New World in the Morning (12 page)

“I'm going to put it in the fridge so that we can have it with our puds.”

“Fine,” she answered. “Good idea. I simply wondered why.”

“In celebration,” I called.

“What of?”

“Just of things generally. Of life. Of the fact you're all so nice.”

“That's very sweet,” said Junie, once I had returned.

“Oh, Pop,” said Matt, “I got my project back today.”

“So soon?” I asked.

He lowered his head, gave a shamefaced smile. “I know I let you think the deadline would be yesterday but I suppose I misled you: most people handed in their work about two weeks ago. Sorry.”

“And that call you had reminding you?”

“Peter Bale—to warn me Miss Martin was finally losing her rag.”

“Well, anyway. Thank you for coming clean about it. I think that's what really counts.”

“Though perhaps it would have been even better,” said my wife, “not to tell such a fib in the first place.” Junie had this awful reverence for truth.

“At all events, Matthias… What was the verdict?”

“Miss Martin seemed pleased with it.” His look of penitence had quickly faded. “Especially—you were right—with that thing I did on Theseus. That thing
you
did on Theseus. But she said I left out the ending. Said he wasn't someone I should really wish to emulate.”

“Why not?”

“Because of Ariadne.”

“What about Ariadne?”

“Well, you sort of gave the impression they got married, lived happily-ever-after, all
that
kind of guff. One of the great love stories, I think you said. She told me he turned out to be a louse. That he deserted her.”

“She accused Theseus of deserting Ariadne?”

“Yes.”

“Called him a louse? I can't believe that. I'm sure you must have got it wrong.”

“Dad! How can you dream up louse? Dream up desertion?”

“Then—I'm sorry—
she
must have got it wrong! You'll have to tell her.”

“Well, I suppose it's not so world-shakingly important.” He shrugged.

“Of course it's important!”

“Then you tell her!
I
shan't.”

“And don't think I won't. Next parents' evening? When's that?”

“You don't mean you'll actually be coming?”

“Try and stop me.”

“There's one on… I think it's a fortnight Thursday.”

“Then make me an appointment!”

We all laughed, myself as much as anyone. “Action Man,” observed Matt. “Three cheers for Miss Martin!” said his mother.

Action Man… I savoured this for several seconds. On one of the tables in the shop there was an Action Man stripped down to his black briefs. I often saluted him as I went past—or set him back on his feet if vibrations had caused him to topple: despite his magnificent physique he wasn't that well-balanced. “Glad you've noticed the resemblance,” I said.

“Why don't you just phone her, Dad?” asked Ella.

“No, you shut up,” said Matt. “He's coming to the parents' evening. They both are. Aren't you, Pop?”

“Course I am.”

“Promise?”

“Only the grave could stop me now. Honest!”

“Honest Sam Groves,” said Junie. “My husband the bookmaker.”

“Funny you should say that.” Though I hoped she didn't have in mind a fairly recent but far from funny incident.

“Why? Is that what you're thinking of setting up as?”

“Well, no. Not necessarily. But you remember how I said earlier that there's something I've been thinking about?” Yes, this was as good a time as any; the children could be in on it, too. In on it right from the beginning. “It's this. That RADA business last night. I don't believe it's going to come to anything. I don't see how it can, one's got to be realistic. One's got to be—”

“But, oh, Daddy,” Ella exclaimed, “you're not giving up the idea of being an actor?”

“Darling, you really shouldn't interrupt,” admonished Junie.

“If RADA auditioned me and decided to take me on, that would be fantastic, Ella. But what I'm saying is—it isn't very likely. Yet supposing it was? We'd been talking about Mum being the one to look after the shop, hadn't we, getting out a bit, meeting people, discovering—?”

“Well, I can't say I'm all that disappointed,” Junie cut in. “You don't have to worry that you might be letting me down.”

“You said you'd quite enjoy it.”

“That's true but—”

“Junie, hold on. I went to see Hal Smart today.”

“Hal? You mean, on business?”

“What other reason would I go for?”

I paused. It had suddenly occurred to me how sad was that remark. Hal and I had once been very close. I'd actually had a crush on him. For practically the whole of my fifteenth year, during what had turned into an unexpectedly curative, even an almost carefree time, the two of us had been inseparable. ‘They'll never prise apart young Groves and Smart,' some budding versifier had once scrawled across the blackboard, ‘they're like apple with cloves, young Smart and Groves,' and I recalled how I'd secretly felt immensely proud to form half of such a brilliant couplet, a couplet which had seemed to me quite as inspired as any in the
Golden Treasury
, of which my grandmother had given me a copy. But now…some twenty-two years later…

“Yes, of course on business,” I said. No wonder I should be such an expert on the matter of life's little ironies. Seeing Hal now could sometimes make me shiver in disbelief. And also in embarrassment: we had once embraced while in the shower.

“And…?” Junie queried.

I looked at her.

“Darling, what were you leading up to?”

“Oh, yes. Sorry. I got sidetracked.” Remembering a rider the nasty Evan Saunders had later added to that couplet—though only verbally, thank God, it was never taken up. ‘Apple with cloves, young Smart and Groves. The tastier tart—young Groves or Smart?' In some ways I'd minded it less at the time than I did today. Or, at any rate, it hadn't tarnished my then pride in the original.

I hastily reassembled my thoughts.

“Woolgathering,” I smiled. “It's just that… Well, you know I never worry you about these things, Junie—not normally—but the shop isn't doing all that well at present. It's probably nothing serious, of course: the usual pre-summer lull: and I suppose I should never have thought of taking Mavis on fulltime…” Junie didn't know I'd taken Mavis on fulltime; this seemed a good moment to reveal it. But, even in spite of that, I hated having to appear so negative. It required a great deal of determination and like Matt last Saturday I kept my fingers crossed—although
un
like him I didn't parade the fact. This helped a little: feeling like my son. Gilded youth! Gilded youth, I thought, but really not so many years divided us, merely twenty-three, less than a generation, I oughtn't to forget that. My own golden future gleamed every bit as bright.

“Oh,
Sam
…!” Junie got up. She came and did to me what I had done to her the previous evening: stood behind my chair and put her arms about my neck and kissed the top of my head. “I knew you'd been behaving a little too cheerfully these past few days! Darling, I should have realized what it meant. I think you're
very
brave but I also think you're
very
foolish…” She bent and put her cheek against my own.

Unsurprisingly, all this solicitude made my eyes moisten. No less predictably, it brought a mocking reaction from our children. (“Oh, no, not again! And see that, Cinders? Action Man is having to dash away a tear!”) Junie resumed her seat while I reprimanded my offspring, although with a tolerance roughly matching their own, for being so silly and immature—and was unsporting enough to remind them that they hadn't yet received their wine.

I turned my attention back to Junie. “Sweetheart, it's truly not so tragic as it sounds.” And now I hammed up the eye-dabbing. “Especially since I've had a bit of a brainwave—and it's all due to this thing about RADA; I mightn't have thought of it otherwise. Now, we have a real need to supplement our income, right? And the job opportunities in Deal at the moment—like in any other small town in this country—are virtually non-existent and—”

“I could maybe get a job at Marks & Spencer's,” said Junie, “or British Home Stores or somewhere. Sam, you should have
told
me if we were getting into difficulties.”

“No. That isn't your department. Nor is it for
you
to try to get us out of them. It's very sweet of you, darling, but…”

I gave a shrug.

“But what?”

“But I could earn a far better wage in London than you could ever hope to earn down here, where if there's anything at all, it's most likely only part-time and poorly paid. Besides, darling, you know me: I've never liked the idea of my wife going out to work.”

“What would I be doing at the shop then? Getting a suntan?”

“That's different.”

“How?”

“You'd be the owner. The wife of the owner. It's somehow not the same.”

“Mr Spock would never understand,” declared Matt, mournfully, shaking his head.

“Captain Kirk would.”

“Well, I'm not too sure about this,” said Junie. “I don't think I go for it. We're a family. When would we ever see you?”

“At weekends. I'd be home every Friday night; wouldn't leave again until Monday. You'd hardly notice I was gone.”

“Is that what you honestly believe?”

“Obviously it's an arrangement that none of us really wants. But if we look at it positively there may be
some
advantages. I mean—apart from all the extra money and the higher standard of living and the holidays abroad.”

“We already have holidays abroad.”

“Yes, but that's only because your parents pay so much towards them—and naturally have the major say in where we go. And that's nearly always to some part of France. But this way we could occasionally branch out: Italy, Greece, maybe even California. Just think of it, how good that would be for the children's education…”

Ella and Matt were instantly in favour of extra money, a higher standard of living and holidays abroad. Even Junie herself was invariably influenced by any question of the children's education.

“Also,” I said, “think how special the weekends would be. A father coming home brings presents and a husband coming home takes his wife out to expensive restaurants on a Saturday night.”

“That's not fair,” said Matt, immediately.

“And his children.”

“Okay, it's getting fairer.” Then he said: “So long as it can be relied on, absolutely.” His tone was now lugubrious again.

“Hey!” I said. “Matthias! What do you take me for? A welsher?”

“What's that? No. An expiring actor.”

This showed signs of developing into a running gag between us. I laughed and hoped to foster it.

“Oh, but you're being crazy,” protested Junie. “Presents! Expensive restaurants! You'll have two homes to run. Meals. Train fares. It will be enough of a problem just breaking even.”

“What do you mean, two homes to run?”

“What do you think I mean, two homes to run?”

I recollected myself, spread my hands and gave a smile. “But, Junie, you don't understand. My needs are simple. A cheap bedsitter with a gas ring. I don't care about the area, I shall always have my home to come home to.” I laughed. “Darling, it almost sounds as though you doubt my potential earning capacity. As though you doubt my real worth.”

“The only thing I doubt,” she answered, “is the ability of others to recognize your real worth…though since when has a person's earning capacity been the measure of a person's worth?”

Then she added: “And you know I don't mean to be brutal but what precisely would you say you're qualified for?”

“Pop, only imagine what she could do if she did mean to be brutal!”

“Here, kids, I think you've got to help me out. What
am
I qualified for?”

“Oh, we'd like to help you out. But the trouble is—poor Cinders hasn't any imagination and you told me not to lie.”

“No, no, it was your mother who told you that. You know my credo. Anything that I can hope to get away with!”

We had a jolly time. Between the four of us (though, to be honest, the women advanced far fewer suggestions than either Matt or me, whether sensible or silly—of the latter, “Join the army!” was a fairly typical example)…between the four of us we came up with at least a dozen serious possibilities. However, Junie laid down two conditions which she said were non-negotiable.

Firstly, she wouldn't have me going into security work and, secondly, insisted I must hold onto my Saturdays. Beyond that, she didn't think that most of the other jobs, even in London, would pay particularly good salaries; but on the other hand she didn't really mind (she supposed) how much I might choose to demean myself—none of them did—provided it only happened at a reasonable distance from Deal.

“Yes, what do dustmen get?” asked Ella.

“And roadsweepers?” speculated Matt. “Or window cleaners? Lavatory attendants? Milkmen? Posties? Gravediggers—
alas, poor Yorick!
—with recitations on the side?”

“Oh, there must be literally hundreds of things that Daddy could do!”

I wasn't too comfortable with the idea of perfectly honest livelihoods being thought of as demeaning, but at least there weren't likely to be that many roadsweepers, gravediggers or dustmen passing through our hall right now and it didn't seem the proper time to get pompous.

“Of course, you
could
always sell your body,” suggested Matt. “Though, I'm not sure, do you think you'd find any takers?”