A Surrey State of Affairs Read online

  “Gypsies,” Miss Hughes said to me in a loud whisper at the newsagent. “You can’t trust them.”

  I crossed my arms and shook my head. One cannot say such things, not in this day and age. It is acceptable to mistrust Latvian performance artists because they are not a racial group, but I am afraid Miss Hughes’s views border on prejudice.

  “You can’t generalize like that,” I told her firmly. “Not everyone conforms to a racial stereotype.” I smiled broadly at Mr. Rasheed, the newsagent, but he must have been too busy counting the coppers, with which Miss Hughes always, pays to notice.

  In any case, Sophie has gone to the circus, despite my admonitions that her time would be better spent practicing her French or removing her flaking nail polish.

  WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 9

  Last night was the first bell-ringing practice of the year. Fortunately neither the bells nor we ringers had rusted over during the Christmas break. Everyone was there—Reginald, the vicar; Daphne, the postmistress; the indomitable Miss Hughes; Gerald, the history teacher, and his wife, Rosemary—and everyone was just the same, with the notable exception of Rosemary. She was wearing lipstick. Bright red lipstick. Her hair, which is of the curly brown variety, had been swept up into a high ponytail, lending her the appearance of a muddied poodle. There was a strange gleam to her eye and flush to her cheek. High heels had replaced orthopedic sandals.

  When she visited the ladies during our tea break, I speculated to Miss Hughes that Rosemary had perhaps undergone a “New Year, New You” makeover. Miss Hughes said she thought it was the menopause.

  THURSDAY, JANUARY 10

  Reginald, the vicar, came round for a cup of tea this morning. He wished to talk about his son, David, a pasty-faced nineteen-year-old who drives the van of the visiting library. Poor Reginald has brought up his son according to his liberal beliefs, preaching the importance of tolerance and open-mindedness. As a result, David has converted to Kabbalah, some sort of mystic sect favored by celebrity gym fanatics such as Madonna. Apparently, this explains why he has taken to wearing a red wristband. Last time I saw him, I thought he had simply visited the municipal pool.

  Reginald stared pensively at his cup of peppermint tea and asked me for advice, with a little tremor of anxiety in his gentle voice. I suggested that he should either find David a girlfriend or enroll him in the Territorial Army. Both options would dramatically reduce his free time and thus his ability to indulge in unorthodox religious experiments. Reginald pointed out that he was a pacifist, and we both fell silent.

  Then I had a sudden moment of inspiration. Sophie! Religious eccentricities aside, David is a very decent sort of young man, with a polite way of talking to his elders and clean fingernails. He could be a positive influence on her. Admittedly, she leaves for the Ardèche on Sunday, but they could always be pen pals. There is something ineffably romantic about penning letters to a dear and distant acquaintance, about yearning for some-one far away across the seas; besides, it might improve her grammar.

  FRIDAY, JANUARY 11

  Reginald and David have just left, the latter with a slight limp. Sophie has shut herself in her room in disgust. Things did not proceed entirely as planned.

  I did my best for poor Reginald. Once the vicar and his son were strategically positioned in the drawing room and had dried themselves off from the tea that Natalia had spilled over their laps, I went to fetch Sophie from her room. I told her that David, a charming, intelligent, and sensitive young man, was waiting downstairs. She asked if I meant “that retard with the gay hair.” This was not a promising beginning.

  Nevertheless, I coaxed her downstairs with the offer of a slice of my Madeira cake. I had already hidden most of the chairs in the kitchen, so the only seat available was next to David on the sofa. At the sight of my daughter—dressed, inexplicably, in a ballet tutu and leggings—David’s pale features lit up and his protuberant ears almost waggled in delight. If only he would shave the peachlike fuzz off his upper lip he would be perfectly eligible.

  Reginald and I chatted away, subtly alluding to David’s achieve-ments, including his certificate from the council for services to the visiting library. However, Sophie merely stared at a small mark on the wall—perhaps she too has noticed Natalia’s sloppy cleaning standards.

  Eventually, Sophie broke her silence and asked why David was wearing a bracelet. He replied with a long-winded and impassioned account of Kabbalah, which concluded with the offer of enjoining her into the faith. Sophie looked blank. David must have misread her confusion for tacit consent, because he suddenly took her small hand in his large, gangly one, and produced a spare red bracelet from the pocket of his chinos. Sophie leaped to her feet and kicked him in the shin like a mule. I was wholly ashamed of her. If she had to resort to violence, she could at least have slapped him in the face like a lady.

  SATURDAY, JANUARY 12

  Reginald telephoned to apologize today. I told him it was quite unnecessary: he is not responsible for his son’s erratic behavior. If we were to be held to account for our children’s every misdeed, then a certain shop assistant at Selfridges would still want my head on a platter after a six-year-old Sophie kicked over her pyramid of champagne flutes in a fit of pique.

  If an apology is due, it is from Sophie. I tapped on her door in order to suggest as much, and was greeted with a very grudging “Yeah, come in.” I did so, and found a scene of devastation. Given that she leaves for France tomorrow, I had been hoping to observe neat stacks of belongings ready to be packed. Instead there were clothes strewn across her unmade bed and unvacuumed carpet willy-nilly, bottles of nail polish tipped over magazines, half-burned candles nesting with chocolate bar wrappers and pots of unidentifiable unguents. Even though Sophie says she wants to save the planet, there were shopping bags of new but unworn clothes from Topshop and Primark, all presumably made in some sweatshop in India or Cambodia then shipped halfway across the world. Much to my chagrin, I even spotted one of my French silk nighties, which had been slashed down one side and pieced back together with a row of large safety pins. I gesticulated toward it and she calmly announced that it was her new dress, but she wasn’t quite sure about the color. This adds insult to injury. Everybody knows that peach is very flattering on the complexion.

  It was useless trying to remonstrate with her against such a backdrop. I will instruct Natalia to clean the room from top to bottom on Monday. She could do with the exercise, instead of stretching out on the leather sofa in Jeffrey’s study at every opportunity. She may be slim for now but these Russian types are quick to develop a stout bottom.

  SUNDAY, JANUARY 13

  Sophie is gone. Jeffrey and I drove her to the airport this afternoon. We stood on the cold tarmac outside Gatwick’s North Terminal, the wind whipping around her overfilled drag-along suitcase. I gave her a firm hug, Jeffrey patted her on the back. She felt very thin and fragile in my arms. For a moment I thought she was crying, but just as I went to comfort her she claimed that her hair had blown into her eyes and swore disgustingly.

  When I got home, I tried to distract myself by talking to Darcy, but I fear that Natalia has been teaching him Lithuanian. Either that or he has bird flu. He made a strange, harsh noise when I tried to get him to say “She sells seashells on the seashore.” I called Rupert, who told me that unless Darcy shows other symptoms beyond talking funny I shouldn’t worry. Reassured, I asked him what he’d been up to today and he said he had been “downloading MP3s,” or something even less intelligible than a parrot’s Lithuanian.

  MONDAY, JANUARY 14

  Today, I finally decided to have words with Natalia. I have had enough of her attitude, her cold soups, her collapsed soufflés, her lackluster dusting, her scattered underwear. If she is to give Sophie’s room the deep clean it requires, she will have to raise her standards. I positioned myself in the leather swivel chair in Jeffrey’s study, then summoned her.

  She did not present herself with the air of anxious deference I had been expecting. Inst
ead she sauntered in and leaned against the wall, with one hand in her jeans pocket, the other twirling the strange tawny streaks that thread through her long, black hair. I informed her that her cleaning was below par and that she had better buck up, but she merely shrugged and looked baffled. I told her to get her act together, but she just stared. I told her to stop leaving her undergarments on the radiator. Again, she looked flummoxed. In desperation, I drew a diagram. She was wide-eyed, but when I stabbed at the drawing insistently with my pencil, she nodded slowly.

  I believe that I have bent her will to mine.

  TUESDAY, JANUARY 15

  My attempt to discipline Natalia has backfired. Yesterday, Jeffrey came home from work and headed upstairs toward his study. I followed him so that I could tell him all about the latest Aga malfunction on the stairway. He opened the door to his study and we were both greeted by the unsettling sight of Natalia cleaning the room in her underwear, which was scant, black, and dotted with little shiny red hearts. It appears that as well as struggling with English, she is incapable of deciphering a simple diagram. Mother never had problems like this in her day. Jeffrey had to lie down to recover from the shock. Englishmen are not accustomed to such spectacles.

  WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16

  I bear grim tidings from bell ringing. Last night I opened the door to the belfry at precisely 7:30 P.M. and was greeted with the usual waft of cold, stony air and the sight of Gerald standing in the shadows. His presence was nothing unusual in itself: the man is punctual to a fault, a habit instilled by twenty-five years of teaching to the bell at the local boys’ school. And yet he failed to return my cheery “Good evening.” When I said it again, he looked up at me with bloodshot eyes and a morose expression. It was then that I noticed the change to his appearance. Ginger stubble spread across his face like an exotic fungus. His usual crisp checked shirt and lustrous leather loafers were gone, replaced by a muddied sacklike pullover and a pair of slippers. His beige chinos lacked their usual immaculate crease down the front. There were purple shadows under his eyes. Tufts of hair protruded from his ears.

  “Dear Gerald!” I said. “What on earth has happened to you?”

  “It’s Rosemary,” he said, in a small, cracked voice. “She’s gone.”

  “On the Women’s Institute’s away week to Tunbridge Wells? Don’t worry, she’ll soon be back. I’d have gone myself if I could trust Natalia to look after things.”

  But she had not gone to admire the architecture of Kent. Rosemary, Brown Owl for the village Brownie group, star fund-raiser of Surrey Conservatives, loyal wife to Gerald and mother of his two grown sons, had run away with a trapeze artist from the visiting circus.

  I am summarizing this information so as not to try your patience: it took me, and subsequently the other bell ringers, half an hour to wheedle the truth out of Gerald. At one point, Reginald had to revive him with a shot of the alcohol we keep next to the biscuit tin to clean rust stains off the bells. The man was quite incapacitated with shock. I can’t blame him. None of us saw it coming, although, come to think of it, Rosemary did perform a particularly emotive rendition of Queen’s “I Want to Break Free” at the Rotary Club “dinner and divas’ karaoke” fund-raiser last year. At one point she tore a clump of her hair out for emphasis. I informed Miss Hughes as such when poor Gerald went to the lavatory, and she agreed that the rot had set in long ago.

  THURSDAY, JANUARY 17

  I wonder if there’s any special technique for persuading an adult son to divulge a little more information about his life. The unsettling events at bell ringing have made me ponder how little we sometimes know about those who are close to us. Given the usual tenor of my conversations with Rupert, I am unlikely to be enlightened anytime soon. Last night’s exchange was typical of its genre. It went something like this:

  “Good evening, Rupert. How are you?”

  “Hi, Mum. Fine, thanks.”

  “So, tell me what’s new!”

  “Oh, not a lot.”

  “How’s work?”

  “Fine.”

  “How’s the flat?”

  “Fine.”

  “Are you warm enough?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you wearing that nice scarf I bought you for Christmas?”

  “Yes.”

  “Have you watered your houseplants?”

  “Mum, I told you—they’re cacti.”

  And so on and so forth, until eventually I’m compelled to fill the silence by gabbling on about Rosemary, the bell-ringing adulteress, and Natalia’s sluttish underwear.

  He is my own flesh and blood, and yet it alarms me sometimes that I know so little about the daily realities of his life. In all his twenty-five years, he has never once brought a girlfriend home, and for the amount of information he voluntarily imparts he could just as easily be a tap-dancing Martian as a software specialist in Milton Keynes.

  FRIDAY, JANUARY 18

  While lying awake last night pondering my son’s reticence and romantic ineptitude, I was struck by a brilliant idea. I was tempted to jab Jeffrey in the ribs and share it with him immediately, but he was snoring so peacefully I was loath to disturb him. Instead I will share it with you. It runs as follows.

  In two weeks’ time, Rupert will celebrate his twenty-sixth birthday. To mark the occasion, I will organize a small party, and I will invite girls, as many girls as I can muster. Once they are assembled, I will present Rupert with gifts that underline his attractiveness to the modern female. These will include:

  A rugby ball. For all the newspaper articles I read about the rise of the so-called “metrosexual,” there is no doubt in my mind that most girls still hanker after a good old-fashioned muddied oaf.

  A compass. To underscore the rugged, outdoorsy image, and also demonstrate his protective side. Should a young couple lose their way, it is always best for the man to be prepared.

  A book by Jeremy Clarkson. Again, this will mark him out as bracingly free of namby-pamby metrosexuality. No woman goes weak at the knees for a liberal democrat.

  A puppy. What woman can resist a young man in possession of a suitably doe-eyed hound? Clearly, I am thinking of something in the Labrador direction, not those vicious pit bull creatures that poor people keep, though I can’t fathom why fake gold jewelry would require a guard dog.

  MONDAY, JANUARY 21

  I do not wish to sound remiss in my wifely devotion, but I was almost relieved when Jeffrey returned to work today. I have heard nothing this weekend but ski talk, and frankly it chills me to the marrow, as if I were already stuck on some wretch-ed, blizzard-swept peak. The annual trip to St. Moritz organized by Jeffrey’s law firm looms, and I am duty-bound to accompany him.

  While Jeffrey derives an intense, childlike delight from the sport, I view it as nothing more than a likely means of breaking my bones and destroying my dignity.

  It is impossible to maintain a tolerable level of decorum while clad in a waterproof duvet with two planks, two poles, hat, gloves, goggles, tissues, sunscreen, ChapStick, emergency snack, wet wipes, and lipstick all attached to one’s person. What’s more, one is always at risk of being crushed by an avalanche or a German snowboarder.

  Jeffrey’s brother, Edward, came for dinner on Saturday and the two men spent the entire evening regaling one another with competitive tales of black diamond runs and off-piste derring-do. Harriet, my long-suffering sister-in-law, rolled her eyes at me in sympathy but there was little we could do. I tried to change the subject to my plans for Rupert’s birthday and the rising cost of hot chocolate in the Alps, but it was to no avail.

  My one comfort is that Sophie will be joining us for the trip. She will not be able to wriggle out of a constructive tête-á-tête if we are sealed inside a ski lift thirty feet above the ground.

  TUESDAY, JANUARY 22

  Reginald came to see me today. I presumed that he wished to discuss how best to provide Gerald with suitable pastoral care and support ahead of this evening’s bell-ringing practice, but
it turned out that other matters, closer to home, pressed upon him.

  As he dunked a biscuit in his tea (an unpleasant habit, but I let it pass), he informed me in his usual timorous voice that David had renounced Kabbalah. Before I could congratulate him, the troubled look in his moist gray eyes silenced me. David, it appears, has renounced his former faith in favor of Islam. He is attempting to cultivate the fluff on his chin into a fist-sized beard. He has renamed himself Abdul Mohammed Ahmed Aziz, and has taken to draping himself in a black-and-white checked neck cloth. He has thrown Reginald’s organic sage and mustard seed sausages in the bin, and gone through today’s Guardian scribbling over any exposed female flesh with a black felt-tip pen. (I felt he should have done the same thing for the words, but kept that to myself.)

  By the time Reginald had finished mingling his concern for his son’s intolerant zeal with a few paeans to the noble history of the Islamic faith, his biscuit had disintegrated and his tea had gone cold. I did not know what to say. His predicament is alien to me. My family has always attended church but none of us is religious.

  Nevertheless, I sincerely wished to help poor Reginald. I told him to bring David along to Rupert’s birthday party. A good party with a few pretty girls and a bowl of rum punch may just shake him out of his stringent beliefs. Or, if it does not, he can sulk in the corner and thus act as a foil to cast Rupert in a more favorable light.

  WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23

  Bell ringing last night. Poor Gerald’s condition has deteriorated. His nasal hair is rampant, his slippers encrusted with grime. We tried to carry on as usual, but the poor man just could not ring his bell with enough vigor. At one point he was so overcome with emotion that he asked me to hold it for him. I made sure I washed my hands afterward.

  THURSDAY, JANUARY 24

  Exciting news! The ladies from Church Flowers are on board for Rupert’s birthday party. Pru has already vouched for her daughter Ruth, a primary school teacher and keen amateur dramatist, being free, and the other ladies are all making similar inquiries of their relations.