Every Woman for Herself (15 page)

‘He’s a little man?’ Anne asked, interested.

‘No, he’s small as in not a huge publishing house. But efficient. We can have it out before Christmas.’

‘Bloody fast, Em!’

‘That’s modern technology for you – stuff it in one end, out comes the finished product at the other.’

‘I think there might be a bit more to it than that,’ I said feebly. ‘Besides, you can’t have a magazine without pictures.’

‘We’ll have that painting you’ve just finished –
Jessie Down the Well
– on the front cover,’ Em said.

‘Yes, and Susie’s done some good cartoons. That should do it,’ added Anne. ‘There you are. All sorted, Chaz.’

‘You don’t think Mace or the vicar is vegetarian, do you?’ asked Em, getting back to business.

‘Mace looks like a meat eater to me, Em,’ Anne said.

‘When did
you
meet him, Anne?’ I asked curiously.

‘Out and about – don’t spend all my time in bloody bed. And the vicar came to see me – don’t know why. I quite fancied him, but he’s got the hots for old Em.’

‘Chris isn’t vegetarian,’ murmured Em, absently thumbing through Mrs Beeton. ‘Can I do roast beef and Yorkshire pudding?’

‘You certainly can, better than anyone,’ I said enthusiastically.

‘No, I meant, because of the Mad Cow – that Jessie won’t touch it, for a start.’

‘She won’t touch anything with calories in anyway; she’s even started saying the bubbles in fizzy mineral water make you fat,’ I said.

‘And everyone probably thinks we’re the Mad Cows already,’ sniggered Anne. ‘Go for it, Em.’

‘Right. And sticky toffee pudding with custard afterwards – men like their stodgy puds.’ She closed the book. ‘There. That’s that. I’m off to the shops. Shouldn’t you be off to get Caitlin, Charlie?’

I jumped. ‘Oh, yes, of course. I thought we could both paint in the veranda today so I’ve set the small easel up next to mine for her.’

‘There are iced rabbit biscuits in the Beatrix Potter tin – take them down with you. But not the frog ones, they’re for Bran.’

‘OK. Thanks, Em.’

‘And I’m off to the hospital,’ Anne said, pulling herself up.

‘The meeting’s tonight at eight, after dinner,’ Em reminded me. ‘In here.’

I didn’t try to protest any more: if Anne and Em were determined
Skint Old Northern Woman
would live, then live it would, and I started to feel quite excited.

I don’t know why Gloria felt that I should beware of Mace, because he has never shown the slightest inclination to drag me into his lair and ravish me, which would be slightly difficult with Caitlin in tow anyway.

I think he’s more in danger of Em dragging him into
her
lair: if she makes her mind up, she is likely to pounce should she get an opportunity. Still, I think she also finds Chris attractive too, if she can only get over his double handicap of Christianity and the love of Dickens.

Mace did not even emerge from his study when I got there this morning. Caitlin was ready and waiting for me.

I painted
Caitlin in the Rainforest
, and Caitlin painted
Charlie with Blue Hair
. Time flew past on hummingbird wings, and before we knew it Mace had come knock, knock, knocking on heaven’s door, and entered our paradise like a particularly beautiful, but potentially dangerous, snake.

Smooth and fatal, sums him up pretty well, really.

Caitlin proudly showed him her picture.

‘It’s a speaking likeness,’ he said solemnly. ‘Especially the hair.’

‘Yes it is,’ Caitlin said severely. ‘You aren’t looking properly, but Charlie showed me: look at Charlie’s hair.’

He turned his oblique, midnight-velvet stare on me, and I shifted a bit under the searching scrutiny.

‘It’s very pretty – and unusual. Silvery hair combined with dark eyes, eyebrows and eyelashes – different.’

‘It’s natural,’ I said coldly.

Caitlin tugged impatiently at his arm: ‘You’re not looking properly, is he, Charlie? The blue paintwork is reflecting onto it so she’s got
blue
hair.’

‘You’re right,’ he said, after another minute inspection. ‘And there
is
a blue-green light up one side of her face, from the plants. If she weren’t wearing jeans, she’d look like a wood nymph.’

‘It’s not good enough to look, you have to
see
,’ Caitlin said importantly.

I hope
I
didn’t sound that bossy.

Mace walked around me and stood close enough to radiate body heat, gazing down at my canvas. ‘It’s amazing how like Caitlin that is, even though she is so tiny in the middle of it. Clearly Caitlin …’ he added quietly. ‘Herself – there’s nothing of me in there.’

‘No, she doesn’t look like you or her mother,’ I agreed. ‘Though she has got your eyes.’

Then I suddenly remembered what his ex-wife had said about Caitlin not being his … though surely he hadn’t believed that?

‘Anyone could have dark blue eyes,’ he said.

Surprised, I twisted and looked up into his brooding face: ‘Well, no, they couldn’t – didn’t you do genetics at school? Besides, yours are a real dark navy blue, and you don’t often see that.’

He smiled like the sun coming out over the High Atlas and said unexpectedly: ‘I think I’ll take you out for lunch.’

‘Oh, yes!’ Caitlin agreed. ‘Let’s take Charlie!’

‘Thanks,’ I said, somewhat taken aback. ‘But I—’

I stopped and swallowed. Well,
you
try being invited to lunch by Mace North and finding an excuse on the spur of the moment.

And
part
of me wanted to go. I suspect it’s the same bit that always wanted to drag the young gardener Steve behind the shrubbery.

‘Were you doing something else?’ he enquired, employing the ultimate weapon: the ‘I’m going to abduct you on horseback, and carry you off to my tent – you don’t mind, do you?’ smile.

‘No,’ I conceded weakly.

Barbarian hordes, sweep me away.

‘Get your coat,’ Barbarian Horde said practically.

I was
so
glad to see that he wasn’t wearing the red duvet today.

‘So my little chicken’s been going out with that actor,’ Gloria Mundi said, parting the silver fronds of my fringe and peering searchingly into my eyes.

‘What? Did you?’ Anne said, surprised. ‘Well, bugger me! Does Em know?’

‘I didn’t go
out
sort of out. I just had a pub lunch with him and Caitlin. I think he asked me on impulse.’

‘Drink this tea,’ Gloria said, thrusting a cup into my hands. ‘I need to see what’s coming to pass.’

‘I don’t feel like a cup of tea, thanks, Gloria. The discussion group will be here any minute, and I’ve got to fetch the magazine stuff up from the Summer Cottage.’

She stood over me, though, until I drained the cup, and then spent long minutes staring down into the tea leaves and muttering.

The coven might dismiss her as a mere wisewoman, but I was sure she knew a lot more than any of them. She just didn’t share it, even with Em.

‘Dead Greg’s widow’s staying at Hoo House with the other loonies,’ Em said, coming in. ‘Inga’s up in arms – said I’d made her employ a “muwdwess”.’

‘Charlie’s nicked your actor,’ Anne said helpfully.

‘Someone dark and strange is entering her life … bringing change and trouble,’ agreed Gloria, taking another doubtful look into the teacup. ‘Storm clouds are gathering.’

‘That might be Angie. She’s naturally dark, she just dyes her hair, and she’s certainly strange.’

‘I’ve got
no
hair,’ chipped in Walter, who was quietly rocking away by the stove, carving another walking-stick head. ‘No bodily hair whatsoever.’

‘And there’s the Treacle Tart, too. She and Father have made it up, and they’re even more all over each other than before.’

‘It’s a man,’ Gloria said with certainty. She tilted the cup as though some trick of the light might show her something better. ‘And I see a child … but—’ she broke off, frowning.

‘What?’ I demanded.

‘Never you mind.’

‘They do a good lunch over at the Stone Cross,’ Em said.

‘How did you …?’

‘Freya. In the back room with her lover.’

‘You don’t mind, do you, Em? It didn’t mean anything, they were going anyway, and just sort of took me along. I don’t want another man, even if Mace were interested in me that way, which he isn’t. Anyway, he’s a bit scary.’

‘He does have a deliciously dark edge to him,’ Em agreed. ‘That’s why he seems so much more suited to my purpose than Chris. I need the love of a Bad Man. We’ll see tomorrow night. The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, so I’m going to mix a potion up that will make him appreciate me. Gloria, you’re in charge of seeing it gets in the right glass of sherry before dinner, and I don’t want any more of that “he’s not for you” business, right?’

‘Right,’ conceded Gloria, with unusual meekness. ‘I’ll see to that for you, don’t you worry. And if you don’t want that vicar, I could see that he falls for Anne instead?’

‘No,’ Em said quickly. ‘No, I’m enjoying the novelty of having a Barkis, even if he’s the wrong one, and Anne doesn’t really want anyone just now. Do you, Anne?’

‘No, just want to get fit and back to work. Besides, Red’s phoned me up.’

‘Red? But you wouldn’t have him back, would you?’

‘Might. Never trusted him in the first place, but damn good in the sack. I’ll think about it.’

‘There’s that Freya at the door,’ Gloria said absently, and I didn’t ask how she knew. ‘I’ll be fetching the ice in.’

I noticed she took my teacup out with her.

We were there until nearly midnight putting the magazine more or less in order, with Jen to tell us what was and wasn’t possible.

It was hard work, but I thought we’d got it right, and Jen had taken my painting of
Jessie Down the Well
for the cover.

Susie’s cartoons were great.

Gloria hung around most of the evening, giving me strange, furtive, sideways looks, so goodness knows what she saw in the tea leaves.

But whatever it was, it certainly wasn’t anything romantic, since that part of me had atrophied away to nothing. I would confess to faint lustful pangs sometimes when I thought of Mace North, but that was more just the last stirring of dying embers, and was balanced out by the slight
frisson
of terror he also somehow managed to inspire in me.

Probably half the female population of the English-speaking world felt the same way, since without being in any way a hunk, he was still the sort of man women look at and wonder about the body beneath the clothes.

Mmm …

When we were tossing filler article suggestions about, Gloria suddenly said she had a winter tip for southern visitors: ‘Never eat yellow snow.’

Well, thank you for that one, Gloria.

On the Friday of Father’s birthday, everyone was preoccupied at breakfast, and immediately afterwards went their separate ways. (Rhymers don’t do cards and presents, they have Feasts instead.)

Branwell was pretty much recovered, but he had received dispensation from his university to stay at home until after Christmas and put the finishing touches to his Great Work. There wasn’t much term left anyway; universities seem to spend more time off than on.

Father abandoned
his
nearly finished book and went out somewhere with Jessica, dropping the girls at school en route. Jessica was upset at breakfast because she’d put two pounds on, and wouldn’t eat anything at all, just drank black coffee, which Em said she’d probably sick straight back up again if she got the chance (but I think she was joking).

I couldn’t see any sign of the two pounds either, but I suppose that’s sort of like three extra layers of skin all over her little bird bones.

Anne vanished for her mysterious treatment, Emily readied herself for a mammoth cooking session, Walter went off into the dining room to polish all the glasses, and Gloria disappeared into the back scullery to brew mysterious potions.

I saw she still had my teacup from the previous night in there with her, when I looked, with a sticker saying,‘Do not wash this cup’ on the side. I couldn’t make anything of the contents, except that they were drying out like dark dandruff.

While I was getting ready to fetch Caitlin, Flossie emerged from her igloo and intimated that she wouldn’t mind coming too, which was a surprise: extra exercise seems to be paying off.

We set off happily enough, but then some primal instinct made me look over my shoulder just in time to spot Angie, turning the Parsonage corner and starting down the track.

Call me a coward, but I did not in the least feel like a screaming match at forty paces, so I scooped Flossie right up off her flat, furry little feet and ran, bursting into Mace’s house unheralded and panting.

Flossie may be a bit thinner and fitter, but she’s still heavy.

Mace, elegantly disposed on the window seat with a cup in one hand like a
soigné
coffee advert, raised a surprised eyebrow.

‘Come in, why don’t you?’

‘Sorry,’ I panted, dumping Flossie on the rug. ‘Angie – Dead Greg’s widow – chasing me.’

Flossie, wagging her tail, ambled over and stuck her wet nose up his trouser leg.

‘Brazen hussy,’ he said, reaching down to fondle her domed and silky skull, inside which precious little went on. ‘I don’t let girls do that until the second date, and we hardly know each other.’

‘That’s not what Gloria says,’ I commented unthinkingly.

He stared at me: ‘I don’t remember any Gloria.’

‘Perhaps you haven’t met her? She’s … she helps …’ I stopped. There
is
no way of describing Gloria and Walter’s roles. ‘She’s Walter’s sister.’

‘
Two
old retainers? Well, well! And what does Gloria base her estimate of my character on?’

‘Tea leaves. Oh – and
Surprise!
magazine.’

His face darkened alarmingly: ‘Never mention that evil, slime-spreading rag again in my presence!’