Mrs Fytton's Country Life (34 page)

Angela's eyes were glowing now, just like Daphne's.

Daphne stood up and stretched. 'Time to get a bath
’
she said. 'Another glorious modern invention. Oh, and I've finished the first wall, by the way. Now I'm going to start on the others. I'll let you know if I find a nude woman. You can catch me when I faint.' And she went home.

The phone rang. Angela answered it, still with a thousand years of women's history ringing in her ears, still with the image of women spinning, spinning, spinning, and getting no credit for it. Still with the thought of the rush lights and the cold, dark waters on winter mornings and the soreness of reddened, roughened hands. And sunlight playing on golden ringlets and the merry bright eyes of little apple-cheeked children.

'Angela Fytton
’
she said.

‘I
an Fytton
’
he replied. Immediately wishing he had not. It was an old private joke.

She gave a little giggle, which sounded fairly normal to him. And then she said something which proved she was not normal at all.

'I'm really glad you rang. I just want to thank you for being so fair about my settlement
’
she said. 'When I think that a century or two ago you could have thrown me out without a penny to my name and only the linen I'd woven. Well
...'

'If you're going to speak to me like that
’
he said, 'I'm ringing off.'

He waited.

'Good night, dear
’
she said. And put the phone down. Ian remained holding the receiver, considerably fazed. 'Well?' said Binnie.

‘I
think I'm going to have to go down and see her
’
said Ian. 'She really does seem to be going mad.'

21

November
/
December

Now calumnies arise, and black Reproach Triumphant croaks aloud, and joyful claps Her raven wing!

mary latter

Marry in haste, repent at leisure.

The liquor must be well stirred up the whole time and most from the bottom. As this is not brewed for keeping, three quarters of a pound of hops to a bushel of malt will be sufficient.

It was seven in the morning. The rest of the household in South Common Road was asleep. Just for a moment, as Ian gazed out of the window and sipped his tea, he wondered what it would be like to live alone. Just for a moment he thought it was probably sweet heaven. He had mixed feelings about everyone living under this roof now, even his infant son. It was all responsibility, responsibility, responsibility -and no one else seemed to be standing on their own two feet. It wasn't that he didn't love them all. He did. He felt protective of his infant son, protective of his infant son's mother. As for his two older children, he knew that this very terrible selfishness of theirs would pass; that they would go to university, perhaps scrape a degree, perhaps do well in one - and take their places as citizens of the world. Eventually. And it was the eventually that was causing the problems. It was the eventually, to coin a phrase, that was driving him nuts. Which made him think, yet again, of his ex-wife.

Observe, never bottle beer, wine or cider, but on a fine day and let the bottles be well seen to. Use none but the best corks.

Ian sat between the chairman of the Residual Industries Board for the Midlands and a venture capitalist who drank his soup with obvious and loud appreciation. Just for one very bad moment, and transported home in his mind, Ian nearly leaned over, poked him in the ribs and said, 'Can't you do that more quietly?' before realizing he was in the Birmingham Small Conference centre, not South Common Road, and this was not his elder son eating Rice Crispies while his wife drummed her little pink nails upon the table top.

The chairman of the RIBM was very pleased with the way the meeting had gone and thought they would be finished by six. He proposed a nice little early dinner before heading off to their various destinations. Ian was about to ring Binnie and tell her that he would be home comfortably before midnight. But he did not.

The ingredients being ready, the water must be made to boil quickly, which done, the copper fire must be damped. The malt, having been previously put in the mashing-tub, reserving a small quantity, as soon as the steam begins to subside, the water must be poured upon it to wet the malt so as to render it fit to be mashed. When well mashed put the spare malt over the top and cover the tub with sacks to keep the steam and the spirit of the malt in, and let it remain two hours.

Two bad telephone calls and one truly hysterical one. About normal for one working day. Binnie rang while he was still on the train to say that Claire had arrived at the breakfast table with three extra teenagers, all of whom smoked and seemed to think that she, Binnie, was something the cat brought in. And Tristan was trying to eat his lunch within a fog of cigarettes. The new cleaner had packed and gone for good, saying she could not stay. She was on the verge . . .

Verge of what? Oh, just verge. Don't be so pedantic.

Just before noon, Binnie called again. Andrew was refusing to speak and, more to the point, refusing to move. He was slumped in front of the big television in the sitting room, watching the video of
Top Gun
over and over again. Claire said that his girlfriend (what girlfriend?) had dumped him. And all Binnie had said was that she was not surprised and why didn't he go and stay with his mother for a few days and cheer himself up? He had not spoken since. Would Ian talk to him? Ian looked apologetically at the chairman of the RIBM and excused himself. The meeting was due to start in five minutes; better now than later. Get on the phone, he said to his son, and use the Harrods account to send the bloody girl some flowers.

Then let it mash again for the second wort in the same manner as the first, excepting that the water must be cooler and it must not stand more than half the time.

Binnie, at four-thirty - this time hysterical. A girl with a nose ring had arrived with a huge funeral wreath of flowers and demanded to see Andrew. They had been fighting and screaming at each other in the sitting room ever since. Now it was quiet. But the hall carpet was completely ruined with crushed leaves and the pollen from all those lilies and When Was Ian Coming Home?

He did not think he would be able to get back that night. The meeting would go on until eleven at least. He managed not to laugh at what he thought was a considerable display of wit on the part of his son and, with a sudden, great bubble of pleasure, said, quite untruthfully, that he had to go now because the chairman wanted him
that minute
...
He would try to call again - no promises - next bit of meeting to be held
in camera -
no phones permitted -1 love you - bye
...

He did, he did. He did love her. It was just so good to be allowed to be invisible for a while. And besides, he did promise Binnie that he would go down and sort things out eyeball to eyeball. Not at half-past eleven at night, admittedly - but, well, when the action seems appropriate, take it there and then. It was a motto that had done him good enough service throughout his business activities. Just as well, he thought gloomily, given the amount of money his private life was costing him. How much were new carpets? How much would his student children need to stagger from bar to bar around Sydney before they found themselves a job? How much would he need to spend to appease his poor little Binnie after they had gone? It was endless, endless
...
Life was never so complicated, he found himself thinking, in the old days.

When cool, the yeast, which should be white and sweet, is added, and the liquor well stirred from the bottom with a wooden spoon, turning it topsy-turvy, which causes the beer to ferment. Be careful that the tub is not too full to work overnight.

The car was waiting for him at Bristol and the night was fine. Warm for November, said the driver. Ian took the keys and waited for the man to take his folding bicycle out of the boot and pedal away. The night is mine, thought Ian, and, feeling wicked as a schoolboy, he slipped into the driver's seat and took out a packet of Gauloise. He lit one and relished it. It reminded him of days that ran into each other, when everything seemed possible and everyone seemed, if not good, then bearable. Including himself. Wherever he and Angela went on the Continent they would buy Gauloise and play at being Belmondo and Bardot. He realized that Binnie would not even know who they were. He tried to continue thinking that was sweet. It was really. He loved the way she clung to him. Sweet. He threw the cigarette end out of the window. She wouldn't let him do that, though. He smoked another. The air in the car was thick with the smell. Just for a moment it was as if he had hit his own personal heaven after all. No one knew where he was, not a car on the road. He was tempted to drive for ever.

Angela risked taking a chill and went out to sit in the garden at midnight. She felt drunk on the air of her kitchen and her still room, with all its yeasty sweetness and drowsy malt, and was far too elated to sleep. These people surrounding her were all so good, so lovely, that she was glad to be able to prepare them a treat. They would taste the ale and they would relive with her the glory of the past in Church Ale House. And she would, finally, belong.

She was so warm from her labours that, despite the chill in the air, she wore one of Wanda's cheesecloth skirts, one of Wanda's butter-muslin tops in rosy pink, and a bandeau of pink ribbon to keep the hair from her face. Wanda had practically thrown them at her when she went to call. Her cheeks were bright, her eyes sparkled, she was tired beyond belief, but invigorated too. 'Nothing is done that is not done well
...'

And she felt she had given today's brewing her all. She would skim it tomorrow, bottle it in four days' time and then she would be free. Time would do the rest of the work.

She leaned against the trunk of the mulberry. Frankly, she told it, what she could do with now was a bit of you know what. Well, quite a lot of it. She knew this feeling of restless tiredness and she knew that one sure-fire way of dealing with it was to give herself up entirely to the experience of being naked next to a man's naked body and letting nature take its course.

She stroked the trunk of the tree at the back, where its huge buttock shapes separated away, and she wandered around to the front, trailing her fingers across its rough bark as if it were a lover. She touched its almost non-existent swelling where the front of the trunk crotched outwards and said it didn't matter. It really didn't matter. And then she laughed and reminded the black and brilliant sky above that it was not, nor ever was, what you had but what you did with it that counted. The stars winked. They knew.

Then she put her arm around the tree again and apologized for not liking everything about it. She was thinking of the mulberries. 'But I do like your shape
’
she said, by way of compensation. 'And no matter about the rest, I'll always be here for you. Let me hold you again
...'
No woman on a still win
ter's night could have importuned a lover more seductively.

Vague in her nostrils came the smell of French cigarettes -as if she were young again, walking with Ian and the children through French meadows after cafes in the sun. The children heavy with sleep, she and Ian heavy with love. If this was what being a country wife did for your imagination, she thought, let me have more of it. . . She wrapped her arms around that ridiculous trunk and squeezed it all the harder. Kiss, kiss, she went, feeling the rough bark beneath her lips and giggling out loud at the foolishness. And 'Oh, you lovely thing
’
she told it, laughing and laughing at its coolness on her cheek.

Behind her she heard the slight click of her gate. As if someone were coming in. Or going out.

It may be tapped within not less than two months to perfection. Beer should stand in the bottles six to eight hours before they are corked. Store in a cool, dry, clean place, away from the light. Drink not before Candlemas.

22

December

I
have always thought that there is no more
fruitful source of family discontent than badly cooked dinners and untidy ways
.

isabella beeton

This was the easy time, the wintering. The hives were silent, sleeping, no more honey, waiting for the spring. The hens had gone on their holidays - hen holidays, not pig holidays, as she reminded him - to Sammy's cottage, with a ten-pound note tucked into their travelling clothes for their keep. The ale was waiting, getting stronger, and on the shelves surrounding it sat her summer bottlings and dryings and saltings. And, for beauty, the frosts had come and the garden took on a sugar-white bloom each morning, sparkling and crystal, the leaves like sweetened glass. The torso of the mulberry tree, laid bare, looked cold and needy, and the once-perfect soft soil of the herb beds was packed down tight and hard as a rock.