DIY & disappointing discussions.

Day 4 - Thursday

Vera was into her DIY big-time. The rain front from yesterday hadn’t cleared East Anglia. There was no BMW waiting at the end of the garden so I walked to the House in horizontal rain, couldn’t have kept a new umbrella up in the wind, never mind my scarecrow number. I was soaked as I came through the magnificent oak front door, and left a dripping trail past the grizzly bears and across the carpet with the coat of arms every ten inches. I heard someone whistling ‘Walking in the rain.’ Charley was more than amused.

‘Oh, Millie! How the mighty are fallen? All it took was a bit of flat-pack and you are history.’

‘Piss off, you smart arse. What stopped you picking me up? I assume she has assembled the units and is now wondering what to do next.’

He grinned even wider. ‘You’re to join her upstairs, in the grey room.’

I looked baffled. All our rooms at home look grey.

‘Top of the stairs and head eastwards. You’ll come to her private apartment.’

‘You are enjoying this, you toad. There is no sun today. How should I decide which is east?’

Now it was his turn to pretend to be baffled.

‘Sozz, Millie,’ he started in his male piss-take voice. ‘I was bottom-set. We didn’t do navigation. You were always top-set. You’ll work it out.’

I climbed the wide cantilever 18th century stairs, leaving a previous Lordship, clearly on a horse, but entitled ‘At Horse,’ in enormous oils, by a little-known painter, on a stair-landing. I wondered what affectation or incorrect preposition they would use when describing matrimonial consummations. At bed? I took out Vera’s notepad to write a reminder to ask, but instead dripped over the pad and the pencil didn’t leave a mark.

I looked out the window from the landing and saw the parish church and river that flows past it.

‘Altar at the East End. River flows eastwards to the sea. Let’s go down here,’ I mumbled to myself. From the bottom of the stairs I heard an appreciative ‘Well done.’ I turned to look down the stairs and stuck my exceptionally long tongue out. Charley’s wickedly charming, ear-to-ear grin stopped me in my tracks and I hesitated, before grinning back.

I walked the long, wood-panelled corridor, covered in pictures of previous lords or dukes or whatever they are, and into Vera’s private apartment. I didn’t realise the office door was also her front door and entered without knocking. From the office another door led into her private apartment.

Her body language betrayed she’d heard me, but she didn’t look up at me and continued standing in front of the assembled table, chair and dresser. Behind her, on the floor, was the sink, leaning on the cupboard arrangement designed to hold it. I broke her reverie.

‘Felicitations, Vera! You can add flat-pack furniture to your list of accomplishments.’

‘Wish I’d learned it earlier in life,’ she snorted, ‘more use than riding a bloody horse and I still can’t saddle those things without help. But I am stumped by the sink. Where should the water get in?’

‘Plumber, Vera. You’ll need a plumber. I took the liberty of ordering my Uncle Wilf for eleven o’ clock.’

‘Is he a plumber?’

‘No, Vera. He’s a lay preacher. He’ll help us pray for a connection.’

She ignored my sarcasm. That woman has admirable self-control.

‘Whatever. So long as he understands his trade. You know my accountant will want to see three quotes and an explanation of the one we accepted, if it’s not the cheapest.’

‘Why?’

‘This house is a business Millicent, not a domicile or a hobby. ‘Best value’ is stamped across every sheet we write on.’

‘I don’t think my Uncle Wilf does quotes, Vera, unless you ask him about the odds for the 2.30 at Haydock Park. He’s more a cash-in-hand man. He can quote Mellors in his hut, chatting up Lady Chatterley, but he probably thinks the hut was in Arabia. Shall I cancel him and we’ll get someone more skilled in quotes?’

She came over and gave me a big hug. I was dumbfounded.

‘You are such a breath of fresh air, Millicent. Promise me you’ll stay this witty for the next two months and I may survive the summer without recourse to booze, drugs or suicide.’

‘That bad, eh?’

‘Oh, yes! It’s that bad.’

I didn’t cancel Uncle Wilf. If only I’d cancelled Uncle Wilf? Sometimes the alternatives jangle through one’s mind for days, imagining how much easier life would have been had one taken another route. Never involve family in business, even if you only want to do a relation a favour.

We left Uncle Wilf with the task, while we went for tea in the café. We couldn’t walk in the garden until the rain cleared and the house remained inaccessible due to guided visitor tours. Huge house, huge garden, stacks of money and you still have to retreat to a coffee-shop.

Wilf was quick and efficient but he’ll never get another recommendation out of me. I wish I’d let the site manager organise three quotes from companies with a historic maintenance certificate. It would have taken a year, but saved the hysterical outburst when the site manager saw Uncle Wilf’s best effort.

‘He’s run hot and cold through from the bathroom next door,’ he gasped in disbelief, ‘and he’s put Rawlplugs in the wall to hold the units.’

He paused and waited for us to castigate Uncle Wilf, who stood at the back, clearing his tools away.

Vera looked mildly disconcerted. I assume she’d heard this speech before and now found it boring.

‘What is it this time, David?’ she enquired in her best imperious tone.

‘The wallpaper, Your Ladyship, the wallpaper. Early 18th century Chinese pattern, grade one listed.’

‘Oh dear. I suppose it is. Never mind. We have to live here.’

‘You tell that to English Heritage when they next inspect.’

He droned on. I lost track of his argument, but it seemed that he was more interested in covering his own backside than protecting an 18th century wallpaper. I was more captured by the fact that he called Vera by her title, but I was allowed to use her first name. I quickly forgot my privileged position when I caught sight of Uncle Wilf, in the doorway, turning red. I knew how irascible he could become if customers criticised his workmanship. It was one of the reasons why, in a time of full employment, he was an unemployed plumber and I had the need to put the work his way.

He drew breath, but I was faster and had him out the door and down the stairs before anyone noticed the impending storm.

‘Just scribble how much you want here, Uncle Wilf,’ I said and handed him the soggy notebook. ‘I’ll collect your money for you.’

I pointed him at the stairs and said goodbye. When he was gone I looked at the number he had written. I was thunderstruck. He surely had the shakes and skidded an extra nought in by mistake. The three historical restoration companies wouldn’t have charged more if they had each put an independent bill in and we’d added them together.

Dave, the site manager, stalked past me as I re-entered Vera’s apartment. His face was of thunder. Vera was inspecting Uncle Wilf’s craftsmanship. She didn’t mention the holes in the Chinese paper.

‘Nice job he’s done, Millicent. How much does he want?’

She had a bundle of notes in her hands and was preparing to start counting.

I divided Will’s number by ten.

‘Three-hundred, Vera.’ I winced. That was still a hundred an hour. She counted the money out and gave it to me.

‘Yelhux!’

‘What was that for?’ I asked.

‘It’s the first time I’ve not allowed that disgusting site manager to bully and intimidate me. That’s an emancipation, I think.’

‘Yelhux!’ I shouted. ‘I’ll have to tell my uncle what a cheat and swindler he is and how he’ll have to settle for one tenth of his original demand. That will be a first, too. He’ll probably slap my face, come home drunk and punch my aunt, but it will be worth it.’

Vera looked worried.

‘Your Aunt may see things differently. And you know what? I’d have probably paid him whatever he asked. I wasn’t brought up to haggle. Then your aunt would have been happy instead of abused and maybe have got a new frock from the deal.’

‘Believe me, Vera - it’s better this way. The only people to have profited from three thousand would have been the bookie and publican.’

‘Quite so,’ she sighed.

I think Vera knew a few aristocratic versions of Uncle Wilf.

The notepad was in a disgusting state. I carefully opened it and separated the sheets, before laying it on a draughty window ledge to dry.

In the afternoon there was bright sunshine and warmth again. I was still damp, my hair frizzed like the prongs of my brolly, and I begged Vera for a walk in the sun to warm up. We sat on the steps of the rockery overlooking the formal garden. Vera promised me that part of the garden would warm quickest. I opened the conversation.

‘What’s this ‘at horse’ bit on the brass plate beneath the oil of the Fourth Duke on the landing?’

That was a hell of a sentence and of the type I am always being criticised for at home. I expected a vacant look from Vera.

‘How would I know?’ she responded immediately, but with a measured amount of poison in her voice.

I was beginning to learn which questions would press Vera’s guilt button. Her body-language revealed it was a topic she didn’t care to discuss with me, a girl from the village, so I pressed home my advantage.

‘Sultan ,Vera, and I promise not to tell anyone in the village.’

‘That means you think you already know the answer.’

‘Possibly,’ I replied. ‘On his horse would imply he may only have one horse. ‘At horse,’ leaves it open and implies he has many. Snobbery, isn’t it.’

‘He and everyone else knew that he had more than one horse, so, ‘at horse,’ is simply stating the obvious. ‘On his horse’, would have been false modesty, something for which my class are not noted. And you can tell who you like in the village. I’m not going to apologise for having more than one horse.’

‘Talking of horses, Sid would like to go riding with you.’

I heard a sharp intake of breath. I pressed on even though I sensed the ice was getting thin.

‘She’s never been riding and always wanted to. You know - girly dreams and all that.’

Vera waited until I had finished speaking, which in view of her response, surprised me.

‘It’s not going to happen and don’t mention it again!’ she snapped.

This was degenerating into a bad day. I decided to lighten things up.

‘So, what does a Duke say to himself if he decides tonight’s the night? He can’t say ‘at Vera,’ because that would imply more than one Vera. Up or on Vera is a bit blunt. ‘The missus is getting a seeing to when I get home’, is rather common.’

Vera laughed.

‘You silly girl. Common is erotic. Didn’t you know? We always let the servants hear us when we are at it.’

That told me.

On the way home I told Sid of my attempt on her behalf and the response I got.

‘What? She forgave your uncle trying to sting her for three grand for three hours work, but she can’t forgive me asking if I can ride one of her horses.’

‘That’s right.’

‘Why?’

‘I suppose, trying to cheat the aristocracy of three thousand pounds, is what she expects a working man to do. Riding out with her is not what she thinks a working girl should expect or even dream of doing. All about stereotypes, I think.’

Despite her huge effort not to show it, Sid looked seriously hurt. In a matter-of-fact way she said, ‘Makes sense, and I’m glad in a way.’

‘Why?’

‘Because it means I can continue hating her and her class with unabated ferocity.’

I didn’t get a farewell that evening, or a kiss on the cheek. I was sad and embarrassed to say, my lips felt lonely. I opened Vera’s notebook as I watched Sid wander proudly off, and stood at our gate, thumbing through the pages to see if there were any outstanding jobs. My eye was drawn to a simple message, written in a childish hand. Once deciphered I realised it wasn’t written by a child. Far from it! The message simply said, ‘fancy a shag?’ It was signed ‘Charley,’ and then there was a mobile number.

I thought a minute or two and considered the evening that awaited me with Uncle Wilf, when he came round to collect his money. I sent the number a text. ‘Right now, please. Where?’

Bedtime now after a fun evening and I still haven’t seen the House, nor paid Wilf, as I forgot to leave the money with my mum.

Forgot to ask Vera about Sid’s sexuality. Boarding school girls know about such things - don’t they? Vera must have had some lesbian experience at school. Surely some stereotypes actually fit. Perhaps Vera still bats for the other side. That’s why her husband is never around.

Life is never dull where the toffs abound.