Christmas Carol

13

Christmas Carol

    Breakfast with Dad at crack of dawn’s okay—he doesn’t ask awkward questions, in fact he never asks questions, really. “Going okay, is it?” is about his level. It’s very, very restful. Mum’s so busy slaving over a hot stove and trying to force fried bacon and tomatoes down me that she doesn’t notice a thing—par for the course, as well. At least she’s started using wholemeal bread, these days. No, Mum, I don’t want tomatoes fried in bacon fat, and they’re not good for Dad, either. “Just for once, Polly,” is the usual reply. Oh, all right, tomatoes fried in bacon fat on wholemeal toast. No, I don’t want butter on the toast, Mum! She’s sure I can't like tea without milk, but gee, know what? It’s better than the usual Mitchell extended family dark orange brew with full-cream milk in it. Why they aren’t all dead of hardened arteries, God only knows. No, well, hard yacker, in Dad’s case.

    Right, I’ll saddle up Marron Glacé and take him up on the tops.

    Marron Glacé’s getting on, he was born when I was about seventeen, so taking him out before the day heats up is the excuse Mum gets for clearing out so early. Actually I’m getting out before my sisters-in-law can descend on the place and start haranguing Mum about Christmas dinner again. It’s not Marilyn and Vonnie: they’re both lovely and I’m very fond of them. But Mum’s insisting on cooking the turkey herself, even though Vonnie said she’d do it this year; and they almost came to blows over it yesterday. And poor Marilyn, who hates disagreeing with anybody, put herself through hoops trying not to contradict either of them, even though she obviously agrees with Vonnie... Oh, dear. There must be some sensible New Zealand families that don’t go all traditional with steaming hot, greasy midday dinners for Christmas Day, surely? Well, Bill and Angie Michaels are sensible about it, they either load the kids onto the boat and have sandwiches with beer or fizzy drinks, or if the Gulf’s a bit rough, a barbecue in the back yard or down the beach. But I don’t know anybody else with that much sense.

    Okay, Marron Glacé, that’s good, we’ve got to the top of this hill—well, low hill—so you can have a rest and I’ll just sit down under this scrubby, tired-looking totara. And brood. Yeah. If I’d—well, not behaved myself, exactly—but if I’d, well, behaved better this past year, would Jake still have broken it off? Was all that stuff about being too old for me just a smokescreen because he’s fed up with me encouraging—well, not encouraging, exactly—flirting with other men? Well, more than flirting with, in the cases of Rod and Nicky Henson, but Jake doesn’t know about that, so...

    Could anyone have told him? Ugh. I feel sick. Nobody knows about Nicky—um, did I tell Jill? But she won’t have told anyone. And me and Rod and Jill are the only ones who know about that. But if Jake had found out, wouldn’t he have faced me with it?

    Sigh. Maybe he would have. Only where his feelings are involved, he isn’t as straightforward as his everyday manner might lead you to suppose. Quite—is shy the word? Introverted, possibly... Emotionally crippled, like most Antipodean men,  bugger them!

    Ooh! Marron Glacé’s come up to nuzzle my shoulder. “If Dad or Vic knew I was giving you sugar, mate—!”

    He whickers into the shoulder.

    Yeah, all right, there’s some in my jeans pocket. “You know that lump sugar costs the earth out here, I suppose? I only buy it for you, you greedy pig!”

    He snuffles it up greedily.

    “And for blimmin’ Roger. Oh, well, it reminds me of France, too...” He’s nuzzling my shoulder again hopefully. “Go away: that’s all. –Go AWAY!”

    Now the benighted animal’s trying to eat my tee-shirt, groan! “Come here, you idiotic animal!” We go over to the next tree and I tether him there in the shade. He begins to crop the scruffy grass.

    I just go back to my tree and sit down again, hugging my knees. Boy, the hills are dry this year... If only I hadn’t fooled around with Rod! Why did I do it? It was so blitheringly stupid! And if Jake has got to hear about it, that would certainly explain why he— Only how could he have? And wouldn’t he have said something? Bugger, my thoughts are going round in circles.

    Probably Jill’s right—as usual. People are reacting to the murder by going nutty. But if I tried to tell Jake the shock of Don Banks being found dead in his patio pool was driving him into some sort of post-crisis behaviour: self-flagellation or something, combined with some weird sort of tidying up of all the loose ends in his life in an attempt to impose meaning and order on an essentially meaningless and chaotic universe, he’d tell me I’d fallen out of my tree. Only it’s true: he seems to be punishing himself and me for—for what? There isn’t any rhyme or reason in it at all! Admittedly we’ve had a few ups and downs this past year, but nothing so serious as to—to drive him into wanting to break it off, surely? In fact, after he got back from South America in October it all seemed better than ever before! We felt so comfortable together. Well, I thought so. But God knows what might have been going through his thick macho head!

    … Should I have—have stood up for myself more, when he said we’d better break it off? Tried to put over my point of view? Only what good would that have done when it was obvious his mind was made up? He’s dreadfully stubborn, once his mind is made up on anything he never— And let’s face it, he isn’t in the habit of letting women talk him into anything. Ugh, yuck.

    Okay, I wasn’t aggressive enough—no, what’s the blasted in-word? Assertive enough! Huh! All right for Jill to say so, she’s the assertive type. I’m too like Mum: I can’t stand up for my rights, having to be assertive makes me feel sick... It’s different when it’s just something at work, I’m fine then, I can stand up to creeps like Kevin McCaffery or Dennis Barlow all right. Only when it’s personal I just can’t! Blast, I’m gonna bawl. Sniff. Sniff. ...Get hanky out and blow nose.

    Uh—agitation under the next tree. Oh, dear, poor old Marron Glacé musta thought I was getting sugar out of my pocket! Oh, well—sniff, sniffle—why not? Wouldn’t it be nice to have your troubles driven away by a bit of sugar?

    “Here you are, you silly old thing.” He snuffs it up quickly.

    Sigh. Lean against his warm flank, keeping a wary eye out for his great feet—he’s a bit thick, he’ll tread on your foot if you don’t watch out. I could write to Jake and explain... No, I couldn’t, he’s made up his mind. Nothing I say’ll make any difference—and a letter’s too open to misinterpretation. And if he doesn’t know anything about the thing with Rod—and I don’t see how he could, really—it’d be awfully silly to let on.

    Blast! Get hanky out again. Marron Glacé nudges my pocket. “NO!” All right, drat you, I’ll go back to the other tree.

    Oh, Jake! Bugger, I am gonna bawl...

    Why did he decide to break it off now? If it’s only post-crisis behaviour, then—then maybe it’ll wear off and he’ll come to his senses… But if he has got to hear about me and Rod, then...

    ’Twas the night before Christmas and Roger was struggling to the bus stop in Puriri town centre with his load of shopping when a large blue station-waggon pulled in to the curb beside him. “Hi, Dr Browne! Can we give you a lift?” Daphne Green—complete with husband, kids and a ragged-looking Christmas tree jouncing and jiggling on the roof-rack, scattering pine needles madly.

    Roger accepted: God knew when there’d be a bus, there was no-one else at the stop. He wedged himself in beside a skinny little girl who was eating an ice cream. Most of the back seat was occupied by huge cartons of groceries and a large roll of bright green plasticized wire-netting. Two little boys crouched on the floor amidst more groceries, tins of paint, and what looked like the greater part of an elderly motor-mower. They rattled up the hill to Pohutukawa Bay to the accompaniment of bright chit-chat from Daphne, and occasional roars of: “Keep DOWN, you boys!” from Tim Green.

    They were on first-name terms by the time they reached the turn-off to the Greens’ place and he felt he could hardly refuse when they asked him in for a drink. Their modern living-room was, to his eye, quite hideous, but the orange couch turned out to be surprisingly comfortable. Roger leaned back with a sigh. Tim chased out a few kids and, with an echoing sigh, dropped into a big brown vinyl armchair, handing Roger a beer.

    “Cheers.”

    “Cheers,” he agreed.

    They swigged. Tim stretched his legs out. “Bloody awful time of year, Christmas, eh?”

    “Er—yes; it is rather!” Roger bleated, taken unawares.

    “Kids like it, I s’pose,” said Tim. He drank some more beer. “Dunno, though,” he added thoughtfully: “they always seem to end up fighting or howling—or both.”

    Not being a family man, Roger was at a loss for a reply here, so he merely drank more beer in what he hoped was an answering sort of way.

    Fortunately Daphne came in at that moment, clutching a large plastic bottle of fizzy lemonade and a glass. “I’ll have a shandy, dear,” she informed her husband, handing him these necessaries. She sank into an orange armchair which matched the couch, saying to Roger with a tired smile: “It’s exhausting, Christmas, isn’t it? Each year we swear we won’t have any fuss, but somehow when the time comes round we always seem to end up with the tree, and the turkey, and the whole bit!”

    “Not really the right weather for it, is it?” he smiled.

    Daphne pushed damp curls off her forehead. She was wearing a sleeveless blouse, and the gesture showed that her black underarm hair needed shaving. Roger, to his own surprise, didn’t feel any disgust. Instead he was swept by a sudden wave of nostalgia: Clément’s friends, Annick and Brigitte, condemning the shaving of underarm hair as a degenerate Anglo-Saxon custom. A lump rose in his throat. Paris at Christmas: a scattering of snow in the streets, turning muddy brown as soon as it fell; Notre Dame crammed to bursting-point with unbelievably insensitive Japanese tourists, pushing and shoving; Christmas dinner of those funny Algerian sausages, “merghez,” only he didn’t have the faintest idea how to spell it, with lashings of oily noodles, washed down with cheap Algerian plonk, all they could afford—but Brigitte had got fresh lychees at the market—and talk; endless, wonderful talk...

    He started. “I’m sorry?”

    Daphne smiled at him. He’d been miles away, poor funny, shy Englishman—homesick, she supposed; rotten being all by yourself in a strange country at Christmas; if only they knew him a wee bit better she’d ask him to come to them.

    “I said, I suppose you’re used to a white Christmas?”

    He was, at any rate, now used to this remark and did not make the mistake of trying to explain that an English Christmas was not necessarily white just because it fell in winter.

    Tim handed Daphne a shandy, and a kid appeared in the doorway with a strange, sidling motion. “Maa-a-um,” it whined. “C’n Oi hev some lemon-ay-eede?”

    “No; there’s some Raro in the fridge,” she said, not looking round.

    “Ee-ao-ow, Maa-aa-um!”

    “Scat!” ordered Tim, and the kid vanished.

    They drank a considerable amount of beer—or shandy, in Daphne’s case—and consumed several packets of potato crisps, chatting in a desultory but comfortable way. Occasionally a kid sidled into the doorway, only to be chased out smartly by its parents. It seemed only natural to accept an offer to “stay for tea: it’ll only be cold meat ’n’ salad.” The cold meat ’n’ salad seemed to be offered both as an apology and an inducement—as though he might be off like a startled deer at the offer of anything more elaborate or substantial! After dinner Tim and Roger loaded the dishwasher and Daphne bundled the kids off to bed.

    Over a few more drinks the conversation drifted round to the murder. Or more specifically, to Daphne’s opinion of the police.

    “Even that Sergeant Baxter—I always thought he was such a nice man, he used to play bowls with my dad. But put a uniform on them—!” She snorted. “They’re all little Hitlers!”

    Tim shifted uneasily in his chair. “The man’s got his job to do, love.”

    “Huh! It’s how they do it that counts! He had the blimmin’ cheek to imply that we might’ve been involved, just because I’ve got a key to Mr Carrano’s place! I told him—didn’t I, Tim?—‘Look, Sergeant,’ I said: ‘from what I’ve heard, that Don Banks had his finger in every pie on the Coast; you wanna look at some of his shady business pals, not at respectable people like us who’d never even met the man!’ –I mean! The nerve!” She swigged shandy. “Mind you, he’s not as bad as that Collingwood.”

    Tim grinned. “Yeah. He was all set to start accusing us of God knows what, eh, Daph? He looked pretty sick when ’e found out we had an alibi! Ya see, we had some friends round that night: played poker till well after twelve.”

    Daphne nodded triumphantly. “So much for the blimmin’ cops, eh?”

    Roger laughed with them; but he felt a trifle guilty: he hadn’t been at all unwilling to learn whether they had alibis. How the Hell did Collingwood stand that job of his? Polly’s and Jill’s blessed detective stories were one thing, but to spend one’s life... Christ.

    Somewhat unfortunately—Tim’s special bottle probably had something to do with this—the menfolk then got onto the mechanics of the thing.

    “Whoever did it,” said Tim slowly, “they must’ve got pretty wet.”

    “Yes,” Roger agreed. “In fact I should think they’d have had to get right into the pool—don’t you agree?”

    “We-ell, I wouldn’t say that, necessarily: it could’ve been done by kneeling on the edge and holding him down.”

    “In any case, he’d’ve splashed a lot.”

    “Yeah, he would of,” agreed Tim.

    “Stop it, both of you!” cried Daphne, clapping her hands to her ears. “Whatever Don Banks might’ve done, he was a human being! How you can just sit there discussing it like that—!”

    The electrician from Pohutukawa Bay and the Oxford arts graduate exchanged sheepish male glances and let the subject drop.

    Later, watching Roger’s retreating figure move slowly up Kupe Street towards Pohutukawa Bay Road—he’d refused Tim’s offer to drive him home, claiming the night air would do him good—Tim said slowly: “Ya know, I reckon he thinks Jake Carrano mighta done it.”

    “What? Surely not, Tim! I mean, he said...”

    “Yeah, I know what he said. I still reckon he thinks he did it, though.”

    “I’m sure he couldn’t’ve done it!”

    Tim scratched his sandy head. “No—he doesn’t sound the type, from what you’ve told me.”

    She gave a little shiver, and hugged herself tightly. “When you think there must be a murderer loose in the Bay—!”

    He put an arm round her shoulders and drew her back inside. “Don’t worry, Daph: the cops’ll get him. That Collingwood might be a suspicious-minded bastard but he seems like a pretty efficient bloke.”

    Daphne yawned. “Yeah—I suppose so.”

    Tim switched off the outside light and closed the front door. “Bed, eh?”

    She yawned again and turned towards the bedroom. Then she stopped in her tracks. “Help! The tree!”

    “Shit! It’s still on the roof-rack! All right, I’ll get it in.”

    “I’ll get the ornaments,” she sighed.

    It was one o’clock by the time they’d finished decorating the tree.

    “Bugger,” said Tim. “The kids’ll be up in another four hours or so.”

    Ten minutes later they were in bed with the light out. Daphne was silent for all of ten seconds. Then she suddenly said: “Tim! Did you lock the back door?”

    “Aw, Hell,” he groaned. Her body was rigid with tension against him. Wearily he crawled out of bed and padded off to check the back door.

    Mike woke early on Christmas morning. In defiance of all the norms of his society—he knew they were the norms and was deliberately defying them—he went for a run. He didn’t meet any other joggers, or even any dog-walkers. He saw several kids on brand-new bikes, several kids playing in their front yards with brand-new plastic junk of one sort or another—lethal-looking, most of it—heard a lot of radios and TVs blaring out Christmas carols, and got home in no better a mood than he had been when he started out.

    As he didn’t have a cat he couldn’t kick it. He turned the TV on for the sheer pleasure of muttering “Crap!” and turning it off when it turned out to be broadcasting a blurred and very, very old Andy Williams Christmas Special. He didn’t try the other channel because he had a fair idea it’d be broadcasting a blurred and raucous Smurfs Christmas Special. He’d forgotten to get any coffee beans so he made himself a cup of nasty instant, singed a piece of bread, punished himself by not putting butter on it but only a scraping of Vegemite, and sat down with a pile of case notes, scowling.

    “There, now!” cooed Mrs Howarth.

    Daphne and Tim watched in a sort of dull horror as their scrawny, freckled, ginger female offspring finished clothing herself in the new pink dress of her grandmother’s choosing.

    “See?” she panted.

    “Yes: very pretty, dear,” said Daphne faintly.

    Tim made a strangled noise.

    “Doesn’t she look a picture?” cooed Mrs Howarth.

    “Don’t I look a picture, Mummy?” said Chrissy loudly.

    “Mm.”

    Tim got up abruptly and went out.

    “Me, me!” cried Charlie.

    “Um—yes: open this,” said Daphne, picking up a parcel and shoving it blindly at him.

    “No, no, that’s not for you, Charlie!” cried his grandmother loudly. “Take it off him, Daphne!” she said crossly.

    Daphne wrenched it off him. Charlie burst into tears.

    “That one’s for Harry, dear,” explained Mrs Howarth loudly. “Give it to Harry!”

    Daphne gave the package to Harry. Harry had long since lost interest: Christmas had been going on for what seemed like a very long time to a two-year-old, and all he wanted to do was play with his new tip-truck. He went on playing with his new tip-truck. Charlie went on howling. Chrissy began officiously to open Harry’s present for him.

    “Isn’t there another one for Charlie?” said Daphne loudly.

    “No, this last one’s for Tim,” replied her mother over Charlie’s sobs. “Where is he?”

    He’d probably gone out to the car to smoke one of those awful cigars that Mr Carrano had given him for Christmas. “Um—I think he went to the toilet.”

    Chrissy looked up. “No, he didn’t: he went out to the car, I seen him.”

    “‘Saw,’” murmured Daphne.

    “Yeah, I seen him,” agreed Chrissy. “Ooh, look! Another tip-truck! Mum, can I have this one? Harry’s already got one.”

    At this Charlie gave a scream of jealousy and rage and Harry looked up suddenly and screeched: “Mine TRUCK!”

    “No—NO!” cried Daphne. At the same time Mrs Howarth tried to explain loudly to Chrissy that girls didn’t play with trucks. Charlie tried to claim the new truck without ceasing to howl. Chrissy maintained her rights to the truck. Harry began to screech: “Mine TRUCK! Mine TRUCK! Mine TRUCK!”

    Tim could hear the ruckus quite clearly, as the station-waggon was parked in the drive just beneath the open kitchen window, and the kitchen was right next to the sitting-room. Slowly and deliberately he wound up the window that was nearest the house, and reached over to wind down the window on the other side. Then he leaned back in his seat and drew in expensive Havana smoke very slowly...

    “Have one o’ these, Bert,” said Dave Mitchell conspiratorially.

    “Crikey, what are they?” replied his second son weakly. “Hindenburgs?”

    “Yeah.”

    Bert took a cigar and nipped the end off. “Where’dja get ’em?” he said indistinctly round it.

    Dave lit it for him. “Polly.”

    Bert sucked and puffed scientifically. Then he took the Hindenburg out of his mouth and said: “Aw, yeah?”

    “S’pose that bloke told her where to get ’em,” said Dave moodily.

    “Got ’em for her, more like; I’ve never smoked anything like this!”

    “No,” agreed his older brother, Vic, puffing out blue smoke.

    There was a short silence.

    “She still seeing ’im, then?” said Bert cautiously.

    Vic snorted.

    “Don’t ask me!” said their father bitterly.

    The Mitchell men stood on the shady back verandah, smoking in silence.

    In the big front room Vonnie said resignedly: “I suppose they’re smoking those things you gave Dad.”

    “Yes,” agreed Polly mildly. “I suppose they are.”

    “You shouldn’t encourage him, Polly!” said Kay Field sharply. “You know those things aren’t good for him!”

    “Once in a while won’t hurt, Aunty Kay,” said Vonnie uneasily.

    “Mm,” murmured Marilyn. “It is Christmas, Aunty Kay.”

    Kay sniffed. “It’s the thin end of the wedge!”

    Suddenly Mirry, who’d been sitting on the floor playing with Bert and Vonnie’s little Diana, and apparently not listening to the conversation, looked up and said: “What wedge?”

    “That’ll be quite enough out of you,” replied her mother repressively.

    “Dr Reeves smokes cigars,” said Mirry defiantly.

    “I dare say he does, whoever he is when he’s at home,” replied her mother grimly.

    Mirry choked.

    Polly was also sitting on the floor. She held out her watch to little Diana and said mildly: “Dr Reeves is a woman, Aunty Kay. She’s a lecturer in the English Department.”

    “Yes,” agreed Mirry eagerly, “and she smokes—”

    “That’ll DO!” Kay got up. “Someone,” she said threateningly, “had better see if Maureen needs a hand; and since no-one else is offering—” She looked grimly at her daughters, niece and nieces-by-marriage, but no-one said anything. Kay breathed in hard through her nose once, and marched out grimly.

    After a moment Marilyn said: “Oh, dear.”

    “Poor Mum,” agreed Vonnie.

    Polly stuck her chin out. “She shouldn’t have invited her.”

    Her sisters-in-law and cousins goggled at her. “Poll-ee!” they protested as one woman.

    Polly pouted. “Everyone’s got free will, even Mum.”

    “Not when Mum’s around,” said Mirry glumly.

    “No,” agreed her sister Janet in a small voice.

    There was a short and gloomy silence.

    “Do you think we’ll be just as bad, when we’re their age?” said Polly thoughtfully.

    “Doreen already is,” said Mirry glumly.

    “She copies Mum,” agreed Janet.

    “Yeah, an’ if Karen ever stopped sprogging, she would be, too,” added Mirry. She began to tickle Diana, who gurgled pleasedly.

    Vonnie looked anxiously at them but only said: “I think you’ve got to be born like it. Well, born with it in you.”

    “Yes; only you’re all right, you haven’t got any Macdonald blood,” said Polly mournfully.

    “You couldn’t possibly turn out like Mum!” Janet assured her loyally.

    “Sometimes I can feel it creeping over me,” replied Polly gloomily. “When I get fed up with Mum, mainly.”

    There was another short silence, broken only by Diana’s gurgling, the faint cries from Vonnie’s and Janet’s boys, who were fighting in the back yard under the nominal supervision of Janet’s husband, Dennis, and the snores from Harry Field, who’d gone to sleep in Dave Mitchell’s big armchair.

    “Aunty Maureen’s too easy-going,” decided Mirry finally. “I think it is possible to be too easy-going, don’t you?”

    “Yes,” agreed Vonnie, sighing.

    “Oh, I don’t know,” murmured Marilyn. As Marilyn was as easy-going as her mother-in-law they all looked at her kindly but didn’t say anything.

    There was a longer silence this time. Then Janet said: “Well, at least we’re going home tomorrow.”

    Everybody understood that she meant and leaving her mother behind, so they all murmured agreement.

    “And Karen’s preggers yet again, so that’ll get Mum off your back for a bit!” Mirry added encouragingly.

    Janet sighed. “Mm.”

    “Two’s enough,” Marilyn said kindly to her.

    “Yes,” agreed Polly firmly.

    “More than enough when they’re two horrors like yours,” added Mirry.

    “She keeps on at me to have a girl!” cried Janet suddenly.

    Polly lay down flat on her back. “Tell her you will when she can arrange for the technology that’ll make sure it’s a female. –Ugh, I’m full.” She undid her jeans.

    Janet had given a startled giggle. She looked sideways at her cousin and said: “You are awful, Polly... Heck, can you see me saying that to Mum?” She giggled again.

    “No,” said Mirry sourly. “Ugh, I’m full, too.” She undid her jeans.

    Little Diana put Polly’s watch experimentally in her mouth and Vonnie said anxiously: “Polly, she’s sucking your good watch.”

    “It won’t hurt it. I wore it in the bath the other day by accident and it’s still going.”

    “Oh,” said Vonnie uncertainly.

    “We all have to eat our peck of dirt,” said Mirry. “Only I’ll take it off her if you think she might get germs, Vonnie.”

    “No, it’s not that... If Polly doesn’t mind?”

    Flat on her back, Polly belched loudly. “Ooh, help! –Pardon. No, that’s all right, she can play with it, it seems to be built like a brick shit-house or something.”

    There was another silence, while Janet and the sisters-in-law pondered uneasily on Polly’s use of language and Mirry wished enviously that she could say that sort of thing and not sound as if she was showing off.

    Then Harry Field said groggily from the depths of the big chair: “Cloning.”

    “Eh?” replied Mirry.

    “Cloning. In vitro. That’s what Janet wants to go in for. I was reading about it in the Farmer: they’re trying these experiments with sheep. Cloning.”

    Polly sat up and said with a grin: “Wouldn’t they be infertile, Uncle Harry?”

    “Yeah, but would that matter?” He winked slowly.

    Polly sniggered. Mirry choked. After a minute Janet said uncertainly: “I don’t think that’s funny, Dad.”

    “You oughta recommend it to Karen, Dad. That last lot of twins of hers are a real pair of ginger frights,” said Mirry meanly.

    “Look out, you’ve got them genes,” replied her father, grinning.

    “God,” muttered Mirry, lying down flat and closing her eyes. “I think I’ll pass on all this sprogging stuff.”

    Her elders eyed her indulgently and didn’t say a word.

    Kay came back and said briskly: “Now, who feels like afternoon tea?”

    Polly and Mirry groaned loudly.

    “Look at the pair of you!” she cried. “Do those jeans up! –Jeans on Christmas Day!” she added irritably.

    “I was going riding,” protested Mirry. She fiddled with her zip. “Ugh. I can’t do them up, Mum, I’m bulging!”

    Harry gave a muffled snort and put his hand over his mouth.

    “That’ll do,” said Kay shortly. “Just get on with it. –Well?” They all stared at her and she said loudly: “Who wants afternoon tea?”

    “Um—a cup of tea would be nice,” said Marilyn weakly.

    “In this weather?” cried Polly in horror.

    “Um, I quite like tea,” said Marilyn, very weakly indeed.

    “I’ll have one if it’s going,” said Harry meekly.

    Kay sniffed but conceded: “That’s two. –Vonnie?”

    “Um... Yes, thanks, Aunty Kay.”

    “Chicken,” muttered Mirry.

    “Three. –You can have one, too, Janet, you need to keep your fluid intake up in this weather,” she decided, and went out.

    “Why?” cried Polly, rolling her eyes at her cousin.

    “Don’t say you are!” cried Mirry in horror.

    “No!” said Janet crossly, going very red.

    “Why don’t you have that thing done, if you don’t want any more?” pursued Mirry.

    “Tubal ligation,” explained Polly.

    “Get cut,” agreed Janet’s father.

    “It might be wise,” agreed Vonnie in an anxious voice.

    “It’s between me and Dennis!” cried Janet. She got up and rushed out.

    “What did we say?” Harry wanted to know.

    “She’s always been like that,” said her sibling.

    “I suppose it is none of our business,” recognized Polly guiltily.

    “Eh? In this family?” said her uncle-by-marriage. Their eyes met. They sniggered.

    Polly got up. “I think I’ll go for a ride. Well, it’s better than stewing in here listening to Aunty Kay. Do you want to come, Mirry?”

    “So long as I don’t have to do my jeans up,” replied Mirry with a groan.

    “Plumbago won’t mind,” returned Polly mildly.

    “Aw-wuh! Can’t I ride Marron Glacé?”

    “No, you saw at his mouth.” Polly went out.

    “I do not!” cried Mirry.

    “You haven’t got a hope, she’s bats about that horse,” her father pointed out.

   Clutching her jeans closed with one hand, Mirry rushed out, crying: “Polly! Wait! If I promise not to saw at his mouth—”

    Vonnie, Marilyn and Harry sat there in peaceful silence for a few moments. Then Vonnie said glumly: “I bet Polly got those smelly old cigars off that man.”

    “Kay reckons they mighta had a row. Well, Polly’s been in a damned funny mood,” contributed Harry.

    Vonnie and Marilyn glared at him. He sank back into the big armchair.

    Another silence. Vonnie stared hard at the carpet. Marilyn, looking teary, stared sadly at Vonnie.

    “What if he did it?” said Vonnie at last.

    “Vonnie—”

    “I know we said we wouldn’t talk about it at Christmas, but what if he did?” cried Vonnie.

    Marilyn’s soft mouth quivered. “I think she really is in love with him,” she whispered.

    “Yes, so do I,” agreed Vonnie in a hard voice.

    Marilyn got out her hanky and blew her nose hard. Harry Field observed this activity with considerable unease.

    “She can always come to us,” said Vonnie at last.

    Marilyn blew her nose again. “Or us,” she agreed.

    After a while Harry said uneasily: “He might not of done it.”

    “Somebody must’ve,” returned Vonnie grimly. “And it was his swimming-pool.”

    “Ye-ah... You reckon Polly’d get mixed up with a type like that?”

    The two young women looked at each other doubtfully. “Aunty Vi says he’s got charm,” Marilyn ventured.

    Harry swallowed.

    Vonnie looked at Diana, who was now attempting to wear the watch on her head. “He’s got something, all right. There’s a picture of a watch just like that in that Australian Vogue I bought in Napier.”

    “She’s not interested in his money!” cried Marilyn, bursting into tears.

    Vonnie opened her mouth to reply but at that moment Kay came in with the tea-tray. “What on earth’s all this? And where are those girls?”

    “Um, Polly and Mirry have gone for a ride, they didn’t feel like afternoon tea,” said Vonnie, seeing that Uncle Harry wasn’t about to stick his neck out.

    Kay snorted. “Well, don’t tell me Janet’s gone with them!”

    “No, I think she just went to the toilet,” lied Vonnie valiantly.

    Kay sniffed. “And what’s the matter with you?” she asked, looking hard at Marilyn.

    “Polly... That man,” she whispered.

    “What about him?” Kay returned grimly.

    “What if he did it, Aunty Kay?”

    To everyone’s astonishment Kay returned roundly: “What? I never heard such utter rubbish in all my born days! Pull yourself together, Marilyn, you’ll be upsetting Maureen, next! Of course he didn’t do it, what’s wrong with the lot of you?”

    Janet came back, looking meek, and sat down unobtrusively as Vonnie said weakly: “How do you know?”

    Kay tossed her head. “I’ve met him, if you want to know!” They were all goggling at her. “Years ago! At Vi’s place!” she said crossly. “You were there, Harry, only I suppose you’ve forgotten,” she added, glaring at the inoffensive Harry.

    “Uh—”

    “It was one of Vi’s dratted afternoon teas. He was there with that woman he married: you know, the Carter girl.”

    “Who?” said Marilyn blankly.

    “Um, I think Aunty Vi was at school with her, or something,” offered Janet feebly.

    Kay sniffed. “No, she was at school with the other one: Greta, the one that committed suicide.” They were all goggling at her. “Her sister! The oldest Carter girl!” she said impatiently. “Jake Carrano married the younger one, and if you ask me, that was the worst day’s work he ever did in his life!” She put the tea-tray down on the coffee table, straightened and went on: “Jake Carrano’s a sensible man. –I know all about that rubbish in the papers about all those women, you needn’t tell me about that!” she added loudly.

    None of them had been going to: they just goggled at her.

    Kay went over to the door. “I’m not saying I approve, but he has been divorced for umpteen years, I suppose he has a right to some sort of human comfort!”

    Harry gulped. Janet swallowed and turned puce.

    “That’s no reason for suspecting a man of murder!” She snorted. “Though I must admit it’s exactly what you’d expect from a silly old maid like Vi!”

    “Oh!” said Harry in enlightenment.

    Kay’s gaze just flickered over him. “If you ask me, it’ll turn out that that Carter woman did it.”

    “Why?” gasped Vonnie.

    “Why?” cried Kay. “Because she’s mad, that’s why!”

    “But—” began Harry incautiously.

    “I suppose you’ve forgotten. Though how anybody could possibly forget something like that!”

    “Eh?” he said feebly.

    “That appalling scene she made because Vi wouldn’t give her the recipe for her dratted chocolate cake.”

    Harry gulped. “Aw, yeah.”

    Kay sniffed loudly. “Over the edge. No sane person carries on like that in a roomful of people at afternoon teatime!” She nodded significantly. “You mark my words: she did it!” She nodded again, triumphantly this time, and sailed out.

    Her relatives looked at one another numbly for some time.

    Finally Vonnie said weakly: “Was it an appalling scene, Uncle Harry?”

    Harry rubbed his nose. “Yeah, it was. Screamed and carried on blue murder, if I remember rightly.” He paused, frowning. “If it was her. Can’t say I could swear to that. Or him. I do remember the screaming—yeah, and her husband hadda carry her out bodily, that’s right!”

    “Help,” said Vonnie faintly.

    “Not literally?” asked Marilyn.

    “Yeah: he was a hefty chap. Now I come to think of it, I s’pose it coulda been this Carrano type. He slung her over his shoulder and marched out with her. Kicking and screaming.”

    “At Aunty Vi’s?” asked Janet in awe.

    “Yeah. Hey, now I remember! You know that ruddy great copper pot she keeps logs in?”

    “In the front room?” asked Janet.

    “Yeah. By the fireplace.”

    “Yes. It’s got a big dent in it.”

    “Yeah. That’s how it got it.”

    “What?” said Janet blankly.

    “This Carter woman. –If it was her. Throwing herself round kicking and screaming: kicked the flaming pot. Let out a dong like nobody’s business.”

    The three women stared at him, eyes wide. Finally Janet said: “Did she kick it on purpose, Dad?”

    “Uh—dunno. No, I think she was just generally flailing round: you know.”

    “She does sound mad,” said Marilyn uncertainly.

    “Yeah.”

    There was a short silence.

    “Ya don’t wanna take too much notice of Kay, ya know!” he said hurriedly.

    “She could be right,” said Janet dubiously.

    Harry Field sniffed. “She could be wrong, too. You wanna pour that tea, Janet? Or shall we let it get good and stewed?”

    Janet jumped. “Righto, Dad.” She poured him a cup of weak tea.

    In the kitchen the robust Kay said grimly to her twin: “Pull yourself together, Maureen.”

    Maureen blew her nose.

    “I’m telling you, Jake Carrano is not a murderer!” said Kay loudly and angrily. “It’s like I said: she’s the likely one, not him!”

    “But Vi said—”

    “Vi’s a silly old spinster who doesn’t know a thing about men!” cried Kay.

    Maureen blew her nose again but to Kay’s relief the tears appeared to have dried up. “Yes. You’re right, she doesn’t, does she?”

    “Scared stiff of them,” said Kay drily. Maureen’s thick silver hair was all over the place: she tucked some wisps into the big bun for her and added, kindly enough: “He’s not the type, Maureen.”

    “You only met him once,” murmured Maureen dubiously.

    “That’s right: and you’d only met David Mitchell once and you’d made up your mind to marry him,” returned her twin affably.

    Maureen went very red but didn’t deny it. Finally she said: “That’s different.”

    “Not entirely. Now, if you think you can come and have a cup of tea without bawling ag—What now?”

    Maureen’s grey-green eyes goggled at her twin over the hand she’d clapped to her mouth.

    “Go on,” said Kay heavily.

    “What if—what if it was her? And she really is mad and she—she goes after Polly?”

    “Why on earth should she? She’s not married to him now!” said Kay impatiently.

    “No: but that wouldn’t stop a mad lady,” whispered Maureen.

    Kay felt a little sick. It was only Maureen’s rubbishy fears rubbing off on her, of course: that was the trouble with being a twin! “Rubbish, Maureen!” she said loudly. “Now, come and have your tea before it gets stewed.” She picked up the plate of Christmas cake.

    Maureen got up, looking uncertain.

    “I dare say Mike Collingwood will have caught her before long!” added Kay bracingly.

    “Ye-es... He worked out it was the Dawson boys stealing those chooks—”

    “You’ve told me that a million times, Maureen,” said Kay heavily. “And I’m agreeing with you, aren’t I? He’ll work it out, don’t you worry.”

    “Yes.” In the passage she paused. “Mike’s divorce has come through, you know. I did think...”

    “Well, stop thinking, he’s not Polly’s type,” said Kay, not altogether unkindly.

    “But she isn’t getting any younger! And even if you’re right and Jake Carrano didn’t murder that man, well, is he going to marry her?” She looked plaintively at her twin’s solid bulk in the dim, old-fashioned passage.

    “He might if she’d behave herself,” said Kay drily.

    “What?”

    “And stop encouraging other men. Not to say accepting expensive presents from them!”

    “But she— Anyway, you can’t count that, Kay. I mean, one of them only gave her a book. And she told us herself they are both just colleagues.”

    “Really?” said Kay, at her driest. “I wonder if that’s what Jake Carrano thinks!”

    Maureen looked at her miserably.

    “Cast your mind back forty-odd years, Maureen,” said Kay grimly.

    “What—what about it?” she quavered.

    Kay sniffed. “Remember what a flirt you were? –Before you met David, I’ll grant you that, so you can take that look off your face!”

    “Well, what about it?” said Maureen at last in a sulky voice.

    Kay sniffed again. “Double that, add in the sexual freedom of today’s young people, and you’ve got your daughter! No wonder the poor man hasn’t proposed!”

    “That’s not true, Kay!” shouted Maureen.

    “Oh, isn’t it, just?” Without waiting for a reply, Kay went into the sitting-room.

    They heard the sound of Maureen bursting into tears and rushing down the passage. A door slammed.

    “And you can take that look off your face,” Kay informed her husband grimly. “I’ve seen that—that thing that that Leo person gave Polly for Christmas, if you haven’t!”

    There was a tingling silence.

    Then Marilyn said dubiously: “It’s only a nightie, Aunty Kay.”

    “Huh!”

    Bravely Janet squeaked: “It’s very pretty.”

    “Pretty!” said Kay awfully.

    The assorted Mitchells and Fields fell silent. Kay poured the tea, as she did so freshening her husband’s cup to the requisite dark orange shade.

    Finally Vonnie ventured: “Lots of men don’t have much of an idea about that sort of thing. I dare say he did think it was... pretty,” she finished in a small voice.

    “It is pretty!” said Janet defiantly.

    “Rubbish, Janet!” Kay sipped tea. “I can tell you exactly why that man bought her something like that, and it wasn’t because it was pretty, let me tell you!”

    They all waited but she didn’t tell them. At last Marilyn, giving up the unequal struggle with the piece of Christmas cake her husband’s aunt had forced on her, said in a weak voice: “Have you ever met Leo, Aunty Kay?”

    “Yes. Once.” Kay ate cake fiercely.

    “What’s he like?” asked Marilyn eagerly.

    Kay swallowed tea. She put down her cup. “Never mind,” she said with terrific emphasis.

    Janet, Vonnie and Marilyn all exchanged excited, speculative glances but didn’t dare to comment.

    “Foreign,” explained Harry incautiously.

    “That’ll do, Harry,” said Kay loudly and clearly. She poured Janet another cup of tea, overriding her protests with: “Nonsense, Janet: we don’t want that bladder trouble coming back, do we?”

    “Mum, that was ages—”

    Kay ignored her. She told them all in great detail about Janet’s bladder infection.

    At Leo’s parents’ home Christmas, as it always did, had started well before the clock ticked over to the 25th. Midnight Mass first, then home for a huge feast. The temperature didn’t drop below sixteen degrees Celsius all night and the humidity was like a smothering blanket, but that made no difference whatsoever. They and their circle of Polish friends had got into the habit of taking it in turns to host the feast and this year was the John Schmidts’ turn. So it wasn’t until well into Christmas Day proper, in fact round about the time that Polly on Marron Glacé and Mirry on Plumbago had reached the top of a hill and were congratulating themselves on getting out of Kay’s orbit, that John Schmidt had a chance to speak to his son alone.

    “You were not at Mass,” he said in Polish.

    “No,” agreed Leo.

    “May one ask why?” asked John with awful courtesy.

    “I’d temporarily run out of sins to confess, so I was out looking for a few m—”

    “Kindly don’t exercise your pathetic wit at the expense of the Church, Leopoldus.”

    “Is this hypocritical exchange really necessary, Father?” drawled Leo.

    The old man’s lips tightened. Then he said: “I do not propose to enter into yet another discussion on this matter. You know my views.”

    Leo replied with a sneer: “Oh, quite. It would never do for the peasants to catch on that their feudal lord isn’t as firm a believer as they are! Has it never occurred to you, Father, that you no longer have any peasants and that this annual charade is even more unnecessary than it was back in the Old Country?”

    His father’s nostrils flared angrily but at this moment Mrs Schmidt came in and said: “Que dit-il?”

    John switched to French. “Our son is endeavouring to explain his absence from Mass. So far unconvincingly.”

    “He has no respect for the forms of decent living,” Marie-Noëlle Schmidt replied calmly. “Don’t imagine that Father O’Rourke missed you,” she added nastily.

    Leo shrugged.

    Marie-Noëlle said to John: “Did you ask him about Jacob?”

    “If you want to know, chère Maman, whether Jacob alone is responsible for the appearance of a corpse in his swimming-pool, I’m afraid I cannot enlighten you,” drawled Leo.

    “That will do!” said John sharply. “Don’t use that tone to your mother.”

    “I’m sorry, Maman. But every time my phone rings these days it’s someone trying to nose out the dirt about Jacob!” He grimaced. “J’en ai marre!”

    His mother eyed him narrowly but replied: “Don’t be silly, of course I didn’t mean that! I’m sure it was a burglar or some such person. –No, do you know why he turned down our invitation?”

    Leo sighed. “I’ve got no idea, Maman.”

    “Oh, dear! Perhaps this business of the murder is disturbing him more than we...”

    “Sensitive as he is,” agreed Leo.

    “If you can’t manage to be an adult, Leo, kindly pretend that you’re one!” said his father acidly. “Kuba’s been like a bear with a sore head lately...” He frowned. “It’s nothing to do with this murder business, it’s been going on for longer than that.”

    “This is fascinating,” noted Leo, concealing his irritation at his father’s use of Jake’s nickname.

    “Of course,” said Marie-Noëlle with a giggle, “it’s possible that he thought that Jerzy and Esmé Jablonski would be here!”

    “One could understand a certain reluctance to present himself, then!” agreed Leo feelingly.

    “We did invite them,” she admitted with a smile.

    “Dare one ask whether it was the quality of Father’s booze or the thought of your galette that deterred them?”

    “Don’t be silly, Leo,” she replied placidly.

    “Your mother and that Esmé woman have had a row,” said John shortly.

    “It wasn’t me!” cried Marie-Noëlle.

    Leo said disbelievingly to his father in Polish: “She didn’t do her rabid French nut?”

    John’s lips twitched. “No, for once. –I’m sorry, darling: I was saying that it wasn’t your fault.”

    Marie-Noëlle drew herself up to her full five-foot-two. “I should think not! What was I— Oh, yes: Jacob. Is it this girl, Leo?”

    Leo flushed. “I have no idea: I am not privy to the intimate secrets of Jacob’s love life. If you’ll excuse me, Maman, I think I’ll lie down. That galette lies heavy—” He put his hand on his flat middle and went out while his mother was still gasping with indignation.

    As soon as she’d recovered she said: “Tu vois!”

    “Non,” replied John, pouring himself a brandy. He sat down with it. “Do elucidate, however, if you would.”

    “Don’t take that tone with me, it doesn’t cut any ice and never has!” Marie-Noëlle sat down suddenly. “Oh, dear. It is that girl: I told you so, John!”

    “Leo, you mean, not Jacob? That nice girl with the brown hair that he brought round for afternoon tea that time? He’s a fool,” he said shortly.

    She glared.

    John sipped brandy. “A very nice girl. Not a floozy. One could have imagined she might have been the making of him.”

    Marie-Noëlle blew her nose fiercely. “That’s exactly what I—”

    John grimaced. “That is, if one had not long since realized that he was a lost cause.”

    “It’s that sort of attitude on your part that makes it worse!” she cried.

    “Indubitably.”

    There was a long silence. Then Marie-Noëlle said with determination: “I’ll ring Jacob and make sure he’s all right!”

    “What—for a lover’s tiff?” he drawled, raising his eyebrows.

    Marie-Noëlle retorted with satisfaction: “You look just like Leo when you make that silly face!” And went out.

    John grimaced. After a while he got up and, sighing, poured himself another nip of brandy.

    Rod’s Christmas Day had gone about as well as you might have expected, given that it had had to be spent with a sodden Pole and a cracked stepmother. Dad had been pissed out of his tiny mind well before the witching hour on Christmas Eve, so his mood the following day was what you might expect. Esmé of course refused to have anything to do with “all that rubbish”—the traditional Polish celebrations—so all that Rod knew of his cultural heritage in that direction had been gleaned from the occasional visits to friends like the Schmidts. When Dad, Esmé or both hadn’t had a falling-out with them, that was. This year Esmé was also refusing to cook anything approaching a traditional New Zealand Christmas dinner, either. Not that this was the first time this had happened: oh, no. Not by a long chalk. Rod wouldn’t have bothered to turn up at all, only the row if he didn’t turn up was worse than the agony of going. He stuck it out till around two-ish. Esmé didn’t appear all that gratified that he actually sat down and ate the nutmeat cutlets with the salad, not to say the carrot juice, so when his father proposed getting out a liqueur and she started screaming at him about all she’d done for him and sacrificing her life for a drunken old sot, and the usual carry-on, Rod walked out.

    He had the board in the back of the Trusty Triumph so regardless of whether surf might be up, he headed for Piha. At least on Christmas Day you might get a half metre or so of wave to yourself!

    Piha wasn’t crowded, actually: Rod was a trifle surprised, because after all the serious surfing crowd weren’t that much into your trad hot Christmas lunch after prezzies and tree—or were they? Grinning, Rod removed his tee-shirt and ran down to the waves.

    He got back to his chalet around five, casting a wistful glance at the Pohutukawa Bay Dairy as he passed it, but of course it was shut, the whole of Godzone shut down on Christmas Day. Rod hadn’t given much thought to such things heretofore but he found himself wondering sourly what the fuck the point of it all was: if the place ever had been a Christian country, which he very much doubted, it certainly wasn’t now. Why inconvenience the lot that wasn’t cloistered in the bosom of its family just for some outdated superstition? Oh, well. Blokes like Dave hadda have their Christmas, too.

    After some scowling and mooching round the sitting-room he went out to the passage and—though without hope—rang Marama’s number. One of the littlies answered. Well, that figured, in the first place there was a tribe of them, and in the second place Mr Te Hana and Marama’s older brothers and uncles were probably all lying round stonkered in the front room and Mrs Te Hana and all the aunties were probably too exhausted to move after doing all the cooking for the tribe.

    “Yeah, hi; who is that?” he said cautiously. If it was Charlene, who was only three, he wouldn’t ask her to take a message, because her favourite trick was repeating your message very carefully and then hanging up on you while she went to deliver it. It couldn’t be little Sylvester, because he never said “Hullo?” or anything when he answered, he only breathed.

    “Fleur,” said the small person’s voice. –Rod reckoned Mrs Te Hana had got most of the younger kids’ names off the TV. He reckoned the old man musta put his foot down over the older ones, because the oldest boy was Tama and the second one was Wiremu, even if they did call him Bill, and the two older girls were Marama, of course, and Hinemoa; only then the old joker musta lost interest, because the third girl was Kiri after Guess Who and after that it had been pretty much downhill all the way. Well, heck: Fleur Te Hana? (Woulda been that repeat of The Forsyte Saga.) Rod was, of course, aware that this phenomenon was not confined to the Te Hanas, or, indeed, to the indigenous section of the population. Didn’t mean he hadda like it, though, did it?

    “Oh, hi, Fleur,” he said with some relief. “It’s Rod Jablonski here. Is Marama about?”

    “No, she went out for a drive with that Greg Lawnmower,” said Fleur on a glum note. –His name was Lancaster but Rod was aware that Marama’s siblings all loathed him: not because he was a pakeha, or any garbage of that sort, but because he was an up-himself little shit of a cost accountant that wouldn’t give the littlies rides in his fucking up-market Porsche.

    “On Christmas Day?” he said weakly.

    “Yeah,” said Fleur glumly. She screeched to the voice in the background that had screeched something to her: “It’s Rod, Mum!” There was a further confab in the background and then Fleur said: “Mum says she bets you’re all by yourself and you can come over for tea, if ya like.”

    Verbatim, thought Rod weakly. Fleur was about eight. Mrs Te Hana was pretty easy-going but he’d have taken a bet that even she wouldn’t have wanted her precise words to be reported. “No, that’s all right, thanks, Fleur. Tell your Mum ta, but I’m busy, eh?”

    Before he could draw breath Fleur was shrieking: “He says ta, but he’s busy, Mum!”

    It wasn’t that Rod disliked the Te Hanas, at all: they were a decent lot. Only the thought of a big, warm-hearted family Christmas that wasn’t his family’s Christmas... Especially while Marama was out with that jerk in his fucking Porsche! Not that Rod was all that keen on Marama, really. And she had sorta given him the brush-off, back—shit, over a year ago, now! Only she was bloody gorgeous; and he had sorta thought, at that bloody party of Sean’s at the end of last term— Oh, well.

    Fleur was assuring him there was loads of ham and turkey left and they hadn’t even started on Aunty Bella’s Christmas cake, yet! Rod repeated his thanks and his refusal and hung up hurriedly before Mrs Te Hana could haul herself out of her armchair and come to the phone to earbash him in person.

    He went and sat on the front verandah and allowed his thoughts to ponder on things that he’d been trying very hard these past few days to keep them off. To wit: was this bust-up of Jake’s and Polly’s definite, and was there any hope that she might look, well, not more kindly, exactly, but more seriously, at R. Jablonski? Well, frankly, just more woulda done, for a start. After some time he admitted to himself that she might look more, yeah: if he hung around and looked available. Only did he want that, without the serious bit? Well, yeah, okay: he wanted it, all right.—Here Rod shifted uncomfortably on the verandah and made a face.—But could he stand it on a long-term basis if he knew that the bloke she really wanted was Jake, not him? Would she get over Jake, maybe, if her and him...? Rod couldn’t help knowing he was attractive to women but he wasn’t gonna kid himself he had a fraction of Jake’s combination of charisma and machismo. He made a ferocious face: partly because both expressions were abhorrent to him and partly because it was too bloody true. So, should he just forget about it? He’d been trying to forget about it ever since the bloody Grad Ball over six months back, when he thought he’d cracked it and then she’d said it was lovely but they’d better cool it.

    He’d been sitting there for some time when the phone rang. Funnily enough it wasn’t Marama ringing to say she’d got rid of Greg Lawnmower and to come on over for tea after all, it was old Rog. Okay, he was at a loose end. Well, all on his ownsome at the other side of the world from his family—mind you, his mother sounded pretty awful, from what he’d let slip, a real nag, but his brother and sister-in-law sounded okay. Well, the sister-in-law—Pandora, yet—was a bit la-de-da but the sort that’d have him over for Christmas as a matter of course.

    “Fancy coming down the beach for a barbie, Rog?” he said kindly. “I’ve got loads of sausages. –You’ll need your Dimp,” he added quickly.

    “It’ll referee the race between the mozzies and the sandflies to raise those huge red lumps all over me, will it? Thanks, Rod. I’ll bring a bottle or two.”

    So they did that. Rod hadn’t meant to tell him that the reason Jake was like a bear with a sore head was that he’d busted up with Polly, but somehow, after a pound of sausages, several frosties from his fridge and a bottle of old Rog’s fizz, he did. Rog was pretty took aback, though it was plain enough to Rod that his feelings were about mixed as his own were.

    After a bit he came out with: “You don’t suppose it’s because—because Jake’s more nearly involved in this Banks business than we thought and—and he doesn’t want Polly to be mixed up in it?”

    Actually it was quite a relief to hear someone say it. So Rod replied: “Theoretically, it’s a possibility, but I can’t see why he’d want to do him in, not when they had that deal over the bach pretty well sewn up.”

    “Did they?” said Roger dubiously.

    Rod sighed. “I’m not just taking Jake’s word for it. Esmé agreed to it. Dad told me he’d talked her into it at last. Don Banks was offering them a bloody good price. Can’t see why else ole Don’d be going round to Jake’s after that barney at the Council, frankly; can you?”

    “No,” he admitted.

    Considerately Rod passed him another frostie. They drank in silence. Eventually Rod said, lying back and staring up at the stars: “Is it only an illusion, do ya reckon?”

    Roger yawned widely. “What: life? The universe?”

    “Did you read that article on the Big Bang and all that in that Nature that was lying round in the Lang. and Ling. staffroom a bit back?”

    “I gave up, it was too scientific for me,” he admitted.

    “Yeah,” said Rod with a smile in his voice. “No, actually I meant love.” He yawned suddenly. “Probably all down to hormones... See, romantic love is a concept dreamed up for the roman courtois—you might not’ve heard that one, Rog,” he said kindly, “not having been privileged to hear Dr Davis in full flight in Lecture Theatre 1.”

    Roger swallowed. “I thought Laclos was her subject?”

    “More or less, yeah. Does the lectures on the history of the novel in French II,” he said, grinning. “Almost got fired at one stage, because she dared to suggest the Poms and one or two Spaniards mighta been writing things that sorta resembled the novel at around the time the Frogs were trying it out. –Not allowed to do that, in these here parts,” he explained. “If ya teach the history of the novel for the French Department the novel proper began with Madame de la Fayette and ended round about Hiroshima mon amour; and if ya teach the history of the novel for the English Department it began with Gulliver’s Travels and ended round about Ulysses!” He broke down and sniggered, shaking all over.

    “I thought that was a phenomenon confined to Albion’s shores,” admitted Roger, investigating another bottle.

    “What, lit’ry jingoism? Nah!”

    Roger broke down and sniggered horribly. After some time, however, he admitted slowly: “It is very hard to decide whether romantic love is real or not, isn’t it?”

    “‘Così è, se vi pare’,” said Rod, shrugging. “Nature’s way of making us carry on the race without suffering too much over having to do it. Not that I’ve found it that terribly painful, mind you—not the mechanics of it, I mean.”

    “No!” said Roger with a sheepish laugh

    Rod sighed. “Do ya reckon getting it on a regular basis makes the romantic illusion wear off?”

    “Must do: look at the divorce rate,” returned Roger sourly.

    “Yeah. What the Christ makes couples stick together at all, then?”

    “I’d say it’s a combination of things: habit; clinging together in the face of an inimical, unknowable universe; social pressures...” He shrugged.

    Rod turned his head and smiled. “Pretty much what I figured! If that’s Drambuie in that bottle you’re fighting with, give it here: I’ll check it hasn’t gone off.”

    It hadn’t gone off, so they rewarded it by drinking a large part of it.

    They finished the evening in a state of boozy amiability. But neither of them was able to prevent his heart pounding with hope at the thought that Polly was free at last—even though, in spite of the booze, each of them realized that he didn’t seriously have a chance with her. Rod was aware that he was too young and callow for her, while Roger was aware—and had been for months—that they were temperamentally completely incompatible.