Deck With Flowers Read online

  He rang, was shown out and drove to the office to make a report to Claudius and Phoebe.

  “Of course I’ll go down to Brighton and fetch her,” he said, “but what do you suppose Madame’s idea is? If she doesn’t start again on her memoirs—”

  “Of course she’ll start again,” Phoebe prophesied with confidence. “She doesn’t want to commit herself, that’s all.”

  “I think I agree,” Claudius said. “Once the girl goes back, I’m sure the book will go on.”

  “I can’t see her taking the job back unless she’s allowed to live out,” Phoebe commented. “She’s the independent sort, and she’s felt Madame’s claws. Rodney, you’d better see if her old room’s free, just in case.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “Then find another. Or perhaps she’ll suggest a place when you see her. And don’t drive too fast on these dangerous roads.”

  “See you tomorrow,” Rodney said from the door. “No, tomorrow’s Saturday. See you on Monday.”

  It was almost as bad weather for driving as yesterday had been; there was snow at the beginning of the journey and coastal fog at the end. He stopped once on the way, and made two telephone calls. The first was to Oliver, to put him in touch; the second was to his sister.

  “Angela?”

  “Oh, it’s you. Did I muck up anything last night, Rodney?”

  “No. Listen; I’ve got some orders. Can you hear me?”

  “Orders, you said.”

  “And meant. Look, Angela, you’ve got to clear out that third bedroom.”

  “The ... But I can’t! It’s crammed with stuff, heavy stuff. I can’t lift it.”

  “What you can’t lift, shove. It’s mostly empty trunks and suitcases. Shove it all in the junk room.”

  “The junk room’s full of Mrs. Major’s ghastly bits of furniture—you know it is! That’s why we moved the trunks and things into the spare bedroom in the first place. And as well as trunks, there are all those books, and the wine from Spain that you bottled, and the carpets that don’t fit, and—”

  “Get it all cleared out, air the mattress and put down the rug from my room and hang up some pictures and then—are you there?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Go round with the vacuum cleaner—round and underneath too—and get the place tidied up and clean. C-l-e-a-n.”

  “But I can’t—”

  “Get Mrs. Major to help you, and have the place looking like a Home Exhibition by the time I get back, which’ll be around five or six. Got that?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Good.”

  He rang off and continued his journey. Brighton, when he reached it, had yesterday’s deserted, woebegone look, but his mind was on other things. He drove to the road behind the Patisserie and stopped at the garage to see if the van was inside. In. She might be in, too. He walked round the corner and pressed the bell of Number 12A. There were swift footsteps on the stairs—certainly not her mother’s—and then the door opened.

  “You again!” she exclaimed.

  “I’ve seen Madame Landini. She sent for me. She wants you back.”

  She motioned him inside and closed the door. He answered her questions as they went up the stairs.

  “She’s decided to go on?”

  “She hasn’t actually said so, but we feel that’s the idea.”

  “Why me? Why not someone else, someone who hasn’t seen her with her temper showing?”

  “She said you.”

  “I hope you remembered to ask for an increase in pay, to make up for the insults?”

  “It would have been taking an unfair advantage. She looked ill.”

  “When does she want me?”

  “Straightaway, if that’s possible.”

  They were at the top of the stairs. Standing in the middle of the living room was Mrs. Baird. She gave Rodney a brief nod, and spoke to Nicola.

  “I heard. You’re determined to go.”

  Nicola went up to her, kissed her lightly on the cheek and then walked into her bedroom; leaving the door open, she began to pack.

  “I’m not determined, I’m not even anxious, I’m not sure I’ll stay,” she told her mother through an open doorway. “But why break off in the middle? The fact that she’s asked me to go back means that she’ll be like honey and apologise every time she gives me some work to do. She’s put herself in the wrong and it’s a situation I ought to explore, correction, exploit. Mother, could you be an angel and make some coffee before we go?”

  Mrs. Baird went into the kitchen. Rodney went to lean against the door of Nicola’s room, watching her. Neat in everything she did, he thought, and contrasted the beautifully-folded, beautifully-ironed garments she was putting into the suitcase with the rolled-up bundles which Angela stuffed in when she packed. Everything in this room was orderly—no clutter of snapshots, just two photographs, one on the dressing-table, the other on the bedside table.

  “My father,” she told him as his eyes rested on them. “Not handsome, as you see.” She closed the case and swung it to the floor. “I’m ready.”

  He carried it out and placed it near the stairhead; when he turned, Mrs. Baird was placing a tray on the table.

  “I’ve made sandwiches for your lunch,” she said. “At the end of the week, the restaurants may be full.”

  She poured coffee for them, but she would not join them; she went into Nicola’s room to check that she had left nothing behind and then sat in a chair beside the table, listening, answering when an answer was required—but Rodney knew that her mind was elsewhere, struggling with a problem to which he had no clue. He saw, to his dismay, that her hands were clutched tightly together on her lap, the knuckles showing white. All this anxiety, he wondered uneasily, because her daughter was going back to a woman who had momentarily lost control and shouted at her? She hadn’t objected to Nicola’s living and working in London before she took the Landini job; why work herself up now? She couldn’t be worried about his own appearance on the scene; he well knew that he was the red-haired, freckled, homely, harmless type warranted to arouse trust in the most suspicious parent. So it was not himself that Mrs. Baird was worried about.

  Whatever it was, she was taking it hard. This was worse, he reflected morosely, than the time he brought Angela up to London, leaving his mother to take the full weight of the quarter-deck routine. A feeling of pity rose in him and drove him to disclose a fact that he had meant to keep to himself until he and Nicola were on their way to London.

  “There’s one thing I haven’t mentioned,” he said. “Madame Landini wants Nicola to make this a residential job.”

  “Residential job? You mean live in her house? Never!” Mrs. Baird declared.

  “That’s right; never,” Nicola confirmed. “I live out, or I stay here.”

  “That’s what I thought. So”—Rodney addressed Mrs. Baird—“I asked my sister to get a bedroom ready—we’ve got three. I don’t think Nicola will enjoy living with us—the rooms are cold and uncomfortable and we’re not a tidy pair. But as Nicola had given up the room she used to have, I thought it might be a good idea if she stayed with us while she looked round.” He turned to Nicola. “You’ll like Angela, but she’s not house-trained. I’m not much better. Will you try it?”

  “Yes, thank you. What job does your sister do?”

  “She starts her first job—travel agency—on Monday.”

  She glanced at her mother, who met Rodney’s eyes, and rose.

  “I promise to look after her, Mrs. Baird,” he said. “Here are all the telephone numbers—my house, Madame Landini, my office—so you can get hold of Nicola any time you want to.”

  “Thank you.” Her voice sounded dull. “Nicola, you’ve forgotten to take the sandwiches.”

  “And my watch.” Nicola handed the packet of sandwiches to Rodney and went into her room. Her watch was not there, and a search revealed that it was not in the house and not down in the shop.

  “Then it’s out with the
van. Mother, will you send it on to me?”

  “No. I’ll keep it until your next visit. Now hurry; you’ve kept Mr. Laird waiting long enough. Take good care of yourself.”

  The sun was coming through the fog as they began their journey. Nicola was silent, and he saw that she was frowning. “Worried about going back?” he asked.

  “No. I’m sorry my mother was against it, that’s all.”

  “Perhaps you mentioned the Maharajah and started her imagination working.”

  “I didn’t. Your uncle didn’t say much about him, did he? Somehow, I got the idea that there was a lot more we didn’t get to know.”

  “Be thankful. Sometimes when you’re talking to old people, you press the button marked Distant Past, and jerk them into reminiscences that go on, and on. And on.”

  “I hope Madame goes on and on. Where did Landini’s money come from?”

  “Dirty deals, mostly—but long before Madame met him. By the time they married, he’d become a respected citizen.”

  “Would you like to have multi-millions?”

  “No. I want a smallish house, four children bright enough to win scholarships, a middle-bracket car and a decent little sailing ship. I’ve got the ship and the car, but the house might be a difficulty; it’s got to overlook the Atlantic, so getting to the office will be a problem.”

  “Does your father’s house overlook the Atlantic?”

  “It depends which window you’re looking out of. It’s on a promontory with an all-round view. Windy and wet, and no shops handy, but we all like it.”

  They ate the sandwiches as they drove. Later, they stopped for tea at a cafe that did its best to make its customers feel they had slipped back a century. Rodney ordered cakes; after one glance at them, Nicola sent them away.

  “What did you do that for?” he asked indignantly.

  “Cake-mix,” she said contemptuously.

  “How can you tell by just looking?”

  “Not one of the things on that plate had ever seen eggs or butter. At the patisserie, we use—What are you ordering?”

  “Hot toast.”

  “Why not wait for dinner? I’ll cook it for you—for you both. Or will Angela have done it already?”

  “If she has, you’ll wish she hadn’t. If you stay with us long enough, perhaps you could give her a few cooking hints. She took a course before she came to London, but it didn’t sink in. You might also try to stop her from cutting up my clothes.”

  “Cutting up ...”

  “My clothes. She does it to get a pattern for a replacement. Only so far, she’s never succeeded in putting anything together again.”

  She was silent. As he ate the toast, he thought he detected in her expression a faint shadow of apprehension. Perhaps he ought to have let her form her own impressions.

  “Didn’t you want to be naval, like your father?” she asked after a time.

  “No.”

  “What’s he like?”

  “Naval. He got up to Captain’s level and then decided that he ought to retire and give more time to his family. From his family’s point of view, it was a great mistake. None of us was the right material for being brought up to what he calls scratch. He kept trying. He still tries, at intervals, but not so hard. When I told them about the Landini memoirs, he and my mother dredged up a lot of memories of her, starting from the time the ship my father was in sailed up and down the English Channel looking for her first husband. They’d heard her sing and they never forgot it. They said she used to make people get to their feet and cheer until—”

  “Did they mention the accompanist?”

  “Why should they mention the accompanist?”

  “You see? Vamp till ready.”

  ‘You think he dived overboard, don’t you?”

  “I don’t know. All I know is that if I ever go to sea with my husband, I’ll have him roped to the deck.”

  “Were you born at Number 12A ?”

  “Yes.”

  “No brothers or sisters?”

  “No.”

  “If I’m asking too many questions—”

  “Go ahead. If I think people are getting too probing, I invent answers. How old is Angela?”

  “Twenty-four.”

  “Does she like living in London ?”

  “I think so. It was her idea to come.”

  “Does she go out a lot?”

  “She could, but she doesn’t. If I can’t order any cakes, let’s go.”

  He had meant, on nearing River Street, to give her a brief account of its recent history, but they were still talking of other things when he stopped the car outside the house. She broke off in the middle of a sentence to look along the rows of newly decorated houses, and gave an exclamation of surprise.

  “This reminds me of that fancy mews your friend Oliver lives in. Which is yours?”

  “This one.”

  “Couldn’t your landlady buy some paint?”

  “She likes to look different.”

  When he stepped into the hall with Nicola, carrying her suitcase, Mrs. Major was going out, dressed in her best—and her best was good enough to prove that for the present, at any rate, she could live without selling her house. She stopped to greet Rodney.

  “ ’ello, Rodney boy. Been to see where me dustbin is?”

  “It’s right outside the door.”

  “An’ now she’s complainin’ about me letting soapy water spill on the pavement. Some people is never ’appy. I’ve got to wash me front steps, ’aven’t I ?”

  “If I slip on the soapy water, I’ll see that you get a nice, long jail sentence,” he promised her.

  “Got a friend with you, I see.”

  “Miss Baird, who’s staying until she finds rooms. Nicola, this is Mrs. Major, who lives only to plague her neighbours.”

  “ ’E likes ’is joke. Just come to London, ’ave you, dear?”

  “Just come back to London,” Nicola told her.

  “An’ where did you stay when you was ’ere before?” Mrs. Major inquired, leaning on the banisters to enjoy a chat.

  “I had a room near Pimlico.”

  “Reely? I ’ad a niece once, livin’ round there. Where was you, exactly?”

  A glimmer of annoyance came into Nicola’s eyes. “Buckingham Mansions, Buckingham Street,” she said. “You goin’ to look for a job?”

  “No. I’ve got one.”

  “I suppose you’re a secret’ry, or something like that?”

  “No. A model.”

  “You got any relations in London, dear?”

  “No.”

  “No parents, nor nothink?”

  Nicola was climbing the stairs.

  “No. I’m an orphan,” she said.

  “You could call me that,” Mrs. Major said. “My old Mum died upstairs, in those very rooms. No brothers or sisters?”

  “Yes. All in Australia.”

  “I’ll pop up for a chat one day,” Mrs. Major promised. Rodney put a hand in his pocket for his key and then decided to pound on the door. It was opened by Angela, in a long dress.

  “Going out?” he inquired.

  “No.” She addressed Nicola. “You see, he didn’t tell me who it was he was bringing home, so I thought it might be the Italian whose phone call I ruined. Rodney hasn’t told me who you are, either, but it’s an easy guess: Madame Landini’s secretary. Is she going on with the memoirs?”

  “We don’t know yet. We hope,” Rodney said.

  He was at the door of Nicola’s room, looking in. A nice job, he thought with gratitude; she really had worked hard to drag out all that lumber. It made a pleasant room: bedside table, his rug, books, pictures.

  “This is lovely.” Nicola looked at Angela. “But am I going to be in your way?”

  “I’m only too happy to have you. Life with a brother can get pretty dull.”

  “Give Nicola a drink,” Rodney said. “I’m going to put on a couple more sweaters.”

  He went to his room, tried to open
the door and found it impeded by a heavy object. Pushing hard, he managed to get an arm in to switch on the light. After an appalled glance, he gave a howl of rage.

  “ANGELA!”

  She was in the living room, putting out glasses and talking to Nicola. She gave him an impatient look.

  “Well, what?” she asked.

  “What the hell did you shove all the stuff in here for?”

  “Where else could I have put it?”

  “I TOLD you. I said—”

  “I’m not a weight-lifter. And Mrs. Major was out, so I had to drag it all, and as the junk room was crammed, where else was there except your room? It’s all the trunks and things,” she explained to Nicola. “I needed a crane.” She held up a bottle. “Can you drink this stuff? A man I know brings it sometimes—he’s something to do with sherry.”

  “I’ll drink anything.”

  “Don’t say that again, or Rodney’ll dish you out some of his home brew. Can you eat things out of tins? I was afraid to cook anything in case it went wrong.”

  “If you’ve got eggs and cheese, I’ll fix dinner. I’m an expert. Do you mind if I sit on the floor. I always do.”

  “Terrible draughts come in under all these doors.”

  “Rodney says you’re going to work at a travel agency.”

  “Yes. Office-boy. I assemble tickets and—Oh Rodney, do be careful. You nearly knocked the vase off that table.” Rodney, transferring heavy trunks from his bedroom to the space he had cleared in the junk room, made no reply. He went on dragging and lifting, his fury increased by the attitude of the two girls, who appeared to have forgotten him. Having at last cleared his room, he washed off his sweat and most of his ill-humour in a hot bath. Coming into the living room in a sweater and old trousers, he saw the table laid and Angela carrying in a dish.

  “The remains of my lunch fish, miraculously made by Nicola into mousse,” she told him. “Salad coming up. Sit down and begin.”

  He paused only to pour himself out a drink. Then he joined the others at the table; the mousse and the cheese soufflé that followed it were so good that he allowed himself to overlook the flow of culinary exchanges that passed for conversation.