Every Woman for Herself (13 page)

‘She does find him interesting,’ I admitted, ‘but he’s frightened of her. I expect that’s how she got me the job.’

‘Frightened of her? How can anyone be frightened of her?’

I looked at him with dawning respect. ‘Yes, but she’s a
witch
.’

‘She certainly is,’ he agreed enthusiastically. ‘She’s put a spell on me. Do you happen to know if Jessica gave her my message?’

‘What, the Barkis one? Yes, and it’s taken her by surprise.’

So long as she didn’t take the actor by surprise … although I supposed he would be more suitable for Em’s purposes than a vicar, even if I didn’t particularly like him.

Poor Chris! He was obviously seeing her through the eyes of love – and he was really rather attractive. And I never had been keen on the idea of Em embracing the Black Arts – she was so
very
thorough.

But could an alliance between Wicca and Church work? I decided to speak to Gloria and see what she thought.

And I’d made up my mind that I was going to tell Mace about Dead Greg before he found out from someone else. If he didn’t want me to take care of Caitlin after that, it was fine by me.

Tips for Southern Visitors, No. 4

In some parts of North-east England, a man would rather kill himself overtaking on a blind bend at seventy miles an hour than drive a hundred yards behind a woman.

When I went up to his cottage next morning there was a sleek, sporty red car pulled up outside, which hadn’t been there before. The actor’s car is some low, dark thing.

Caitlin opened the door, her fingers to her lips: ‘Ssh! Come into the kitchen – Mummy’s here, and she and Daddy are having a talk in the living room.’

Indeed, even as she drew me into the kitchen I heard a husky voice drawl: ‘… buried out here in the cultural desert!’

But there she was quite wrong, for there are lots of blue-blooded Russian émigrés in Huddersfield, all enjoying soirées, the dance, theatre, ballet. A stray Tartar would be quite at home.

‘Perhaps I should go away and come back la—’

‘
There
you are,’ snapped Mace North from the doorway, as if I was hours late. ‘Caitlin, go and put your things on and Charlie can take you for a nice walk.’

‘It’s brass-monkey cold out there,’ I objected. ‘I’ll take her up to the Parsonage.’

‘Wherever,’ he said abstractedly.

‘Is that the nanny you mentioned?’ said the low, slightly husky voice, and Mace’s ex-wife, the actress Kathleen Lovell, peered around him. She looked me up and down critically with huge brown eyes in a gauntly pretty face.

Up to that moment I’d felt quite good in my jumble-sale jeans and dark green suede jacket, but now I felt like the hired help. Come to that, I
was
the hired help.

‘You’re tiny, aren’t you? And not so very young – I expect you’re glad of the job. Would you like to come to America with us after the wedding?’

As job interviews go, it was a bit sketchy.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m staying here.’

‘And so is Caitlin,’ said Mace with a steely note in his voice.

‘Of course – for now,’ she agreed. ‘I’m just back from Morocco,’ she said to me. ‘I’ve been filming
The Return of the Sheik
– you must see it, it’s too scary for words! The Sheik is a ghost, drawn back by my golden-haired, voluptuous beauty, but ours is a love that can never be.’

‘No, I can imagine,’ I agreed.

‘That’s the last
fat
part I’m going to play,’ she added firmly. ‘I’m going to lose a stone for the wedding, and then I’ll be thin enough for roles in America – you have to be skinny to get
anywhere
over there. My fiancé, Rod – Rod Steigland, you know, the actor? – is going to insist I’m the female lead in his next film.’

‘I don’t think you’ve got a stone to lose,’ I said, amazed, for she looked even more of a collection of bird bones than Jessica. ‘Or even an ounce!’

‘Sweet of you,’ she drawled. ‘But thin is the new fat – it simply isn’t good enough. Are you
sure
you don’t want to be our nanny and come to America?’

‘I wonder if you’d excuse us, Charlie?’ Mace interrupted. ‘Kathleen and I have got a lot to discuss before she has to leave. Caitlin will be down in a minute.’

‘But—’ I began, because surely Kathleen would want to see something of her little girl before she went off again? But the door to the living room closed firmly behind them. And then, as is the way with old doors, quietly clicked open again, just a hairline.

A better person might have gone to round up Caitlin, or waited outside. I edged a little nearer to the door, and listened, fascinated. It was like hearing a play on radio with an exceptional cast: the enunciation was
superb
.

‘I’d like to have Caitlin make her main home here in England with me, Kathy,’ Mace said quietly. ‘If you remember, I didn’t go for custody because we agreed that we’d share time with her and do whatever was best for Caitlin.’

‘Well, we have, haven’t we? And you can still see her. I mean, Rod’s got a flat in London, you’ve got a house there, and you come over to the USA sometimes to make films.’

‘Not so often – my ambitions have changed in the two years we’ve been apart, Kathleen. I see my future now mainly playwriting and maybe the odd cameo role.’

‘Well, I suppose that’s right for you. Go while you’ve still got what it takes.’

‘Yes, but it means I’m the one with the stable home, while you’re jetting about from one place to the next leaving Caitlin with a series of nannies. It would make more sense if she lived with me and came to you for holidays.’

‘You’re just jealous of Rod, because Caitlin likes him! You can’t bear the idea of another man being her daddy!’ said Kathleen, her voice rising. ‘You only married me because I was pregnant!’

‘I’m
glad
she likes Rod – I like Rod too, the poor harmless mutt. But I’m still her father, and I don’t want her living on the other side of the world.’

‘Well, I’m her mother, and you will just have to put up with it!’ she exclaimed triumphantly.

‘Not if I apply for custody. I know one or two things about you, Kathleen, that a judge might be interested in!’ he said, his voice hard.

‘Well, here’s something you didn’t know,’ Kathleen said with deadly venom. ‘Caitlin isn’t yours!’

At this interesting moment Caitlin galloped back into the kitchen, wearing her teddy suit and with her wellies on the wrong feet, so I quickly ushered her out of the cottage.

Behind me it had gone ominously silent, until I heard Mace say, in a quiet but carrying voice that brought goose bumps up on the back of my neck: ‘What do you mean?’

Then I regretfully had to close the front door.

I began to feel sorry I’d never seen him act in anything.

Em was in the kitchen, and so, to my surprise, were the twins, perched on chairs with their arms up to the elbows in mixing bowls.

Frost and Flossie were in hopeful attendance, lightly dusted with flour.

‘What are you making?’ demanded Caitlin excitedly, bouncing up and down in her little flowered wellies.

‘I’m making rock cakes, and Feeb is making gingerbread,’ Clo said importantly. ‘Do you want to join in?’

I divested Caitlin of her teddy suit and wellies, wrapped her in a pinafore and stood her on a chair.

‘You can make chocolate slab,’ Em said, tossing digestive biscuits into another bowl. ‘Here, take this rolling pin and bash these biscuits to pieces.’

‘Where’s everyone?’ I asked Em as the girls beat the ingredients to death, squealing.

‘Father’s working. His agent’s taken to calling him on an hourly basis, so he’s finally shaken off the tart and got on with it. The said tart’s gone off in a huff, shopping, but the girls didn’t want to go.’

‘I thought they liked shopping?’

‘Seem to have gone off it – and they wouldn’t put dresses on this morning, only jeans. She didn’t like that, either.’

‘Well, they’re only children. You can’t have much fun if you’re trying to keep expensive clothes clean.’

‘Anne’s gone for her treatment, but she says she’ll tell them some more stories later – and she’s bringing them an effing
present
.’

We exchanged slightly incredulous stares.

‘Bran’s in his room, working – he’s nearly fit to go back, I think. It’s not long before he’ll be home again for Christmas, anyway. Walter’s watching the TV, and Gloria’s in there too, with the ironing.’

How cosy it all sounded … and soon it would be Christmas – at home – without Matt!

‘Mace was having an argument with his ex-wife when I came out,’ I told her. ‘She’s beautiful, but even skinnier than Jess.’

‘Gloria says Mace’s reputation with women is terrible,’ Em said.

‘Does she? How does she know?’

‘
Surprise!
magazine. She gets it every week. She doesn’t like you going down there to look after Caitlin so she’s going to read your tea leaves, to see if you’re safe.’

‘Of course I’m safe! I hardly think he’s even registered that I’m a woman – just a useful version of the village idiot,’ I assured her.

When I took Caitlin home, tired, grubby and with a cake tin of edible goodies for Daddy, there was no sign of the sports car or its glamorous occupant.

In its place was a battered motorbike, and the vicar and Mace were in earnest discussion in the kitchen.

It seemed a bit early for whisky.

It was certainly no time to explain about Dead Greg either, which was a pity, for in my brief absence someone had scrawled ‘Murderess!’ on the veranda windows in harpy-red lipstick.

Looked like Angie’d arrived.

Tips for Southern Visitors, No. 5

People will be quite kind to you when they realise you are from the South, because you can’t help it.

My painting,
Jessica Down the Well
, was coming along nicely, and I had a little row of tiny primed white canvases awaiting my attention.

Jessie was not at her best the following morning: first she kicked up a fuss because the washing she left in the machine the night before had been decanted onto the floor, although she should have known from past experience that getting up early to take it out herself was her best option.

Then she made a bit of a scene at breakfast, when the twins showed her the presents Anne had brought them back from town, although they were only new outfits for their Barbies.

The girls’ dolls were now fetchingly attired in army fatigues
à la
Action Man.

‘They don’t do Action Woman yet,’ explained Feeb earnestly, ‘or Anne would have got those, but these fit OK. Anne usually buys men’s clothes anyway, especially waistcoats, because you need loose, practical clothes in a war zone. See – my Barbie’s wearing a flak jacket.’

‘And mine’s got army boots on, and when we get home from school, Anne’s going to help us to camouflage their helmets with grass and twigs!’ said Clo eagerly.

‘But Barbies aren’t soldiers,’ Jessica said earnestly. ‘And Action Man is for little boys!’

‘But I’ve just explained – these are Action
Women
,’ said Feeb impatiently. ‘Really, Mummy!’

‘But Mummy’s always taught you that war is wrong!’

‘Yes, but if it happens, someone’s got to report it, haven’t they?’ Feeb said sensibly. ‘Anne goes on the TV. When she’s better she’s going back, and then we can see her on the news!’

‘Mummy,’ wheedled Clo, ‘could I have a movie director Barbie?’

Thrown off balance, Jessica said, with relief: ‘Of course, darling! That will be much more fun, won’t it?’

‘Oh, yes – then
my
Barbie can be the camerawoman recording Feeb’s Barbie for TV,’ Clo agreed.

‘Call your sister Phoebe, Chloe. I don’t like these abbreviations.’

‘Clo, Mummy. And Phoebe’s always going to be Feeb now: we’ve decided.’

That was the final straw and Jessica forbade them to have anything more to do with Anne, a condition impossible to impose in the circumstances.

Father had had enough by then, and said he was glad to discover the twins were not just the brainless, giggling little imbeciles he’d thought them, and then Jessica turned on him and tried to have a row.

Father doesn’t like rows, so he scowled and went off into his study, locking the door; so at least he could get some work done.

‘Em, can we have treacle tart and cream tonight?’ wheedled Clo. ‘It’s my favouritest pudding in all the world.’

‘And mine,’ agreed Feeb. ‘Mummy, Em calls you the Treacle Tart – is that because
you’re
scrumptious, too?’

‘No, it’s because she’s dark and sticky,’ Em said, smiling.

Bran, who’d been sitting silently stirring sugar into his porridge in slow motion, looked up and answered the smile. ‘Sticky pudding?’

‘After dinner,’ Em said.

‘I don’t know what your problem is, Jess,’ Anne said, from behind the newspaper. ‘You don’t want them to grow up thinking being a giraffe-necked blonde bimbo is the height of ambition, do you?’

Jessica was sulking again. Em looked about to win the battle after all.

I had packed up my black clothes and Gloria was going to take them to a charity shop. I wore only my jumble-sale finds now, and a crocheted cardigan in multicoloured yarn that Gloria had made for me, in a pattern of daisies in squares.

Other than my cardigan I seemed to be moving towards the sea-green and silver spectrum, which I supposed was more suitable to a cool and fishy Pisces than black.

Horrorscopes: what your star sign says about you!

PISCES are cool: watch them slither off on their own business just when you thought you’d caught them in a net of the mundane. But don’t worry, there’s nothing scaly about them and they always return home to spawn.

Mace was definitely taciturn next morning, but that was all right because Caitlin talked enough for all of us. I didn’t think he was brooding over what his ex-wife had said, though, because it was probably something she’d thought up in the heat of the moment.

He did seem to be a devoted daddy, whatever Gloria said about his reputation, while I couldn’t say I was impressed by Kathleen’s maternal instincts. But clearly she’d got some, or she wouldn’t want to take Caitlin to America with her.