Knit One Pearl One (30 page)

“Perfect.”

“And did Martin tell you about the table? Won’t that be lovely? He’s been telling Reg all about it, and he’s put a lot of thought into it you know.”

“I know, Gran, and I’m sure it will be lovely.”

She pats my arm. “He’s a lovely man, your Martin. Come on then, let’s start walking back. Reg is far too tiddly to drive, nice little walk will do us all good. Might have a cup of tea at your house to break the journey up the hill.”

“Good idea.”

“There might be a cake in your fridge if we look, with candles.”

“Oh Gran.”

“It’s not a proper birthday without candles, pet. I’ve put her yellow cup in the bag, you’ll need it in the morning.”

“Thanks Gran.”

And there’s still cake to look forward to. How perfect.

It’s half past twelve on Monday morning and I’m at Ellen’s house in Notting Hill, trying on frocks ready for the magazine piece on Ellen and her passion for knitting. In the end she decided to do one big interview and a photo shoot with
Good Housekeeping,
as it’s the perfect hook into her target audience for the television series apparently, and they don’t tend to run pieces where they completely stitch you up and make you look like a nutter. Which is reassuring. Despite having to catch the train at the crack of dawn, I’m still feeling the joy of being out for a grown-up day in London, with no small people needing anything. Ellen’s child-free since Harry’s taken Eddie out for an action-packed day of swimming and baby jungle gym, which I think is a more macho version of ordinary baby gym. Gran and Cinzia are with my three, having a morning at the beach before Gran goes off for her stint in the Lifeboats shop and Cinzia takes them home for an afternoon of films and pizza making. And even though I know the entire kitchen will be covered in a thin film of flour when I get home, I don’t care. I’m finally getting a glimpse of what it must be like to be a mother seahorse. I’m child-free and not working, for what feels like the first time in years, and it’s brilliant.

“That looks great on you, darling.”

“Thanks Ellen.”

I’m wearing a pretty smock dress, in dark navy blue silk with pink and orange splodges on it, which looks a lot nicer than it sounds, with one of my mohair shawls, in marmalade, draped artfully by the magazine stylist. I’m also wearing orange suede sandals with very thin straps. Not practical, impossible to walk in, and fabulous. I even managed to paint my toes yesterday, with some of the pink polish from Daniel’s birthday bag. My legs are as tanned as they ever get, after all our school holiday trips to the beach, and my hair has been curled by a man called Fabrizio. So far, so good.

“Great colors.”

“It feels lovely.”

“Let’s go with that then. Sophie, can you fix my hair, and then we can start.”

The photographer is busy setting up his cameras. I think he’s called Eden, or it might be Edam, which doesn’t seem likely, but he’s so laid-back he doesn’t actually speak, so I can’t work out how to ask him. I think I’ll just try to avoid calling him the name of Dutch cheese and hope for the best. We’re in Ellen’s first-floor drawing room in her smart Georgian town house; in one of those posh squares which have a gated garden, just like in the film, although without Julia Roberts or Hugh Grant lolling about. It all looks very smart, with vases of beautiful flowers and the baskets of knitting and wool which I brought with me. The mantelpiece is crowded with pictures of Ellen and Harry with Eddie, and there’s a huge arrangement of delphiniums and roses in the hearth.

I’m sitting next to Ellen on the gray velvet sofa.

“Why are you pulling that face, darling?”

“This is my being-photographed face. I told you this wasn’t a good idea.”

“Well pack it in; you look like you’re sitting on something sharp. It’ll be great. You look divine, I look divine, the knitting looks divine, relax.”

In between having our hair tweaked and more face powder dabbed on, Eden/Edam takes what seems like hundreds of photographs, and then stands with the people from the magazine peering at a computer screen and agreeing that he’s doing an amazing job.

Ellen seems oblivious to this, and we sit chatting. I’m telling her about how the school holidays have turned into one long endless blur.

“I’m so fed up with making picnic lunches, I’m half praying for rain.”

“How much longer have you got before they go back?”

“Two more weeks, nearly. They go back on the Wednesday, and it can’t come soon enough for me. I mean it’s lovely, for the first week or so, and then they get bored, and I’ve still got the shop to sort, and Elsie had her week away, and well, basically, it’s been a bit of a nightmare. I wish I could afford to take us all off somewhere, have a real break.”

“Well do it then, darling.”

“Maybe next year.”

“Use up some of your rainy day money.”

“Yes, but that’s for rainy days, Ellen, not summer holidays. When the boiler blows up, or the car breaks down, that kind of thing. I’m not making enough money for holidays yet. Nearly, but not quite.”

“Dear God, nearly but not quite? Give yourself a break. You’re so boring, you know that, don’t you? It’s one of the things I love most about you. You’d be having a rainy day fund even if you won the lottery, wouldn’t you?”

“You never know, Ellen. Life has a habit of smacking you into a tree when you least expect it, and someone has to be able to pay all the bills.”

She leans forward and kisses me on the cheek, and Eden/Edam shows a brief flicker of interest before he returns to the computer screen.

“That won’t happen again, darling.”

“I know. Because I’ve got my rainy day money stashed away. So it can’t. If I disappeared tomorrow, Gran and Reg would have enough to bring the kids up. I’ve got my life assurance, and their savings accounts, and I’ve written a new will. It’s all sorted, so I don’t have to think about it.”

“All right, little Miss Sunshine, you’ve got it sorted, I get it, and you’re right, Harry made us do new wills too, but let’s not think about it, it’s far too upsetting. I can’t imagine a world without marvelous me in it, and I don’t want to try. I know, why don’t we book a villa together next year? It really wasn’t that expensive, not that I’m going back to Tuscany again, too many Brits wandering around with bright red faces wearing socks with their sandals banging on about bloody frescoes.”

“Sounds just like Mum.”

We both giggle.

“We could try Spain, that’s bound to be cheaper. We could all go, and it would give Eddie someone to play with, so you’d be doing me a favor.”

“Maybe.”

“Don’t sound so enthusiastic, darling.”

“Sorry, no, it would be lovely, only I think my idea of a cheap holiday and yours might be a bit different. But let’s see. It would be lovely if we could, really lovely, the kids would be thrilled.”

“It’s a definite then. We’ll find something, and I won’t tell you how much it costs, and then you can pay the same as a cheap package deal and we’ll all be happy. And don’t start saying ‘yes but,’ because that’s what we’re doing. I’ve decided. And I’m loving this cardigan, darling; I want to make another one.”

Ellen’s knitted a short pale pink cardigan in a silky cotton, which I sewed up for her because she tends to end up with bumpy seams and one arm shorter than the other.

“I’ve brought you the olive green you liked; it’s in one of the bags.”

“Thanks darling, and I want to make something for Eddie, do the full motherly thing. One of your blankets, if you’ll do the sewing thing for me?”

“Of course.”

“I’m really enjoying knitting again you know; it fills in time when I’m hanging about in the studio, and it means I’ve always got something pointy to hand if anyone annoys me. Christ, aren’t we done yet?” She turns to Edam. “Five more minutes, okay, and then I’m throwing everyone out. We’ve got things to do this afternoon. Darling, hello, stop looking at that bloody screen, are we done? Because you’ve got about five minutes left before I turn back into a psycho pumpkin.”

Ellen did the interview earlier on, and it all sounded great. The piece will be at least three pages, and there’ll be an insert box with details of the shop and our website, and some pictures of knitting kits and our new range of tea cozies. Laura and I knitted a batch of pale blue and pebble white ones for Gus and Duggie at the Bay, with “The Bay” knitted in mint green, which inspired us to do a whole new range. So far we’ve done ones with “More Tea, Vicar?,” “Keep Calm and Carry On,” and “Time for Tea & Cake,” with a small knitted fairy cake on the top instead of our usual pom-pom. We’ve lined them with cotton gingham, and they’re selling really well, particularly at weekends, when the exodus from London brings all sorts of day-trippers into the shop. I’ve got Gran and Betty making more, and I’m doing a kit for the Tea & Cake ones, since they’re the best sellers so far.

“I can’t wait to see the magazine. It’s for the November issue, so it’ll be out in October, yes?”

Ellen checks with the magazine people, and a rather scary-looking woman who’s wearing very bright red lipstick and various shades of black says yes, it will be November.

“But we won’t actually still be sitting here then, will we, darling? Because a one-hour shoot does seem to be heading toward the third hour now, and I’m starting to get a bit pissed off.”

“Sorry, we’re nearly done, we’d just like one more set, maybe with you standing by the window, and Joanne sitting on the sofa; we think the contrast would work really well.”

Ellen gives her a Look. Oh dear.

“It’s Josephine, as in Napoleon and Josephine, and I’m Napoleon: small, but very determined. Happy to be violent when required. And no, I don’t think standing by a window will work. Apart from anything else, I don’t actually knit standing up. Authenticity is so important, isn’t it, darling? Let me see what you’ve got so far. But I’m serious, ten more minutes and we’re done.”

By the time we’re finally done, it’s half past two, but I’m the proud owner of the silk dress and the orange sandals, at a vastly reduced price, which Ellen has negotiated, which is a bloody good job because the dress alone costs nearly three hundred pounds in the shops.

“Right, let’s go. Clothes shopping, then tea somewhere fabulous. Where does your train go from?”

“Charing Cross.”

“I’ll get my girl at the office to book the Savoy then.”

“Can’t we go straight to tea? I’ve already got a new frock, and shoes.”

“No, we cannot. And don’t forget, they pay expenses, so send me your train ticket and I’ll get the office to sort it. There’s a new wool shop I’ve spotted, which you’ll love, all your sort of stuff, only three times the price, and then I want to go to Bond Street. There are some shoes I need to try on, and who knows, we might even find you some decent jeans.”

“I’ve got jeans, Ellen.”

“No, you haven’t, not really, darling. Trust me.”

She drags me round a series of shops, including the fabulous wool shop full of treasures at extortionate prices, where I surreptitiously take a few pictures with my phone, and then countless shoe shops and clothes shops, which all end up merging into one. But I do buy a new pair of jeans, which even I can see are somehow magically better fitting than my usual ones; and a new pair of green ballet flats; two new bras, after a rather unwarranted lecture from Ellen where I basically ended up buying them just to shut her up; and a floral A-line skirt, in blues and greens, which she insisted I buy practically on pain of death.

“I’m still not sure about that skirt you know, I don’t really need it.”

“If we only bought things we need, darling, we’d all look appalling. Clothes are meant to be beautiful, lift your spirits, that kind of thing, and that skirt is beautiful and it lifts my spirits, so shut up. The color works for you, the cut is great, and you can wear it with your boots in the autumn. It’ll cheer us up in all that mist and rain you go in for down by the seaside. Let’s find a taxi.”

“Can we go to John Lewis? I want to look at new sheets for the boys, and maybe—”

“God, you’re hopeless. Sheets are for online shopping, not wasting valuable drinking time. Let’s do the Savoy tourist thing and have afternoon tea. At least they do a decent martini there. Or champagne? And if you say you want a nice cup of tea, I’m going to hit you with your new sandals.”

The Savoy have stopped serving tea when we arrive, and a rather snooty waiter is about to glide away and leave us standing there until Ellen goes into full Britain’s Favorite Broadcaster mode, and before we know it we’re whisked off to the American Bar, and given a gorgeous array of dainty sandwiches and cakes, and a bottle of champagne.

“God, I love champagne, anytime, anywhere. It always hits the spot, doesn’t it darling?”

“It certainly does.”

“Have you had a lovely time today?”

“Perfect.”

“Good, so have I. Just think, if you moved back to London, we could do this every day.”

“Apart from the fact that I’d be working full-time to pay for the nanny, and the massive mortgage, so we’d probably see less of each other than we do now. Talking of which, when’s your new nanny starting?”

“Next month. We’ve settled on three days a week. She still does two days for her other family, and that’s a good sign, that they want to keep her, yes?”

“Definitely. She sounds lovely. How long has she been with them?”

“Nearly ten years, so hopefully that will all work out. Harry’s already happier now he can see the end is in sight; he hasn’t completely loved the house-husband thing, not that I blame him. Total nightmare stuck at home every day trying to think of clever things to do with glove puppets. I hope she turns out be a total treasure, so he can get some freelance work. I’ll be busy with the autumn series, and then we can decide about baby number two.”

“I thought you had decided.”

“I keep changing my mind. I’d definitely go for it if I knew I’d have a girl. Don’t look at me like that, I’m just being honest; if I had another boy, I wouldn’t put it up for adoption or anything, but I really want a girl. Why don’t you have another one too? One of us is bound to get a girl, and if it’s you we can do a swap. Actually, that’s a brilliant plan. Otherwise all my expert shopping skills are going to go to waste. Eddie yells if I take him into any shop that doesn’t sell food.”

“I’m sure he doesn’t, Ellen.”

“He bloody does. He’ll sit in the buggy quite happily at the farmers’ market, or in the trolley at the supermarket, but anything remotely designer, he kicks off the minute I wheel him through the doors.”

“He’s a boy after my own heart.”

“Yes, but my Pearly girl definitely has the makings of a fashionista, even if her mother doesn’t.”

“Not if it involves hats she doesn’t. She buried another one on the beach last week. She digs a nice little hole and then pops her sun hat in when she thinks I’m not looking. She’s as bad as bloody Trevor for digging bloody holes and burying things.”