Last Guests of the Season (7 page)

‘I will.' He pulled the door to a little, and left them, crossing the rag runner to fetch a sweater. The bedroom was shadowy, dimly lit through the open shutters by the distant blueish-green of the village street lights and the stars. Quiet voices drifted up from the terrace. He rummaged on a chair, found and pulled on a sweater, and stepped out on to the balcony.

Behind the ridge of mountain facing him the moon had begun to rise. He leaned on the stone ledge and looked down. Claire, Frances and Oliver were drinking coffee companionably, Claire stretched out on the swing-seat in her full black and white skirt, bare feet crossed at the ankles. Oliver was reading again; he said to Frances, sitting opposite Claire at the marble table, ‘Do you realise it's only twenty-five years since the last wolf was seen up here? In the mountain villages the dogs still wear spiked collars, just in case.'

He spoke in a tone which sounded to Robert as formal as if he were speaking to someone recently introduced, and he thought: it must be because they're with us, surely they can't go on like this all the time.

‘Goodness,' said Frances. She was leaning on the table, her chin resting on one hand, smoking thoughtfully. She looked, in profile, neater than ever, smoke rising thinly into the air above her. And watching them all – not, for some reason, announcing his presence – Robert saw on her face, as she watched Claire, an expression which he found unfathomable.

‘What's this?' called Tom.

‘What's what?' Robert came out of the dining-room, where morning sunlight lit the cotton tablecloth, the packets of English cereal and glazed brown dish of crumbling yellow maize bread. They were breakfasting late, planning a morning by the river, all rather quiet this morning, feeling their way a little still; except for Tom, who had fidgeted, and kept leaning back in his chair despite repeated requests from Oliver not to do so.

‘Well, can I get down, then?'

‘We haven't finished. Sit still.'

‘Please?'

‘Oh, go on,' Robert had said easily, reaching for the honey jar. ‘Don't you think? They can all get down.'

But Jack stayed where he was, next to Claire, slowly finishing his milk, and Jessica affected not to have heard, smiling loftily as Tom got off his chair, catching the edge of the tablecloth as he swung round. Claire reached out just in time to prevent his plate from falling, and Tom, oblivious, went out into the sitting-room. They could hear his bare feet on the wooden floorboards, and a series of clicking sounds. And Robert, coming out after a few minutes with a loaded tray, found him gazing up at the enormous straw cloak which hung on a wooden stand near the dining-room door. A hat surmounted it, a kind of vast straw sombrero; at the base, the ends of a pair of wide trousers were visible, thick and feathery, like shire horses‘ feet. On its stand, the outfit towered above them, taller than Robert by a good few inches, taller even than Oliver, who had brushed past it on his way to bed last night, going up first, earlier than the rest of them.

‘That,' Robert said now, ‘is a shepherd's cloak.'

Tom frowned, reaching out to touch it. Layers of dense combed straw were sewn in bands from shoulder to mid-calf on a coarse fabric backing; he ran his hand downwards, and again. The wooden stand rocked a little.

‘Careful.'

‘It feels nice. The hens would like it.'

Robert smiled. ‘They would.' He thought how Jack, by now, would have been – had been, last year – asking questions: why was it made of straw? Did shepherds really used to wear things like this? Did they still? Tom asked nothing. He moved closer, and put his face against it, smelling it, his fingers rustling the layers. Again, the wooden stand began to rock.

‘Tom, it's very heavy – come away from there. Do you want me to tell you about it?'

‘All right.' Tom moved reluctantly, and Robert made for the kitchen, saying: ‘It's made of all that thick straw to keep the rain out.'

‘Oh.' Tom followed him, running his hands along the panelling in the passage.

‘It must have been very uncomfortable, even so,' Robert went on, putting the tray on the table by the window shaded with creeper. ‘Don't you think? Tramping about over the mountains with all that heavy wet straw hanging off you, and rain dripping off your hat brim.'

‘A bit like a sheep,' said Tom, who had opened the fridge door.

Robert pictured wet Portuguese sheep in hats. ‘True. What are you looking for?'

‘Oh, just something for the cat.'

‘I don't think you should encourage that cat, quite honestly.' Robert carried the breakfast things over to the sink. ‘She'll become a bit of a pest.'

‘Oh, please.' Tom turned round, leaving the fridge door open. ‘She'll die if we don't feed her. She'll
die.'

‘All right, all right.' He reached out and shut the door.
‘We'll
die if flies get in the fridge and crap all over the food.'

‘Will we really?'

‘No. But don't leave it open, there's a good chap.'

‘Okay.' Tom leaned up against the draining-board, watching Robert squirt in violently coloured washing-up liquid and turn on the taps. The pipes banged and shook.

Through the open door to the passage Robert could hear the others wandering away from the breakfast table; he saw Jessica going into her room to get her swimming things, followed by her brother. ‘Why don't you go and play with the others?' he suggested, rinsing cereal bowls.

Tom ignored him, twisting a worn tea towel on a hook.
‘Please
can I feed the cat? Is there any milk?'

Robert looked at him. ‘Are you always this persistent?'

‘What?'

‘Never mind.' He nodded towards the breakfast tray. ‘I expect there's some milk left in the jug.'

Together they went to the back door and Robert pulled it open. Immediately there was a swift movement: the cat, who had been waiting, slunk down the stone steps and looked up at them.

‘I told you she was hungry.' Tom made eating noises. ‘Come on, puss, here you are, don't be frightened.'

Robert poured milk and stepped back into the doorway; he stood watching the cat's cautious approach up the steps again, and her eager lapping. Tom, squatting beside her, knocked the saucer and reached out to stroke the staring fur.

‘I really wouldn't,' said Robert, automatically.

Footsteps came lightly along the passage: he turned to see Frances, in stone-coloured shorts and pale blue shirt, move towards the stairs. How had this woman, formal to the point of primness, produced this clumsy and eccentric child? He thought again of the curious expression on her face last night when she looked at Claire, and shook his head, musing, as she climbed the stairs.

More footsteps, brisker and heavier.

‘How are we getting on?' Claire came into the kitchen, carrying a rucksack. ‘We'll take fruit and crisps, shall we? And I'll make up a bottle of squash.' She looked at the unfinished bowl of washing-up, and the open door, and raised an eyebrow. Robert nodded towards Tom; she came to look.

‘Oh, Tom – that mangy animal! I don't think you should touch her.'

‘If you succeed in stopping him, you're a better man than I.' Robert returned to the sink, hearing Tom say fiercely: ‘She's
not
mangy,' and Claire, as he had done, sigh and accept defeat.

‘What about the dinghy?' she asked, pouring concentrated squash into an empty plastic bottle.

‘Do we know where the foot pump is?'

‘Not exactly, but I can look.'

‘Leave it,' said Robert. He tipped up the bowl and let the water drain, with painful slowness, down the plughole. ‘There's plenty of time. I haven't even seen the river yet, what with drives to the airport and all that. Let's just get down there, for God's sake.'

The path to the river led through maize fields, reached by walking down the hill and along the cobbled streets through the village. It was after half-past ten by the time they set out, the air hot and still, the sky without a cloud. They all wore sunhats; their sandals slapped on the stones. From the hillside the erratic church bell now rang steadily for mass; coming down the hill towards the intersection of streets they saw, ahead, one or two families walking slowly towards the main road in their Sunday best, the men and boys in open-necked white shirts and shiny flares, the women in brightly patterned frocks. Two old ladies in black, on sticks, followed slowly.

‘Did you go to a service last year?' Oliver asked Claire.

‘No, never. We went inside to have a look, of course, but not to an actual service.' She turned to look at him. He was wearing loose cotton trousers, a faded blue T-shirt and cream cotton jacket; with his Panama hat and glasses, carrying his book, he looked, she thought, like something out of Bloomsbury, the family bag of swimming things in his other hand almost as incongruous as it would have looked on Strachey, or Duncan Grant. She hadn't given much thought to Bloomsbury for a while. It was years since she'd taught
The Waves
at A level, and even then, she realised, she had connected it with life at university and the kind of intensity she used to associate with Frances, not life as it had since become: pleasurably ordinary, filled with children. Brilliant, neurotic Bloomsbury had produced, as far as she could remember, few children.

They walked past a stone wall covered in blackberry brambles.

‘Why?' she asked Oliver. ‘Would you like to go to a service?'

‘Perhaps. Might be interesting, don't you think?'

‘I suppose so – I imagine it's much like most rural Catholicism, though, don't you? Overblown, full of incense and ignorance –' She stopped, suddenly embarrassed. ‘You're not Catholic, are you?'

‘Lapsed,' he said, looking at her in amusement. ‘It's all right, please don't worry. You don't go to church in London?'

‘No, never.' None of their friends went to church. ‘Do you?'

‘Sometimes. More out of nostalgia than anything else, I suppose. I take Tom occasionally – part of his education.'

They had reached the bottom of the hill, where the street divided: a great wooden barn stood at the corner, set on stilts in a spacious yard, and three small grubby children in oversized clothes were taking turns with a makeshift go-cart, rattling over the concrete. They stopped and waved, calling.

‘Bom dia, bom dial'

One of the children, a little boy, wore glasses; Claire remembered him from last year. She saw Robert and the others pause by the gate and smile; the children ran towards them and Tom began to climb the bars. Frances put out a restraining arm; he hung over the top bar, grinning, as Claire and Oliver came up.

Robert turned to them. ‘Oliver – I was just telling Frances, this is a threshing barn, for the maize. When it's dry, they bring it in and beat it over a hollow manger: you'll hear them. Then they sweep up the grains from the floor. We went to watch them last year, didn't we, Jess?'

Jess nodded, running her sandalled foot up and down in the dust.

‘And you wrote about it at school, didn't you?' Claire said encouragingly.

‘Mmm.' She went on scuffing.

‘Did you?' said Oliver. ‘That sounds interesting.' She looked up at him, and they smiled at each other. ‘It's rather magnificent,' he went on, turning to the barn again. ‘Must be a good two hundred years old?'

‘Easily,' said Robert. ‘Most of the houses in the village are older than that.'

They stood gazing at it: the trailing vines overhanging the flight of worn stone steps to the doors, the weather-beaten wood, with its peeling black paint. High on the rooftop, pigeons cooed. Frances put her hand on Tom's arm again as he made to clamber over; he shook her off.

‘I want to have a go in that cart thing.'

‘I want to go to the river,' said Jack. ‘Come on. It's
hot.'

‘Yes, let's go,' said Claire. ‘You'll like it down there, Tom. Are you a good swimmer?'

‘I've done my ten metres.' He clambered down again, reluctantly.

‘I've done my fifty,' said Jack.

‘So?' Tom flushed. ‘So? What's so great about doing fifty?'

‘Well, it's better than ten, isn't it?'

‘I'm sure,' said Robert, moving between them, ‘that by the end of the fortnight you'll be both be doing a hundred. But the river's a bit deep in places, and it goes down quite suddenly, doesn't it, Jack, so you'd better be careful, okay?'

‘You didn't mention that,' said Frances.

‘Well, most of it's pretty shallow. Has he brought armbands?'

‘I'm not wearing
arm
bands,' said Tom.

‘Oh, yes you are,' said Oliver.

Frances said carefully, ‘Let's discuss it when we get there.'

Jack said, ‘I haven't worn armbands since I was in reception,' and Tom reached out and shoved at him.

‘Shut up!'

‘You
shut up,' said Jack, recoiling, rubbing his arm.

‘No,
you
shut up.' And Tom lunged towards him again, red in the face.

‘Tom!' said Oliver and Frances together, and Oliver moved swiftly over and grabbed him. ‘Stop that at once, do you hear?'

‘Get off me.' Tom tried to wrench away, but he couldn't. He stood panting, like an enraged bull, fighting back tears.

‘Baby,' said Jack.

‘Okay, okay.' Clare moved towards him, brushing past Jess. ‘Jack, will you stop teasing.' She held out her hand. ‘Walk with me, please. Come on, we're all getting hot and bothered, we'll feel better as soon as we get to the river.' She was aware of the children in the yard behind them, hanging over the gate, fascinated. She gave them a cheery wave, and took Jack firmly by the hand. ‘Let's go.'

‘Sorry about that,' said Oliver.