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‘Cakes and Ale’
Libby and Tim certainly didn’t let the grass grow beneath their feet, and by the time Ben returned from London only a few days later, they were engaged, living together and planning their imminent nuptials.
I’d finally broken the news to Ben on the phone, but I wasn’t sure he quite believed me until he got back and I showed him the announcement in the local paper, which had just come out.
‘This has to be the most unlikely pairing ever!’ I said. ‘I mean, “A marriage has been arranged between Mrs Elizabeth Cazzini of London and Pisa, and Mr Timothy Rowland-Knowles of Blessings, Neatslake,” may sound very well, but everyone around here knows that she started life as plain Libby Martin from the council estate. And if her mother wasn’t actually on the game, she sailed perilously close to the edge! Libby doesn’t even have a father to give her away; she says she’s going to do it herself. Mrs Talkalot at the post office says the village is reeling with shock, but she personally doesn’t think Libby is after Tim’s money. I told her Libs is much better off than Tim so, if anything, it would be the other way round, but I’m not sure she believed me.’
Even two rich and elderly husbands later, transformed into a wealthy and sophisticated widow, I was sure there would always be people who would try to put her down. Not that they would manage it. Libby might look like the fairy off the top of the Christmas tree, but her backbone is pure steel.
‘That sort of class snobbishness doesn’t seem to matter so much these days, does it?’ Ben said rather absently, staring at the newspaper.
It was on the tip of my tongue to blurt out that it certainly did matter to his parents, who had never thought me good enough for their blue-eyed boy, but I heroically managed to stop myself in time. It was mostly his mother’s jealousy and spite, anyway.
‘I suppose you’re right and perhaps no one will take much notice, especially since Libby’s mum moved down to Brighton years ago to live with her other daughter,’ I conceded, though if Gloria Martin turned up at the wedding—and there is no way you can’t invite your own mother, regardless of what you think of her lifestyle choices, is there?—then it might rake things up again. ‘Tim doesn’t care who her parents are. Dorrie Spottiswode did think Libby was a gold-digger at first, but she quickly warmed to her once she discovered she was a well-off widow, and she’s started going on about “vigorous plebeian blood enriching the atrophied Rowland-Knowles family tree”, now.’
‘Libby’s certainly a fast worker; I’ve only been away a few days.’ Ben didn’t sound admiring, more thoughtful, but as I’ve said, he’d always been a bit jealous of our close friendship. Perhaps it was because Libby and I shared a bond that deep. We both had sadness in our pasts and a yearning for security, even if our ideas of what that entails, and how to obtain it, were entirely different. I often suspected a bit of Ben’s parents’ snobbish attitude had rubbed off on him too, so no matter how smart and rich she became, in his mind she remained Libby Martin from the dysfunctional family at the wrong end of the village.
‘She didn’t have to work at it, Ben, because she and Tim fell in love the instant they set eyes on each other again. It’s terribly romantic! He showed her over the house and then they went out to dinner—and by next day they were cruising Lord Street in Southport, looking for an engagement ring, and sending out the announcement to the newspapers. They just caught the deadline for this week’s issue.’
‘Does she have enough room on her finger for any more rings?’ he asked sarcastically.
His attitude was really starting to annoy me. ‘Don’t be silly. She took off Joe’s ring when she put on Tim’s, just as she did with her first husband’s when she married Joe. The ring’s terribly pretty—rose diamonds in a platinum setting.’
I tried not to sound too wistful. The only ring I possessed was Granny’s old worn wedding band, upstairs in a box of treasures; but then, when I spent most of my days either up to the elbows in earth or cake mix, it wouldn’t be practical to wear jewellery anyway, would it? But it would have been nice to have the option!
‘Marry in haste, repent at leisure,’ Ben quoted smugly.
‘Oh, honestly, Ben!’ I snapped. ‘What is the matter with you? Libby’s married in haste twice before and been very happy, so I think she knows what she’s doing. And it will be lovely to have her living nearby—she’ll be company when you’re away. They’ve asked us both over for a drink tomorrow evening, so that you and Tim can get to know each other.’
‘We do know each other. We’ve met a couple of times down at the Griffin.’
‘Oh, have you? I know we ran into him there once when we were with Stella and Mark, but we didn’t talk much.’ Ben does sometimes walk down there in the evening with Harry and then stays for a drink, and to most men, exchanging a few words at the bar is enough to constitute a friendship. ‘Well, it’s kind of them to invite us round for a drink, isn’t it?’
He grunted unenthusiastically, but I expect he was just tired. As usual on his return from these trips, he was looking exhausted and glad to be home, but I had a feeling there was also something on his mind…
‘Libby showed me over Blessings yesterday and the Elizabethan part does want a lot doing to it. Tim’s stepmother really let it go. It’s not even clean. That Portuguese couple who worked for her don’t seem to have been very efficient at all, so I’m helping her have a good spring-clean. Just as well it’s not that big a house, more of a town house than a manor.’
‘Haven’t you got enough to do, Josie? I hardly see you as it is. You’re always off looking after Harry, walking the dog, making cakes or doing errands for the Three Graces.’
‘But these days you’re shut away in the studio working most of the time you’re home, Ben, so I don’t see much of you either, unless you come to talk to me while I’m gardening,’ I pointed out.
‘I want to finish that second series of paintings,’ he said, ‘but if you’re out half the time, you aren’t going to know whether I’ve been looking for you or not, are you?’
Actually, I did have a pretty good idea, because once he was down in the studio he was lost to the world until called in for meals or to help with something. He’d even constructed a little lean-to kitchen area at the side, with a cold-water sink and a kettle, and took a Thermos of cold milk down with him for his tea. I kept the biscuit barrel stocked up, and popped down with hot scones and other treats from time to time. Sometimes he used the kitchen area as a darkroom and I lived in fear that one day he’d absent-mindedly make his tea with developing fluid, or something.
If he’d been around more often, he would have realised that I was only usually out in mid-afternoon when I needed a break, unless I crept out to the church gates for ten minutes for a sneaky wedding fix when I heard the bells peal out…
‘Helping to sort out Blessings is just a temporary thing and we’re having fun!’ I said. ‘I rang Sophy Winter up and asked her advice on cleaning and renovating old properties, because she’s done wonders with Winter’s End since she inherited. She was very helpful. And her great-aunt Hebe is a friend of Dorrie’s, so when she heard what was happening she sent Libby a big jar of her home-made beeswax polish. Wasn’t that kind?’
‘I can’t see the elegant Mrs Elizabeth Cazzini getting her hands dirty. You’ll end up doing it all yourself.’
‘There you do her an injustice,’ I said indignantly, ‘Libby’s never minded hard work. She went straight out and bought overalls and ordered the cleaning materials Sophy advised from a specialist firm called Stately Solutions.’ I didn’t mention the several pairs of thin cotton and latex gloves, with which Libby intended to protect her immaculate nails. ‘Dolly Mops, that cleaning agency from Ormskirk, sent a team round to give the modern wing a good going-over, but Sophy advised us to do the rest ourselves. And she knew someone who could come and repaint the plaster walls with whatever authentic gunge they need—you can’t just slap vinyl emulsion on them.’
‘Oh, well, I suppose it’s only a week or two, and I expect you’ll both have fun doing it up and planning the wedding and everything,’ he said, his usual good nature returning. ‘Now I’ve got this studio space in Camden I’m bound to be away more, so it will be good that you’ve got company.’
While I was pleased to see Ben slowly warming to the idea of Libby’s permanent presence on the Neatslake scene, this last statement dismayed me.
‘Away more? I thought the stuido was just for storage, because it would be easier than moving your work up and down between here and London in the van. Are you going to paint there too?’
‘Probably just finishing things off. I’ll still do most of it here. But the artists at the studios are forming themselves into a group to exhibit together, the Camdenites, and they want me to join them.’
‘Ben,’ I said, dismayed, ‘at this rate we might as well both move down there and use the cottage as a weekend retreat!’
‘Don’t be silly, you know we both love it here and it’s where my inspiration comes from. It’s only networking, exhibiting and selling my stuff that takes me to London. Now my name’s really getting known, I have to strike while the iron’s hot. But this will always be my home, and actually, when I’m in London, I love the idea of you up here waiting for me and everything going on just as usual.’
‘I suppose you’re right,’ I said, slightly mollified, ‘and I do see what you mean about striking while the iron’s hot. But I don’t actually hate London and it’s always nice to catch up with Russell and Mary, so I think, although I got out of the habit of coming with you after Harry had that fall, I should get back into it again!’
‘But that’s easier said than done, isn’t it? I do understand that you can’t leave Neatslake at present. It’s not like Harry can be left alone to look after things any more, and the garden would run to seed now he’s too frail to do much. Besides, what about the Three Graces, not to mention Josie’s Weird and Wonderful Cakes?’
I sighed. ‘I know—it’s all so difficult! I love my life here and I don’t want to go away. It’s just I don’t want us to be apart so much, either.’
‘It’ll get better soon, you’ll see,’ he said easily. ‘When I’m a big name, I can paint anywhere and people will come to me to buy my work, not the other way round.’
‘I suppose so, and it’s some consolation to know we have friends you can stay with. How are Russell and Mary?’
In the days when the three of them were at the Royal College of Art and I was looking after us all and working in a nearby florist’s, learning how to torture innocent flowers into bouquets and wreaths, we’d all been good friends and shared seedy digs together. Now they’re married and have a ground-floor flat in Camden, and they put Ben up in the spare room.
‘They’re fine,’ he said, suddenly looking a bit shifty and evasive. After all these years I recognise the signs.
I narrowed my eyes. ‘And?
‘And what?’
‘And the rest—whatever it is that you don’t want to tell me.’
For a moment he stared blankly at me.
‘Come on, Ben, tell me the awful truth. You haven’t fallen out with Russell and Mary, have you? We’ve known them so long and it’s been really useful being able to stay with them.’
‘No, I haven’t fallen out with them, but they may not be able to put me up much longer because they’ll want their spare room themselves.’ He got up and put his arms around me. ‘Mary’s expecting. She says it’s all due to some herbal stuff she’s been taking, but I suspect it’s more because they ran out of money for further IVF treatment, and the pressure was off a bit.’
‘Expecting?’ I held him off, gazing up into his face, which looked anxious and concerned. ‘You mean, it worked?. What kind of herbal stuff?’
‘Something she got from a Chinese practitioner, though I really don’t see how a few dried plants brewed up into a tea could make any difference, Josie.’
‘Well, something obviously did! How pregnant is she?’
‘About three months. I only just found out, but I didn’t want to tell you because I knew you would be upset.’
‘I’m not upset,’ I lied, since I certainly was. And also, I was ashamed to find, jealous—plus deeply hurt that Mary hadn’t told me about the Chinese herbalist, when she knew how desperately I wanted a baby, too. ‘I’m really pleased for them, but surprised Mary didn’t phone and tell me herself.’
‘I expect she wanted to wait a bit before she told anyone this time.’
Mary had been pregnant twice after IVF treatment and lost the babies at the twelve-week stage, so that would be quite understandable.
‘This Chinese medicine…I wonder where she—’ I began.
Ben’s arms tightened around me. ‘Forget it, Josie. What’s meant to be, will be.’
I held him off and snapped, ‘That’s all very well, but maybe it was meant to be that I consult a Chinese herbalist too! Had you thought of that?’
‘Now, darling, don’t start getting upset about it. I knew this would rake it all up again,’ he said, stroking my back in a would-be comforting way that didn’t quite cut the mustard this time. My biological clock had been ticking so loudly lately that he must have felt he was being followed around by the crocodile in Peter Pan.
‘We’re happy just as we are really, aren’t we?’ he added soothingly.
‘Yes, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make the attempt to have a family, does it, Ben? I mean, without getting obsessed by it, we could at least explore all the avenues before giving up!’
Not for the first time I suspected that, whatever he said, Ben liked being the centre of my world and didn’t want to share it with anyone, even children (or my one close friend, Libby). Like a big cuckoo chick in a nest, really…
I wondered if all hugely talented artists were that egocentric.
Ben gave me another squeeze and then, obviously considering the matter closed, sat back down in the rocking chair, his long legs stretched out in front of him. Changed back into old, worn jeans and sweatshirt, his light brown hair tousled, he was the Ben I knew and loved, rather than the distinctly smarter London version who had returned to me earlier that day, but it still didn’t stop me feeling exasperated with him.
‘It’s so good to be home,’ he said with a sigh. ‘I’m shattered. At least here no one expects anything of me and I can just sink back into my groove.’ But then he sat up again as a thought struck him. ‘Unless…Libby’s not staying with us, is she?’
‘No, she moved into Blessings the day after the viewing.’
He subsided again. ‘That’s what I said—fast worker!’
Of course, I phoned Mary as soon as I had a minute to myself, to congratulate her and, if truth were told, to find out all about the Chinese herbalist.
‘This is such great news, Mary! I don’t know how you managed to keep it to yourself for so long.’
‘Well, I would have told Ben sooner only—’
‘I know,’ I broke in sympathetically, ‘you wanted to hug it to yourself for a while, make sure everything was going well, didn’t you?’ I suppose that explained why she’d been a bit distant and reluctant to talk to me for ages too.
‘Yes, there was an element of that until I was at the three-month stage,’ she admitted, ‘but also I felt so sick all the time, which was a bit distracting, though that’s better now. Just as well, because I’ll have to go on teaching as long as I can. The two courses of IVF we paid for meant we had to increase our mortgage, so we still need my income coming in. But afterwards, Russell and I will have to arrange our classes so that one of us can baby-sit while the other is teaching.’
They both lecture part time and since Mary’s are mostly evening classes, that should work well.
‘I bet Russell’s delighted!’
‘Oh…yes. And relieved, I think.’ She gave an embarrassed laugh. ‘It’s only now it actually looks as if I will have this baby that I realise quite how obsessed I’ve been with it. It’s lucky we’ve managed to come through it all as a strong couple.’
‘I thought you’d given up any thought of getting pregnant after the last attempt.’
‘Oh, no! I had to give up the IVF—it was way too expensive and the whole regime of drugs and stuff very invasive—but I never gave up hope.’
‘Ben said you were taking a kind of herbal medicine?’ I prompted.
‘Yes,’ she said eagerly, ‘about a year ago Olivia told me about a Chinese herbalist who specialised in infertility problems, so we went together, for courage.’
‘Olivia?’
There was a pause, and then Mary said, ‘Oh, she’s a fairly new friend you haven’t met. But she’s in her early forties so she was getting even more desperate than I was. Anyway, we were given this rather foul concoction to take three times a day, plus recommendations to balance our yin and yang and stuff like that.’
‘And do you think that’s what did the trick?’
‘I honestly don’t know. It might have been just the relaxing part of it that was crucial, though, goodness knows, we were relaxed enough when we were first married and nothing ever happened then—and we were both younger, so it should have been easier to get pregnant.’
And what happened to your friend? Did it work for her too?’
‘Well, that’s the amazing thing. She fell pregnant about a fortnight after I did! But again, who knows whether it was because she stopped trying so hard or due to the healthy regime and the medicine?’
Who knew, indeed…but it sounded at least worth a try!
‘Mary, do you think you could give me the contact details for this herbalist? It’s all natural, isn’t it?’
‘I haven’t got them by me, but you can look her up on the internet,’ she said, and I jotted down the name.
‘Thanks, Mary.’
‘Are you sure you want to try it?’ she asked. ‘It’s very expensive, though not on the scale of IVF treatment, obviously. And pregnancy does change things. Ben said to me once that he really didn’t mind that you hadn’t had children because he liked you just to himself, the two of you, and having a family would have changed the dynamics of the relationship.’
‘Ben said that?’ I thought about it. ‘He’s always gone along with me when I’ve said I wanted children, but you’re right, he’s never actually been bothered by them not coming along, except on my account. But then, I suppose I’ve always gone along with things he’s felt strongly about in the end, like his going all anti-marriage, even when it upset Granny. She would have loved to have seen me married.’
‘Ben does dig his heels in about things sometimes,’ Mary agreed, ‘and then he never changes his mind. Not that I’ve seen much of him the last few months. I—’ She broke off. ‘Sorry, thought I heard Russell come in. What was I saying?’
‘That you’d hardly seen Ben lately, but I suppose he’s pretty busy when he’s down, especially now he’s taken on studio space. I take it you are one of the Camdenites too?’
‘Yes. Some of my big sculptural ceramic pieces are going into the first exhibition. It’s all looking very promising, though in a way we’re all currently riding on the coat-tails of Ben’s success.’
‘I don’t think he sees it that way—we’ve all been friends so long. And it’s been kind of you to let us use your spare room. I know I haven’t visited for ages, but it’s a relief knowing that Ben’s staying with friends when he’s down in the Big Smoke. But I expect you’re going to turn it into a nursery soon, aren’t you, so he’ll have to find himself another place to stay?’
‘I—yes,’ she said, and then added hurriedly, ‘Look, I’ve left something on the stove, I’ll have to go. But it’s been lovely talking to you, Josie.’
‘Yes, we really should—’ I began, but I was talking to empty air.
What she’d said about Ben not being that keen on the idea of children really crystallised what I’d long suspected myself. He would have accepted it, had it happened, but that was as far as he was prepared to go. And that wasn’t far enough.
It would be terribly devious if I did something about it behind Ben’s back, but it didn’t stop me looking up that website. Mary was right about the expense, but then, we had money in the bank, some of it earned by my cake business, not just from Ben’s work. And the regime seemed to involve a healthy diet and destressing more than anything, which could only be good.
It was surely worth a try? And if babies changed the dynamics of a relationship, it was in a good way, so if anything came of it, I expected Ben would get used to it. He’d have to.
As I started to bake the first in a series of small, round dark fruitcakes from which to construct the wedding cake of Libby’s dreams, I kept wondering if the Chinese medicine had really been what had made the difference to Mary, or if it was just coincidence—or even hope and positive thinking?
It was an exciting prospect, though. All aspects of my life seemed to be exciting lately!
