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Authors: Margaret Drabble
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different generation from Tony’s mother, but Tony was used to that: most mothers belonged to an older generation than his own freakish darling. Most mothers, in Northam as in Ogham, seemed more reliable, more capable, more regular, more
dull
than Fanny Kettle. But Alix had not been dull: she had been full of talk, full of questions, full of enthusiasms. She had been particularly interested and indeed well informed about Tony’s father’s recent dig. She knew about chariot burials and Romans.
Sam Bowen claimed that she was obsessed by a murderer in Porston Prison, and Tony Kettle had waited eagerly for evidence of this, but none had emerged.
Instead, Alix over the fish pie had talked of the finds at Wetwang, the burials at Eastwold. She was fascinated to learn that the Kettles had actually lived at Eastwold, practically on the site, as it were. She wanted to know what it was like living at Eastwold Grange, how he had found the social life of Ogham, whether she ought to go and visit the ruins of Ogham Abbey. She expressed a polite desire to meet the Kettle parents.
Tony had drunk a glass of white wine with his supper. There wasn’t any pudding.
‘I’m afraid I never make puddings,’ said Alix, as though this deficiency had newly occurred to her. ‘I don’t know why, but I never do.’
Brian Bowen, Sam’s father, had showed less interest in ar
chaeology, but equal interest in Tony’s impressions of social life in East and South Yorkshire. Brian worked, Tony gathered, for fhe Education Department of Northam City Council. He wanted to know what Tony thought about sixth form colleges, how many kids had gone on to do A-Levels at Ogham, that kind of thing.
‘Your parents didn’t think of boarding-school?’ he asked, at one point.
‘I wouldn’t go,’ said Tony. ‘They suggested it, but I would stay at home.’ He laughed, a little uncomfortable at being the centre of so much attention. ‘Really boring it was, but I would stay.’ He paused, took another sip of wine, continued boldly, ‘But they took me around, you know. I didn’t spend all my youth in the sticks, as Sam likes to think. I went around with my mother. To London. And Paris. And Venice. Places like that.’
‘How nice,’ said Alix; thinking, what an odd boy, what can his parents have been up to?
Tony Kettle, standing irresolute an hour later in the vast high-ceilinged kitchen of the new Kettle residence, wonders the same thing. And wonders if Brian and Alix are
normal
parents, or whether there are no such creatures as normal parents? And if there were, would he want them for his own? He shrugs. He doubts it. He will take life as it is. What choice is there, after all?
He returns to the living-room, quietly removes the glass, the bottle and the ashtray, and slowly, sneakily, from the far end of the room, increases the volume of sound on the television. His mother stirs, mumbles, suddenly sits bolt upright, as Tony backs out of the door and makes his escape up the stairs.
Attractive danger. Natural curiosity. Unnatural curiosity. Charles Headleand cannot resist pursuing a visa for Baldai, Alix Bowen cannot resist travelling to see her murderer across the lonely moor, Susie Enderby cannot resist returning to take tea with Fanny Kettle, Janice Enderby cannot resist inviting people to dinner and Liz Headleand will not be able to resist an invitation to appear in a contentious debate on television. Their friend Stephen Cox has been unable to resist one of the challenges of the century, the secretive Pol Pot, hiding in his lair, at the end of the Shining Path.
Cliff Harper’s approach to the cliff edge of danger is less voluntary. He does not have an illusion of freedom. He has been struggling for years to prevent himself from reaching this precipice. He lies awake at night, adding up columns of figures, counting his creditors. He lacks the gift of self-deception, the Micawber touch which might have got him out of this mess. His partner Jim
dull
than Fanny Kettle. But Alix had not been dull: she had been full of talk, full of questions, full of enthusiasms. She had been particularly interested and indeed well informed about Tony’s father’s recent dig. She knew about chariot burials and Romans.
Sam Bowen claimed that she was obsessed by a murderer in Porston Prison, and Tony Kettle had waited eagerly for evidence of this, but none had emerged.
Instead, Alix over the fish pie had talked of the finds at Wetwang, the burials at Eastwold. She was fascinated to learn that the Kettles had actually lived at Eastwold, practically on the site, as it were. She wanted to know what it was like living at Eastwold Grange, how he had found the social life of Ogham, whether she ought to go and visit the ruins of Ogham Abbey. She expressed a polite desire to meet the Kettle parents.
Tony had drunk a glass of white wine with his supper. There wasn’t any pudding.
‘I’m afraid I never make puddings,’ said Alix, as though this deficiency had newly occurred to her. ‘I don’t know why, but I never do.’
Brian Bowen, Sam’s father, had showed less interest in ar
chaeology, but equal interest in Tony’s impressions of social life in East and South Yorkshire. Brian worked, Tony gathered, for fhe Education Department of Northam City Council. He wanted to know what Tony thought about sixth form colleges, how many kids had gone on to do A-Levels at Ogham, that kind of thing.
‘Your parents didn’t think of boarding-school?’ he asked, at one point.
‘I wouldn’t go,’ said Tony. ‘They suggested it, but I would stay at home.’ He laughed, a little uncomfortable at being the centre of so much attention. ‘Really boring it was, but I would stay.’ He paused, took another sip of wine, continued boldly, ‘But they took me around, you know. I didn’t spend all my youth in the sticks, as Sam likes to think. I went around with my mother. To London. And Paris. And Venice. Places like that.’
‘How nice,’ said Alix; thinking, what an odd boy, what can his parents have been up to?
Tony Kettle, standing irresolute an hour later in the vast high-ceilinged kitchen of the new Kettle residence, wonders the same thing. And wonders if Brian and Alix are
normal
parents, or whether there are no such creatures as normal parents? And if there were, would he want them for his own? He shrugs. He doubts it. He will take life as it is. What choice is there, after all?
He returns to the living-room, quietly removes the glass, the bottle and the ashtray, and slowly, sneakily, from the far end of the room, increases the volume of sound on the television. His mother stirs, mumbles, suddenly sits bolt upright, as Tony backs out of the door and makes his escape up the stairs.
Attractive danger. Natural curiosity. Unnatural curiosity. Charles Headleand cannot resist pursuing a visa for Baldai, Alix Bowen cannot resist travelling to see her murderer across the lonely moor, Susie Enderby cannot resist returning to take tea with Fanny Kettle, Janice Enderby cannot resist inviting people to dinner and Liz Headleand will not be able to resist an invitation to appear in a contentious debate on television. Their friend Stephen Cox has been unable to resist one of the challenges of the century, the secretive Pol Pot, hiding in his lair, at the end of the Shining Path.
Cliff Harper’s approach to the cliff edge of danger is less voluntary. He does not have an illusion of freedom. He has been struggling for years to prevent himself from reaching this precipice. He lies awake at night, adding up columns of figures, counting his creditors. He lacks the gift of self-deception, the Micawber touch which might have got him out of this mess. His partner Jim
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