Ricochet Baby (9 page)

‘Oh nooo,’ shrieks Joan. ‘It’ll be tainted.’

Bernard is glad that it’s not him who has discovered this; it almost makes him feel happy.

The turkey is edible, they all agree; really, if they hadn’t known, they’d never have guessed. They pass the wine, they make jokes, they pull crackers and find treasures and funny hats, which they put on. Edith’s Christmas pudding is what she describes as Very Old Christmas Pud, stiff with brandy and rum. It’s the kind that can be fried up and eaten with ice cream for a week or more afterwards.

The heat is rising, and the fan that Edith has provided is working hard to keep the temperature bearable.

‘Shouldn’t we drink a toast to Paul and Roberta’s baby?’

‘We’ve drunk enough toasts, if you ask me,’ says Glass.

‘One more or less won’t hurt,’ says Bernard. ‘Who votes on a toast for the baby?’

The room goes quiet, divided between father and son.

‘I reckon we should have a toast,’ says John Vance. ‘Yeah, let’s have a toast.’

Dorothy bangs her glass up and down on the table. Bernard fills her and John’s glasses and then, because it would be churlish to refuse, they all allow him to top them up.

‘To the baby,’ says Bernard.

‘To the baby,’ they echo, all except Roberta, who is holding her hands against her stomach in a nervous way, as if to protect the child. Wendy, sitting beside her, pats her arm, as if they know each other well. Roberta recoils from her touch. She has had nothing to say to Wendy all day.

‘You two can teach us a thing or two,’ says Bernard. ‘Eh, Orla? Have to tell us how it’s done.’

Roberta’s hand flutters to her throat.

‘We wondered if you’d be godparents,’ she says to Bernard and Orla, hoping that they will accept the compliment.

‘So there is going to be a christening,’ says Milton. There is another difficult silence.

Orla looks down at her plate. Milton laughs loudly to cover his embarrassment at his unintended gaffe.

‘You could have one for us, eh, Rob?’ Bernard says. ‘If it’s that easy.’ He flashes her one of his rare white smiles.

‘Stop it, Bernard,’ Orla whispers. ‘Please.’

‘Yes, stop it, Bernard,’ says Edith, ‘you’re embarrassing our guests.’

Orla pushes her chair back from the table, trying to escape, but she is hemmed in by Dorothy’s wheelchair. Trembling with rage, Glass brings his fists down in front of him, spilling red wine across the bright white linen.

That’s enough,’ he says. ‘That’s enough of all this.’

M
ILTON AND
F
AY
leave when they think nobody will notice, but Wendy does, following them out, chattering about the garden, the heat, about the lovely dinner they have all had, trying to delay their departure. In a few moments, Paul sees that his parents are going and follows them out.

‘It was nice of you to come,’ he says, shaking hands with his father in a formal way.

Fay doesn’t say, how did you get into this, son, but you can tell from her expression that this is what she is thinking. This has been quite a different gathering from any she has been to with Roberta’s family before. She is reminding herself that Christmas is a bad time of year, but it’s also a time when people have a tendency to say what they mean.

‘It was nice for Roberta,’ Paul says.

‘She looks as if she needs a rest,’ replies his mother.

‘We’ll get on the road soon.’

‘Thank Edith for asking us, won’t you?’

‘We will go to your place next year.’

Wendy exclaims over a flower bed, as if she had planted it. ‘I must do a bit of trimming and dead-heading here,’ she says. She
bends and breaks off some roses, handing them to Fay, so that she is forced to wait, while Paul and Milton walk on towards the BMW, parked in the shade.

‘I’d like you to have this, too,’ says Wendy, in a conspiratorial way. She slips a piece of paper out of a pocket in the denim skirt and hands it to Fay. ‘I’m sure it will mean something to you, dear.’

Fay looks at the paper, on which Wendy has inscribed a date. An expression of astonishment crosses her face, followed by a flicker of fear.

‘I don’t know what this is about,’ she says and stuffs the paper back into Wendy’s hand. She walks swiftly away, and climbs into the car, without looking back. ‘Goodbye dear,’ Fay cries hurriedly to Paul, and slams the door shut.

As they speed back to town, Milton says, ‘Don’t let them bother you. The boy’s made his bed and we don’t have to see them that often.’

‘I had no idea that family drank so much.’ Fay stiffens her shoulders against the leather upholstery. ‘And what a temper that man has.’ She is talking about Glass.

G
LASS SITS AT
Orla’s table drinking instant coffee. They are in the drawn-out, drained-of-emotion days between Christmas and New Year.

Bernard and Orla’s house smells of boiled onions and baked puddings. She is a tidy enough woman but there is a bareness about the rooms. Lately, he has been seeking out her conversation. Her tea is too strong, but he drinks it any way. Bog standard Irish, says Edith. He hasn’t felt Irish mist on his face, and he doubts that Orla has felt a great deal of it either, rather a cheek-by-jowl
tenement
house among streets streaming with children, and washing hanging limply across the yards. Her father is a welder in Belfast.

‘I hope you don’t mind me coming again,’ he says. ‘There’s not much peace up there.’

Orla sits across from Glass, running a hand through her unruly hair. When Glass first knew his daughter-in-law she was small and pixie-like, with a chaste, unused expression, but hopeful — he would have called her eyes hopeful. Today there is something dull about her, dressed in baggy jeans and a loose T-shirt that hides her homely waist. A blowfly is beating itself to death on her
windowpane
. He wants to thrash it down. In the space of a few weeks
he has become fretful, like an old dog. They are all sick of him
talking
about the circles, but the phenomenon, if that’s what it was, has disturbed him, the tenor of their lives.

‘You’ve still got your guest?’ asks Orla, although she has seen Wendy only the day before.

This, more than anything, is what he blames on the circles, a third person in his household, who seems to have taken charge.

‘I don’t like it,’ he says. Across the paddocks, Edith and Wendy can be seen at the back of the garden weeding the herbs.

‘What’s she up to now?’ asks Orla, although her mind is not on the conversation; she’s heard it all before.

‘I found papers disturbed on my desk the other day,’ he says.

‘You should leave your doors closed.’

‘I feel that she’s looking for something. I hear her rustling round at night.’

‘Perhaps she’s just getting a snack from the kitchen,’ says Orla thickly. She has begun to cry in a silent yet uncontained way, as if that is the whole object of his being here. Glass has never seen Orla cry.

‘I wish I could make things better for you, Orla,’ he says. ‘D’you want me to speak to Bernard?’

She shakes her head. As she reaches above the sink for a paper towel to wipe her eyes, he stands and puts his arms around her, which is not what he had meant to do. Orla is not a woman for showing affection or allowing it to be shown to her. She has always kept herself to herself. Inside his embrace, he waits for her to tense, but instead she puts her face into his shoulder. She smells of
carbolic
soap and green apple shampoo.

‘My Mam’s sick,’ she says. ‘You’ll remember, she said she was coming over here to see me. Well, it’s not true.’

‘She’s a woman who changes her mind, as I recall.’

‘She meant to come, she really did. But my sister rang for Christmas. It was all in her head. Mam’s dying, Glass. I want to go home.’

‘Well, of course you should go. What does Bernard say?’

‘I haven’t told him,’ says Orla. ‘Not yet.’

‘H
OW DID WE
ever manage without each other?’ Edith says. She and Wendy dust their knees down from the weeding and prepare to go inside. She means, of course, how did I ever do without you, but she feels certain that Wendy feels the same.

But Edith is more anxious than she appears. Christmas, she tells herself, was not a disaster. Really, it was not. I behaved
better
than usual, she tells herself, it was everyone else who was awful. She prefers not to think about Dorothy; she has pretty well forgotten why she enjoys putting her in her place. She has long ago decided that you can forget most things most of the time, when you get older, but Glass is not so sanguine. It’s not what he has said, it’s what is unsaid between them, even more so than usual. He avoids walking into rooms when Wendy is
present
, and when she comes into one where he already is, he goes out.

Finally, last night, he had spoken. ‘I don’t see you any more,’ he says.

‘I’m here all the time,’ said Edith, surprised at this way of putting it, although she had been expecting an approach of some kind.

‘So is she. It can’t go on.’

‘I don’t see that she’s doing any harm.’

‘What does she want from us?’ Glass said.

This, too, has taken Edith aback; it hasn’t occurred to her that Wendy wants anything but the things she craves —
companionship
and a delicious intimacy that has been lacking in her life.

‘I reckon she’s a sponger,’ Glass said. Afterwards, he had tossed and turned all night. Sooner or later, Edith knows she will have to deal with the matter.

The cellphone, lying among the garden tools, rings. The call is for Wendy. Edith is surprised; she had never considered whether anyone knew Wendy was here. How had she let them know? She has not seen her posting letters or making phone calls. There is a daughter, she remembers. Sarah, she thinks, although it is clear that Wendy has not seen her for years. Perhaps she lives in another country. Edith has never got round to asking; when she thinks about it, Wendy has never allowed it. But this is a man’s voice, brisk and officious. Wendy starts when she hears it. Politely, Edith walks away while the conversation takes place.

When it is over, Wendy stands tapping the phone in the palm of her hand.

‘I have to go,’ she says. ‘I’ll leave in the morning.’

‘When will you come back?’ asks Edith, as if Wendy’s home here is permanent.

‘I’m not sure,’ says Wendy. ‘Perhaps I could come again next year?’

Edith realises that Wendy is talking about moving on for good.

‘I don’t want you to go,’ she says, angry with some stranger claiming Wendy in this casual way, even though she can see that Wendy may be providing a solution to a difficulty of her own. ‘How far do you have to travel?’

‘Not far,’ says Wendy vaguely. ‘I might visit my daughter, I’m not sure.’

‘So she does live in New Zealand?’

‘Sarah lives in Palmerston North.’

Clearly, Wendy does not wish Edith to pursue the matter. ‘Well, things are a bit up in the air, you see.’

But Edith is aghast. For all these weeks, and over Christmas, Wendy has had family just a short journey from here with whom, presumably, she could have stayed. She gets a glimpse of the
matter
from Glass’s point of view.

‘Can we run you to the bus?’ Edith asks. ‘Or, better still, I could drive you through. We could have a nice day, take a picnic. At least I could meet your daughter.’ Straight away, she regrets what she has said — Wendy’s daughter might have any manner of
afflictions
or deficiencies, she may have failed, or be in some way
disappointing
.

‘I doubt if Sarah will be in the mood for visitors,’ says Wendy. ‘Besides, I’ve some business to do in the city. I’d be grateful if you could take me to the train in the morning.’

In the evening, she shows Edith a silver bird, which she
produces
from a large velvet bag she has been keeping in the wardrobe. Her possessions seem heart-rendingly small. The bird is beautiful, and the silverwork as fine as any Edith has seen. Wendy turns it over and shows her the Earl of Maudsley’s crest. ‘My family’ she comments. ‘Of course, I could have bought it at any junk shop, couldn’t I?’ Her laugh is fleeting.

This could be true, but only a careless dealer would have let a treasure like this slip through at a price Wendy could afford. Though Edith has no doubt Wendy has seen better times.

She mentions this to Glass when they are in bed.

‘So she’s going,’ he says, and touches her breast in a surprised and interested way. ‘Be sure you check her bag when she leaves.’

M
ARISE ASKS
P
AU
l and me over for a party on New Year’s Eve, but neither of us wants to go.

‘What would you like to do?’ I ask, hoping he will say that we can just sit and look out at the sea. Last year, our first in the new house, we had had a party ourselves, and at midnight we could see firecrackers going off over the hills, and on the harbour, and from house to house people called out Happy New Year. A wonderful spot, our friends had agreed.

‘I think we should go and see my parents,’ he says. ‘They’re off to Fiji soon. We won’t get a chance to see them again until they come back.’

So that’s what we do. Fay and Milton live in a quiet cul de sac in an expensive neighbourhood. Their house is surrounded by
velvet
green lawns and magnolia trees and neatly weeded strips of
garden
. Doors open on to discreet balconies and nooks and a brick courtyard. Inside the house rolling cream carpet is broken by expensive rugs and heavy gold drapes. The look is designed to be both opulent and spacious. Look at our large, expensive house, it always seems to be saying. Perhaps this is unfair. In the beginning, when Paul first took me to visit his parents, this is not what I thought. But I sometimes feel that, in their house a vitality seems to be missing, which is at variance with the way Fay presents her
personality
. This is how it feels today; Fay looks distracted and drawn, not herself at all.