Bad Behaviour Read online

  Susie came to stay in October. Her character in the soap was due to be killed off and after a pantomime in the Midlands she had nothing to look forward to.

  ‘Will you ask Tom for a job for me?’ They were sitting in Hester's new office at the Hall drinking fresh coffee from Royal Doulton mugs. ‘I could be a hostess or something. For conferences.’

  Hester crossed her legs, enjoying the feel of expensive sheer tights sliding under her silk slip. She looked over the top of her glasses at Susie lounging opposite.

  ‘Can't you ask him yourself?’

  ‘You know I can't.’ Susie said morosely. ‘He doesn't want me around. All I was good for was to bring him down to the Hall and introduce him to you.’

  ‘Don't be silly.’ Hester stood up, smoothing her skirt over hips that delighted her with their new slimness. ‘If you want to do me a favour, go home and make sure Peter's put the casserole in the oven for supper. He doesn't always remember.’

  ‘Well, he's hardly used to having a career woman as a wife, is he?’ Susie snapped as she slammed out the room.

  It was the following evening after a late meeting at the Hall that the telephone call came asking Hester to come home quickly.

  ‘Dad's gone off and Susie's locked herself in the spare room. She's crying. I think they had a row.’

  Tom took charge, fetching her coat and driving her the short distance home before sweeping the children off to McDonalds and leaving Hester to talk Susie out of the spare room.

  ‘I'm sorry,’ she said coming out slowly, her huge eyes red-rimmed under dishevelled blonde hair. ‘I've packed. I'm going.’

  ‘But why?’ Hester followed her downstairs, bewildered. ‘What did you have a row about?’

  ‘It doesn't matter.’ Susie refused to meet her eyes. ‘Where are the children?’

  ‘Tom took them to McDonalds. Where's Peter?’

  ‘God knows.’ Susie's voice wobbled. ‘Didn't he tell the children?’

  ‘No. They said he let them in and then stormed out of the house. They were rather scared, I think.’

  ‘I expect they were.’ Susie gave Hester a nasty look. ‘Their mother hasn't been here very much, has she? They haven't got anyone to turn to!’

  ‘What?’ Hester gasped. ‘How dare you! I'm working to keep the family - you know that! So do they - and so does Peter!’

  ‘Oh, yes, they all know.’ Susie went back towards the stairs. ‘I'm going to collect my things.’

  ‘Susie! What do you mean? Tell me what’s happened!’ Hester grabbed hold of Susie's arm, which Susie detached immediately.

  ‘Ask Peter. If he comes back.’

  ‘If he comes back?‘

  ‘He won't while I'm still here. I made sure of that.’ Susie turned and went upstairs.

  Hester sat down abruptly, discovering that she was shaking and surprisingly, short of breath. She could hear Susie moving around upstairs, in the bathroom and the spare room, the click of the light switch and finally footsteps coming back down. She stood up again and took a deep breath. Susie reappeared, her hair falling over her face and conveniently hiding her expression.

  ‘I'm sorry. I expect it was my fault - don't they say that women always feel guilty? But I won't be able to come back. If Tom wants to see me, tell him to ring me in London, will you?’

  Hester felt the grip of something decidedly unpleasant somewhere under her rib cage.

  ‘He didn't..?’ she whispered, and had to sit down again.

  ‘He tried.’ Susie's expression was grim. ‘He didn't succeed. What he said to me was just as bad.’

  ‘Wh-what...?’ Hester's brain didn't seem to be sending the correct messages to her mouth.

  ‘That now you had Tom and my career was going down the drain I should be grateful.’ Susie shrugged. ‘Something like that.’ She went to the front door and opened it. ‘I'll be in touch.’

  She hadn’t been. And Peter hadn't even tried to deny anything. He had directed a tirade of bitter abuse at his wife and left. That had been the last time Hester had seen either of them.

  Her gaze focused on the chestnut trees again and she sighed. How had the years dealt with Susie? Susie who had despised Hester for staying at home with a husband she didn't really love and her children, who she did. Of whose beautiful face and figure she had been so jealous, yet so vicariously proud.

  A hand came down on her shoulder and she turned to meet the familiar dark gaze of her husband.

  ‘Have you been in yet?’ asked Tom.

  Hester shook her head. ‘I still can't face it.’

  ‘She asked for you. She didn't really blame you for Peter trying to rape her. You know that. She only blamed you for becoming as successful as she had been.’

  ‘Oh, Tom! She was a famous actress! I was only…’

  ‘A very successful businesswoman.’ He kissed her. ‘And I married you. Without wanting to sound too cocky, that really upset her. It would have been all right if it had been anybody but you.’

  ‘I know…’ Hester sounded miserable. ‘So why does she want to see me?’

  Tom smiled and pushed her gently towards the door. ‘You know the answer to that.’

  She caught a brief glimpse of her reflection in the polished chrome plating on the heavy door; a slim, worried middle-aged woman, brow furrowed over huge glasses, her elegant red suit a little crumpled, short dark hair ruffled up as if anxious hands had ploughed through it. She took a deep breath and pushed open the door.

  The room was quiet, very bright. The woman sitting on the edge of the high iron bed in a floral cotton nightdress had her head bent over the small white bundle in her arms. She raised her head and looked round slowly, her familiar brilliant smile spreading over plump features as she held out a hand sporting a gleaming wedding ring.

  ‘Hello, Mum,’ said Susie.

  Hay fever

  ‘Watch it!’ Helen grabbed the ladder as Sean sneezed again. ‘For goodness’ sake! Haven’t you taken your pills this morning?’

  Sean rubbed his eyes and nodded. ‘I think I need stronger ones.’ He began to descend the ladder.

  ‘You can’t have stronger ones. If you did, you couldn’t work or drive the van. They’d make you too dizzy.’ Helen pushed her hair back from her damp forehead.

  ‘You could drive the van.’ Sean was mopping at his swollen eyes.

  ‘I can’t go up the ladder, though. You can’t have a decorator who can’t stand heights. Especially an exterior decorator.’

  ‘You can’t have one with chronic hay fever, either.’ Sean sat down gloomily on the garden wall. ‘We’ll have to give it up.’

  Helen gave an exasperated sigh. ‘Again? Like you did with the delivery service? And the sandwich business? And the light removals?’

  ‘It’s not my fault!’ Sean shifted uneasily. ‘I can’t help my bad back or my eczema.’

  ‘And I can’t help you, either!’ said Helen warningly. ‘I agreed to give this a try until I got another job, but one of us has got to be earning a decent salary or we’ll never pay off our debts.’

  ‘It’s all right for you.’ Sean kicked at a pebble, not looking at her. ‘You can go and get a job anywhere. I can’t.’

  ‘If you hadn’t left the building society because they didn’t understand you…’

  ‘I wanted my independence! You know that.’ Sean glared at her from his almost-closed eyes.

  ‘Pity you don’t want to be independent of me.’ Helen glared back.

  Sean stood up. ‘Oh, come on, let’s get this job finished. I’ve only got to do the bedroom window frames and that’s it. Then I’ll pack it in.’

  ‘You won’t be able to see to paint. And if you start sneezing again you’ll fall, like you nearly did just now.’

  ‘Not if you stay at the bottom and hold the ladder. It won’t take me more than half an hour.’

  Helen sighed and replaced the baseball cap on her head. She was getting fed up with this. Give her a nice air-conditioned office any day, with a regu
lar pay cheque every month, even if it was boring. At least the bills got paid that way, and there was a growing sum in the building society towards a holiday - even a mortgage. At least, there had been. Until Sean had wanted his independence. Then had come the expenses. She had paid for the van and the insurance. Insurance for Sean, too. She’d had to shoulder all the other burdens in the last few months; the rent, the bills, his overdraft charges. He’d moved in with her three months ago to save rent, so her independence had gone completely. He never thought about that.

  She squinted up at him on the ladder. He’d been so good looking when she first met him in the building society. Beautiful auburn hair and sharp suits, and in bed - well! She thought she’d struck it lucky at last. But it had really been Sean who’d struck it lucky with her. Mousy little Helen, who’d only been out with one or two boys before - and they hadn’t exactly been world beaters.

  ‘Nearly finished!’ He called down. ‘I’ll come back later this afternoon and check that the windows open all right, so we’ll leave the ladder here.’

  Helen nodded and grabbed the ladder as he sneezed again. If he wasn’t careful it would be the last job he did, sneezing like that. Something would have to be done about his hay fever.

  They went back to the flat for lunch and Helen began leafing through the holiday brochures she’d collected from the travel agent while she ate her tuna sandwich.

  ‘I’d give up that idea, if I were you.’ Sean was looking better, sitting with his feet up on the coffee table, a can of lager in his hand.

  ‘What idea?’ She frowned at him.

  ‘Foreign holidays. I can’t make enough money - and anyway, I couldn’t stand the heat, could I? Or the pollen.’

  ‘You could take your antihistamine pills - stronger ones. You wouldn’t be working or driving on holiday, would you?’

  ‘Ah!’ He wagged a finger at her. ‘But I’d be drinking, wouldn’t I? Can’t take them together.’

  ‘You needn’t drink.’ Helen lowered her eyes to the highly coloured picture of a Caribbean beach, wistfully.

  Sean shrugged. ‘Wouldn’t be much of a holiday, then, would it?’

  Helen sighed and stood up. ‘I’ll go and make the coffee. We’d better get on if you’ve got to check on that job and collect the ladder.’

  ‘OK. But you needn’t come. I’m much better, now - haven’t sneezed for ages - and I’ve only got to pop up the ladder for a minute. And make that coffee a bit stronger, this time, eh? I could hardly taste it this morning!’

  Helen gritted her teeth and went in to the kitchen.

  It was about half past five when she and the client found Sean’s body on the patio underneath the ladder and about three hours later when she sat in their sumptuous lounge being plied with brandy and sympathy.

  ‘He had hay fever, didn’t he, dear? I remember him sneezing and the ladder wobbling.’

  ‘Yes - the police think that’s why he fell.’ Helen wiped away a tear. ‘He took his antihistamine pills this morning, but he had a lager at lunchtime and wouldn’t take any more because they react with alcohol.’

  ‘But those pills make you dizzy, anyway, don’t they?’ Mrs Wilson patted her hand. ‘So he shouldn’t have been up that ladder either way, really, should he? I hope he was insured!’ She looked uncomfortable. ‘Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.’

  ‘That’s all right.’ Helen gave a tremulous smile. ‘We’d just upped the insurance as a matter of fact. And at least the last cup of coffee I made for him was just how he liked it - really strong and sweet and bitter.’

  Just the thing to hide the taste of all those anti-histamine pills that had dissolved completely along with the sugar.

  A Sponge Too Far

  Written live on air on Radio Kent. So it’s short!

  ‘Mrs Munnings! Whatever do you think you're doing?’

  The tall, spare figure of the headmistress bent vulture like towards Mrs Munnings, hovering, pink and shiny, by the cookers.

  ‘Er…’ said Mrs Munnings. A squeal issued from the other side of the room. ‘Donna! Stop that! Please! I've told you... Oh, dear!’ She cast a despairing look round the chaos that was the Home Economics department.

  ‘Mrs Munnings!’ hissed the Headmistress. ‘In twenty minutes time the governors will be starting their inspection - and do I have to remind you that they start here?’

  ‘Er...’ said Mrs Munnings.

  The head threw a reproachful look at the photograph hanging over the fire extinguisher. ‘Come back, Miss Gooch, all is forgiven,’ that look seemed to say, as she swept from the room.

  The kitchen was a mess. Gleaming stainless steel surfaces resembled the dirty rough sea of the estuary, scummy, smeary and undulating, reflecting sudden startling flashes of watery sunlight through grimy windows. Outside, Mrs Munnings could hear excited voices, music - or at least she thought it was music - coming in disjointed bursts through a loudspeaker. She sat down dispiritedly on a slightly wobbly kitchen stool and rested a weary head on a sticky hand.

  ‘I am a failure,’ she said out loud to the empty kitchen.

  On the far counter, stood the efforts of her pupils. Neatly iced Victoria sponges, all perfectly risen, filled with the jam they had made with the glut of strawberries three months earlier. And Donna's stood in front of her, mocking, its burnt sides collapsed, the icing a grey mess like overworked playdough.

  Mrs Munnings stood up and straightened her apron. On the wall, the photograph of her predecessor, the immaculate Miss Gooch, smiled down at her in superior fashion, not a hair out of place.

  ‘It's all right for you,’ Mrs Munnings told her. ‘You never made a failed sponge. You always had perfect pupils, you always kept this unit spotless, you always got them good grades in their exams.’ She sighed. Why had she turned to teaching so late in life? Why did she think she could do it?

  ‘Miss! Miss!’ A breathless voice panted behind her. ‘You've still got your apron on!’

  ‘So I have!’ Mrs Munnings smiled down at the small round child beside her.

  ‘Shall I put it away for you?’

  ‘Thank you, Donna.’

  Donna looked thoughtfully at her cake. ‘I'm sorry about that Miss.’

  ‘Never mind, Donna. I’m sure there's something else you're good at.’

  ‘Getting into trouble, Miss Baring says.’ Donna was mournful. ‘She's asked to see my Mum about it.’

  'Oh, dear, has she?’

  ‘I can't seem...’ Donna's voice wobbled suspiciously. Mrs Munnings was silent for a moment.

  ‘Well, I'm not all that good at being a teacher, am I Donna? Not as good as Miss Gooch. But I'm a very good cook. You'll find something you're good at, believe me’

  ‘I do like cooking, Mrs Munnings. Things like casseroles and roast dinners - and vegetarian stuff - I love that. And anyway, I think you're a good teacher. We all do.’ Donna looked round in a conspiratorial fashion. ‘We didn't like Miss Gooch ‘

  Mrs Munnings pushed down an altogether unaccustomed surge of pleasure and pride. What did Headmistresses matter if the girls liked you? She slipped briskly off the stool and whipped off her apron.

  ‘Well, how about if you give me a hand, Donna? You help me and I'll see what I can do for you. Let's take my cake out of the oven, for a start.’

  Twenty minutes later, the door opened on a spotlessly clean Home Economics department, six neat little girls ranged primly in front of the table on which stood six beautifully iced cakes, and one only slightly shiny teacher.

  ‘How lovely! May we try the cakes?’ asked the chairperson of the governors, her hat bobbing with enthusiasm.

  Miss Baring turned and looked down a nose considerably elevated.

  Six little hands held out six little plates and the governors crowded round to sample the proffered delicacies. Through a haze, Mrs Munnings heard the snatches of conversation.

  ‘Your own jam?'

  ‘All of you?

  ‘You grew them?’

  ‘So li
ght!’

  At last silence fell and Mrs Munnings looked up. With as much precision as a dance troop, her girls fell in beside her and fixed their eyes on Miss Baring.

  ‘Donna?’

  ‘Yes, Miss Baring?’

  ‘Was this your cake?’

  Only Mrs Munnings saw the fingers crossed behind Donna's back. ‘Yes, Miss Baring.’

  ‘Well done.’ Miss Baring turned her flock towards the door, where she turned and looked over her shoulder at the immaculate scene behind her.

  ‘Well done, Mrs Munnings. Carry on.’

  Mrs Munnings smiled.

  Temptation

  ‘Temptation,’ said the fairy, ‘is a test of how good you really are.’

  Lindy folded socks into a basket and cast a wry eye at the television screen. Resisting temptation was the proof of how good you are, she wanted to say. I must be very, very good.

  ‘If you saw a lovely scrubbed carrot,’ went on the fairy, ‘just lying there, would you take it? Or would you think that maybe it belonged to somebody else?’

  ‘Like Peter Rabbit,’ Simon nodded solemnly, taking his thumb out of his mouth to speak.

  Lindy picked up the washing basket and carried it to the stairs. She didn’t want to listen to goody-goody fairies lecturing about temptation. She wanted to give in to temptation - desperately. She climbed the stairs, littered dangerously with Simon’s toys, and began to unload the washing into the airing cupboard. If she gave in to temptation this would stop, she thought. This careful washing and mending of clothes well past their wear-by date, the almost permanent tiredness caused by trying to keep a home going and do two part-time jobs, as well as looking after a demanding four-year-old. If she gave in to temptation, she could be whisked away from all this, buy Simon a bike, be surrounded by freshly papered walls and luxurious curtains at windows that looked out over beautiful views instead of grim narrow streets and rows and rows of grey slate roofs.

  She put the last neatly folded jumper into the airing cupboard, shut the door and sighed. Time to get ready for work. She went into the bedroom and began to change into her pink and white checked overall before opening the drawer beside the bed and taking out the photograph. She studied the handsome face that smiled out at her as she did every day and wondered what the fairy on the television would say about her particular form of temptation. Nothing, probably. Her voice would become suspended with shock and horror. Lindy giggled as she imagined the fairy flapping wildly round with her gauzy wings trying to stop all the dear children listening to this terrible woman.