Vintage Babes (19 page)

‘Max is a personal trainer,’ I said, ‘and Jenny and I and Tina Kincaid, she’s Duncan Kincaid’s widow, do classes with him at Tina’s house –’

‘You do classes with Tina?’ Dilys cut in. She frowned. ‘With Tina Kincaid?’

I nodded. ‘Twice a week. I’ve told you about the classes, Dad.’

‘Yes, but –’

‘I do fitness training with the guy. End of story.’ I was impatient. Several other people had inferred that Max and I were a pair and it was starting to annoy. ‘Shall we go and eat?’

The meal went well. Both my guests had hearty appetites and were appreciative. As Dilys chatted away, telling a couple of slightly bawdy jokes, I began to understand her attraction for my father. She had a vivacity which was appealing. An energy which you had to admire. This was a woman who had no intention of growing old gracefully and would party until she dropped.

‘That trellis of yours looks wobbly,’ my father remarked, as we drank coffee in the living room afterwards. Rising, he went to the window to take a closer look. ‘Suppose I firm it up?’

The trellis was fixed to the fence at the bottom of my small back garden. It supported a rambling rose and whenever the wind blew – today there was an intermittent breeze – it had a tendency to sway.

‘Now?’ I said.

When he had attempted to fix my temperamental loo, at a lunch when Ernest had been a guest, he had been gone for ages, leaving me to face Ernest’s inquisition alone. On his return, my father had admitted defeat and declared that I needed a plumber.

‘Why not?’

‘Do it, George,’ Dilys told him, ‘and I’ll help Carol clear the table.’

‘There’s no need,’ I started to say, but she was already on her feet.

‘Never imagined I’d be getting married again. Not at my age,’ Dilys remarked, as my father exited and she walked through to my small front dining room.

‘You’re getting married?’ I blinked. ‘You don’t mean to my dad?’

‘Sure do, doll.’ She began gathering up dessert bowls. ‘In the summer I thought.’

‘The summer?’ I repeated, and heard myself squeak.

Although each time we met my father usually made some mention of Dilys, the mentions had been casual. Often about the tastiness of a meal she’d prepared. There had been no hint of their relationship becoming serious. And what about my lovely mum? It was less than two years since she had died and for him to have so swiftly swapped his affections to another woman – it seemed like treachery.

I frowned. ‘My father hasn’t said anything to me about you getting married.’

As she carried the bowls into the kitchen, Dilys chuckled. ‘He hasn’t got around to proposing yet, but he will. You know what men are like, you can see how their minds work, what they’re gearing up to long before they know it themselves. It were just the same with my other husbands.’

‘Other husbands?’ I queried, following with the wine glasses.

‘I’ve been widowed twice and divorced once,’ she began to explain, as she went to and fro between dining room and kitchen. ‘My first husband were a soldier and the silly bugger got himself killed before we’d had much time together.’ Dilys sighed. ‘And before he could get to know our daughter. Second bloke were a wrestler, called himself Concrete Charlie and liked to wear my camiknicks he did.’ She cackled maniacally. ‘But he were always down the boozer, so I gave him the heave-ho. Though I’d already met William’s dad. Real smasher, he were. We lived in Bermondsey for years, then he suddenly decided he wanted to be in the country. Bought a house not far from here, but out in the sticks. Didn’t suit me. Fields for miles and I can’t drive, so I were really stuck.’

‘Awkward,’ I sympathised.

‘Bloody boring with only cows to look at. Minute he kicked it, I moved into Bridgemont. Thanks to my Billy. William,’ she corrected herself. ‘He doesn’t like me to call him Billy now, says it brings back memories.’ Her brow furrowed fleetingly, as if the memories could be unhappy. ‘You see I were able to buy a flat in Bridgemont because William and his wife bought the house from me, cash on the nail. Good job they did, too, because no one else would’ve wanted it. Falling to pieces it were, but they had plans for a big renovation. Marble floors, billiard room, a swimming pool which their kids would’ve loved. Going to be a real rock star pad. But then William and his missus got divorced.’

‘So the renovation didn’t happen?’

Dilys shook her head. ‘William still owns the place, but it’s still falling to pieces. He lives in London now.’ She looked out of the window. ‘I’ll go and see how George is getting on.’

As she disappeared into the garden, I stacked the last of the dirty dishes beside the sink. I was wondering furiously how much credence I should give to her claim of my father planning to propose – I couldn’t imagine him as someone’s fourth husband – when the door bell rang. Answering it, I found a man in white shirt and jeans stood on the path. He was shortish and slim, with close-cut brown hair silvering at the temples. Good-looking in a rough diamond sort of a way.

‘I’m William. Dilys’s son,’ he announced, smiling. ‘I know I’m early, but I’m pressed for time.’

‘Come in. I’m Carol. Your mother’s in the back garden with my dad. He’s fixing a trellis, but it shouldn’t take long.’

‘I believe you work on
The Dursleigh Siren,’
he said, making conversation as I led him through to the living room.

I nodded. ‘I’ve been there for quite a while.’

‘You enjoy it?’

‘Very much.’

There was a pause, then he said, ‘Your father also told me how your ex-husband is the political editor on a national paper.’

I gave a silent groan. I could imagine the talk of ‘my’ Tom’s success. ‘Yes. I used to work for a national, too.’

‘Your father never said that. Did you cover politics?’

‘No, I did news reporting in general. Wrote about everything from IRA outrages to streakers at sports fixtures to break-ins at gold bullion warehouses.’

‘When was this?’ he enquired.

‘Back in the Dark Ages, the late seventies when I first started out and then again during the eighties and early nineties. What line are you in?’

Crossing to the window, he looked out at the garden where my father was inspecting his work on the trellis. William knocked on the glass, and my father and Dilys turned and smiled, acknowledging him.

‘I have business interests in London. Import and export. Seems like the folks are ready to go,’ he said, as they began walking towards the house.

William was greeted and urged by my dad to stay for a while and have a cup of tea or coffee or something stronger.

‘Carol enjoys socialising,’ he said.

‘No time,’ William declared, and headed for the hall.

‘Surely you can spare ten minutes?’ Dilys appealed.

‘Sorry, no.’

He was determined to leave. Did he fear my supposedly desperate desire for a male might result in his entrapment? Whatever, William’s eagerness to depart seemed less than flattering.

My dad kissed me goodbye. ‘Thanks a lot, pet. Lovely lunch.’

‘Delicious, doll,’ Dilys said, ‘and so nice to sit down to a meal prepared by someone else.’

As the Jaguar disappeared down the street, I frowned. There had been something about William which revived a distant memory. Either I had seen him before or he reminded me of someone. When and where? Who? He had said he worked in ‘import and export’, but that meant nothing and offered up no connection. I thought and thought, but the memory remained elusive.

I had finished the washing-up and returned to fretting about the depth of my father’s relationship with Dilys – should I phone my brother and tell him? – when the doorbell rang again. Walking down the hall, I saw an outline I recognised through the frosted glass of the front door. It was Lynn. An unexpected visitor.

‘Howdy,’ I said, smiling. ‘I’ve just had Granddad here for lunch. And not only Granddad, but –’ I stopped. I had caught sight of Beth, tucked in behind her mother. She wore an embroidered denim dress, white tights with short denim boots and had a Groovy Chick haversack on her back. She was sucking her thumb. Usually she runs forward to hug and kiss me, and to be hugged and kissed in return, then she asks for a chocolate lolly. But today there were no hugs or kisses, no request. Today she was subdued. ‘Hello, my darling,’ I said, touching her glossy brown curls. Curls she has inherited from her father. ‘I didn’t see you. How are you?’

‘She’s tickety-boo, but I’m not,’ Lynn said tersely. ‘I’m here to ask if we can stay with you for a while because I’ve left Justin.’

‘Left him!’ I shrilled.

Over the past month Lynn had made intermittent complaints about her partner, but I hadn’t taken them seriously. They were, I’d believed, the usual niggles that occur in all relationships – and my daughter does have a tendency to make Himalayas out of earth mounds. She can also act rashly.

‘Don’t bust a gut. I’ve had enough. Can Beth and I stay?’

‘Yes, yes, of course. Come in.’

‘You’re a star, Mum.’

I’m not. If I’d lived in a broom cupboard I would have welcomed them in, that’s what mothers do. When your children are small, you look after them and innocently imagine that once they reach the age of eighteen or so, they will be off your hands. Ha ha. What you don’t realise is that children are around, in one way or another, for the rest of your life. And you never stop thinking about them, worrying over them, relishing their successes.

But my cottage has two bedrooms; mine which contains a double bed and a smaller room with two singles. The smaller one used to be Lynn’s room and Beth has slept there when Lynn and Justin have been out late to dinner with friends or at a party, and I am babysitting. I enjoy looking after her and hearing her news, sharing her secrets; though the responsibility of being in charge of a grandchild is surprisingly wearing. I’m always secretly relieved when her parents arrive to collect her – alive and happy, with no cuts, grazes or broken bones – and I only have myself to worry about again.

‘Beth, go with Gran,’ Lynn instructed. ‘I’ll bring everything in.’

I shepherded the little girl through to the kitchen and poured her a glass of her favourite apple juice – another item which, like the chocolate lollies, is specially bought. All the while, there were glimpses of Lynn carrying an assortment of cases, travel bags and plastic supermarket carriers up the stairs.

‘Daddy’s been naughty,’ Beth announced, as Lynn went out to her car again. ‘Mummy shouted at him.’

‘It was just a little quarrel,’ I said soothingly. ‘Like you sometimes quarrel with your friends. They’ll soon make it up.’

‘But Daddy shouted back. They both shouted really loud.’ Her lower lip quivered. ‘It hurt my ears.’

Pulling my little granddaughter onto my knee, I wound my arms around her. It upset me to see her upset and I hated the thought of her watching her parents fighting. It chilled me to the bone. Made me so angry. Had they had no thought for her distress, no consideration, no common sense?

‘Mummy and Daddy will soon make it up,’ I repeated.

‘Mmm.’ Beth sounded doubtful, then she looked out of the window. ‘Can I play in the sandpit?’

I smiled. ‘On you go.’

A couple of years back, I had dug a square, roughly four feet by four feet and eighteen inches deep, in the bottom corner of the back garden, lined it with polythene, bought suitable sand from a builders’ merchants – my dad had told me where to go and what to ask for – and filled it. The purchase of buckets and spades had followed. It was an operation which Lynn had viewed with surprise and much amusement.

‘I never saw you as the soppy grandmother type,’ she had said.