"Going Dutch" - читать интересную книгу автора (Fforde Katie)

Chapter One

Dora put down her bags and looked at the woman who was waving to her from across the water. As instructed, she had taken a taxi from the station that serviced the pretty Thames-side town and had been deposited at the gates of the moorings. Then she had telephoned to announce her arrival. Her new landlady was going to meet her and let her in.

She did recognise her, of course, but her best friend's mother had changed a bit since she'd last seen her. Now she was wearing a long overshirt and a pair of baggy jeans. Before, she had worn the sort of County women's clothes Dora's mother wore: skirts, silk shirts, or possibly a shaped T-shirt, with a cashmere cardigan round the shoulders. Her hair, which used to look coiffed in a hairdresser-once-a week way, was now rather wild. She was smiling warmly, however, and Dora felt that going to her for refuge may not have been such a bad idea after all.

‘How did you manage this lot on the train?' asked Mrs Edwards when she had crossed the bridge and reached Dora. She picked up a selection of 'bags for life' that bulged with woolly jumpers. 'And why do you need all these jumpers? It's May!'

‘My mother said it's always cold on boats,' Dora explained apologetically. 'And people were very helpful,' she went on, remembering how their kindness had nearly made her break down and cry. She was so brittle, the smallest thing was likely to set her off.

‘I do really think that on the whole mankind is nicer than it gets credit for,' said Mrs Edwards, politely ignoring the remark about the cold and boats. 'Now, follow me.’

Dora heaved her rucksack on to her back and followed her along the path to a tall steel gate. Mrs Edwards leant forwards against a metal plate. The door beeped and she pushed it open.

‘I keep the fob in my bra,' she explained. 'I've usually got my hands full. I'll give you one, then you can come and go as you want.' She sent Dora a glance. `OK?’

Dora nodded and followed Mrs Edwards down the walkway to the pontoons. Tied up against each one was a barge of some kind. Although she longed to look at them, Dora was grateful that Mrs Edwards didn't stop – her rucksack was so heavy. They had passed about four barges, each different from the other, before Mrs Edwards halted next to a huge vessel painted dark green.

‘This is The Three Sisters. It was originally called that in Dutch, but no one could say it, so Michael, who owns it, translated it. It's a common name for Dutch barges.’

Mrs Edwards swung the bags over the side of the barge and then followed them, her legs going over in a surprisingly nimble way. Dora thought her own mother would have made much more of a meal of it, but reflected that her mother had always made a meal of everything, which in part explained why she was here.

Mrs Edwards turned to give Dora a hand. 'You give me that lot, then if you put your foot there, you can get on board quite easily. A bit of practice and you'll be leaping on and off like a young lamb.'

‘I'm not sure about that,' said Dora, clambering aboard awkwardly. She followed Mrs Edwards up the metal step and through a door.

‘This is the wheelhouse, obviously,' said Mrs Edwards,indicating the huge wheel. 'But also the conservatory.' Amongst a row of flowerpots containing tomato plants and geraniums Dora also spotted pots of basil and parsley. 'All these would have to be moved if we ever went anywhere, which, thank goodness, we're not doing.'

‘You get a good view from here,' said Dora, looking around her. 'And, presumably, lots of sun.'

‘It's a lovely place to sit, I must say. There aren't usually so many barges here, but there are lots of visitors, because of the rally. It starts tomorrow.'

‘Oh, have I come at a bad time?'

‘Not at all! It'll be nice to have some moral support.'

‘Isn't the rally fun, then?' asked Dora. She wasn't sure what a rally involved but she decided just to go along with anything Jo – Mrs Edwards – suggested. She didn't feel up to any decision-making herself quite yet.

‘In a way.' Mrs Edwards was more cautious. 'But on Sunday there's a parade of boats, which means you have to let anyone who wants to, come and look all over your boat.' She looked concerned. 'I find the idea of strangers tramping about my home completely hideous! I'll have to have a massive tidy-up.’

Dora now dimly remembered that her friend Karen's mother had always had a more laissez-faire attitude to tidiness than her own mother. She'd been very relaxed about them making a mess in the kitchen, experimenting with recipes for toffee, fudge and, later, pancakes. 'Well, of course, I'll help you.'

‘Let's not think about it now. Let's go down and have a glass of wine. I know it's only five-thirty, but as far as I'm concerned, the sun's over the yardarm,' said Mrs Edwards.

‘What does that mean?'

‘I'm not quite sure, but I do know it means you can have a drink. I think when you've had a long journey and not a very brilliant time recently, you deserve one. And I have to keep you company.' She smiled and Dora thought what a nice-looking woman she was. Middle-aged, of course, but quite attractive.

She returned the smile and followed her landlady down a flight of wooden stairs.

When Dora's best friend Karen had called, all the way from Canada, and said, 'Go and stay with Mum on her barge,' Dora had been diffident.

‘She won't want me inviting myself to stay. She's had a ghastly time herself!'

‘I'll tell her. She must know what's happened anyway, she was invited to the wedding. But she'd love having you. She needs the company. Whatever she says, she must be lonely, and you might be able to stop her getting too eccentric.’

Dora wasn't nearly as bossy as Karen and had no intention of trying to put Mrs Edwards back on the path of conventionality, but as she really needed somewhere to go, she eventually agreed. 'Being a social pariah, I don't have much choice,' she'd said.

‘You're not a social pariah! You fell out of love with a man who really was quite boring and then changed your mind about getting married. People do it all the time. It's no big deal.’

Dora had spluttered her disbelief. 'Yes it is! We'd been planning this wedding for about five years.'

‘Not since you were seventeen, for goodness' sake! You only met John when you were seventeen.'

‘It seems like it. I definitely caught my mother with a bride's magazine very shortly after she and Dad met John's parents.’

Karen had sighed.

‘And there isn't a soul in the village who isn't bestfriends with, or related to, either John or me!' Dora shuddered at the thought of all those disapproving looks and forthright comments she had left behind. 'And as they all say I've broken John's heart, and perhaps I have, that leaves me as Norman No-Mates.'

‘Norma No-Mates,' Karen had said.

‘Whatever!'

‘You go to Mum. You can keep an eye on her and she'll look after you. She loves looking after people.'

‘She may be relishing her freedom,' Dora had pointed out.

‘Freedom is something you choose to have. Mum was dumped for a younger woman. She'll be feeling awful.' Karen's indignation was audible over thousands of miles of airwaves. 'I know Dad wouldn't have left her if I'd been around. He just waited until I was out of the way. Bastard!’

Dora had tutted. 'Karen! That's no way to talk about your father!'

‘But Dora, how would you feel about your dad if he'd left your mother after nearly thirty years?’

Dora had considered. 'Yes, OK, I see what you mean.’

Now, she looked around her while Karen's mother found glasses and a bottle of wine. They'd dumped her various bags in the cabin which was to be Dora's 'for as long as she needed it'. The saloon was much larger than she'd expected, with a sitting area down one end, a kitchen – or should that be galley? she wondered – and eating area down the other. The walls were painted white and the ceiling was panelled wood. There was some sort of stove in one corner, and a banquette and chairs nearby. It was very cosy, but not, now she thought about it, terribly tidy.

‘There's a packet of crisps in that cupboard,' said Mrs Edwards. 'Get it out, would you? There's a bowl in there somewhere, too.'

‘Would you like me to use the china bowl or the wooden one, Mrs Edwards?’

Mrs Edwards regarded Dora with a horrified expression. 'Oh, call me Jo, please! No one calls me Mrs Edwards these days. I'd assume that my mother-in-law had risen from the grave and appeared at my shoulder.’

Dora felt embarrassed. 'Have you gone back to your maiden name, then? I wouldn't blame you-'

‘Oh no, or at least, I suppose I might, it's just that everyone calls me Jo. You must too.'

‘OK, Jo. Which bowl?' Dora lost her shyness now she was using Jo's first name. It put them on a more equal footing.

Jo pointed to the wooden one, handed Dora a glass and sat down on the banquette, finding space for her own glass among the piles of papers, recipe books and a make-up bag. 'Put the crisps down somewhere while I think what we're going to have for supper. Tomorrow there's a gala dinner. I've bought you a ticket.'

‘You must let me pay you back for it,' said Dora, sitting down opposite her new landlady. 'You needn't worry that I'm going to sponge off you. I'm going to pay my way.'

‘I'll accept a small rent,' said Jo, 'because one must be sensible about these things, but not until you've got a job.'

‘I've got savings,' protested Dora. 'It was meant for the honeymoon.' Then she realised she'd said a trigger word for an explosion of tears. She'd liked her job and had hated leaving it when she had to escape the village.

Possibly sensing Dora's potential wobble, Jo said quickly, 'We'll sort everything like that out later. Just drink your wine and relax for a moment. We could go out for fish and chips,' she added.

Dora sniffed valiantly. 'That would suit me.’

‘When I think of all the proper meals I made for my husband, when really, I'd've been perfectly happy eating scrambled eggs and salad most of the time, it makes me realise what an utter waste of time marriage can be. You were very sensible not going through with your wedding.’

Dora took a sip of wine to see off the tears that still threatened. 'You should have heard my mother on the subject. I could have been a scarlet woman abandoning my six starving children to become a Madam in a brothel, the way she went on.’

Jo sighed. 'It would have been extremely hard work arranging the wedding, and cancelling it all would have been worse.'

‘I did offer to do it all, but she just took over.’

Dora's mother didn't trust Dora to do anything as grown up as organise a wedding, although she felt she was perfectly grown up enough to get married, even if Dora was only twenty-two.

‘She's a very efficient woman.'

‘Mm,' Dora muttered into her glass.

‘But it would have been quite wrong of you to have gone through with it if you didn't feel it was right, just to save face.'

‘That's what I think, but Mum didn't agree. She said she could never hold her head up in the village again, and wouldn't even let me send the wedding presents back! She was so furious she just wanted me out of her sight and to do it herself.'

‘If Karen had been here, you could have gone to her,' said Jo, 'but as she's not, she was quite right to suggest you came to me.'

‘I'm sure.' Dora sipped again. Somehow she did feel better just being here with Jo.

‘We're both running away, really,' said Jo, thoughtfully.

‘I'm running away from the wreckage of a marriage and you're running away from a wedding.'

‘Was it awful when your husband left you? Sorry!' said Dora. 'That sounds so stupid. Of course it was! I'm just thinking how John must have felt.'

‘He couldn't have felt quite the same as I did,' said Jo. 'I mean, he's in his twenties and has got all his life before him. He's bound to find someone else. I'm fifty, no one is going to want me.'

‘Oh, I'm sure that's not true..

Jo laughed. 'It's OK! I wouldn't have anyone else, not now. Years and years of my life I dedicated to my husband and child – did I get a long-service medal? No I did not. I got dumped for a younger woman. Such a cliché! He might have had the decency to leave me for a less humiliating reason. But no.' She frowned. 'He had the nerve to say, "If you met her, you'd understand. She's just like you were when you were young."‘

Dora took this in. 'Oh my God!'

‘It was as if he'd used me all up and needed a new one of me.'

‘I'd have murdered him!' Dora was suitably indignant.

‘I would have done if I'd had a weapon handy at the time, but fortunately the moment passed.' Jo chuckled. 'Actually, although I'm still livid when I think about it, I've had quite a lot of fun since I moved on to the barge. It was great being able to start afresh.'

‘I know Karen thought you'd want to stay in the house, where all your friends were.'

‘The trouble is, I didn't have a role any more. Philip wanted the house and the Floosie – that's what me and Karen call her – seemed happy with the idea.'

‘I'm not surprised! It's a lovely house. I have so many happy memories of being there.' Dora thought back tothose early experiments with make-up and weird hair styles, and the little plays she and Karen used to put on. 'Do you remember the soap opera we made with the video camera?'

‘ Pitrevie Drive ? Of course! The tapes are still up in the attic. You two were hysterical.'

‘It was fun. I do miss Karen.'

‘So do I, but I keep reminding myself that she hasn't gone for ever, only for a couple of years.'

‘I bet she wanted to come home when your husband left you!'

‘Of course. I had to tell her I'd never speak to her again if she did, though. I couldn't have her career messed up as well as my life.'

‘You're very strong. I'm sure Mum would have gone to pieces.’

Jo sipped her wine. 'I had my moments, but now I'm a strong, independent woman, with no intention of ever having any sort of relationship again.' She regarded Dora. 'I wouldn't want you never to have another relationship, but you will soon find that having a boyfriend isn't everything.’

Dora laughed wryly. 'Oh, I know that. I had one for years and years! It certainly wasn't everything.’

Jo chuckled and picked up some crisps.

‘But why couldn't you have stayed in the house? People would have rallied round, been nice to you, wouldn't they?' Dora thought about the lovely Georgian home with the garden that Jo had made so beautiful. Moving on to a barge must have felt a bit of a come-down – or a downsize at the very least.

Jo was eager to reassure her. 'Oh yes, everyone was very supportive while I was still there. They kept asking me out to girly lunches, found spare men for me, but I couldn't bear the pity. When I moved here, no one knew anything about my previous life and I felt I could start being someone different.' She frowned. 'Actually, not someone different, I mean the person I was all the time, when I was pretending to be a good woman who ran jumble sales and sat on committees.'

‘Didn't you like all that then?' Dora's mother loved nothing more than sitting at the head of a table of people with a glass of water and a clipboard.

‘Some of the time,' acknowledged Jo. 'Lots of it was pretty boring.' She sighed. 'I'm not on any committees now. It's bliss!' Then she bit her lip. 'Except I've got to help decorate the tables for the gala dinner tomorrow. I still haven't quite got the knack of not volunteering.'

‘And we've got to tidy up for the boat parade thing?’

‘Yes.'

‘I'm quite good at tidying. My mother forced me into being a tidy person.'

‘Huh! She had more luck than my mother did then! She tried to force me into being tidy too, but she never managed it. It's why I never told Karen to tidy her bedroom.’

Dora was utterly incredulous. 'What, never?'

‘Well, no, because there was never a moment when her room was worse than mine.' She sighed again. 'I think it may have been one of the reasons Philip left me, although he never said.'

‘You would like me to help? You wouldn't think I was being bossy?’

Jo put a hand on her knee and laughed. 'With a daughter like mine, no one even comes close in the bossy stakes. And anyway, I'm grateful for all the help I can get.’

Dora was almost as fond of Karen as Jo was but entirely agreed with the first statement. 'Shall we put some musicon? I've got a CD that always gives me energy. It's quite old, of course. One of Dad's, but I love it.’

Jo got up, laughing. 'That'll suit me fine, then. The CD player's over there.’

The heavy rock music did get Jo into the mood for cleaning. She'd meant to do it all before Dora came, of course, but after she'd done the bathroom and Dora's bedroom, there'd been no time for the saloon and kitchen.

Dora had purloined the Hoover and was putting her back into the floor. Jo was trying to clear the table, a much less satisfying task as it required decisions. Jo hated making decisions. Unaware that she was doing it, she put her hand in her pocket and found a piece of ribbon. It had come off a bale of tea towels she had bought for Dora's benefit. She squared off a pile of papers and magazines and tied the ribbon round it. Then she put it next to the bowl of fruit. She considered. Not quite an artistic statement, but it did make it look as if the papers needed to be there.

Living on her own had allowed her to become even more untidy than she had been before. When she was married, to a tidy man, she'd been forced to clean and tidy at boringly regular intervals. Now she was free of that she'd let things slide rather. She filled the dishwasher with her usual lightning speed. The rock music made her want to dance and she did wiggle about a bit as she wiped the surfaces in the kitchen, but really letting rip might have made Dora worry that she was now living with a lunatic. Worse, she might report back to Karen that her mother had finally lost it.

She wiped a cloth wrung out in a bleach solution round the portholes, where condensation, and then black mould, tended to gather. It wasn't her barge, she only rented it, but it was her home. When Michael, an old university friend of Philip's, had offered it as a place she might go to, she'd been thrilled.

Philip had been totally against the idea. 'You could never live on a boat!' he had said. 'It's a ridiculous idea! Why not rent a flat or a house somewhere instead?’

Any idea that living on a barge might not be a good idea had evaporated at his words. Living in a cut-down, lesser version of what she was used to would be humiliating. Finding a completely different solution seemed a much better idea. 'Because I want to live on a barge,' she'd said firmly, 'and there's nothing you can do to stop me!’

There had been a side to Philip that was quite controlling, and the realisation that he'd forfeited his right to tell his wife what he felt was best for her had caused him to fall silent for a moment. 'Well, don't come running to me if it all goes wrong!' he had said eventually.

‘Philip, you have left me for a younger woman. If I need anything from you at any time, I will ask for it!' She had taken a breath. 'For nearly thirty years I looked after you and Karen, I gave up my career, I kept up the house and garden, I did my bit for the community and I entertained your boring business friends for dinner. You owe me!'

‘You are a wonderful cook,' he'd said, trying to placate the woman who had become much stronger than she had been during their marriage.

‘I know! But I'm no longer your wonderful cook!’

‘Oh, Jo, I do feel bad! You know I do-'

‘Well, how do you think I feel! I'll tell you: discarded. Like a bit of old carpet that did sterling service for years and then is dragged off to the local tip! That's how I feel. And if I want to live on a barge, I will.’

Michael had been very pleased to think his barge might have a tenant. She had met him and he had shown her round.

‘I'm going to be out of the country for at least a year, and boats don't like being left with no one to look after them. You'll be doing me a favour.'

‘It was very kind of you to think of me,' Jo had said. 'Well, I wouldn't have thought of you if Philip hadn't emailed me and told me what had happened.'

‘He did that? How odd! I didn't think you saw each other often enough for that.'

‘Oh, we haven't met for years, but we've got each other's email addresses, and he sent one to everyone in his "old friends" file in his address book.'

‘He didn't!’

Michael had nodded. 'I don't think he's proud of it, Jo. He just felt he had to tell everyone.’

Jo had sighed, trying not to feel betrayed all over again. 'Oh well, it's worked out to my advantage. It's a beautiful barge, and I'm going to love living here.' Especially when she discovered she'd still be able to email Karen and use her mobile, from certain parts of the barge anyway.

‘It's a good community,' Michael had said. 'People from all walks of life live here. Some most of the time, some just for weekends, but they're a good bunch. They'll rally round if necessary.’

Jo had started to say that it wouldn't be necessary, but then realised there was a lot to learn about boat life and she probably would need to call on people for help from time to time, so didn't.

Three weeks later, she'd moved on to the barge. Philip had brought her things, guilt making him extremely helpful. After a few teething problems, when she had needed help to make the pump-out function, she had taken to it like the proverbial duck to water.

‘As long as I don't have to go anywhere,' she had said to Michael on the phone when he'd rung up to check that she'd settled in. 'I'll be absolutely fine!’

And now she had Dora. If Dora's situation hadn't been desperate, she would have suspected her daughter Karen of planting Dora. While she hadn't really been lonely, she was programmed to look after people. Having a broken hearted surrogate daughter was just what she needed.

Soon, she'd have to think about earning a living. Philip had given her quite a large amount of money and she looked on this as a redundancy payment. She'd had no qualms about accepting it. Eventually, when they got divorced, she'd probably be entitled to at least some of the value of the house, but until then, she wanted to keep as much of her lump sum intact as she could. And although having Dora would give her life more focus, she needed something else to do. Since she'd arrived on the barge she'd spent her spare time redoing the paintwork in the original boatman's cabin, which was her bedroom. This was a painstaking activity she mostly did when there was something good on the radio. It involved much sanding down and filling and she had only got to the painting stage quite recently. She looked on it as payback for being given somewhere to live at quite a low rent. But eventually, she knew, she'd have to get a job.

The trouble was, at fifty, she was virtually unemploy able. She hadn't been tempted to go to university and had done a secretarial course instead. Then she'd had office jobs. But those skills were no use to her now. Even if she went on a computer course, no one would take her on without recent office experience and her most recent office experience, if you discounted all the voluntary work she had done over the years, had been working for a manage ment consultancy in London over twenty-five years ago. She had had to beg for an electric typewriter.

She'd had a computer for several years now, and had used it to write minutes, create notices and, more latterly, to shop over the Internet. But she couldn't do spreadsheets, or use accountancy packages, or any of the things a modern office would require.

‘And even if I could,' she had said to Karen, 'no one would take me on at my age.’

Her daughter had tutted but acknowledged the truth of this.

So she'd have to create her own job and work for herself, but for now she had Dora to look after. And they both had a rally to take part in.

‘I'm shattered,' she called to Dora, who was scrubbing the grout round the kitchen tiles with a toothbrush. 'Are you hungry yet?'

‘Mm. Definitely. Do you want me to go for the fish and chips?'

‘We'll go together and I'll show you where the shops are. You deserve a reward. I truly am grateful for your help, especially on your first night here.’

As they passed the shower block Jo suddenly stopped. 'Oh, Dora, I'm so sorry, I've got a letter for you. Seeing where we pick up our post reminded me.' She burrowed about in her handbag and gave the envelope to Dora.

‘That's Dad's handwriting,' she said.

‘You don't have to open it now,' said Jo after a moment, when she saw the look on Dora's face. 'You can do it another time. Let's go. I can almost smell the vinegar.’

They ate most of their supper on the way home. 'After all, we don't want to make more clearing up,' said Dora, who was, Jo realised, a girl after her own heart.