some mega-crisis and asking ungraciously if she and the children could come to supper after all. Lysander, who would rather have gone back to sleep or out on the bat with his Pearly Gates cronies, said: ‘Of course.’ He’d come and fetch her; only to be told: ‘What’s wrong with walking? It’s only half a mile.’
‘That was Rachel,’ sighed Lysander.
‘Isn’t she fantastically young and pretty?’ asked Georgie, jumping out of bed and scuttling into the bathroom so Lysander shouldn’t get too long a sight of her droopy bottom.
‘Used to be, but she’s got seriously fierce. Oh dear, it didn’t even seem a good idea this morning. Friday’s my worst night of the week, knowing I won’t see you until Monday.’
Following Georgie into the bathroom, he slid his arms round her waist, nuzzling at her shoulder.
‘Promise to ring me every moment you can, and try and persuade the Ace Carer to play cricket on Sunday.’ Then, turning on the taps, ‘I’d better have first bath so I can nip down to The Apple Tree and get some supper and a video for the kids before they close.’
Suddenly Georgie realized why the mention of Rachel upset her.
‘She was coming to dinner the night she and Boris split up. That was the night Guy fed Julia in,’ she said.
‘Don’t think about Julia.’ Lysander took Georgie back in his arms, stroking her hair.
‘You won’t fall in love with her, will you?’ Georgie clung to him. One of the lovely things about Lysander was that she never had to try and be cool.
The day that had started so beautifully deteriorated. Returning from The Apple Tree, Lysander passed Rachel trailing two tired, fretful children, Vanya and Masha, aged four and three, who were only too pleased to jump into such a glamorous car and shrieked with excitement when Lysander drove at his usual reckless pace. Rachel was less amused.
‘Any speed over 55 m.p.h. wastes energy.’
She then proceeded to castigate him for not using unleaded petrol, and for not having a catalytic converter to exclude carbon monoxide.
Lysander’s hayfield of a front garden, however, temporarily cheered her up.
‘How brave of you to flout the Best-Kept Village committee and grow your lawn. Those nettles attract the peacock butterfly and the thistles are a wonderful magnet for goldfinch, and, look, kids, lots of dandelions so we can make a salad for supper.’
The inside of the cottage was less of a success. There were plates, glasses and overflowing ashtrays everywhere, and a bowl of uneaten dog food, black with flies. When Jack and Maggie rushed to meet them, both children knocked their heads together burying their faces in their mother’s skirt. Seeing Rachel wrinkling her long elegant nose at the smell of dog and game-keeper’s ferret, which always surfaced on hot days, Lysander let rip with air freshener and fly spray and got a bollocking for using aerosols.
‘This place is a bottle bank in itself,’ Rachel went on in horror.
‘I keep forgetting it’s dustbin day. Basically, the dustmen come before I get up,’ said Lysander apologetically. ‘Let’s have a drink.’
For a second, as Lysander took out some cans of Coke and a bottle of Muscadet, the children’s eyes-sloe- black like their father’s — lit up.
‘They’re not allowed Coke — sugar rots their teeth,’ said Rachel. ‘Water will do. Where are the mugs kept?’
‘In the machine. It’s just finished.’
‘But it’s only half-full,’ said Rachel, opening the door. ‘Can’t you appreciate what a waste of energy this is?’
Masha and Vanya weren’t allowed crisps either nor little chocolate nests filled with eggs.
‘I’ll have to re-educate you completely,’ sighed Rachel. ‘Those chocolate nests are at least eight hundred calories and when you think of the pesticides used on the cocoa bean. You must have some carrots and apples I can chop up.’
The fridge nearly finished her off. By not defrosting it, Lysander was completely responsible for global warming. Everything was past its sell-by date and he’d get listeria from the three half-full tins of pate.
Getting some carrots out of the vegetable compartment she started ferociously chopping on a wooden board. Arthur, who always hung around touting for snacks when he saw people in the kitchen, frightened the life out of her by sticking his great face, half of it stained olive-green from rolling, in through the window. His wall eye lit up at the sight of the carrots. Really he was the muckiest horse.
‘Arthur’s joined the Green Party,’ giggled Lysander.
‘Must you trivialize everything? I hope to stand for the Rutminster Greens at the next election.’
‘Oh, right,’ said Lysander, ‘or rather left.’
‘Greens are not automatically left-wing.’ Rachel put a plate of carrot matchsticks in front of her unenthusiastic children.
‘Go and explore,’ Lysander told them. ‘There’s a nice pond outside.’
‘Who furnished this place?’ Rachel’s eyes roved over the ticking sofas and chairs and the bishop’s throne.
‘Marigold.’ Lysander handed Rachel a glass of Muscadet. ‘She’s getting me a microwave, thank God,’ he removed a dandy brush, a curry comb and a chewed trainer from the sofa, ‘which’ll help because I get bored and forget to eat waiting for things to heat up.’
‘Trust Marigold!’ Rachel was appalled. ‘Microwaves are not only toxic to the liver but they kill off the brain cells.’
‘My liver came out waving a white flag years ago,’ said Lysander draining half his glass, ‘and I’ve never had a brain cell to kill. Hallo, kids, I’ve got you a good video.’
Again the children’s faces lit up, then faded as their mother said she didn’t allow them to watch television, then getting some 100 rolls and egg boxes out of her basket urged them to make a castle.
‘Want to watch television,’ grumbled Vanya.
‘Well, you can’t. I’ll start you off,’ said Rachel, getting out a bottle of glue. ‘This place is a tip. Don’t you ever clean it?’
‘Mother Courage comes once a week but we seem to spend our time gossiping. She says she doesn’t like to move things, so she doesn’t.’
There was a pause. It was terribly hot.
‘Perhaps you’d like a swim in the river,’ suggested Lysander. ‘I wouldn’t mind one.’
‘Polluted,’ snapped Rachel.
‘Well, we’d better have some supper.’
‘Oh God,’ Rachel clutched her head. ‘White baps are the worst thing you could give them, and haven’t you realized beef burgers are made from the pancreas, lungs and testicles of animals?’
Lysander looked at her meditatively. Easygoing to a fault, he was about to tell her he could see exactly why Boris had walked out. Then he caught sight of Masha and Vanya. They were like children on newsreels, so often photographed beside bomb craters and the dusty rubble of houses in foreign wars, children displaced because they’d been fought over.
‘There are plenty of eggs,’ he said gently. ‘Your mother can make us something she considers suitable for supper and we can play football with Jack, and then I’ll give you a ride on Arthur.’
This was a huge success. Jack could dribble a ball for hours and Arthur loved children. Sent to wash their hands before supper, Masha and Vanya came out shrieking with giggles.
‘Rachel, Rachel, come and see the willies.’
Storming into the downstairs lavatory, Rachel found the artistic fruits of Lysander’s drunken despair after the church fete when he had taken a can of red paint and sprayed cocks, balls and a vast nude lady with enormous tits and crossed eyes over the walls and then written I LOVE GORGY in huge letters.
‘Oh God, I forgot about that!’ Lysander tried not to laugh with the children.
‘Not only are you damaging the ozone layer and adding to global warming,’ stormed Rachel, ‘but you’re ejecting tiny particles of toxic paint into the environment.’
‘And you make the worst scrambled egg I’ve ever tasted,’ Lysander wanted to tell her as he emptied half a bottle of tomato ketchup, Rannaldini fashion, over the loose, tasteless mass. The only way Rachel used salt was to
