The Saint Zita Society (6 page)

Khalid, in the manner of every British plumber, electrician, gardener or other tradesperson, called out, ‘Hello? Are you there?’ and Montserrat ran up to escort him out.

‘These stairs are dangerously steep,’ said Khalid in a severe tone. Montserrat had never noticed before. ‘The floor down there,’ he said, ‘is made of tiles, very hard, and this banister requires fixing. It could become detached as a person descends and then what happens?’

‘God knows,’ said Montserrat.

‘Also human beings know. I would call it a deathtrap.’

She let him out and watched him climb the area steps to the street.

T
he House of Lords car park would fill up in the afternoon but now, just before noon, it was half empty. Henry had shampooed the Beemer in the mews behind Hexam Place that morning and now he parked it in the slot he always used next to the space where the Government Chief Whip left his shabby old Volvo. The difference between the Beemer and the Volvo, one so smart and glossy, the other so scarred and dusty, brought him a lot of pleasure, though he was disappointed that Lord Studley had made no comment on the contrast. Henry got out, opened the nearside rear door for Huguette and then the passenger door for her father. He wasn’t rid of them yet.

It was the first time he had driven father and daughter together and he was afraid all the time Huguette would speak out of turn, like saying to him, ‘See you on Friday,’ or ‘Why didn’t you text me?’ She was capable of it. From the moment Lord Studley had said, ‘I’m giving my daughter lunch at the House,’ he had been nervous. First, for instance, he had to pretend he didn’t know where Huguette lived, though, oddly enough, he had never been to her street by
car before. Then he had to say, ‘Good morning, Miss Studley,’ not sure if this was all right or whether it ought to be, ‘Good morning, the Honourable Huguette.’ But apparently he had got it right as neither of them complained. Huguette was in a sulky mood, not speaking much, while Lord Studley talked at length about the oral question he had to answer when the House sat at two thirty. It seemed to be about Brazil, a debt or loan and the International Monetary Fund and Henry was none the wiser when he had driven round Parliament Square and turned in through the security lane. Huguette looked as if she had gone to sleep. Lord Studley broke off at this point to show his red-and-white-striped pass with photograph to the policeman on duty, though the officer had seen him pass this way daily for years.

His employer wanted Henry to carry into the House and up to his office his briefcase and a large cardboard box full of papers. They went through the Peers’ Entrance where Henry had to have his photograph taken to go on a pass and then go through the scrutiny like at Heathrow. Lord Studley shared an office with a minister of state who was in charge of Southern Hemisphere Development, a man whose driver Henry knew and now talked to about the Saint Zita Society which Robert unfortunately couldn’t join owing to his not being a resident of Hexam Place. Lord Studley had gone off somewhere to fetch a file he wanted Henry to take back to number 11 and in his absence Henry kept up a busy conversation with Robert to deter Huguette from making an indiscreet remark or kissing his cheek or something.

Things went from bad to worse when the phone rang, the Southern Hemisphere Development minister answered and Henry heard him say, ‘Oh, Oceane, how are you?…Fine, thanks … Clifford just popped out for a minute. I’m sure he won’t be long.’

Don’t make me speak to her, Henry prayed silently. Huguette was mouthing, ‘Leave me out of it,’ when her father came back. He took the receiver with a sigh and, while handing the file to Henry, said, ‘Come back for Miss Studley at two thirty, will you?’ Henry fled. He had got out of that by the skin of his teeth, a useful if old-fashioned phrase he had picked up which seemed applicable to much of his life these days.

The Beemer left on the residents’ parking outside number 11, he went down the area steps and into the house by the basement door. Why not pop out to the Dugong for a glass of their alcohol-free wine and a ploughman’s and take the file upstairs when he came back? He didn’t even bother to put the passage light on but opened the door to his bedsit. The light was on in there all right and Lady Studley was sitting on his bed, smoking a cigarette.

‘Oh, Henry darling, didn’t I time it absolutely right? I’ve been here just two minutes waiting for you. Do say you haven’t got to go back for my naughty girl.’

‘Not till half two,’ said Henry in a gloomy tone.

T
he voice said, ‘How can I help you?’ and Dex knew he had struck lucky. His god was not always so responsive. He could try number after number and only get that woman saying they were not recognisable or else a high-pitched ringing tone. But this time he got that pleasant gentle voice wanting to help him.

‘Make the sun shine, please,’ he said.

There was no answer. There never was and Dex didn’t expect it. With the ways of gods he was acquainted since early childhood and knew they moved in mysterious ways. His first foster-mother had taken him to her church at every possible opportunity and between visits taught him how to
pray at home. She explained that his prayers weren’t always answered because he was often bad. God liked prayers but only answered those of good people. He must have got a lot better because Peach quite often did what he asked, stopped the rain, made the sun shine, got him a job. His voice never said yes, he would do it, or no, not this time, but in his mysterious dark way he did whatever it was or else he didn’t.

This time he did it, he made the sun shine, and Dex set off for Hexam Place with the big cloth bag in which he carried his small gardening tools. The large ones Dr Jefferson let him keep in the area cupboard at number 3. It was late in the year for mowing the lawns at number 3 and number 5 but Dex thought it dry enough to attempt it. He called Peach for help as he was walking down the Buckingham Palace Road because a bunch of evil spirits passed him, all of them young, all of them blank-faced and one with red hair. They laughed at him and clutched each other and he was afraid. Instead of answering, Peach made a brrr-brrr sound that went on and on. Dex stopped it, though he disliked doing this because it seemed rude. But perhaps Peach knew what the trouble was because the evil spirits didn’t touch him but ran away over Ebury Bridge. The sun was strong now, shining brightly out of a deep blue sky.

T
he meeting of the Saint Zita Society took place at lunchtime and mainly concerned a particularly horrible habit increasingly indulged in by dog walkers, though not of course June and Gussie. While these offenders obeyed the requirement to scrape up their animal’s excrement into a plastic bag, instead of taking the bag home with them, they tied a knot in the top of it and left it at the roots of one of the trees in the pavement. Such nasty little bags were sometimes to be seen at the roots of every tree in Hexam Place.

This was a subject that aroused a lot of anger in Saint Zita members, of whom Henry, Beacon, Sondra, Thea and Jimmy were present round the table in the Dugong. It was unanimously decided to write a letter to Westminster City Council and another, slightly differently worded, to the
Guardian
. Thea was chosen to write the letters, rather to Beacon’s resentment. She might have a degree but he was positive it wasn’t as good as his nor obtained from as good a university as the University of Lagos. Could he have been rejected or even not considered for the job because he was African? However, he said nothing – for now, he thought – and walked along Hexam Place a few paces behind June instead of accompanying her.

Making sure Beacon was looking, June went up the steps of number 6 to the front door and let herself in, taking her time about it. Zinnia was clearing up after the Princess’s lunch.

‘Are you drunk?’ said the Princess.

‘Of course not. At my age!’

‘I don’t know what difference age makes. My grandmother drank more heavily the older she got. She was paralytic in her seventies and unconscious in her eighties. Have you done whatever it is you have to do on the computer to fix us in for our flight?’

‘
Check
us in, madam,’ said June. ‘It’s too early. We’re not going till Sunday.’

‘I’d have thought the earlier you did it the better.’

Then you’d have thought wrong. ‘They won’t let you do it till twenty-four hours before the flight.’

‘How ridiculous,’ said the Princess. ‘When we get back I’m thinking of getting myself a wheelchair. I could get out then. I’m dying of boredom stuck in here. You could push me.’

‘No, I couldn’t, madam. I’m too old to push other old people about. If you want a wheelchair you’ll have to get one you drive yourself.’

‘Well, when you chart us in for the flight could you look up wheelchairs on dongle?’

Zinnia was giggling. She had the Caribbean ready sense of humour and irrepressible laugh. June frowned at her and said she would see. She couldn’t be bothered to correct her employer’s two new errors but maybe next time such a mistake was made she’d asked the Princess if she’d like a computer lesson from Thea next door. Imagine how that would go down! She hunted around for Gussie, found him asleep under the piano and put him on the lead. The two of them carried out a survey of the tree roots in Hexam
Place and adjacent streets. Even when composing the relevant item on the agenda, June hadn’t suspected there were quite so many of those disgusting little bags. Gussie enjoyed his part in the research, amazed at being allowed to sniff the excrement repositories as much as he liked. June counted twelve in Hexam Place alone. While photographing the most obtrusive on her mobile, her activities were watched by a passing dog walker who stared at her in horror, picked up his Pekinese and ran off towards Eaton Square.

They were going to Florence. They always went to Florence for a week in October and to Verona for a week in May. From this fortnight in Italy June had managed to pick up a little Italian and had bought herself an Italian dictionary and a phrasebook. HSH the Princess Susan Hapsburg spoke no Italian despite her year and a half living with Luciano. That evening, over drinks, they described to Rad Sothern how they would pass their week.

‘She thinks she’s an egghead,’ said the Princess, ‘goes to museums and churches and whatever.’

Rad was too young to know what ‘egghead’ meant. ‘So what do you do, Your Highness?’

‘Well, Mr Fortescue, since you ask, I manage to get about on foot a little. It’s the sunshine, you know, it does me good. I go to dress shops and jewellery shops and spend money and sit outside cafés and watch the world go by. She’s happy enough to join me when there’s any drink going, I can tell you.’

Not deigning to rebut this, June went to the window and looked up and down Hexam Place. The only car parked in the street was Montserrat’s VW. ‘Your friend taking you out for a drive, is she?’

‘Not so far as I know.’ Rad sounded rather uncomfortable.

‘I thought you might be going over to Wimbledon Common. It’s a fine night. Maybe it’s more cosy at home.’

Rad said a hasty goodbye, wished them a nice holiday and made his way across the street to number 7 where he went down the area steps and for a moment disappeared from view. It looked to Miss Grieves on the basement stairs of number 8 as if he must have retreated into the cupboard which faced the basement door. That dark girl who was a friend of Thea’s soon appeared, flooding the area with light from the basement. In her day and for a good many days afterwards no girl would have met her boyfriend dressed in dirty jeans with their bottoms turned up, an old biker’s jacket and a man’s vest. Rad emerged from where he had been hiding and followed her in. They didn’t kiss. Weird, thought Miss Grieves. Not to say bloody mad.

Maybe he’d stay the night. There was no reason why he shouldn’t. The Stills seemed very easy-going with their staff. Miss Grieves went back to her evening drink, half English Breakfast tea and half whisky, and lit a cigarette. Back at the window an hour later she saw Beacon arriving in the Audi, turning, parking behind that girl’s car. She could see him quite clearly by the light from a street lamp slip on a headset and move his right thumb round the circle on an iPod. Even the colour of the iPod could be seen, an iridescent peach.

Now if he gets a call to go and get Preston Still from Victoria or Euston or somewhere, thought Miss Grieves, what’s the betting that as soon as the car moves off that girl will have Rad out of there before you can say ‘mystery’? But why? Maybe Lucy Still doesn’t mind her having a lover in her room but Preston does. A far cry it was, all of it, from the days when she had been maid-of-all-work to Lady Pimble in Elystan Place. She dragged a chair to the window so that she could keep on looking in comfort. Whatever Beacon was listening to it seemed to be keeping him in a state of rapture, his head
back against the Audi’s headrest, his lips parted in a beatific half-smile. Gossip was that he only had hymns on his iPod, ‘Abide with Me’ and ‘Lead us, Heavenly Father, Lead us’, and all that stuff. Bloody insane. It could go on all night …

But suddenly the headset was pulled off, the iPod discarded and Beacon was talking on his mobile. Seconds later the Audi was moving off southwards. Victoria it must be, thought Miss Grieves. And sure enough, Montserrat must have been watching – wasn’t there any sex going on with those two? – for Beacon hadn’t been gone five minutes when the basement door opened and Rad emerged, shoved by the girl, her hand in the middle of his back. He ran up those stairs like all the devils in hell were after him and legged it up the street. Miss Grieves wondered what he’d do if she went out there and asked him what the hurry was. But she didn’t go. It took her a good ten minutes to climb those stairs.

T
hea decided to have a second cigarette while she was out there. She was sitting on the third step from the top of the steps up to the front door of number 8. It was either that or stand shivering in the wet back garden. She picked another Marlboro from the pack and lit it, inhaling deeply. The only ‘staff’ in Hexam Place to smoke were Henry (in his room with the window wide open and him hanging half out of it), Zinnia (in her own home and in the street) and Miss Grieves (as much and as often as she liked in her own flat with all the windows shut). Damian and Roland were anti-smoking fanatics. That was the way Thea put it, or sometimes ‘anti-smoking fascists’. If they had ever had anything to do with Miss Grieves they would have known about her smoking and done their best to stop it with threats and maybe promises but they didn’t know because they had never been inside her
flat or smelt her. Miss Grieves reeked of stale cigarette smoke, providing a lesson to Thea. Before going into Damian and Roland’s part of the house she took the dress or suit she had been wearing to the dry-cleaner’s, had a hot bath and washed her hair.