug, and Stephen dropped his gaze. Julia tittered and, failing to catch Hilary's eye, tried Leo, - but he, with his usual self-concern, was the only one of them carrying blithely on with his lunch. Hilary wanted to scream at Lesley that she was way behind the times. All the signs were that Oliver Leafield wasn't gay at all, even if he did have a very strange taste in women.

“Don't be ridiculous!” She felt she must say something. “Tobias won't care who his nanny is seeing, - and you can hardly tell her who she can or can't fall in love with!”

“But it'll make things so
awkward
…”

Yes, if Frances was attached to a member of the family, the Shirburns might have to start thinking of her as a human being instead of a servant. Most inconvenient for them!

“Can't you have a word with Daniel?”

“No of course I can't! Good heavens, do you think anything I said would put him off? Even if I did want to discourage the relationship, that would be the very worst way of going about it!”

“But you're his mother…”

“Precisely.”

“We men are very perverse,” explained Oliver.

He could say that again! …What could he possibly see in a woman who was such a contrast to him in every way, someone with absolutely no pretensions to culture or refinement, someone as plump, and brassy, and blatantly sexual as Kath Arncott? If that was his type, he might as
well
be gay as far as Hilary was concerned, because she herself certainly had no chance!

“So what are we going to do?”

“I don't know.” Daniel stared out of the window at where the children were playing in the garden.

Frances sipped her tea, relieved to be sharing the burden of her news. “At least Oliver's not gay, - but I
can't
believe he'd rather have her than your mother! I mean, Kath's very nice, but she's actually quite fat, and I wouldn't have called her pretty exactly, would you?”

“Well, I don't fancy her,” Daniel reassured her, “but then I go for slender, mousy little women, without much to say for themselves.” He pinched her knee. “A retiring sort of guy like Oliver
might
be attracted by that in-your-face approach, I suppose. You know what they say about opposites.”

Frances wrinkled her nose. Were men really that unpredictable when it came to sex? Perhaps they were.

“No,” Daniel went on suddenly, “he's keen on Mum, I know he is. We've just got to find a way of sorting things out and getting them back together.”

“Couldn't you have a little chat with him, - explain what happened?”

“You must be joking!” A look of horror came over Daniel's face. “What am I supposed to do, - take that poor guy aside, and tell him that everyone thought he was gay? I'm sorry, but no
way
!”

“We've been playing Desert Islands,” Tobias told his mother.

“That sounds fun, darling.”

“I was the castaway and Posy was the person who owned the island. She gave me special berries to eat.”

“
What
?”

“I wasn't sick,” Tobias assured her.

“But what did she give you? …Where's that girl, Shelley? Why didn't she stop her? …Stephen, come here at once! We must call a doctor!”

“Don't panic, Lesley,” Hilary tried to calm her. “He doesn't look at all ill. I'm sure he would be if he'd eaten anything poisonous.” …Daniel was coming down the stairs. Thank heaven!

“Okay, mate, how many of these things did you eat? Come and show me where you picked them, Posy.” He took charge, and led them into the garden.

He came back a short while later, grinning and mopping his brow. “Rose-hips. That won't do him any harm. No, it's all right, Lesley, - full of vitamin C.”

She would have been less reassured, however, if she'd heard what Daniel confided to Hilary when the children had been swept upstairs for a rest.

“That wretched girl really was trying to poison him, you know! She said that she hoped Tobias would die, because then she could live here all on her own when she's grown up!”

“Well, Nanny, how are you getting on?” …None the better for a visit from Lesley. “Stephen and I are very sorry to see you laid up. And Tobias is missing you badly. - There was a most unfortunate incident in the garden just now! …I wonder how long it will be before you're back on your feet?”

Okay, she got the message! The Shirburns loved her so much, they were desperate to enjoy the pleasure of her company again. She told her what the doctor had said, and watched Lesley contort her face in a ‘harrumph' of irritation. After that there wasn't much to talk about, since she obviously hadn't come to cheer her up with any little items of news or gossip, and Frances lay silent, waiting for her to go.

But instead, Lesley drummed her fingers, sighed and gazed out of the window. Eventually, just as Frances was plucking up courage to say that she really needed to sleep now, she spoke.

“I do hope you're not going to get involved in any silly distractions while you're here, Nanny.”

Frances stared at her perplexed. What did she have in mind, - wild games of Scrabble? An over-stimulating crossword puzzle?

“Stephen and I have always thought you were such a sensible girl, - quite unlike Tobias's last nanny! And it's Tobias that has to be considered here.”

No, she still couldn't put the clues together.

“Children need to know exactly where the boundaries are, don't they, in their little lives? We adults are more adaptable, but it's very confusing for a child if his perception of where those lines are drawn should be disturbed. Poor Tobias has already had enough to upset him recently, what with his adventure yesterday, and the incident this morning…”

Frances shook her head, still utterly mystified. What could she possibly have done, lying here in bed, to upset Tobias? He hadn't even visited her since her accident.

Lesley saw that she'd have to make herself clearer. At last she came out with it.

“I understand that you've embarked on some kind of romantic liaison with Daniel Watlington. …Whether or not his family look kindly on such a relationship, Stephen and I thought you should know that it really won't be acceptable to us, as your employers.”

Frances drew in a sharp breath of disbelief.

“We're only thinking of the effect it will have on Tobias. - He's very fond of his cousin. …As I said, you're a sensible girl,” Lesley went on, when Frances could find no reply to this
non sequitur
. “I'm sure you wouldn't want to cause any embarrassment, especially to young Daniel.” She patted the bedclothes in a would-be friendly manner. “We can't always follow our own desires, when there's other people to consider, can we?”

“Are we going to have Grime and Brine round again?” asked Posy, fresh from a ‘nap' in which Hilary suspected little sleeping had been done.

“No, darling, not today.”

“Can we go round to their house?”

“No,” Lesley backed Julia up, “Grime and Brine are busy this afternoon.”

“But Mrs. Arncott said they'd like to ‘return our hostipality',” Posy reminded her aunt with a sceptical look, “and they got
Roadkill V
for Christmas.”

“There are
much
nicer things we could play here,” said Lesley quickly, seeing her son about to express a heartfelt longing for
Roadkill V
.