An Ocean Apart (36 page)

“What time?”

“Have to be early, I'm afraid. Can you make it seven o'clock?”

“Yup, okay.”

“Good. Well, look, I'd better be off. Apologize to Russ for not giving him a game.”

“Oh, I think he'll survive,” Jennifer sighed. “As will we all.”

Alex smiled without looking at her directly. “I'll see you Wednesday then.” He turned and began running up the steps.

“Alex?”

He stopped and looked back. “Yeah?”

“Could I have a kiss?”

Alex came down the steps towards her and gave her a peck on the cheek. “See you Wednesday.”

He took the steps two at a time and, without a backwards glance, headed along the terrace and went into the house. Jennifer stood where she was, her arms folded, looking up towards the empty terrace. Then, with a shake of her head, she turned and walked slowly back to join the others at the tennis court.

“That's a goddamned shame,” Russ said, taking a swig of beer from the bottle. “I'm not going to get my game now.”

“Well, I sure as hell ain't going to take you on!” Sam laughed, sitting back in his deck-chair and taking a drag on his cigar. “I'm not going to risk spoiling an enjoyable afternoon by having a coronary.”

“You don't need to play tennis to do that, Sammy,” Molly said in a matronly voice. “You smoke too many of those things for your own good.”

“Oh, don't start on that, Moll! Hey, Gerry”—he turned to the pony-tailed man—“why don't you give Russ a game?”

Gerry shook his head. “No, I'm really not into tennis as a competitive sport,” he said in the mildest of Irish accents. “I just like to have myself a gentle runaround.”

“Mom?” Benji had been sitting cross-legged on the ground, pulling up clumps of grass.

“Yes, darling?”

“Can I whisper something to you?”

Everyone turned to look at Jennifer, raising their eyebrows in intrigue.

“Okay.”

Benji jumped up and walked over to his mother's chair, and putting his arms around her neck, he whispered in her ear.

“Oh, I don't think so, Benji.”

“Why not? It's a great idea.”

“I know, darling, but he's busy right now.”

“Well, can't we ask him? Or at least ask Russ.”

“Oh, this involves me, does it?” Russ said, moving towards Benji with his hands held out in strangle formation.

Benji screamed and sought refuge behind his mother.

“Go on, quick, Mom, ask him before he gets me!”

Jennifer laughed. “Okay—Russ. Benji has suggested that you play David.”

Russ stopped and looked at her inquiringly. “David? Who's he? I heard his name mentioned earlier.”

Jennifer leaned sideways in her chair to look past Russ and pointed to where David was working.

“The gardener.” She watched as he tamped at the ground around a newly planted shrub with his hands. “Look, Benji, I don't think he'll want to be disturbed. He's extremely busy.”

Russ turned round and looked to the other end of the court. “Can he play?”

“You bet he can!” Benji said, moving quickly to stand by Russ so that he could convince him of the idea. “He's really good, Russ, 'cos he's teaching me how to play, and he can hit the ball real hard!”

“I think it's a good idea,” Molly said quietly, and everyone turned to look at her.

“Now why would you say that, Moll?” Sam asked in a surprised voice.

Molly smiled. “Let's just say that he had a hand in turning my game around during that last match.”

Russ looked at Jennifer. “Well?”

She shook her head. “Okay, Benji, you win! Go and ask him.”

And with a whoop of joy, Benji ran off round the side of the court to fetch David.

Dodie, who had been sniffing around the pine-trees next to the shore of the bay, let out a short bark as she saw Benji approach, and ran past David at a gallop to greet him. David looked up from his work. “Hi! How are you getting on?”

“Great!—David?”

“Where's your father? I thought you were going to introduce me to him?”

“Yeah, I know,” Benji said in a disheartened voice. “He had to go off to work.”

“Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. Maybe I'll meet him next time.”

“Yeah—but, David?”

“What?”

“Russ usually plays Dad at tennis, and Dad's gone now.”

“That's a pity.”

“Yeah—but Russ … well … David, would you play Russ?”

David pushed himself off his knees and stood up, and glanced to the other end of the court where everyone was looking in his direction. He turned back to Benji. “No, I don't think so.”

“Why not?”

“Well—for a start, I'm not wearing any of the right clothes.”

“You can play in those, can't you?”

“Well, then, I don't have any shoes.”

“You're wearing shoes!”

“I know, but—well, I don't think I should, Benji. I've got work to do.”

“Mom says it would be all right. Please, David, I think she wants you to, otherwise she'll have to listen to Russ grumbling all afternoon!”

David smiled at him and, after a moment's thought, nodded slowly. “Why not?”

Benji's face lit up. “You mean you'll play?”

“Yeah, if your mother doesn't mind.”

Benji let out another whoop. “He's going to play you, Russ! He says he's going to play you!” He grabbed hold of David's hand and began pulling him as fast as he could around the side netting of the court.

Jennifer got to her feet and walked a few paces towards the corner of the court to meet them.

“I'm sorry about this, David. I hope you don't mind. It was Benji's idea.”

“Yeah, I guessed that. Look, I'm afraid that I don't have proper shoes to wear.”

“I told him that the shoes he's wearing would be okay, Mom,” Benji cut in, still holding on to David's hand. “Dad's would be too small for him.”

“I expect they would be.” She looked down at David's battered pair of boating shoes. “They'll do fine, David.” She turned and started to move back to the others. “Well, come on, you'd better meet your opponent.”

Jennifer introduced David to Russ and the rest of the assembled company, Molly giving him the biggest smile as she shook his hand. Gerry jumped up from his chair and spun his racket round in his hand, offering it, handle first, to David.

“You'll be needing a weapon.”

David bent down and cleaned his hands by rubbing them hard on the grass, then took the racket with a smile. “Thanks.” He turned to look onto the court, where Russ was already hitting booming and faultless practice serves down to the far end. “Well, I'd better go and start doing battle.”

After a brief knock-up, during which Russ had David running from one side of the court to the other in order to gauge the weaknesses of his new opponent, Russ felt confident enough in his appraisal of David's game to knock all the balls down to his end.

“Okay, we won't toss. You just serve.” He walked over to the forehand court, giving Jennifer a smile and a wink before settling himself in readiness for the first ball of the match.

He made no contact with the serve at all. Not with the racket at any rate. The ball came over the net like a bullet, swinging straight in towards his body. The spin kicked it up viciously from the service line causing Russ to throw his head to the side to avoid being hit in the eye, and the ball struck him with a resounding
thwack
just above the left cheek-bone. There was a gasp from the spectators, followed by a muffled grunt of pleasure from Sam and a much less subtle yell of joy from Benji.

“Shit!”
Russ exclaimed, standing stock-still and looking down the court at David.

He held up his hand in apology. “Sorry about that!”

Rubbing at his painful cheek, Russ made his way slowly across to the backhand court, and, giving his racket one quick spin in his hand, he readied himself for the next serve.

This time, the ball slammed down into the backhand corner of the service box, without a trace of the spin that had been put on the first serve. Having expected it to slew back in towards him once more, Russ found himself having to lunge sideways to try to reach it, doing so with such force that he continued on into the side netting. Dropping his racket, he spread-eagled his hands against it to prevent his face from being shredded through the wire.

As he turned to pick up his racket, there was a silence from the audience, save for a few throats being cleared. He walked back to the forehand court, glancing at Jennifer as he went.

“Where the hell's this guy from?” he whispered to her out the side of his mouth.

“Scotland,” Jennifer said quietly.

“Hey! I didn't even know they
played
tennis there!”

He whacked at the soles of his shoes with his racket, more to vent his anger than for any constructive purpose, and once more settled himself down to face both the power of David's serve and the ignominy of his task.

By the time that four games had been played, Russ realized that he was no match for his opponent, never once being able to premeditate what he was going to do. If he powered a serve down towards him, David would take all the speed off the ball and plant it at such an angle across the net that Russ was invariably left stranded somewhere in the middle of the court. If he relied on his slower spin serve, then David would come in like an express train to hit the ball so early that it would be thumping hard against the back netting before he'd even had the chance to move off the baseline. Swearing in frustration to himself at being four games down and avoiding now the looks of the hushed spectators, he hit the balls hard down to David's end to prepare himself for the coup de grace.

At that point, things started to go very wrong with David's game. Serves began to go inches wide or whack against the white tape of the net, and his returns either ballooned over the baseline or hit the side of the racket and skidded off to the edge of the court. Russ, encouraged by his sudden change in fortune, began to play once more to his audience, winking at them when he managed to win a point, or yelling out “Yes!” every time that David double-faulted. Within twenty minutes, Russ was poised at match point, victory and vindication for his earlier inabilities within his grasp. He swung a service down to the backhand court, and David, moving to the wrong side, missed the ball completely. Russ threw his racket in the air and ran to the net, and stood with his hand outstretched, happy to end the match at that point. David approached him and grasped his hand.

“Well played, Russ, that was good fun.”

“Yup, good game. Damned lucky I began to read your game right. I thought you had me there for a minute.”

They both walked off court to applause and many congratulatory comments on the standard and enthralment of the game. Benji, however, approached David with a profound look of disappointment on his face.

“We thought you were going to beat him, David, but you started to play like me!”

David laughed. “That's what happens in tennis, Benji. Things go right for a time, and then suddenly,
whoosh!
everything goes wrong.”

Russ threw his racket on the ground and went over to the icebox and took out a beer. “Do you want one, David?”

“No, thanks. That's very kind, but if you don't mind, I think I'll just finish off what I was doing.”

“You won't go brooding on defeat now, will you?” Russ said, flipping off the bottle-top and taking a mouthful of beer. “It was pretty evenly matched throughout.”

“No, I won't do that.”

Jennifer looked up at him from her chair. “You really don't have to go back to work, David.”

“Well, actually, I do. I really need to get the rest of those shrubs in by this evening, otherwise there's every chance they won't last.”

“Okay—but thanks again for giving Russ a game.”

David nodded, then walked back around the court to continue his work in the flower-bed.

By five o'clock, the final shrub was in place. He gave each of the new plants a final watering, then, gathering up his tools, he made his way back around the side of the court, giving Dodie a whistle as he went. There was no one left at the summer-house, the tennis party having finished an hour before.

As he reached the corner of the hedge, Jennifer appeared around it, accompanied by Gerry. They stopped as he walked towards them.

“All done?” Jennifer asked.

“Yeah, they're all in.”

Jennifer smiled. “David, I don't think you've been properly introduced to this mad Irishman, Gerry Reilly.”

David stepped forward, and transferring his tools to one hand, stretched out the other. “Hullo, Gerry, pleased to meet you.”

“David,” Jennifer continued, “Gerry has a recording studio here in Leesport, and he's just had a … what is it again?”

“A new mixing console.”

“Right—well, he's just had a new mixing console delivered, and he can't manage it into his studio by himself, so he was wondering if you might be able to give him a hand. That is, if you haven't got any other plans.”

“No, I'd be delighted. I've got nothing at all on this evening.”

“Oh, that would be great, David!” Gerry said, rubbing his hands together. “It's just that I've got to get it ready for this group coming in tomorrow, and I'd be struggling by myself. Look, I'll go and get my things from the house and meet you round at the back. Have you got a car?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, so you can just follow me. Are you sure this is no imposition?”

“Not at all. As I said, I'm doing nothing else.”

“Great—well, see you at the cars, then!” He turned and ran back up the steps onto the terrace and disappeared into the house.