A Proper Family Christmas (5 page)

“Yes, I've always found you a remarkably intelligent woman.” He paused, presumably waiting for an embarrassed disclaimer, or an expression of gratification, while she exercised her remarkable intelligence in trying to hit upon one more good reason to keep him away.

She tried a last pre-emptive strike. “Well, wish me luck at Haseley then. We must meet up after Christmas and I'll tell you all the gory details…”

“When were you planning to leave?”

“Tomorrow afternoon. I must go and finish packing.” She stood up, ready to put the phone down.

“I might as well give you a lift then.”

“What? …Oh no!” Defeat snatched from the jaws of Victory.

“Well, how else are you going to get there? Hasn't Daniel got the car?”

“I've booked the train,” she fibbed desperately.

“But it's miles from a railway station! You'd have to get a taxi all the way from Cheltenham.”

“There's a bus to Cirencester…” Hilary knew she was losing this. No one could deny it was a nightmare journey to Haseley by public transport.

“I insist on driving you down. I don't mind going a little out of my way,” said Leo magnanimously.

Hilary gave up.

“Oh well - thank you, Leo.”

“I'll pick you up about three. You won't keep me waiting, will you?”

“No,” sighed Hilary. “I'll be raring to go.”

Frances, strapped in the back of the car with a restless Tobias, found the journey to Gloucestershire tedious. Stephen was basically a nervous driver, keeping to a steady fifty on the dual carriageway while hugging the centre line, but every now and then, when Frances peered round the head-rests obstructing her view, she caught him taking the most horrendous risks. Lesley didn't seem to notice, despite her running commentary on his and other road users' shortcomings, but then she had the advantage of being a non-driver.

Frances retreated back behind the head-rests and turned her attention to Tobias, who had tired of the journey almost before they had left the suburbs. Her efforts to entertain him were rather inhibited by the presence of the passengers in the front seat.

“Let's see who can spot the most yellow vans.”

“I can't see any.”

“Well, horses, then. There's one in that field.”

“There aren't any more.”

“There might be, in a minute.”

“Actually, we're coming to a town now, so it's not really fair on him.”

“Are you feeling sick, Tobias?” Lesley screwed round in her seat. “He sometimes does feel sick in cars.”

Her son weighed up the idea, and decided in favour.

“Yes. I need a sweetie.”

“Oh - did Daddy remember to bring any sweeties?”

“Daddy thought Mummy was packing the food, actually.”

“Actually, Mummy thought things for the car were Daddy's responsibility.”

“I've got some peppermints in my bag,” said Frances.

“I'm afraid Tobias doesn't like mints.”

“Shall I read you a story?” Frances saw that Lesley was about to suggest looking for a sweet-shop in the middle of the Witney bypass. “We brought ‘The Little Blue Elephant', didn't we?”

Tobias eyed the book, wondering how much fuss to make about the sweet, and Frances hastily began to read.

He interrupted after a sentence or two. “Are we nearly there yet?”, and this became his refrain every few miles for the rest of the way. Frances, trying to read in a jolting car in bad light, began to feel sick herself.

“I'd like one of those,” said Tobias, watching her unwrap a mint.

He finally fell asleep as they turned up the steep lane which led to Haseley village, and Frances was able to look around her.

She found that they were high up. A sweeping view of fields in every shade of brown and green stretched into the distance, lit softly by the low winter sun. The lane was bordered by an old wall, its patchwork of grey stone, green moss and yellow lichen echoing the fields beyond. The little hedged paddocks round her own village seemed suburban by contrast.

“It's beautiful!” she exclaimed. “What a lovely place it must have been to grow up in.”

Lesley turned and put an angry finger to her lips, indicating the sleeping child.

“It's all right in the summer, I suppose,” said Stephen, who hadn't seen her. “But of course there's no one to talk to - no one intellectual, I mean.” He nodded dismissively at the cottages they were now passing. “Haseley's the only decent house for miles.”

Frances looked at the indecent houses huddled cosily under thatched roofs, glimpses of Christmas trees glittering in the windows, and felt a pang of homesickness.

“Here it is!”

The car turned between a pair of gaunt stone pillars and up a driveway shrouded by gloomy evergreens. Then suddenly the view opened out, revealing the house in all its glory.

“Ugh!” Frances gasped.

A Victorian monstrosity was the phrase that came to mind. It was like something out of a Gothic horror film. She gaped incredulously, taking in the battlements, the gargoyles, the stained-glass windows, and a huge turret at one end.

“It is rather fine, isn't it?” said Stephen. “Better than anything in North Oxford, I always think.”

They had drawn up beside a flight of steps leading to an ornate Tudor-style porch. Lesley glared at the closed oak door.

“You'll have to ring the bell, Stephen. You'd think Father might have opened the door when he heard the car! Oh dear, how are we going to get Tobias out without waking him?”

Frances knew this was impossible, and steeled herself for the wail as Tobias was extracted from his safety-harness. He was building up to full cry as she struggled up the steps with him, just as the door opened to reveal William Shirburn, unwelcome written all over his face.

“Here we are, Dad! Here at last.”

“I told you not to wake him! Let us in, Father, please!”

William's features screwed up to match his grandson's. He stepped aside, glaring at the disappointingly thin nanny and her burden of wailing child.

“He's very tired, poor little thing. Are you hungry, precious? Put him down, Nanny, he hates being carried. - This is Nanny, by the way.”

“Frances,” said Frances, lowering Tobias to the floor thankfully. He clung to her legs, angry at this sudden loss of status.

“I expect you'd like a nice eggie. Has Granddad got any nice eggies?”

“No,” lied William.

“He may be feeling sick. Are you feeling sick, Tobias?”

“The W.C.'s over there,” said William helpfully.

“What about a hot bath?” suggested Frances.

“You'll have to put the immersion on if you want baths. I can't afford constant hot water,” William lied again.

At that moment, Kath Arncott came to the rescue. She had stayed on rather longer than usual that morning on the pretext of making sure everything was all right for the Shirburns when they arrived, but really in the hope of catching a glimpse of Lesley's face when she saw her room. However the record playing on the kitchen radio had blended so well with Tobias's wails, she hadn't realised what was happening until it stopped and he was left to howl solo. She hurried into the hall.

“Here we are then! All safe and sound. Ooh, what's all this silly noise?”

Tobias, taken aback by the huge vision in an apron, paused to stare.

“That's better. He looks as if he could do with some shut-eye. Do you want to get the things in, Dr. Shirburn, and I'll show you where your rooms are. Bit of a climb, I'm afraid.”

Lesley, bemused by the sudden quelling of her child, made to follow her unsuspiciously.

Stephen stayed where he was. “We were hoping there might be something Tobias could eat. He's hungry after the drive.”

“Lord yes! There's all kinds of stuff in the cupboard. I got in some of that alphabet spaghetti. Sort of educational, isn't it?” She smiled knowingly at the Oxford don. “Still, you don't want to spoil his appetite, do you? Come on up. Mr. Shirburn's put you in the east wing.”

Frances took Tobias's hand.

“No, I'll take Tobias!” said Lesley, sharply anxious to regain control. “You can fetch some of the luggage.”

Frances, turning to obey, caught a distinctly evil gleam in the old man's eye as he watched his daughter-in-law mount the stairs.

She was therefore not entirely surprised when a squeal that was not Tobias's greeted her and Stephen as they toiled up the last and dustiest flight.

“What is it?” gasped Stephen, unable to hurry with three suitcases.

“It's just too awful to believe!” shrilled Lesley from above.

Frances was beginning to think she could believe anything in this House of Horrors, and arrived on the landing with her own case and Tobias's toy-bag quite prepared for the old man downstairs to have filled all his spare rooms with headless corpses.

“Needs a bit of a clean-up,” Kath Arncott smirked, fully satisfied with her victim's reaction. “But of course I hadn't the time, with you all coming at such short notice.”

“Oh dear, no reading lamp!” said Stephen, who had brought some work to do over the holiday.

“It's quite ghastly!” wailed Lesley. “I've a good mind to go straight home!”

Kath's smile widened.

“I don't want this room,” said Tobias, catching the atmosphere. “It's got a spider in it.”

“You're sleeping next door,” Kath informed him. “- you and your Nanny.”

They followed her next door. Frances, who had not expected to have to share a room with Tobias, stood behind the others in the doorway, waiting to hear whether the verdict here was any better.

Apparently not.

“I don't want this room either. It smells pooey.”

“Shush, darling. Stephen, your father is quite impossible - sticking us up here in this pig-sty”!

“You'll have to put us somewhere else,” said Stephen. “There must be something in the house fit for human habitation!”

“Oh yes - but you're not the only guests here for Christmas - didn't Mr. Shirburn mention it?” said Kath, knowing perfectly well he hadn't. “And of course Mrs. Watlington has to have a nice room, seeing as how she's elderly…”

“Aunt Margery? Oh Lord!”

“And she's bringing a gentleman friend - no, not
that
sort of friend!” She winked at Frances to annoy Lesley. “Some bloke to look at the house and take photos for the paper.”

“A
journalist
?”

“And then there's
young
Mrs. Watlington. Her lad's away, so she would have been all on her own…”

“Oh really - it's too bad!” Lesley exclaimed. “We were looking forward to a quiet Christmas alone with William - we had some business we particularly wanted to discuss with him. And now we find he's invited that dreadful old sister of his, and some complete stranger, and Hilary Watlington! …I don't know why she can't spend Christmas on her own - it is three years now, after all. If we'd realised all that tribe were coming, we'd never have… I mean, we could have put up with the damp course,” she admitted crossly.

“I'm having the
other
room,” Tobias declared, nearly stomping into Frances on his way out.

“Oh, but I think Mummy and Daddy…”

“You go where you're put, young man,” said Kath, taking him by the shoulders and turning him round. Tobias drew a deep breath.

“All right, darling. Mummy and Daddy will have this room. You'll have to change the beds round, Stephen.”

CHAPTER 4

William, satisfied that he had made his guests as uncomfortable as possible, was enjoying an early lunch. He saw no reason why he should inconvenience himself by waiting to eat with his visitors. Mrs. A. had got them a quiche, anyway, and he didn't like quiche, so he was tucking into a stew he'd made for himself the night before with tinned beef and carrot and onion. It was even better the second day.

Scratch agreed when given the plate to lick, and was not pleased to be interrupted by the tentative opening of the kitchen door behind him.

“Sorry!” exclaimed the new nanny, as cat and plate skidded across the floor. “Er - they told me to try and find some lunch for Tobias.”

“Huh! I can't see what's to stop that child sitting down to a meal with everyone else,” said William, retrieving the evidence of his own recently-consumed lunch from the floor.

“He's a bit moody after the drive,” said the nanny. “ - You can't hear him down here…”

“No,” smiled William.

“…And they thought a meal might settle him down.”

“Well, it's no good expecting me to provide food for a child,” William scowled. He was making no concessions to this thin nanny and the unreasonable demands of her obnoxious charge. “I haven't got any of that American stuff.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Pizzas and burgers and peanut butter. That's what they eat nowadays.” William watched a great deal of children's television.

“Not Tobias! He only has natural, unprocessed food,” the nanny sighed. “I think there's a box of his stuff somewhere.”

William did remember Stephen bringing a large box in from the car. He hadn't seen why Tobias should be indulged in silly fads, however, and had hidden it on top of the cupboard as soon as Stephen had gone.

“On the other hand, Mrs. Arncott seemed to think you had some tinned spaghetti. I don't suppose that would kill him, just for once.”

William caught her eye and relented a little. She looked tired, this thin nanny. Wisps of blonde hair were escaping from her bun, and what should have been an English rose complexion was pale. He found her the spaghetti, a saucepan, and even a slice of bread.

“White,” he pointed out with a challenge. “I'm sure Tobias has brown bread at home.”

“You bet - with little bits in!”