Family Album (4 page)

“What happens in the cellar?” inquires Philip, eyeing that door.

Gina shrugs. “Black beetles. Spiders. Cellar life.”

They are wandering in the garden, after lunch—after too much lunch. Roast leg of lamb, mint sauce, roast potatoes, broad beans—the works. Rhubarb crumble with cream. Cheese board for any survivors.

“Shall we think about going home soon?” says Gina.

Philip considers. “Of course, there is a sense in which you
are
at home.”

“I am talking about the flat.”

He puts his arm around her. “I know you are. Joke. Of a kind. All the same, say what you like, your mother is a crack cook. OK, let us get ourselves together. Do you want to take those newspapers back? Your father would no doubt use them.”

Philip carried down their bags. Gina was in the hall with Alison and Ingrid. Alison was saying that it had been so good to meet Philip, and they must come again soon. Gina was saying yes, sure, of course, trouble is I never know when I’ll have to be off somewhere. Ingrid had put beans, carrots, lettuce, herbs into a carrier bag: “The lettuce you must eat this evening, while it is fresh. The herbs put in water.”

Alison called out, “Charles—they’re going.”

Charles emerged from his study. Gina took a step forward, kissed him. “We’re off,” she said. “Traffic—Sunday evening. Don’t want to leave too late.”

Charles accepted the kiss, patted her arm. “Good to see you other than on a screen. Not that I look at much TV—I prefer to read the news—but we catch you occasionally.” He held out his hand to Philip. “Nice to have met you . . . er. Hope I didn’t go on too much last night.” A quizzical glance. “Company can set me off.”

Philip said that he had enjoyed their discussion.

Alison was waving a piece of paper at Gina. “Addresses, dear. Everyone’s addresses—e-mail and otherwise—since you’re not sure if you’ve got them or not. Roger’s moved to a new hospital in Toronto. And Katie’s husband is being transferred to San Francisco—they’re so pleased. Clare’s touring at the moment with the dance company—in Japan; she sends such pretty postcards. So there’s only her Paris address. Sandra of course has her flat in Rome.”

“And we think there is perhaps an Italian man,” said Ingrid.

“Do we?” said Charles. “I have not been told this. Are his intentions honorable?”

Alison laughed. “Really! Sandra is thirty-eight. I expect she can look after herself.”

“No doubt. I was merely trying to be the responsible father. So there you are, Gina—that’s the rundown on the family. Global displacement, you note.”

“We have still Paul,” said Ingrid.

“And are so thankful that we do.” Alison embraced Gina, dabbed her face against Philip’s. “I wish you could have seen more of him but of course the Garden Centre calls. Have a good journey. Come again soon.”

Philip drove, this time. As the car went through the gates he saw the group on the steps reflected in the driving mirror—Alison and Ingrid waving, Charles simply standing, the dog at his feet, tongue lolling. He thought they looked firmly set in some other time—about 1975, maybe—and said so, intending no criticism.

“Seventy-seven, probably,” said Gina. “The summer of my eighth birthday.”

Except that they are not, she thought. She saw her young mother, her young father. She saw everybody in another incarnation—Paul, Sandra, Katie . . . all of them. Aunt Corinna—she was there then too. Not set fast—moved on and away. Except that it is all still there also, going on just as it did. That day. Other days.

 

 

 

 

C
orinna sits on the terrace, and looks down into the garden. She has arrived late; the party is in full swing. Black mark for that, no doubt—perhaps canceling out the brownie points for being here. She is not Gina’s godmother—this is an atheistic household—but her “patron,” and patrons are required to attend birthdays. “Gina would be so hurt if you didn’t come”—which actually means that Alison would be so hurt.

Children everywhere. The garden running with children. A display of Alison’s fecundity. Not quite all are hers, of course—there are visitors, Gina’s invitees. The family rule is that the birthday child alone is allowed guests, Corinna remembers, and a handful only, the family itself being so numerous. So Gina has the decreed smattering of friends.

Alison is joyous, Corinna sees. The earth mother. Dressed by Laura Ashley, or perhaps robed would be a better word—an acreage of sprigged cotton, top to toe, nicely concealing the lack of figure. Could she be . . . ? Oh no, perish the thought. And the earth mother has provided—the kitchen table is testimony to her labors. Plate upon plate of tricksy little sandwiches, with identifying flags, bridge rolls, sausage rolls, tiny iced cakes in frilly cups, brandy snaps, chocolate biscuits, and jugs of apple juice and lemonade. And, in the middle, the Cake—eighteen inches in diameter at least, homemade down to the last piped rosette and the neat calligraphy: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GINA. Though the eight candles I imagine came from Woolworths, thinks Corinna. Oh, the earth mother has done her stuff.

Why does Alison so exasperate me? Is it because she has six children, and I have none? But this is 1977, and a woman’s achievement is not measured by the output of her womb. In my circles, where people have heard of feminism, Alison is a throwback: she is entirely dependent on her husband, her skills and talents are limited to nappy changing and birthday cakes, whereas I am a well-regarded scholar and teacher. I know more about Christina Rossetti than anyone except a tiresome man at Yale who will be trumped when my book comes out. In the modern world, it is I who am the achiever, not Alison.

All right, maybe the children come into it. Somehow. But it’s more elemental than that. It’s to do with that inexhaustible smile, and the way she pats your arm, and her general shapelessness and the fact that she’s barely read a book in her life, and that slight stammer, and her majestic complacency.

Why ever did my brother pick her? Suddenly she was there, and he’d married her, and no sooner married than babies poured forth. What’s in it for Charles? Amazing sex? Surely not. Three meals a day and room service when required, yes. Charles has never been asked to lift a domestic finger. Genetic prowess? Well, maybe. Who knows what dark unspoken urges he has. I’d be the last to say I know my brother.

Corinna has a cup of tea in her hand, supplied by Alison: “You must be parched after that drive, and we’re not going to have the birthday tea till after they’ve finished the treasure hunt.” Corinna drinks her tea and watches children eddy in and out of the bushes. Alison is in their midst, clapping her hands and exhorting them onwards. Ingrid wanders up from the pond garden, a baby on her hip. Her role today seems to be to keep the baby out of harm’s way. When did this one arrive? One was barely aware that there had been another.

And now Charles has appeared, also coming from the pond garden. He joins Alison, who is consoling someone who has not yet found any treasure, and he stands beside her, looking somehow entirely detached, as though none of this were anything much to do with him, as though he had merely strayed upon the scene. But, paradoxically, he manages also to seem some kind of pivot, he commands attention, this tall man in jeans and a green checked shirt, slightly stooped, as though he condescended to the shorter folk about him, at whom he vaguely gazes through heavy-rimmed glasses. There they stand, Alison and Charles, in the middle of their suburban acreage, their progeny whooping around them.

Alison is skimming and floating. She skims about the garden, with the children; her skirts float around her; she is on a tide of pleasure. Her thoughts too skim and float: lovely day . . . sun . . . children . . . Sandra, don’t push Katie, there’s plenty of treasure for everyone . . . Summer birthdays always best, poor Paul with January, one should have thought ahead . . . Paul’s a bit forlorn, so many girls, with Gina’s friends . . . Will there be enough lemonade? . . . Will they eat the paste sandwiches, too savory perhaps? . . . Gina, do make sure the little ones find some treasure, I don’t think Roger has
any
. . . sun . . . children . . . Ah, here is Charles.

She skims to a stop, with Charles now beside her. “They’re having
such
a lovely time,” she tells him. But Charles is not here, she can see, he is concerned with matters of the mind, the things that go on in his head that she could not possibly follow. She puts her arm through his, smiling. Smiling and smiling.

“Who are all these children?” he says. “The ones that aren’t ours?”

“They’re Gina’s friends from school,” she tells him. “Just six of them, for her birthday. Rowena and Sally and Rosie and, um . . . Corinna is here. Having tea on the terrace. Why don’t you join her?”

And here now is Ingrid, wandering over the grass, her hair glinting in the sun, the baby on her hip. Charles goes. Alison smiles at Ingrid. “Is Clare tired?” she says. “You could try putting her in her cot for a bit.”

“She is fine,” says Ingrid. “Shall I soon take the ice cream from the freezer?”

“Soon,” says Alison. “They’ve nearly found all the treasure now.”

She sits at the top of the grassy slope above the pond garden, waiting. The treasure is hidden all over the garden—gold and silver chocolate coins. The little ones think the fairies hid it, but Gina knows better: she saw Alison, earlier, bustling in and out of the bushes, reaching up onto tree branches, pausing at the swing, the long bench, the steps up to the terrace. The treasure hunt is not to start till Alison shouts one, two, three—go! So they are all poised, dotted about the garden. She can see the bright flicker of their clothes, hither and thither, each pitched where they think they have a private hunting ground. There is Paul, over by the rhododendrons. Paul is not much enjoying himself, Gina knows; it is not his birthday, he has no friends here. She is sorry about that, because she is in bliss herself, but it is after all her turn. You wait a whole year for this, and he had his, as did all of them.