The Triple Goddess (76 page)

One lectured him sternly, ‘Everyone knows there are three subjects you never raise in a pub, Manny: politics, religion, sex. There’s a fourth—me.’

Amid grunts of agreement from all around, Manny was quick to acquiesce. ‘No problem. I don’t know anything about politics, or religion, as it happens, and I’ve never had sex.’ The last confession, like that of his lack of familiarity with automobiles, caused a pause in the raising of glass to mouth, until it was tacitly decided that he was speaking in jest, whereupon the tension was released. ‘So what do you talk about?’ pursued the DL’s man. ‘Village gossip, I suppose.’

‘Never,’ responded another; ‘Least not in here. In here we discuss nothing. Nothing at all.’

‘Nothing?’

‘That’s what I said, Jimmy.’

‘Man…’

‘Talk of the devil!’, someone said, and Manny started. Although closing-time was rapidly approaching, newcomers who had managed to nip out late from their homes “for a quick one” were still being welcomed by the others. Each clack of the door-latch prompted a flicker of eyeballs to see who it was and assess whether he might be good for a pint that did not have to be returned until next time, when the debt might have been forgotten. Drinking time being of the essence, Manny was not introduced to these people, who accepted him as if he had been in their company all evening, and he was included in their reckless drink-buying and hail-fellow-well-met repartee while they devoted themselves to getting as many pints under their belts as possible before the chiv of reality was inserted between their shoulder-blades.

As the party drew to a close the babel took on a desperate intensity. In place of the earlier light-hearted verbal sallies, quips that would not have caused a smirk in the cold grey light of morning were thrown into the public domain and greeted with an insane hilarity. Still the decibels continued to ratchet up.

By the time that Hob, in a stentorian voice that contrasted markedly with his earlier bonhomous banter, announced ‘Last Orders!’, the pub was so densely packed that there was scarcely room to move. All good things had to come to an end, even in this adult Christopher Robin Enchanted Place. When ten minutes later Hob rang the bell again like an infernal angelus and bellowed, ‘Time, gentlemen, please!’, the Bacchanalian atmosphere instantly vanished and an oppressive mood descended upon the company like a skunk at a wedding party. The regulars, stricken, squinnied at each other as if they were seeing themselves for the first time, as consciousness of domesticity and duty returned. They watched in a daze while the bartenders, with treasonous efficiency, cleared the slops out of the beer-trays, wiped down the bar, and emptied the ashtrays.

Gleefully Hob tallied the night’s takings.

The smoky fug was dispersed by the frequent opening and slamming shut of the doors at either end of the bar, and the unrecycled night air entered like a constable to evict those who lingered. Coats were shrugged on and the circle of locals grew smaller, melting like a block of ice. There were few goodbyes and no handshakes, and each person looked downcast and sheepish, as if he had just woken up next to some ill-considered one-night stand. Though everyone gave the impression that they were holding their liquor reasonably well, the manservant knew this to be a short-lived pretence that would be given up as each villager quit the premises to stumble home and fumble with his door key. Several came back to collect their dogs who, inured to the noise, had dozed off against the counter.

A triumphant Hob finished punching numbers into a dirty pocket calculator, and the devil lady’s servant, Manny no longer, decided then and there to give him the highest commendation when he made his report in the morning. After his initial deposit had run out he had paid as he went, so there was nothing owing. Having no concern about his own sobriety, he shook Hob’s hand and walked home whistling and pleased with how he had comported himself. He considered that he had passed his test with flying colours, and that his mistress could not fail to be impressed by his performance and intelligence gathering.

His confidence about this was shaken when, over the weekend, he spotted two of his boon companions on the Street, and crossing over to greet them, readied himself for a hearty exchange of badinage. With any luck he would be treated to some juicy piece of gossip. But to his puzzlement and dismay, the pair looked offended, as if he were a stranger or down-and-out who was going to ask for a jump-start to his vehicle or beg for money. Then their faces set and they marched off.

Really, thought the demon manservant, to one such as himself the human condition was quite unfathomable.

*

In the pub, one of many such centres

Of the universe, the volunteer staff

Of Mission Control, on indefinite break,

Discuss the failings of their friends and kin.

Others within this Strangers’ Gallery

Go on to solve the world’s problems

And deplore the snafus that caused them.

But regarding a nearby town:

“Don’t know no one there no more,”

“Haven’t visited it for years,” and

“Wouldn’t know my way around.”

Taking my face inside

I leave it at the bar, feeding on nuts and beer

And chatting to the locals, while I admire

The shepherds’ crooks against the chimney breast

And drink and warm myself before the fire.

Through the window, stars and the coronet

Of the moon adorn the brow of the downs.

As I sit and mull and noodle

On the mind-piano, robins of flame

Dance in the grate, and prawn-eyed embers

Glow with slowly ashing secrets.

When I came back to the bar to collect my face,

It jumps up like a terrier and licks my ear

And says, “You can take me home now, gorgeous!”

Chapter Sixteen

‘’Ods bodikins!’ cried Effie, blowing through the kitchen door of the cottage and falling into a chair at the table, bosom heaving. ‘Faugh! Fegs!’ This was her normal manner of entrance and Ophelia did not look round. Had Effie crept in, she would have been worried. Inarticulate noises like the phonetics described at the front of dictionaries: sibilants, spirants, palatals, gutturals, plosives, fricatives, affricates, liquids, dentals and nasals, were common about the house.

Washing dough off her hands at the sink, Ophelia said, ‘That’s the ticket, take a load off.’ She knew the importance of giving Effie a moment to settle down after one of her ballistic entrances.

Whenever Effie was out Ophelia took over duty in the kitchen. It was the engine-room of the house, and one had to ensure that there was sufficient solid fuel in the stove cooker for the stream of products that it spewed from the torrid maw of its roasting, baking, and simmering ovens. The air was permeated with the aroma of spices. At present Ophelia was removing a wholemeal loaf from the baking oven with arm-length gloves so thick that she could hardly bend her fingers. The bread, she was glad to see, had baked to an even shade of medium brown. Removing it from the tray, she set it on a rack to cool and replaced it with a dozen rock cakes that she had just mixed.

Effie, when she was not dashing from point to point around the village, spent her days kneading, stirring, talking on the telephone, and receiving casual visitors. Something was always being brought to a boil, scrambled, seared, baked, roasted, fried, simmered, steamed, tossed, thickened, liquefied, sieved, peeled, chopped, sliced, iced, or glazed. A natural multi-tasker, she could only think properly when she had utensils in hand and the phone cradled under her chin. What bowl or pan or jug she selected and which measuring-cup, ladle, spoon, knife, whisk or rolling-pin, depended upon the mood she was in, and her state of mind was evident from how furiously or steadily she was wielding her implements.

Awaiting the raw products of her dynamism was the cooking range, a ferrous dragon with an insatiable belly of fire. At night as it slumbered it slow oven-cooked porridge for the morning while the Argus-eyed peacock feathers in the terracotta pot in the corner kept watch. During the day, when its cast-iron fire or oven doors were opened, a magmatic heat that might have been vented from the core of the earth poured into the room.

To placate it, the beast had to be stoked at intervals throughout the day with small logs and coke and kindling and household rubbish, and the fire riddled for ash as if one was scratching the stomach of a pet to rid it of fleas. Meat bones and the gristly remains of mealtime sacrifices, fruit and vegetable peelings, newspapers, circulars, rejected opinions, unwanted advice: all were physically or virtually incinerated or cremated. The range gave the impression that it would have consumed people too, given the opportunity: tradesmen, meter-readers, travelling salesmen, burglars...no one would be safe who stepped indoors while the occupants were out; for the cottage was never locked.

A step up away from the stove and preparation and washing-up areas were pine cupboards, a dresser, and an oak farmhouse table where the women took their meals, talked, read and informally entertained. They even took naps there with head on folded arms. The formal dining room and the equally ignored living room were very rarely used socially, and for the most part housed storage boxes and floor to ceiling bookcases of the hundreds of paperback crime thrillers that Effie devoured as avidly as she did cake, and the many cookbooks that she was given as presents and never consulted.

From her command centre in the kitchen Effie remained in touch with the outside world via a black Edwardian Bakelite rotary telephone, which she activated by inserting a well-chewed pencil into the dough-encrusted circles of the dial. The flex of the frayed cord that issued from the horn-shaped mouthpiece had been curlicued into pigtails by Effie’s carrying the phone around with her as she talked and twirling the handset while trying to do too many things at once. Visitors wondered whether her megaphone voice had need of the phone to reach her communicants.

Her words were accompanied by a jungle-beat of wooden spoons on copper vessels, the clatter and crash of saucepans and skillets on the boiling-plate and simmering-plate hobs with their insulated lids, the crack of eggs on the edges of enamelled bowls, whir of beaters, growl of grinders, slap of batter in basins, springing of scales; and the occasional scream of the timer that was wound for short temporal regulations other than the boiling of eggs, which was a judgement call. Flour settled like snow on snow on every surface, and following some of her lengthier conversations Effie might find that she had baked a batch of something unawares.

Today, to assist her friend in recovering from whatever it was that had upset her, and which she would shortly be hearing about, Ophelia poured Effie a cup of tea from the double-handled Brown Betty that was sitting on the hotplate, eased a piece of chocolate sponge onto a side-plate from a platter decorated with flowers and wavy edges of faded gilt, and slid it across the table to her.

When she was sufficiently restored Effie was ready to describe her experience. ‘That man Dark is the worst. Except for his boss-lady, who is the worst of the worst. Though for worseness there’s little to tell between them. They’re a sort of combination of worsity, worse luck.’ She paused for a gulp of tea as she awaited Ophelia’s,

‘Why, whatever has happened?’

‘I bumped into Diemen and Dark on the Street. Literally bumped, because I gave Dark a shove towards a pile of horse dung he was stepping around, and some of it got on his shoe. Diemen said to me, “Just so you know, Effie, the days of Lady Liberal and Father Nice Guy are over.” And Dark echoed, “Our patience has run out. Our tolerance is at an end. Enough is enough. Prepare ye the way of the lady.” And I said, quick as a flash and witty too—what was it I said? Oh yes, “I couldn’t agree more, your days are indeed over. Prepare ye to meet your baker.” That was rather fine, on the spurt of the moment, wasn’t it? Prepare to meet your baker!’

‘Very good, dear.’

‘Anyway, Diemen said you should expect a letter.’

Ophelia reached for the open envelope on the table and passed it over with a sigh and a piece of shortbread. ‘It was in the box when I went out to pick some herbs. There’s no stamp, so I assume her servant hand-delivered it.’

As Effie put on her reading glasses and scrutinized the letter her eyes bulged and face empurpled. The address was formal and commenced with reference to “a most unsatisfactory meeting,” and “failure of compliance”; and it went on to make mention of “egregious” this’s and “irregular” that’s, and there were assertions of “in the strongest possible terms”, “be in no doubt as to our determination to…”, and “you leave us with no alternative but…”.