‘Ay, the gret black monolisks fra’ Pitlochry,’ said Fabrice, ‘a’ change heer for Ballachulish.’ The others were shaking with laughter at what was evidently an ancient and well-loved joke. ‘Nu – now we are na’ longer wee bairnies they canna scaith us.’
‘You didn’t leave because of them?’
‘They are still ghoulish (in Pop now) but no, definitely not.’
‘And you haven’t been beaten this half?’
‘Oh definitely. I was beaten for covering a boy with baby-powder and Sigi was for holding a boy’s head under the bath water.’
‘Sigi!’ There was such horror in my voice that he looked quite startled and quickly said, ‘But I didn’t hold it for as long as they thought.’
‘Mum – nobody minds being beaten, you know.’
‘Speak for yourself, Charlie,’ said Fabrice, making a face.
‘Of course it’s rather ghoulish pacing up and down one’s room before. But not nearly enough for running away. Our reasons were positive, not negative.’
The others agreed. ‘Definitely. It was the feeling that life was passing us by and we weren’t getting the best out of it.’
‘Packing and rocking and rolling aren’t the best, either. They will stop wowing you very soon and then where will you be?’
‘By then nothing will matter any more. Our teens will have gone and we shall be old and we shall die. Isn’t it sad!’
‘Very sad but not quite true. You will get old and die, but after the end of your teens until your death beds there will be endless years to fill in somehow. Are you going to spend them all, all those thousands of days, packing shavers? Is it for this that you were created?’
‘You see, you haven’t understood, just like we were so afraid you wouldn’t.’
‘Why don’t you come back with me to Paris in the morning?’
They looked at each other uncomfortably. ‘You see, we think London is a better town to live in at our age. Paris isn’t much good for teenagers.’
‘Definitely less commercial.’
‘So you won’t come?’
‘You see, we’ve signed on for our work.’
It was evidently no good pursuing the subject so we spoke of other things. They asked how Northey was. ‘By the way,’ I said, ‘she’s a teenager but she’s perfectly happy in Paris; she loves it.’
They said, scornfully but quite affectionately, that she had never acted like a teenager.
‘Act is the word,’ I said, beginning to lose my temper, ‘acting and showing off. If you had to leave Eton why couldn’t you have gone at the end of the half instead of having a scene with your tutor and hiring a Rolls-Royce to take you, in full view of everybody? So vulgar, I’m ashamed of you. And how I wish you knew how babyish you look in that silly fancy dress.’
‘This dinner party is going downhill,’ said Fabrice.
‘Definitely,’ said Sigi.
‘Ghoulish,’ said Charlie.
‘Yes. I think I’m tired after the journey.’ I looked at my children and thought how little I knew them. I felt much more familiar with David and Baz. No doubt it was because these boys had always been inseparable. As with dogs, so with children, one on its own is a more intimate pet than two or three. The death of my second baby had made a gap between David and Basil; I had had each of them in the nursery by himself. I suppose I had hardly ever been alone with either of the other two in my life; I was not at all sure what they were really like.
‘Don’t be tired,’ said Fabrice. ‘We thought we’d take you to the Finsbury Empire. It’s not Yank unfortunately (he’s in Liverpool) but quite a good pop show.’
‘Darling – no, I can’t anyhow. I promised I’d ring up Sigi’s mother and tell the news. She’s expecting a baby, Sigi.’
If I’d hoped to soften him with this statement I was disappointed. ‘I know!’ he said furiously. ‘It really is too bad of her. What about the unearned income? There’ll be nothing for any of us if she goes on like this.’
‘Lucky you’re so good at packing.’ I felt I had scored a point.
As soon as the children had finished their pudding I paid the bill and said good-bye to them. There seemed to be no point in prolonging the interview only to hear, as I was already sick of hearing from David and Baz, what a ghastly (or ghoulish) failure Alfred and I had made of our lives; how we had wasted our youth and to what purpose? It was true that I was tired and, in fact, deeply depressed and upset. I had been unable to touch my dinner; I longed to be alone and lie down in the dark. First, however, I telephoned to Grace. (Alfred I knew was dining out, I would speak to him in the morning.) She was not surprised to hear about the crooner.
‘It went on the whole summer at Bellandargues – lanky Yank the Boy from Brum, till I could have killed them. You didn’t quite take it in when I told you. It’s an absolute mania. But then, Fanny, aren’t they getting hard up?’
‘I’m coming to that,’ I said, just as Fabrice had, ‘hold everything, it’s far the worst part. They’ve got a job – they’re quite all right for money and I’d just like you to guess what they are earning.’
‘Perhaps – I don’t know – they couldn’t be worth £3 a week?’
‘Nine.’
‘Pounds a week? Each? But it’s perfectly insane! We shall never get them back now.’
‘Exactly.’
‘But what do they get it for?’
‘Packing, Grace. They pack all day, five days a week, in order to have their evenings free for the Birmingham-born Bomb.’
There was a long pause while she digested this fact. Then she said, ‘My dear, the person who gives Sigismond £9 a week to pack
