Читать книгу Keeping Mum - Kate Lawson - Страница 8

‘Right, so has everyone got their starting notes? And is everyone happy with the arrangement for this?’ asked Alan, before rapidly running through the flight plan for a little gospel number the choir were polishing for the All Stars On Tour show. It was also the opening number for the ‘Bon Voyage’ concert they were staging in the Corn Exchange before they left and it really needed to go with a zing.

Alan tapped his baton on the music stand. ‘Mellow—nice and bluesy. Basses in first, twice through the intro and then altos you come in, along with the tenors and finally sopranos. We do the whole thing through a couple of times and then head on home for a big finish? Okay, just watch where I’m going with this—now relax, breathe—and let’s really go for it. Lots of life, plenty of swing,’ said Alan enthusiastically. Standing out in front of the choir, who were currently arranged in concert formation, he looked around the faces to ensure he had everyone’s attention.

‘Right. Here we go. One, two, one two three four…’ and brought the bass section in with a crisp flick of his hands. At least, that was the idea—except that that wasn’t quite what happened. For some reason, things weren’t going well tonight, and the whole number rapidly dissolved into total chaos. The normally crisp dm, dm dm-dm, dm dm—a percussive, plucky snap without a vowel sound, created by the bass section and meant to resemble the sharp rhythmic slap of a well-tuned bass, and a staple part of a lot of ‘a cappella’ choral numbers, which anchored everyone else—sounded like a bag of spanners being dropped down a flight of concrete stairs.

Welsh Alf’s attempts to recover the timing made the whole thing far worse—a lot worse. Within a few bars, the song sounded like a broken engine, mistimed, misfiring and gradually tearing itself apart, while behind it the dm, dm dm-dm, dm dms slowed, stalled and finally faded.

‘Whoa, whoa, there cowboy,’ said Alan, face contorted into a grin as he pulled an imaginary horse to a standstill. ‘Let’s try that again then, shall we folks? Just relax, feel the beat. Let’s be honest, if you don’t know it by now, really there isn’t a lot of hope. Basses, would you like me to run through your part one more time with feeling?’

There was a faint murmuring, which Alan took for a yes, at which point he began to go over their part line by line. Given that most of it was dms, it wasn’t so much a case of checking the words as the pattern. Cass looked around the rest of her section, wondering what the problem was. Fiona had barely said a word all evening, although everyone looked a bit down in the mouth tonight; surely they weren’t all keeping mum?

Cass closed her eyes and reminded herself that she wasn’t planning on saying anything about Andy, not one word, and that what happened between Fiona and Andy was none of her business. In fact, she had arrived a few minutes later than normal, and had to squeeze herself into place amongst the rest of the section, just so she couldn’t do any pre-match bonding with Fiona, and she planned to leave before the last note had stopped vibrating round the hall, so she wouldn’t slip up and nothing would slip out.

‘Righty-oh,’ said Alan, clapping his hands after they’d dm-ed the song through a few times. ‘I really don’t know what the problem was there, guys, but my advice is, you know it, you just need to relax and go with it. Right, let’s go from the top. And don’t worry, it’s pre-match nerves. Not long now and we’ll be on the road in Cyprus, on stage, on the terrace drinking pina coladas, groupies and sugar daddies hanging around wherever we go, clamouring for our bodies.’

‘For god’s sake don’t tell my missus that,’ said Welsh Alf, looking all flummoxed and anxious. ‘I’ve had a hard enough job getting her to let me go as it is.’

There was a lot of laughter.

‘You all set?’ asked Fiona, as everyone settled down.

Cass nodded. ‘For the trip? Oh yes, really looking forward to it,’ she answered brightly, making sure there was no room for any other questions.

‘Me too,’ said Fiona.

Across the hall, one of the sopranos stuck her hand up and waved it about like a schoolgirl keen to answer a question. ‘Alan? Alan?’ she called in a tinkling voice, trying hard to grab his attention.

Taking advantage of the hiatus, Fiona said, ‘Actually, Cass, I was hoping to have a word with you. Are you going to the pub afterwards? I wanted to talk to you about the other night.’

Cass felt her heart sink. After all, she could so easily be wrong about Andy and the girl, which was exactly what Rocco and her mum had said on Saturday evening, while eating a superb supper of halibut and prawns baked under a crust of Gruyère crumble, served with Cass’s homegrown spinach, pan-fried courgettes and sauté potatoes—along with a spare man called Mike who they had invited along to make up the numbers.

‘My advice? Snout out,’ Rocco had said, tapping the side of his nose by way of a visual aid. ‘You’re damned if you do and you’ll be buggered if you don’t in a situation like that. God only knows the bucket of worms you’ll be wading through.’ He pulled a face. ‘Blast, I just mixed my metaphors, didn’t I?’

‘Well and truly mixed, diced, and deep fried,’ said Nita, tucking a strand of bleached blonde hair back behind her ear. ‘Best to leave that one alone, Cass my darling. I remember what she was like when you were at school. She was always difficult. You did the right thing, told her to talk to him, and now it’s up to them to sort it out for themselves. Do you want some more fish—there’s plenty?’

‘So what’s your connection to the woman with the wayward husband?’ asked Mike conversationally, offering up his plate for seconds. ‘Nita said that you were in antiques—do you do counselling on the side?’

Cass glanced across at him. Mike was around five ten with grey-blonde hair and bright blue eyes with enough wrinkles around them to suggest he probably smiled a lot more than he frowned. Sadly, that was not enough to make him her type or fanciable. And, truth be told, he was probably nice, except that tonight romance wasn’t what was on her mind. So far he’d done little but listen and fiddle with things in his jacket pocket and she was torn between feeling sorry for him and being annoyed. Her mum and Rocco always did this, invite along some poor sucker, hoping to play matchmaker, when really all she wanted was to gossip with the pair of them.

‘We sing together,’ she began. ‘And we used to go to school together. She moved back to the area a couple of years ago.’

‘Oh right—yes—in the choir, Rocco was telling me about that. Sounds like fun.’

‘They sing like angels,’ said Nita.

‘You ought to hear them,’ said Rocco. Cass shot him a look. He beamed back at her.

Mike was an architect, and apparently yes, he was an angel too, because her mother had said so. He’d drawn up the plans for their kitchen and now he’d come up with some sort of fancy notion for the roof, which included taking most of it off and turning part of it into a sun terrace.

‘You’re having a terrace?’ asked Cass, as she shovelled more of the baked fish onto her plate.

Rocco nodded. ‘Uh-huh—your mother reckons if they’re right about global warming that our flat roof is going to be like St Tropez, so while we’ve got the whole thing stripped back to bare bones, why not? Who wants this last bit of fish?’

Mouth full, Mike waved it onto his plate. ‘Yes please, god, that’s really fabulous…’

‘Worth getting up at seven for?’ asked Rocco in passing. Mike, quite reasonably, looked mystified.

‘It’s a close call,’ said Cass. ‘Did you get to the airport on time?’

Rocco pushed the bowl of vegetables in her direction. ‘Certainly did. Your mum was going to pick them up, but you know what her driving is like.’ He tipped his hand sharply left and right.

Nita made as if to hit him with the spoon.

‘Oh, come on, Nita. Last time we went to Stansted you reversed over some poor bugger’s hand luggage and then drove off with both back doors open,’ said Rocco, topping up Cass’s wine glass.

At which point Nita hit him with the spoon. ‘You are such a liar. Here baby, take the last of the potatoes…’

Supper at their house contained more nurturing in one evening than most women got in a lifetime.

‘And be fair,’ continued Nita. ‘Rocco’s enough to drive Francis of Assisi to drink. Nag, nag, nag, look out for this, did you see that, mind that cyclist. Don’t drive in the middle of the road…He would drive anyone loco. Talking of which, Rocco tells me that you and the All Stars are off on tour?’

‘Um,’ said Cass, through a mouthful of sauce, ‘A fortnight today. You are coming to the concert, aren’t you? Rocco—you did tell her, didn’t you?’

The pair of them nodded. ‘As if we’d miss it,’ said Rocco. Cass couldn’t work out quite just how much of that was sarcasm. ‘We can get you a ticket if you want to come along too, Mike, can’t we Cass?’ continued Rocco.

Cass glared at him—not that Rocco noticed.

‘That sounds great. Where are you going on tour?’ Mike asked.

‘Cyprus. Seven days of singing with our lot and about twenty-five other choirs. It’s their first a cappella festival. I know it sounds nuts but it’ll be great. We’ve got some workshops and rehearsals together, a few performances and lot of sun, sea, singing and…’

All three of them looked expectantly in her direction, waiting for the pay-off line. Cass reddened and held up her hands. ‘It’s a competition—the winning choir gets a trip to the States. We’re going to be singing in a Roman amphitheatre.’

‘Really—well, sounds like fun,’ said Mike, politely.

‘Sounds way, way too Butlins to me. So what’s happening to the pooch, the puss and the old hacienda while you’re away?’ Rocco asked casually.

‘Kennels, cattery and most probably closing down for a few days. The boys are both at Uni at the moment—not that I’d ask them to come home and house-sit. They’d eat me out of house and home and leave the place wrecked. And Jacko’s busy—that’s a local guy who helps me out in the shop,’ she added for Mike’s benefit. ‘Besides, I need a break, and business is usually slow at this time of the year anyway. People will ring if they want anything special.’

She and Mike had already had the, So you’re an architect, how very interesting conversation, followed by the Rocco tells me you’re an interior designer section, to which Cass had added the actually these days I mostly restore and sell old furniture speech, so at least he was up to speed with her professional life.

‘And people will come back. I’ll put a sign in the window.’

‘How very twenty-first century…’ said Rocco, steepling his fingers. ‘We’ve been discussing this, haven’t we Nita? How about if we stepped into the breach for you?’

‘What do you mean? I wasn’t aware there was any breach?’ Cass said suspiciously.

‘Y’know, pick up the pinny, mind the fort,’ said Rocco.

‘Do you mean run the shop?’

Her mother and Rocco did some very slick synchronised nodding.

Cass stared at the pair of them. ‘Because?’

‘Actually, it would just be me during the day,’ said her mother apologetically. ‘Well, most days, and I couldn’t promise it would be every day, but we can look after the animals, can’t we Rocco? I’ve always wanted a cat. And Buster loves us.’

‘And while we’re at it, we wondered if we could maybe borrow your house as well.’

‘Because?’

‘Well, because first of all we can keep an eye on the place,’ said Nita. ‘I mean, you always have nice things there. Very nice things, according to Rocco.’

Cass held tight to Rocco’s shifting gaze. He reddened.

Mike meanwhile looked backwards and forwards, as if he’d got good seats at centre court.

‘And this whole thing about having the roof off. I mean, we all know it’s going to be great when it’s done, French windows coming off the sitting room onto a roof terrace—great views. Mike’s done an amazing job with the plans, haven’t you Mike? I did tell you that we’ve got to have the roof off, didn’t I?’ Rocco said after a few seconds.

‘I think you may have mentioned it.’

‘Well, they’re going to take the old chimney stack down at the same time, and our builder has got a gap in his schedule and he said if we can stand the noise and the chaos he’ll come and do the roof before the bad weather sets in. I said to your mother that we should have had it done before we had the kitchen, really…’

‘I didn’t know how bad it was, did I? I mean I had no idea—really. I’m not a builder…’

Before they started a full-scale spat, Cass said, ‘Which would be in a couple of weeks’ time, would it? The roof coming off?’

Rocco, cornered, nodded. Mike was about to say something but Cass cut across him. ‘Which would make me being away convenient,’ she suggested.

‘The thing is Cass, we’re prepared to work round you, aren’t we, Rocco?’ said Nita, shovelling the last of the sautéed potatoes onto her plate.

‘They’re taking the roof off, not taking the house down,’ said Cass.

‘You know how much I hate noise,’ said her mother.

‘And dust,’ said Rocco. ‘I mean, can you imagine what it’s going to be like? Kango drills, brick rubble, hairy-arsed builders lolling on around sacks of cement reading the Sun. And you know your mum works from home. The studio is going to be knee deep in rubble.’

‘We were planning to just sheet everything down and move into a hotel or something.’

Rocco nodded in agreement. ‘That’s right, and we’ve booked industrial cleaners for when they’ve finished.’

Mike had the good sense to say nothing.

Cass shook her head. ‘You’ll need to get industrial cleaners in before you move into my place.’

‘That’s not true, sweetie,’ said her mum. ‘Your place is really lovely—so cosy. Rocco was telling me about the choir trip and said you were going to be away for the week. And we just thought—’

‘We wouldn’t be any trouble,’ said Rocco.

‘We thought we’d be doing you a favour.’

Cass looked from one to the other. ‘I should have known that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. This is a done deal, isn’t it? The pair of you have set me up.’

‘No, no of course not,’ Rocco said. ‘As if—think of it more as a happy coincidence, providence smiling on us all. Your mother has always fancied running a shop. What do you reckon then, sound like a good idea?’

‘I mean tell us honestly, what do you think?’ said Nita.

‘That my place is small and full of animals. And my shop is smaller and full of tut?’

‘Uh-huh, well we already know that. We’ve been round to your place before.’ Nita turned her attention to Mike. ‘It’s the most amazing place. A real Aladdin’s cave. You should go some time.’

‘Yes, but not to stay in,’ said Cass. ‘And not to have to deal with the vagaries of the plumbing or root through the fridge or see what I’ve got hidden at the back of the airing cupboard.’

‘Oh come on. You’re just being paranoid,’ said her mother.

‘And, besides, you could probably fit the whole of my house in your kitchen,’ protested Cass.

‘You can, we’ve already measured,’ said Nita. ‘But the good news is it’s not going to come as a surprise. And we love Buster and Mungo.’

‘And this way your shop stays open, and we get to stay sane, pootle through your warehouse and cherry-pick your stock,’ said Rocco.

Her mother got to her feet. ‘Take no notice of him, Cass. I promise you it’ll be fine. You can have a great, stress-free break and we get a dust-and jackhammer-free week. Now I’ve made the most fabulous pudding —strawberry shortcake. Would you like some pudding, Mike?’

He nodded. ‘Sounds great.’

Cass laughed. ‘Be very careful with these two, they lull you into a false sense of security with food and then bam—they’ll be moving in.’

Rocco handed her a clean side plate. ‘We’ll take that as a yes then, shall we?’

Did they really think she was going to be thrown off track by dessert? ‘What about if your roof’s not done by the time I get back from Cyprus?’

‘They’ve promised it will be, but if it isn’t then we’ll just move into a hotel for a day or two,’ said her mother.

Cass stared at the two of them, busy planning and plotting, and smiled. ‘And you’ll keep the shop open?’

‘Oh god, yes,’ said Rocco, waving the words away. ‘You know that your mum has always wanted to dabble in dealing and rag rolling. And I’ll be in and out, keeping the home fires burning, you’ll hardly know that we’ve been there—and besides places get damp when you don’t keep them aired. Especially this time of the year…’

‘And burgled,’ said her mother, sliding a huge plate of strawberry shortcake cut into thick wedges on the table between them. ‘Let’s not forget burgled.’

Mike picked up a cake slice. ‘Shall I be mother?’

Which was one amongst the many thoughts in Cass’s head as they waited for Ms Soprano to check the lyrics of a song they’d sung for the best part of three years and to pitch a note that she had hit every week since.

Since having supper at her mother’s, Mike had rung and left a message on Cass’s machine and she was weighing up whether or not to ring him back, even if he wasn’t her type. Which threw up the question: what was her type, and was it a type she wanted to hang on to?

Fiona meanwhile, moved in a little closer and said in a whisper, ‘So, can I buy you a drink—just a quickie? On the way home? Just to say thank you?’

Cass stared at her. ‘Thank me? There’s really nothing to thank me for, Fee. And besides, I’ve got way too much to organise, you know, what with going away and the animals and the shop and…’ Which was the excuse she planned to use on Mike, too, if he rang again. Cass looked away, deliberately leaving the sentence hanging in the air between them.

Undeterred, Fiona moved closer still. ‘Me too, but this won’t take long, really. I just wanted to talk to you about the other night.’

Which was exactly what Cass was afraid of. Somewhere in the back of her head she thought she could hear a cage door creaking open on rusty hinges, making Hammer House of Horror sound effects. This wasn’t going to end well unless she made a concerted effort to keep her mouth shut. So, instead of words, Cass settled for a grunt.

‘The thing is,’ Fiona said. ‘This is hard for me to say really, but you know what I’m like—a bit of a control freak.’ She pulled a comedy face and then paused, apparently expecting Cass to correct her, but when nothing came, continued, ‘What I wanted to say was that I’m sorry about the other night, and that you were right. Totally. So thank you for that.’ She held up her hands in a gesture of surrender. Pax.

Cass stared at her. ‘Sorry?’ she said, struggling to keep her expression neutral.

‘The other night. Thank you. You were right about Andy and me, and the whole stalking thing. He’s been really stressed at work and things haven’t been right for—well, months really—and then I read in the paper that they’d been making staff cuts at his place and you know what men can be like—bottling things up, not talking about what’s really bugging them. And the move’s been stressful. I mean, he grew up near Cambridge, so we both know the area but it was still a big change. Anyway, I’m certain that’s what has been making him twitchy and a bit preoccupied, the not-knowing if he’s going to be one of the ones for the chop. He says his job’s safe, but you never really know, do you?—and I can’t have helped, being off with him, putting two and two together and coming up with…’ She laughed nervously. ‘Well, you know what I came up with. Andy and I talked about it on Sunday, when we’d got some quality time together.

I said, “Andy, I know there’s something wrong, I want us to talk about it, and I know what it is.” Cass, he went all pale—and I said, “It’s all right, Andy—it’s been all over the papers—it’s all the job cuts, isn’t it? Why didn’t you say something?” And although he didn’t really say very much about it, I could tell he was relieved.’

‘I bet he was,’ Cass said, before she could stop herself.

‘And the upshot of it is that everything is fine,’ said Fiona, ignoring her.

Cass stared at her. ‘Fine?’

‘Uh-huh. Absolutely. I told him about what we’d talked about. You and me. Not all of it, obviously, I didn’t want him thinking he was living with a maniac,’ she laughed. ‘So I just explained that I’d needed someone to talk to and that you told me straight out that I should be talking to him, not to you. Anyway—we talked for a bit; well, I talked and he listened. Andy’s always been a good listener and—’ Fiona smiled—‘and I’ve persuaded him to come to Cyprus with us, with the choir. Isn’t that great? I thought it would be a bit of a second honeymoon.’ Fiona reddened. ‘Not that we had a first one, I mean we’re not married, but you know what I mean. I’ve already asked Alan and he said it will be okay. We’ll just get a room to ourselves. I mean it’s two to a room, I had been thinking that maybe you and I could share—but anyway, Andy’s coming and he’s going to roadie for us.’

‘We’re an a cappella choir, Fee, all we’ve got is us and our voices and a crate of brown ale for Alf.’

Fiona giggled. ‘I know, but I thought it was just what we needed. We could do with a change of pace. We’ve been talking about a baby—well, at least I have. I mean, if I don’t do it soon—tick-tick-tick.’ She tipped her head from one side to the other, miming a biological clock.

If only Fiona’s timing had been that accurate during the introduction to the last number, they’d have it done and dusted by now, and they wouldn’t be having this conversation, thought Cass ruefully, trying very hard not to meet Fiona’s eye.

‘It’s all right for you, you’ve already done the whole parenthood thing,’ Fiona said, managing to make having children sound like a package holiday to Greece. ‘How old is Joe now?’

‘Twenty-one.’

‘And Danny?’

‘Twenty.’

Cass could almost see Fiona’s brain doing the maths. ‘I was nineteen when I had Joe.’

Fiona smiled. ‘See, I wish I’d started young, got it all out of the way, but better late than never—how’re they doing?’

‘Fine,’ Cass began, relieved that across the room Alan was busy tapping the music stand to attract their attention. ‘Busy doing all the things kids do at Uni.’

‘Studying hard?’

Cass smiled; she was thinking more along the lines of getting drunk, running up a huge debt and staying out late, but didn’t say so.

‘It must be lovely for you,’ said Fiona. ‘Seeing them grow up—I was saying to Andy I’d like two, although I’d really like one of each.’

‘Anyone here want to sing or shall we just carry on chatting?’ Alan said, his voice cutting through the din like a band saw. ‘I’d like to remind you all that I get paid whether you sing or not and that the meter is running.’

‘So all’s well that ends well,’ said Fiona brightly to Cass, turning her attention back to Alan.

‘Sorry?’ said Cass.

‘Me and Andy. All’s well that ends well. You stopped me from making a total fool of myself.’

‘After four then,’ said Alan, raising his hands to bring them in again.

Cass stared at Fiona; she couldn’t help thinking that maybe she should say something after all. Although Cass had a feeling that, whichever way she played it, this wasn’t going to end well. Which led Cass on to thinking about what it was she did know for certain, which wasn’t much, and from there to Fiona having a baby and from there on to how very complicated life could become without you trying.

‘Are you with us?’

‘What?’ Cass looked up and realised to her horror that the whole choir had stopping singing and turned to look at her. She reddened furiously. ‘Sorry, is there a problem?’ she blustered.

Alan smiled. ‘That rather depends on how you feel about modern jazz,’ he said.

Cass sensed this wasn’t going to end at all well either. ‘I was singing, wasn’t I?’ she asked.

‘Oh yes. You most certainly were,’ said Alan. There was a pantomime pause. ‘Unfortunately you weren’t singing the same song as the rest of us.’

Cass stared at him. ‘Really?’ She said incredulously. ‘Are you sure?’

Beside her, Welsh Alf and the rest of the lads nodded earnestly. Embarrassed didn’t anywhere near cover what she felt.

Cass’s feelings of preoccupation stayed with her all the way home. And her thoughts were certainly not just about Fiona and Andy. The to-do list in her head was steadily growing longer and longer. Usually they went to the pub after rehearsals, so it would be after closing time when she wandered back home and there would be other people around coming back after a night out, but heading straight back after choir the streets seemed almost deserted. It was cold, the wind busily scouring rubbish up out of the gutters for dramatic effect, and under every streetlight lay a pool of film-noir lamplight, not that Cass noticed. The dog and cat were upset she had arrived back early having planned a night of chase, chew and snore, but she didn’t notice that either and headed up to bed for an early night.

Trouble was that the night seemed never-ending and full of dreaming and waking and thinking and dreaming some more. Cass’s dreams were long and complex, full of Fiona and Andy and the girl in the market, and some kind of giant fish—possibly beginning with H—flapping about on a roof terrace, along with angels and singing and unseen tensions and hurrying, and hiding and a sense of impending doom; by the time the morning came, Cass was completely exhausted and relieved to get up.