The puppy, who was stretched out beside Lysander on the sofa, gave a whimper and flexed her toes in her sleep. Her skin drooped between each rib. Ferdie knew how to touch Lysander’s heart.
‘Georgie’s like that little dog,’ he said gently. ‘She may not have cigarette burns on her back, but she’s in just as bad a way. Give it a try for a week.’
There was a long pause. Safe from the banging clays, pigeons cooed contentedly in Marigold’s wood.
‘Oh, OK,’ said Lysander crossly.
‘Come and have a look at the cottage I’ve found for you,’ said Marigold, ‘and then we’ll have some dinner.’
Magpie Cottage stood in the far side of dense woods on the edge of Larry’s land. Approached from the road by a rough cart-track, its front garden consisted of neat squares of lawn bordered by iceberg roses. Pink rambler roses and purple clematis swarmed over the door. Inside there was a kitchen, a dining room and drawing room knocked through and two bedrooms upstairs. Out at the back was another little lawn, a scented flower-bed filled with white stocks, pinks and tobacco plants, a pond and a white bench under a walnut tree. A four-acre field filled with dog daisies and red sorrel curved round the house and garden like a magnet.
‘It’s seriously nice. Arthur’ll love it,’ said Lysander, who had cheered up. ‘He’s so nosy he’ll be able to put his head in through all the downstairs windows.’
‘It’ll need a few pennies spending on it,’ admitted Marigold.
‘Judging by the smell a few pennies have been spent in it already,’ said Ferdie.
‘A keeper had it,’ explained Marigold, ‘hence the pong of ferret. Ay’ll get it painted and cleaned up and you’ll need a cooker. Would you prefer gas or electricity?’
‘Basically I don’t cook,’ said Lysander, ‘but gas is better for lighting cigarettes.’
‘You will keep the garden taydy, won’t you, Lysander? Paradayse has won the Best-Kept Village award ten years runnin’.’
Marigold worked fast furnishing the cottage with, among other things, a large brass four-poster, blue-ticking sofas and chairs and a big wooden bishop’s chair she’d found in a jumble sale. Eight days later, Lysander, Arthur, Jack, Tiny and little Maggie moved in. Loot from grateful wives now included six polo ponies which Lysander was keeping over at Ricky France-Lynch’s yard at Eldercombe and Mrs Gunn’s promised yacht which Ferdie had already swapped for a new soft-top dark blue Ferrari. He felt it was important for people to be able to see Lysander driving round Paradise and, besides, he wanted to appropriate the red Ferrari himself.
After moving in, he and Lysander went out to The Heavenly Host where they dined outside under the stars in the buddleia-scented dusk. Taking off his jacket Ferdie noticed Lysander’s post which he’d left in his inside pocket.
‘I forgot to give you these. Fan mail still coming in for Arthur and three letters from your father.’
‘I don’t want to see Dad. He was so horrible last time.’
‘Well, at least open the one from your bank.’ Ferdie chucked a thick white envelope across the red-check tablecloth.
‘Are you determined to ruin my dinner? Gregor and I lost a hell of a lot of money in the casino at Palma. If only you’d let me come home straight away.’
‘Open it,’ said Ferdie, ‘I promise you’ll be pleasantly surprised.’
With shaking hands Lysander tore open the envelope and holding up a candle scanned the contents for a long time, his lips moving as he read, growing paler and paler.
‘My God,’ he whispered, ‘I’m £102,000 overdrawn and I’ve got to pay £750 interest. What am I going to do? The Ferrari’ll have to go and the ponies and what about Arthur’s vet bill? Oh Christ.’
‘It’s in credit, you jerk,’ said Ferdie. ‘And you made £750 in interest just last month. So you can bloody well buy me dinner.’
It took him several minutes to convince Lysander, who promptly suggested they went out later and blew some of it at the nearest casino.
‘We will not,’ said Ferdie tartly. ‘I’ll be fired if I don’t put in some work at the office and you’ve got to move in first thing on Georgie. Here’s the way I suggest you play it.’
28
A heavy dew silvered the parched fields. Invisible larks carolled joyously in a sky as blue as Mary’s robes. However, as Lysander drew up at Angel’s Reach the following morning, Georgie Maguire greeted him in a dressing gown and tears.
‘I thought Guy’d left me a little love note on the kitchen table,’ she sobbed, ‘but when I looked it just said: Don’t forget the dustbins. And even worse he’s written Julia’s number, without her name of course, on the inside of his Parish Council file.’
She waved a buff folder. ‘I felt so miserable I’ve written Cuckoo beside it in biro, and now I can’t rub it out.’
‘Pas de problème.’ Taking the folder, Lysander tore off the corner with Julia’s number and chucked it in the bin.
‘Guy will notice that even more,’ said Georgie aghast.
‘Say it’s mice, or better still, moths. The waitress at The Heavenly Host says there is a plague of moths because of the drought.’
‘There aren’t any clothes for them to eat because they’ve all gone to Marigold’s Nearly New Stall,’ said Georgie, but she stopped crying.
‘Go and have a nice long bath and get dressed,’ said Lysander, dumping several carrier bags on the kitchen table. ‘I’m going to make you porridge for breakfast. No, I promise it’s delicious, with cream and treacle, and then croissants with black-cherry jam.’
‘D’you know how to make porridge?’ asked Georgie.
‘I’ve made enough bran mashes in my life. You just read the directions. Then I’m going to take you to meet Arthur and then we’ll have lunch at The Pearly Gates to get people gossiping and then go shopping for lots of glamorous clothes. Bath’s better than Rutminster. Oh look, there’s a little green van going up Marigold’s drive.’
‘That van goes to all the big houses in Paradise every Monday,’ said Georgie sadly. ‘It takes away old plants and replaces them with shiny new ones with flowers. They ought to do the same with wives.’
‘Now, now,’ reproved Lysander. ‘You’ve got to stop sniping and cheer up.’
The ice was broken by Lysander reading all the directions wrong and making porridge so thick the spoon set in it like cement — so they had three croissants each and gave the porridge to Arthur. When they returned much later in the day they discovered that the video that Lysander’d thought was a jolly musical turned out to be an incredibly blue movie about rent boys.
As a result Lysander sat through the entire video in mounting horror with his T-shirt neck pulled up over his eyes, only lowering it occasionally when Georgie, in fits of laughter, said it was safe to look or when he wanted another drag at his joint.
‘I really like gays,’ he kept saying in bewilderment. ‘Who would have thought my friend Gregor could do things like that? I’m sorry, Georgie.’
He’s still only a child, thought Georgie, but certainly a very endearing one.
When Guy returned on Friday he was relieved to find the house a lot tidier and flowers in the downstairs rooms — but no little posy to welcome him in his dressing room. Nor any whisky, nor dinner on, nor any sign of Georgie. Usually the sniping started as he crossed the threshold. When she drifted down the backstairs from her study half an hour later she looked noticeably better, as though an iron had smoothed out her face.