Maralinga (5 page)

‘My friend can give the tickets to someone else. Don't worry, they won't go to waste.'

How on earth had
that
happened, Elizabeth wondered, but she didn't question his motives. It was typical of Danny's impetuosity. And also of his immaturity, she thought, both of which could be rather endearing. She rang her parents and told them there'd be an extra guest for dinner.

 

‘She's bringing a
young man
with her,' Marjorie announced.

Alfred looked up from his journal to where his wife stood framed in the doorway of his study. He had long ceased to be startled by her sudden appearances.

‘Who is?'

‘Your daughter.'

‘She's bringing a young man where?'

‘Here. To dinner. Next Saturday.'

‘Good God, is she really?'

‘Yes.'

‘How extraordinary. Why?'

‘I'm not sure. Perhaps because it's her birthday.'

‘Ah.'

‘
Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you
…'

Marjorie's entrance was spectacular, Alfred having dimmed the dining room lights to add to the drama of the moment. In her outstretched arms she held a tray upon which sat a gigantic chocolate cake complete with twenty-four blazing candles and the words
Happy Birthday Elizabeth
starkly etched in white on its black-brown icing.

‘
Happy birthday, dear Elizabeth, happy birthday to you …
'

Alfred joined his wife in song as she placed the cake ceremoniously on the table, and both of them encouraged Daniel to sing along.

Elizabeth refused to cringe, although she flashed a wry glance in Daniel's direction. She'd warned him her parents were eccentric, even a little odd. This was so typical, she thought. Sometimes they forgot her birthday altogether – they'd done so on occasion even when she was a child, which she'd found devastating
at the time – then, when they did remember, they went to ridiculous lengths, possibly to assuage the guilt of previous years. Tonight was a perfect example. Candles belonged on the cakes of ten-year-olds, Elizabeth thought, and the cake itself was utterly impractical. Obscenely large, it would have fed thirty hungry people and, furthermore, it was chocolate. Her father was allergic to chocolate.

Daniel found Elizabeth's
I told you so
glance confusing. He could sense nothing at all odd about her parents. Throughout the dinner, he'd recognised that her mother was perhaps a little vague, but that hardly constituted odd, and her father seemed a most reasonable and intelligent man. When the conversation had touched briefly on politics, Alfred Hoffmann's criticism of Winston Churchill as a peacetime prime minister had indeed differed radically from Daniel's own father's views, but then his father was of the old military school, Daniel had reminded himself. There were, after all, many who were critical of Churchill's leadership these days, and their opinions were hardly a sign of eccentricity. As for the birthday cake … to Daniel, it epitomised normality. It was a reminder of the many birthday cakes his mother had baked for him and his younger brother over the years.

‘
For she's a jolly good fellow
…' He sang along heartily and joined in the three hoorahs which followed Marjorie's ‘hip hips', and also the loud cheer as Elizabeth obediently blew out the candles with one breath.

Marjorie carved the cake into portions, serving a huge wedge for Daniel and smaller slices for
herself and Elizabeth. Alfred's dessert plate remained conspicuously empty.

‘Do start, Daniel,' she urged as she noted the young man's hesitancy. ‘Alfred won't be having cake – he's allergic to chocolate.'

‘Right.' Daniel wondered, as he picked up his fork, why she'd chosen to make a chocolate cake given her husband's allergy. ‘By golly, Mrs Hoffmann,' he said after he'd taken the first mouthful, ‘this is truly magnificent.'

Daniel would have complimented Elizabeth's mother had the cake been virtually inedible, so determined was he to make a favourable impression, but he was genuine in his praise. And he was, after all, somewhat of a connoisseur. His mother prided herself, and justifiably so, on her baking skills. Prudence Gardiner's sponges were fluffy, her fruit cakes full-bodied and her scones as light as a feather.

‘Yes, it is rather good, isn't it,' Marjorie agreed.

‘It's more than good. It's even better than my mum's, and that's saying something, I can tell you. She's a wonderful cook, but you've outdone her tonight.'

‘Good heavens above, I didn't
make
it,' she laughed.

‘Oh.' Daniel was momentarily stumped. Surely all mothers made cakes.

‘I don't bake. I've never baked. But there's a lovely little shop I've discovered in Reigate where they make things exactly to order.'

‘So why chocolate when Daddy's allergic?' Elizabeth asked bluntly.

‘Because chocolate cakes are synonymous with birthdays,' Marjorie replied, as if the question were
one only a simpleton would ask. ‘Isn't that right, Daniel?' She flashed a smile to include their guest, who fortunately wasn't required to answer. ‘Probably because the wording stands out so wonderfully well, don't you think?' She gestured to the starkly white
Happy Birthday Elizabeth
, of which the
eth
was now missing. ‘A lemon sponge wouldn't offer the same impact, would it?'

‘Mummy doesn't cook,' Elizabeth said. She intended no insult to her mother, but the conversation was taking a ridiculous turn and Daniel was looking bemused, so she thought it best to explain the situation, which actually made a great deal of sense. ‘She doesn't like to cook, and she believes that people shouldn't be forced to do things they don't wish to do unless absolutely necessary.'

Marjorie ignored her daughter. ‘The truth is, Daniel, I have no skill in the kitchen.' The humility of her statement and the charm with which it was delivered plainly signalled there was nothing more to be said.

But Elizabeth wasn't about to drop the subject. ‘Only because you've never tried! And you've never tried because you don't
want
to.'

How she wished her mother would stand up for her principles! Marjorie Hoffmann was an intelligent woman who, in Elizabeth's opinion, should proudly acknowledge her refusal to conform.

Alfred drained the last of the claret from his glass and watched with interest. These days, mother and daughter rarely clashed. There had been times, he recalled, during Elizabeth's adolescence, when Marjorie, who always preferred to avoid confrontation, had been forced to take a stand. ‘Some of us
don't wish to make statements, dear,' Marjorie had finally said in response to her daughter's continuous badgering. ‘Some of us are, perhaps, a statement in ourselves.' The argument had infuriated the adolescent Elizabeth, who had considered it not only irresponsible but tantamount to a betrayal. She clearly believed that in not speaking out, her mother was shirking her duty as a modern woman. Alfred had noted, however, that somewhere along the track the argument's irrefutability had hit home. Maddening as Elizabeth found her mother at times, it was evident she'd developed a healthy respect for Marjorie's unorthodox approach to life. In any event, she'd stopped nagging.

That is until tonight, Alfred thought. Tonight, for some strange reason, his daughter seemed to have reverted to adolescence.

‘You have no skill in the kitchen, Mummy, because you don't
wish
to.' Elizabeth continued, dog-like, to gnaw at the subject. ‘For goodness sake, you refuse to even boil an egg. You absolutely
loathe
the kitchen, why won't you admit it?'

‘She's right, Daniel.' Marjorie acquiesced with sudden good grace and a faintly theatrical sigh of resignation. ‘The joys of cooking are lost on me, I fear.' She smiled benignly at her daughter. ‘Although even Elizabeth would admit I do make a fine cup of tea.'

‘But the meal …' Daniel looked from one to the other, confusion gaining the upper hand. A perfectly prepared chicken and mushroom casserole could surely not have been purchased at the bakery in Reigate.

‘Elizabeth's father,' Marjorie admitted. ‘Alfred loves to cook.'

‘Oh yes, indeed.' Alfred nodded emphatically. ‘Soups, stews and casseroles for the most part. I like to mix things; the transformation process is most fulfilling. It's the alchemist in me, of course. Can I tempt you to another glass of wine, Daniel? I have an excellent Bordeaux to hand.'

‘Um …' Daniel was caught out by the question and the need to respond. Things had turned swiftly bizarre and he was thinking that perhaps Elizabeth was right after all, and her parents were odd.

‘I intend to have another myself.' Alfred rose eagerly from his chair.

‘Well, yes, thank you, sir.'

‘Excellent.'

Marjorie stood also. ‘Cup of tea, Elizabeth?' she asked.

‘Lovely. Danny and I'll clear the table.'

‘Thank you, dear.'

Daniel was surprised. Elizabeth's antagonism towards her mother had disappeared as quickly as it had manifested itself. And when her parents had left the dining room, she made no further comment, so he simply followed her lead and started clearing the table.

‘Well, well, well, who would have dreamt it possible,' Marjorie said, placing the kettle on the stove.

Alfred carefully drew the cork from the bottle of Bordeaux, pleased that Daniel had agreed to another glass. He would have felt a little indulgent opening a second bottle just for himself, and he did so enjoy his clarets.

‘Who would have dreamt what possible, my dear?'

‘Elizabeth. She's in love.'

‘Good God, why on earth would you think that?'

‘Put it down to female intuition if you wish, but I'm quite sure I'm right.' Marjorie took the teapot from the cupboard. ‘She wants him to know us, Alfred,' she said, then quickly corrected herself. ‘No, that's not quite right – she wants him to know
me.
You've always passed with flying colours, my darling. You are your daughter's hero.'

‘Is that why she was on the attack?'

‘Oh, yes. She wants him to respect me, which I find rather sweet, but the fact is, Alfred, she wants to
share
us with this young man. She wants him to know us the way
she
knows us. Normally Elizabeth couldn't give tuppence whether people like us or not – and why should she? But this particular young man's opinion is important to her, which, to my mind, means she's in love.'

‘How extraordinary. I would have thought it the other way round myself. I would have thought
he
was in love with
her
.'

‘Well, of course he is, that goes without saying.' Marjorie busied herself setting things out on the tea tray. ‘She's not aware of it, of course.'

‘Not aware of what? That
she's
in love with
him
, or that
he's
in love with
her
?'

‘Both. Blinkered vision, it's so typical of Elizabeth.'

‘Dear me.' Alfred didn't doubt his wife for one moment; Marjorie was most perceptive about things of importance. Her vagueness sprang principally from a lack of interest in the minutiae of everyday life, which Alfred found perfectly understandable. ‘But this could play havoc with her plans for a career.'

‘Yes, indeed.'

‘Do you think he's serious?'

‘He appears to be, but then he's so very young. Who can tell?'

‘Oh dear, dear me,' Alfred said anxiously.

‘There's no point in worrying, my darling. After all, there's nothing we can do, is there?' Marjorie obviously expected no response as she blithely continued. ‘If Elizabeth refuses to acknowledge her feelings to herself, she's hardly going to acknowledge them to us,' she said as she filled the milk jug and placed it on the tray. ‘And if you were to question Daniel's intentions, you'd only humiliate her dreadfully. She'd never forgive you for that.'

The kitchen door opened just as Marjorie picked up the tea tray. ‘No, no, things will sort themselves out one way or another. Now where shall we have our tea and our wine?' she asked loudly as Elizabeth and Daniel entered with the dishes.

‘The conservatory.' Alfred's answer was instantaneous. ‘I haven't yet shown Daniel my oleanders.'

‘The conservatory it is then.'

As they crossed paths at the door, Marjorie issued instructions to Elizabeth. ‘Just rinse the dishes and stack them in the sink, dear, they can wait until morning. I'll come back for the teapot, the water hasn't quite boiled yet.'

Alfred, bottle in hand, held the door open for his wife. ‘Leave the dishes to Elizabeth, Daniel. We need two fresh glasses, on the double.'

‘Yes, sir,' Daniel said as Alfred and Marjorie disappeared.

‘The oleanders.' Elizabeth smiled. ‘I think it means he likes you.' She pointed at the cupboard above his head. ‘Wine glasses up there.'

‘Right.'

Daniel left the kitchen, thinking how appalled his mother would be at the thought of unwashed dishes remaining stacked overnight.

 

‘So, Daniel, what do you think of my oleanders?' Alfred asked several minutes later when he'd poured the wine and they were seated at the table, Marjorie having returned to the kitchen for the tea.

‘Most impressive, sir.'

Daniel looked about at the unkempt mass of bushes and trees that filled every inch of the conservatory. They were impressive in sheer volume alone, but their limbs were gawky, their foliage tough, and even their pink and white flowers, pretty though they were, seemed to belong somewhere else.

‘Unusual, aren't they?'

‘Yes.' Daniel agreed with enthusiasm – he'd gathered from Elizabeth's comment that the oleanders were something special. ‘Very unusual indeed.'

‘Only here, in an English conservatory.' Alfred's smile was wry. ‘They're as common as muck throughout the whole of the Mediterranean and the Middle East – the damn things grow like weeds.'

‘Oh.' Daniel felt self-conscious and a little uncomfortable. He hoped Elizabeth's father hadn't been trying to catch him out. ‘I wouldn't know, sir,' he answered. ‘I haven't travelled much.'

‘Ah well,' Alfred laughed, ‘I've no doubt that'll be rectified soon enough.' He hadn't been trying to catch the boy out at all, but he liked the honest simplicity of his reply. ‘Join the army and see the world, eh?' He raised his glass.

‘Yes, sir, I certainly hope so.' Daniel responded to the toast.

Alfred took a hefty mouthful of wine, and there was a moment's silence while he savoured the aftertaste. He swirled the contents of his glass, studying the colour and ‘legs' of the Bordeaux. ‘Wonderful thing, travel,' he said finally, and once again he contemplated his oleanders. ‘My wife thinks I keep them because they're evocative of my travels and she's quite right, but that's not the principal reason for my attachment.'