New Arrivals

19

New Arrivals

    John Aitken, having sold what little remained of his furniture after Felicity’s depredations, and packed his books and shipped them off to New Zealand blissfully unaware that he wouldn’t see them again for at least another six months, got on a British Airways jumbo on a grey, miserable August summer morning at Heathrow, and arrived in New Zealand on a grey, miserable August winter morning that was very little different from the one he’d left. Not having had a stopover, he felt too stunned to do anything except get his briefcase, himself and his one suitcase through the Customs and Agriculture inspections, crawl into a taxi and decant himself into his hotel. There he slept for fourteen hours.

    “Where?” said the taxi driver blankly next morning.

    John had been abroad before, but New Zealand was supposed to be an English-speaking country! “Just a minute,” he said slowly and carefully. “I’ll write it down for you.” He wrote “Pacific Institute of Political Studies, University Drive, Puriri,” on a blank page of his address book and showed it to the man.

    “Puriri?” said the driver incredulously. “Ya don’t wanna take a taxi all the way up there, mate; it’ll cost you a fortune!”

    “Oh. How much, exactly?” asked John doubtfully.

    The driver told him. For good measure he told him how far it was.

    John looked at him in horror.

    “I could take ya down the Bus Terminal,” said the man kindly. “But your best bet’d be to hire a car, if you’re gonna be going up to Puriri much.” He looked at him enquiringly.

    John said weakly: “Yes... I suppose I’ll have to find a flat there, too, if it’s that far away.”

    “Come out to live here, have ya?” said the driver with interest. There were no other fares in sight, as it was only eight o’clock.

    “Yes; I’m going to be working at the Institute,” said John, wondering why it was that other people never got themselves into a position of being interrogated by perfect strangers but he always seemed to. There’d been that terrible old lady on the plane, too: she’d seemed to want to know every detail of his personal life, not to mention imparting all of hers, and it had been both extremely embarrassing and very boring.

    “You’ll definitely need a car, then,” said the driver cheerfully. “I’ll take you down the nearest rental car place, eh?”

    “Yes; thank you,” agreed John, not realizing that the downtown office wouldn’t be open yet and that he should turn round and go back into the hotel and get the receptionist to arrange a car for him.

    On the way the taxi driver told him all about the weather conditions this winter, which had apparently been rather wet and windy, and interrogated him as to whereabouts in England he came from, and said Aw, yeah? and he had relations somewhere over there, in a place called Sheffield, was that anywhere near Bath? Not really, said John weakly.

    Of course the rental car office wasn’t open, and there was a nasty little wind blowing, though it wasn’t really cold. John hunched into his turned-up collar and mooched around for a bit. Then he went for a little walk. The office still wasn’t open when he came back from it. Then he went for a much bigger walk, got caught up in a crowd of office workers, and got lost. He had to ask four people before he found one who could direct him.

    He hadn’t driven for years—not since Felicity took the car, in fact—but a practical colleague, on learning where he was bound for, had found out a lot about New Zealand from somebody he knew who’d once been out there, and made quite sure that his driving licence was OK. This practical friend had also made sure that John would arrive in the country both with plenty of travellers’ cheques and with some New Zealand currency; which was just as well, because the small banking agency at the International Airport had been closed when his plane arrived.

    It took him some time to get onto the right motorway, but he did actually manage it, though this was due to good luck and not at all to good judgement. Since the taxi driver had told him how far it was he kept an anxious eye on the mileage, and when he seemed to have done about twenty miles, turned off at the nearest settlement.

    “Puriri?” said the garage man incredulously. “It’s another good twenny-five K, mate!”

    “Oh; I thought it was about twenty miles from the city,” said John uncertainly.

    “Yeah, it is—more or less; you’ve come about twelve miles.”

    “But… I was sure I counted twenty miles; this speedometer must have something wrong with it,” said John, staring blankly at it.

    The garage man gave a sudden shout of laughter. “That’s not miles, mate; that’s killer metres!”

    “K— Oh!” said John, going very red.

    Chuckling, the garage man suggested on a cosy note: “Fill ’er up, eh?”

    The rental car place had assured him that all their cars had full tanks; however John said weakly: “Er—yes, if you could just top it up, thanks,” and paid over a sheaf of quite unnecessary dollars.

    The grinning service station attendant retired within his banks of soft-drink bottles, wrapped sliced bread, Crunchie Bars, and other necessities for today’s driving public, and informed his mate that they’d had a right one, there.

    “Aw,” said his mate tolerantly. “A Pom. Whaddidja r’expect, Gav?”

    John drove slowly and carefully northwards for about another twenty-five K, and found himself out of the dreary grey weather and in a little seaside settlement where the sky, though filled with ragged clouds, was blue, and the sun was shining in spite of the brisk wind. By now it was getting on for lunchtime, and although he’d eaten an enormous breakfast as soon as he felt he could decently ring Room Service, that had been hours ago; he was starving again, and felt he really couldn’t face his new place of employment until he’d had lunch. So he parked the car in a side street, pleased to find there were no parking meters back there, and for walked a considerable distance along the waterfront past what seemed like an interminable number of motels until he found The Primrose Café. The coffee was no worse than what he was used to back in England, and the sandwiches were very tasty, and so was the piece of quiche. He felt much happier after this, and walked slowly back to the car with his overcoat over his arm, enjoying the warmth of the day.

    … “Yes, of course; Dr Aitken! Welcome to the Institute!” said Marianne, smiling. She got up, shook hands, and introduced herself. “I’ll just see if Dr Macdonald’s free.”

    She knew he was, of course—at least, he was in his office by himself reading a magazine, which Marianne now understood was an activity that came under the heading of work to academics. However, it wouldn’t have been etiquette to admit this, so she buzzed him, and Hamish, very pleased to be interrupted (it was an American journal), came out immediately and shook hands.

    John was very pleased by the warmth of their welcome, for he’d been feeling himself very much a stranger in a strange land, what with the killer metres and the unexpected distance the Institute was from the University’s address; his alienation had been increased, not decreased, by the fact that, after the garage attendant who had chuckled, no-one had seemed to notice he was a foreigner at all—they had, of course, but there were thousands of British residents in New Zealand and naturally no-one had realized he was straight off the plane.

    Hamish asked him nicely how his flight had been, and John, recognizing this for the conventional enquiry it was, didn’t tell him, but merely said that it had been very smooth.

    They hadn’t expected him today, so after he’d gone into Hamish’s office Marianne shot into the Ladies’ and divided the bunch of flowers off her own desk into an unequal two, and put the larger lot on John’s desk. Hamish didn’t even notice this effort when he took John in there, but John was very touched by it.

    Then they had a quick tour of the prefab, and John was introduced to Caro Webber and Val Shipley from the Library, and Val’s new assistant, Julia Peters (who used to work for Dent, Foreman, Shapiro) and finally, to Charlie Roddenberry, who’d just come in after an early lunch. Charlie shook hands enthusiastically, but was a little disappointed to see that their new Lecturer seemed like a real Britisher. John was a trifle disconcerted by Charlie’s obvious Americanness—in spite of the New Zealand natural wool Aran-knit sweater that was keeping his well-shaped, wiry chest warm under his Californian tweed jacket. Since it was such a sunny afternoon Hamish then took John over to the building site, where he informed him with approval that the Library would be ready for commissioning by the end of the year, and they hoped to have its official opening ceremony at the beginning of the next academic year.

    “Next September?” said John incautiously.

    Hamish laughed. “No; next March!”

    “Oh; of course,” mumbled John, flushing behind his curly beard.

    The sun was still shining, so they strolled round the campus. Cautiously John asked where the main campus was. Hamish explained this and told him a lot about the University Library, in particular its history collection. John hadn’t majored in history so he was a bit nonplussed by this. He wanted to ask Hamish about accommodation in Puriri but felt too shy to do so. Hamish didn’t think of this, so he didn’t mention it. He took John back to his office and got out this year’s University Calendar and a copy of the Institute’s shiny new prospectus for next year and explained with satisfaction that the latter, having been well circulated amongst all the Antipodean universities, was already, together with their advertisements in the relevant journals and newspapers, starting to net them applications from as far afield as Perth and Dunedin. John looked at him in astonishment.

   Suddenly Hamish gave a huge laugh and said: “No, no! I mean Perth, Australia, and Dunedin, New Zealand, of course!”

    His Scottish accent was so strong as he said these names that John, who of course then laughed, too, couldn’t have said if he was laughing more at his natural mistake or at the incongruity of it all.

    Hamish then went over, in great detail, the complexities of the degree structure and the relationship between the Institute and the University. John, who had no head at all for such administrative matters, was thoroughly bewildered at the end of this session, in spite of the fact that Marianne had brought in a delightful afternoon tea on a pretty tray shortly after it commenced.

    When Hamish finally let him go, with a mountain of bumf that included next year’s course plans that he might like to glance through as soon as he had the chance, John just sat limply at his desk with his door closed for some time.

    Then there was a soft tap on the door. John jumped, and called: “Come in!”

    Pretty Miss Davies came in, smiling, and said of course he wouldn’t have had time to think about this, yet, but she’d sorted out some information about properties available up here on the Hibiscus Coast: was he thinking of renting or buying, at first? John was paying enormous sums in maintenance to Felicity; he said weakly that he’d be renting.

    “Then I’ll leave these with you,” said Marianne, putting some papers in his in-tray, “and do ask me, if there’s any way I can help, won’t you?”

    “Yes; thank you very much. Um, I was wondering—” he said, as she turned to go.

    “Yes?” said Marianne, smiling.

    Very pretty, smartly-dressed secretaries intimidated John, but he looked into her friendly brown eyes and felt less intimidated than usual. “Uh—well, it’s such a drive from my hotel; would there be a hotel in Puriri?”

    “Not a hotel,” said Marianne firmly, “but there are lots of motels. I know of a very nice one, The Blue Heron; it’s not on the main road like most of them are. It’s very quiet and pleasant; I think you’d like it.” She tried not to look at his shabby tweed jacket and ancient grey jersey, and added: “It wouldn’t be nearly as expensive as those hotels in town, either—they’re really terrible: tourist traps!”—with a little laugh.

    “That sounds wonderful. Thank you,” said John weakly.

    Marianne looked at him kindly. The Carrano Group had had no such persons on its staff, of course, but she recognized in him the sort of man who isn’t very good at practical things and lets other people ride rough-shod over him. Gently she said: “If you’d like me to, I could give them a ring and see if they’ve got a room.”

    “Oh—ah—would you? Thank you very much,” said John, flushing under his beard.

    Marianne asked him how soon he’d like to move, and John said as soon as possible; so she went off to her office and capably booked him a nice, quiet room.

    Up at the far end of Pukeko Drive at The Blue Heron Molly Collingwood was only too pleased to have a customer in the middle of the off-season. Even though they’d expanded into a little restaurant, built on what had been an empty field next to the motel, and were starting to do very nicely out of it, they could always do with off-season custom at the motel. When her husband came in from checking that the restaurant was all neat and clean again after the lunchtime trade and ready for the evening trade, she told him about it.

    Mike Collingwood laughed and said they ought to give that secretary up at the Institute a commission, she sent them so much custom! Which indeed Marianne did; she’d looked at innumerable motels in Puriri before deciding that The Blue Heron was the only one that was quiet enough, and in nice enough taste, to appeal to their staff. –Or, indeed, to Maurice Black: she had stayed there for a week herself when she was in-between her city flat and the new, much nicer, Puriri flat that she’d decided to buy.

    Molly laughed, too, and agreed. Since their helper who looked after the motel office and switchboard in the evenings had arrived to take over, she and Mike went off to have an early tea before they opened up the restaurant. Once upon a time Molly, who’d been a widow when they’d met, wouldn’t have bothered much with tea; she probably would just have had a cheese toastie or a sandwich out at the reception desk. But now that she was living with Mike she ate proper meals—and had lost a bit of weight, because she no longer got cravings for chocolate bars—and felt and looked much better for it. So they had a nice, light salmon quiche and a salad, because Molly wanted to keep Mike’s tummy as flat as it had been when she’d first met him, about three years ago.

    Mike, who adored Molly, and adored her cooking, and couldn’t believe his luck in having found her after his rotten first marriage had come very much unstuck and he’d started to think there was nothing much left in life except his job in the Police, that he’d started to have doubts about, kissed her very tenderly after tea and told her to take it easy, she wasn’t the ruddy customers’ kitchen slave—and not to take those rings off to wash her hands on pain of instant dismissal from the Collingwood family! At which Molly obligingly gave a loud giggle. He went off cheerfully to do his impersonation of a maître d’—which after being a Chief Detective Inspector he still felt was an impersonation—and Molly put on a fresh apron and bustled into the restaurant’s kitchen to oversee the dinners for tonight’s handful of customers, in a state of blissful happiness.

    “My, this is pretty!” said Missy Nakamura, looking about her with pleasure at the view of Puriri as Fred prepared to drive the Hertz hire car they’d arranged to have waiting for them at the airport down a hill and over a little bridge. “A bit like—uh—Monterey, wouldn’t you say, Jo-Beth?”

    Jo-Beth, in the back seat next to little Harry in his child restraint, said: “Yeah; or maybe Santa Barbara; what do you think, Fred?”

    “Venice,” said Fred decisively, driving very slowly and carefully on the “wrong” side of the road down into Puriri. His female belongings agreed that it was kinda like Venice, too!—-neither of them making the mistake of thinking he meant Venice, Italy.

    Fred drew cautiously into the kerb, and, because the driver’s seat was on the wrong side, too, asked Missy to ask that old lady if this was Puriri, honey.

    Missy did.

    The elderly Mrs Tonks was terribly surprised to hear a nice, clear, American voice issuing forth from that pretty little Japanese face—at which she’d blenched, for Puriri, though rather off the beaten tourist track, did occasionally get the odd Japanese tourist, partly because of its lovely beach and partly because it was on the main north highway; and which was more embarrassing, the ones whose English you couldn’t understand a word of, or the ones who couldn’t speak a word of English, Mrs Tonks honestly couldn’t have said.

    She beamed at Missy and said: “Yes, that’s right; this is Puriri, dear!”

    “I suppose you couldn’t direct us to The Blue Heron Motel, could you, ma’am?” asked Fred, leaning across Missy.

    The fact that the Nakamuras were booked into The Blue Heron was not a coincidence; even Jo-Beth’s impressive reference skills had failed to elicit any information whatsoever about Puriri, so she’d very sensibly written to the Institute’s Secretary asking if she could send them a list of reasonably priced motels handy to the Institute. Marianne had not only sent the list, she had also sent them a map of Puriri County, all the tourist brochures about the Hibiscus Coast and its environs that she could find, a copy of the local free weekly, and the seventy-fifth jubilee booklet of Puriri Primary School (the only other published information on Puriri she could dig up). She’d accompanied all this with a very pleasant covering letter in which she explained that, although the Nakamuras would, of course, want to make their own minds up, she could heartily recommend The Blue Heron. Adding if there was anything at all they would like to know about Puriri, or New Zealand living conditions, not to hesitate to let her know.

    Had she written anything like this last to John Aitken—and, in fact, she had written something rather like it—he would naturally have assumed it to be merely a polite form. The Nakamuras had, however, taken her at her word, and Fred had written asking her if there was any more information she could send them on the types and prices of properties in the area, and enclosing a letter from his wife. Missy, who’d been getting cold feet about moving all those thousands of miles to a foreign country, had wanted to know about baby foods, and diapers, and baby products, and children’s clothes, and whether there was a good pediatrician in Puriri. Marianne, with quite a lot of help from Pam Anderson on the more maternal bits, and some assistance from Polly Carrano on the more up-to-date maternal bits, had replied in great detail to all of this. Missy and Fred had written back a joint letter of thanks. They were looking forward to meeting Marianne, and Marianne was looking forward to meeting them.

    Most of Puriri’s motels were on the waterfront, which was where they were at this moment, since that was where the highway went, but Mrs Tonks knew it wasn’t one of them. Just as well, with the prices that that fancy Wenderholm place charged! She said doubtfully: “The Blue Heron...”

    “It’s on—uh—Pukeko,” said Fred carefully, consulting his note-book.

    This form was strange to Mrs Tonks; the more so since Fred had said, very carefully: “Puh-KEE-kuh,” and almost everybody in New Zealand said: “Poo-KEK-oh”.

    “Pu— Oh, you mean Pukeko Drive, dear!” said Mrs Tonks, beaming. “Yes, I know the place you mean: it’s right at the end of Pukeko Drive; if you turn up this next street, here,”—she pointed—“that’s Sir Harry Carter Avenue—and go right on up to the end of it, and turn right, that’s Pukeko Drive! And then you just keep going and the motel’s right at the end of it on your left; you can’t miss it, it’s the only motel up that way.”

    The Nakamuras beamed back—Mrs Tonks noticing meanwhile with interest that there was another pretty little Japanese girl in the back seat, and a dear little baby, fast asleep—and, thanking her profusely and telling her to have a nice day, now, drove off carefully and turned into Sir Harry Carter Avenue.

    Mrs Tonks watched this approvingly; then she slowly made her way home for lunch. As she was a widow, she didn’t have anyone at home to tell about her interesting encounter, except her big torty cat, so she told him. After lunch she rang up her friend Mrs Potter, Senior, and told her; then she rang up her daughter Moana Baxter, who was married to Jim Baxter, the police sergeant—after glancing at her watch to be sure Moana would be home, because she’d recently started working longer hours at The Deli—and told her.

    “What a nice old lady!” said Missy approvingly.

    “Yeah; would she be a Maori, do you think?” said Jo-Beth, with interest.

    “I guess,” replied Missy uncertainly. “She did have quite a brown skin, huh?”

    Fred drew in at the curb and said: “She wasn’t wearing one of those funny grass skirts; and she didn’t have one of those tattoos on her chin, either.”

    He got out the map of Puriri County and turned to its reverse, where there were street maps of Puriri Township, Pohutukawa Bay and Kowhai Bay.

    “I think they only do that in—uh—the tourist traps,” said Jo-Beth uncertainly. “Kinda like the Indians on the reservations, y’know?”

    “Yeah,” Missy agreed. “After all, they weren’t all wearing grass skirts in Hawaii, either!”

    They all laughed happily; unlike John Aitken, they had had a stopover on their journey, and a very pleasant stopover it had been, too.

    “Yeah,” said Fred pleasedly, after checking up on Mrs Tonks on the map: “this is right: we just go on up Sir Harry Carter, like she said, and turn right here, see? And then we’ll be on Pukeko.”

    They couldn’t go wrong, because although Sir Harry Carter came to a dead stop in the middle of some fields with realtors’ notices up, the old lady had been quite right, and sure enough, there was a sign saying “Pukeko Dr.” After driving along Pukeko through some wet-looking fields, where Missy and Jo-Beth were fascinated to spot some ducks and then some kinda funny-looking big dark blue birds with long red legs, they came to some pretty little clapboard houses, and looked eagerly for their motel. No motel. Fred drew into where the curb would be if there had been one, any more, and said: “On the left, didn’t she say?”

    “Maybe she got it wrong,” said Jo-Beth doubtfully. “You know what old ladies are.”

    Missy frequently got confused between right and left herself—she always knew precisely which direction she meant, she just couldn’t always apply the right name to it. She said cautiously: “I don’t think there were any motels on the right, either, honey.”

    “No, I’m pretty sure there weren’t,” agreed Fred. “We-ell—I guess we go on, huh?”

    They looked uncertainly at Pukeko Drive, which curved into some dark trees a little further on.

    “She did say right at the end of Pukeko,” said Jo-Beth.

    “Okay, let’s try it,” said Fred decisively. “We can always come back and ask at one of those houses.”

    The car edged forward up Pukeko Drive.

    It wasn’t really all that far, as the Nakamuras would soon discover on closer acquaintance; but it seemed, like all strange roads, to go on forever. Forever edged with damp fields, funny-looking dark trees and more damp fields with more red-legged dark navy birds—Missy deciding they were real cute, Jo-Beth, who was more practical, wondering if they were edible, and Fred, who didn’t like wildlife, observing they had real mean-looking beaks on ’em.

    They passed yet another clump of trees, and the road rose slightly towards a low hill that had been getting nearer and nearer—and then, all of a sudden, there was a pretty, modern-looking motel on the left, with a big blue neon sign in the shape of a bird with “The Blue Heron Motel” under it.

    Missy, who was starving, said with relief: “Oh, great: it’s got a restaurant!”

    Jo-Beth, who definitely shouldn’t have had that Coke a while back, not on top of the coffee they’d had before that, said grimly: “Just so long as it’s got a john.”

    And Fred noticed gloomily that there were some of those beaky birds right across the road, giving him a real nasty look, and Jesus, right out there on the motel lawn there was a row of—

    “Ducks!” cried Missy ecstatically. “Aren’t they just the sweetest things? Look at their little feet!”

    Yeah, and look at the beaks on ’em, thought Fred sourly, and what was more, there was no sign advertising a swimming pool! But he would never have dreamed of spoiling his wife’s and his sister’s enjoyment by voicing any of these thoughts.

    “Yeah, it looks okay,” he said mildly.

    Having kept remarkably fit throughout her pregnancy, Veronica Sarah Riabouchinska produced, only a couple of days late according to Bruce Smith’s timetable, and with remarkably little trouble, a bouncing baby boy. In fact she had such little trouble that Baby (they still couldn’t decide on a name) was born only twenty minutes after a grey-faced Peter had got her to the pleasant little Puriri Private Hospital, where Bruce Smith and one of his partners delivered the babies of everybody who was lucky enough to be able to afford to go there, and quite a few emergencies that couldn’t afford it at all, but that the partnership just wrote off.

    Most of their other patients were old ladies in for their veins, or old men in for a prostate operation, because for the former there were gigantic waiting lists at all the public hospitals, and for the latter the old men’s wives all thought it was much nicer to have it done private, and we’ve got our Medical Insurance, dear, why not use it? There were two specialists, an ophthalmologist and an ENT man, who also sent patients there, so Bruce and his partners were raking it in.

    Sir Jerry was ecstatic, and insisted on driving up to the hospital right away. Since Baby had conveniently got himself born in the early morning and not in the middle of the night, and since Mrs Bond had yet another of her migraines today, Belinda’s invaluable factotum, Jimmy Cooke, was helping with the beds and the vacuuming, and about to make a really dainty little lunch; so Belinda, who didn’t trust ecstatic grandfathers on long drives on the motorways, got him to drive the Rolls. Which Jimmy did, in a state of absolute bliss, but nevertheless very carefully and sedately.

    Veronica was asleep when they got there, but after they’d stood by the bedside for a little, breathing heavily in the case of Sir Jerry, she opened her eyes, smiled drowsily and said: “He looks like Peter.”

    Peter kissed her cheek gently; Belinda kissed her cheek gently; and Sir Jerry, looking like a bullfrog that has puffed himself up to the utmost point a bullfrog can without actually bursting, kissed her cheek explosively, and said: “Well done, Vronny! Knew ya could do it!”

    Veronica chuckled, and a smiling nurse came in and shooed them all out, and said they could come back tomorrow, and no, there weren’t any visiting hours for fathers and grandparents, just come any time—but after ten a.m.’d be better, because of Doctor’s Rounds; and Daddy had better go right home and get some sleep, because he looked exhausted after his ordeal.

    Peter said: “But I cannot h’wait until tomorrow to see her again!” and the nurse patted his arm and said, of course not, Daddy could come back tonight, and Mummy would be feeling much brighter by then, but she wouldn’t want to see him looking like that—refraining from saying “looking like something the cat dragged in.”

    Baby was in the nursery, just until Mummy had had a sleep, and then they had a sort of half-rooming-in system which was designed to let Mummy and Baby get to know each other but at the same time to let Mummy get some sleep. –Polly Carrano, who in the face of her husband’s loud objections and the earnest representations of his old school friend, the eminent gynaecologist Sir John Westby, had had her twins in Bruce’s hospital (Westby assisting, quite unnecessarily), had assured Veronica earnestly that this was by far the best scheme, you got so damned sleepy. Veronica had scornfully thought that she wouldn’t be sleepy—until her ninth month, when she was very heavy and, though not admitting it to Peter, terribly tired most of the time. She would shortly realize that Polly was quite right, not only about being sleepy after giving birth, but about quite a lot of other things, not least of which was the fact that when you were in milk your brain went all dopey, and you didn’t even feel like reading, much.

    They all had a nice peep at Baby, not that there was much visible from the other side of the nursery window, and then the nurse came along and said quite crossly was Daddy still here?

    So Jimmy drove Peter’s Mercedes and Sir Jerry drove Belinda and Peter in the Rolls to the house at the far north-eastern tip of Kowhai Bay. Mrs McKenzie from next-door came shooting over to say how was Veronica, and how was the baby, and was it a boy or a girl? And Peter, who’d fallen asleep in the back seat on the short drive, pulled himself together, beamed, and said they were both fine, and it was a boy, and told her the baby’s weight in metric measurements.

    Mrs McKenzie was in her fifties and still thought of babies’ weights in terms of pounds and ounces, so she was none the wiser, but beamed anyway, and said that was lovely, and she’d keep Sharon for the rest of the afternoon, if they liked. Peter had forgotten all about Sharon, in the stress of the moment, so he gulped a bit at this. However, Belinda thought that she could manage, so Mrs McKenzie, whose married son lived in Vancouver, and who’d only seen her grandchildren on one visit, reluctantly handed Sharon over.

    Peter made only a token protest when Belinda ordered him off to bed: he’d been sleeping very badly for the last month, and Veronica’s pains had started at around four in the morning, though for some time she’d said it was only wind; and then she’d said it wasn’t that bad but he could time them if he must; and he’d been on tenterhooks the whole time and had witnessed the actual birth—though in Bruce Smith’s unexpressed opinion, while this was highly desirable for young fathers, it wasn’t actually a damn good idea for fiftyish first-time fathers who looked to him as if they’d been through the mill a fair bit in their time. But Peter had insisted, and all Veronica’s married friends’ husbands had done it as a matter of course, and she hadn’t stopped to think that all those husbands had been in their twenties or early thirties at the time. Bruce, of course, knew nothing of Peter’s history, or he might have put his foot down.

    Peter slept until dinnertime. Sir Jerry, Lady Cohen and Jimmy consumed a very pleasant, if belated light lunch, and Jimmy insisted on helping Lady Cohen prepare the dinner, before saying reluctantly that he’d better take a taxi back, Paulie was expecting him, and he’d be rabid if he was late. “Paulie” was a new name, but Lady Cohen tactfully didn’t enquire, just told him to take the Rolls, dear, and he might as well hang on to it for the rest of the week and get some use out of it, dear, because they’d stay up here with Peter.

    So Jimmy drove off, a bit dazed to find himself in temporary possession of thousands and thousands of dollars’ worth of car.

    Sir Jerry had been having a nap in Peter’s big armchair in the drawing-room in front of the heater while this was going on—they still hadn’t managed to find a suitable kauri fire surround second-hand and the fireplace, though the builders had assured them it was there, behind the gib-board, was still blocked off.

    “WHAT?” he roared when Lady Cohen tranquilly told him what she’d done. “You let that—that prancing fairy drive off in MY ROLLS?”

    “Calm down, Jerry. You know what the doctor said about getting yourself worked up,” said Belinda firmly.

    “Calm down!”  spluttered Sir Jerry. “What if he writes it off? What if he steals it?”

    “Nonsense, Jerry! Jimmy’s a perfectly respectable young man: of course he won’t steal it. And he’s much less likely to crash it than you are: he’s a very good driver.”

    “Bloody feller wears an earring!” he spluttered.

    “Two earrings,” said Lady Cohen mildly.

     Sir Jerry goggled at her.

    “In the same ear, of course.”

    “Never mind that! What about my car? How could you be so—so irresponsible, Belinda? We don’t know anything about the feller!”

    “Nonsense, Jerry! I know all about him—and so would you, if you ever listened to a thing I said! And anyway,” said Belinda, with superb illogic: “the car’s insured.”

    “Hmf!” replied Sir Jerry, with a sort of flounce.

    “I’ll just ring Helen and make sure Damian got the message to go round to their place after school,” said his wife, looking at her watch, “and then you can pour me a sherry, dear.”

    Naturally she’d already rung Helen with the great news, so now she merely made sure that Damian was there, which Helen said he was, and it wasn’t true that Mum let him stay up till eleven o’clock on a school night, was it? Certainly not; absolutely no later than nine, said Belinda firmly, for she was taking great care of Damian, who had apparently recovered very well from his accident and its accompanying traumas, but got unexpectedly tired at odd times.

    “And if he starts yawning, or gets very grumpy, dear, just pack him off anyway,” she added.

    “I’ll do that,” said Helen with grim satisfaction. “Oh, by the way, he wants to know if he can come and see the baby tomorrow.”

    “Damian does?” said Damian’s grandmother dazedly.

    “Yes; he says they’ve only got sports tomorrow afternoon and he’s not allowed to play, yet, and they’ll let him off early if he brings a note; is that right?”

    “Yes; the doctor said he mustn’t play sports with that head,” said Lady Cohen weakly.

    “Okay; well, I’ll bring him up tomorrow afternoon, shall I? When’s visiting hours?”

    Pleasedly Lady Cohen told her of the hospital’s relaxed rules about visiting hours.

    “That’s even better than that place I had Melanie!” said Helen, astounded.

    Lady Cohen agreed that it was wonderful, and—still a bit dazed—asked if Melanie was coming tomorrow, too. Helen replied that she couldn’t, she had a Latin test. There was a wail of “Aw-wuh! Mu-um!” in the background. Helen told her mother that she’d bring Melanie up on Saturday.

    “What about Carol?” said Belinda cautiously.

    “Well, I rang her, as soon as classes were over.” –Carol, as threatened by her Uncle Nat, was now a boarder at St Ursula’s.

    “What did she say?”

    “‘Oh, that’s nice,’” quoted Helen grimly. “I asked her if she wanted to come up with us on Saturday and she said ‘No, thank you, Aunty Helen, I have to practise my serve.’”

    “Oh. Well, I suppose it’s a good sign that she’s taking an interest in her tennis again,” said Lady Cohen in a shaken voice.

    “That’s what I thought at first,” replied Helen, grimmer than ever. “Only Melanie says that all the school courts are being resealed and none of them’ll be playable for another two weeks: there was a notice about it at Assembly this morning.”

    “Oh, dear!” said Lady Cohen.

    “Quite,” Helen agreed.

    “Cigars!” said Sir Jerry, as soon as Belinda had hung up.

    “What, dear?”

    “Cigars! Must get ’im some decent ones!”

    “Oh—to wet the baby’s head—yes,” replied Belinda vaguely.

    Having got over the initial shock about the Rolls, Sir Jerry had reflected that he’d taken out every damned kind of insurance there was, so if the prancing fairy did nick it, he—Jimmy—would be the only one to get it in the neck. He decided tolerantly that this baby business had knocked Belinda sideways—poor old girl, not as young as she once was—and didn’t correct her. “Here’s your sherry,” he said mildly, handing her a glass of the Harvey’s Bristol Cream that Peter kept especially for his parents-in-law. He raised his own glass.

    Beaming, Belinda raised hers.

    “Down the hatch!” said Sir Jerry, grinning.

    “Jerry!”

    Sir Jerry was, after all, a grandfather several times over, and now that he knew Veronica was okay, was really quite himself again. He chuckled richly. “Had ya going there, old girl, didn’t I? Well—here’s to ’em, eh? Veronica and the baby!”

    “Veronica and the baby!” echoed Lady Cohen. They touched their glasses solemnly together, and drank.

    “S’pose they haven’t decided on a name, yet?” said Sir Jerry, sitting down heavily.

    “No,” said Belinda. She sat down opposite him in an armchair that was much too deep for her. “The last I heard, Veronica was holding out for Something Petrovitch if it was a boy, and Peter was still saying that Vernon was a pretty name.”

    “Vernon!” said Sir Jerry with awful scorn. “Does he want to turn the poor kid into a pansy, or something?”

    “I suppose he’d be called Vern at school,” said Lady Cohen vaguely, looking round for cushions. Since Veronica wasn’t a cushion-y person, there weren’t any.

    “Hmf! If he wasn’t called a damn sight worse!”

    “Well, ‘Damian’ is fairly awful, too, dear,” she said fairly.

    Sir Jerry grunted.

    “Dear Peter doesn’t understand about English names,” said Lady Cohen placidly.

    He grunted again.

    “Jerry, has your chair got a spare cushion?”

    “No,” said Sir Jerry, looking behind him to make sure.

    “Oh, dear; I think I’ll get a pillow.” She made as if to rise; Sir Jerry ordered her to stop there and, grunting, hauled himself up and clambered upstairs.

    When he came back with two pillows he reported that Peter was still asleep. He kindly didn’t report further that Russians apparently threw all their clothes on the floor and slept naked, nor that he’d replaced the duvet that had fallen off his naked son-in-law.

    It was Damian who finally chose the baby’s name. When he first saw his little dark-haired cousin, Baby was behind the nursery glass again. Lady Cohen watched sympathetically as he went all pink. Then he said, in an awe-struck voice that was growly anyway, only growlier than usual: “Isn’t he small?”

    “Yes,” his grandmother agreed: “you forget how tiny they are, when there hasn’t been a baby in the family for a wee while.”

    “Sharon was awfully small, too, wasn’t she?” –Lady Cohen was holding Sharon.

    “Yes; she was a tiny baby,” agreed Belinda, very sensibly not comparing weights, which would have meant absolutely nothing to a teenage boy. “She’s really big now, by comparison, isn’t she?”

    “Yeah, ’course: she can walk now; she must’ve grown a lot of muscles and that.” –Damian was doing Physics and Chemistry, but not Biology, which in his grandmother’s opinion, was a pity; but boys’ schools were never very keen on Biology. He poked Sharon gently in the tummy and added: “Proper little bruiser, now, aren’tcha, Sharon?”

    “Dame-a!” said Sharon pleasedly, making a grab at his nose.

    “Ow! Gee, she’s as strong as a horse!” said Damian, looking at his little sister with unconcealed pride.

    “Yes, she’s a very healthy little girl.” Lady Cohen attempted, without success, to interest Sharon in the view of her new cousin.

    When they were back in Veronica’s room, and Sir Jerry and Helen had gone off to have their turn peering at Baby, Veronica grinned at Damian and said: ‘‘Well, what did ya think? Ugly little bugger, isn’t he?”

    “Veronica!” said her mother in horror.

    Damian smiled weakly, went rather red, and replied: “I thought he was okay.”

    Peter was sitting on the side of his wife’s bed holding her hand. “Good!” he said merrily. “Because I heard a rumour that Someone thought he looked loike me, when she woke up yesterday afternoon, and—”

    “Shuddup!” growled Veronica, chuckling and squeezing his hand very hard.

    Then the nurse came in and said she was bringing Baby in in a minute, and we could all have a wee look at him, but then it’d have to be Daddy only, because it was only Day Two, wasn’t it, and we didn’t want Mummy all tuckered out, did we?

    Damian listened to this speech with a disbelieving expression on his face. When the nurse had gone Veronica winked at him.

    “Does she always talk like that?” he said weakly.

    “Yeah; they all do—nauseating, isn’t it?’

    “Too right,” he agreed numbly.

    “Damian!” said Helen sharply, having come back in time to hear this last exchange.

    “It’s okay, Helen; I started it,” said Veronica. “I reckon it’s all this atmosphere of milk and babies—turns their brains to permanent mush.”

    To Damian’s relief his Uncle Peter laughed, so he did, too.

    Sir Jerry, huffing and puffing importantly, came in with Nurse and Baby (Nurse not letting him hold Baby, just in case he dropped him or huffed himself into an apoplexy, or something—she was only twenty, and had no idea that practised grandfathers knew all about handling babies)—and they all duly admired Baby from close up. Lady Cohen noticed that Damian took care not to breathe on him, and made a mental note to tell him all about mother’s milk, and immunities, and that sort of thing, at the first opportunity.

    Then they all obediently went off home, except Peter, who stayed to watch Veronica feed Baby, which Veronica was managing very well; Nurse was very pleased with her. Nurse, besides being only twenty, was rather short and slight; Peter, terribly amused, reflected that she was like a fussy little tug pushing and pulling the big liner that was Veronica in the way she should go.

    On Saturday afternoon Helen and Nat came up with Damian, but poor Melanie had caught an awful cold, and Helen absolutely forbade her to come, immunities or no immunities. Sir Jerry and Lady Cohen had been in that morning but Peter had driven them home at lunchtime; to his relief they had volunteered to take Sharon for a little while, just until Veronica was settled. Veronica seemed to Peter to be doing a remarkably good imitation of a browsing Jersey, not to say a beached whale, at the moment, and he felt it was he who needed settling. He kept having awful dreams of having to take her to the hospital, and waking up all hot and bothered, and finding that it was all over.

    “Have you thought any more about names?” asked Helen. She knitted busily at the blue matinee jacket she was making, now that they knew it was a boy. She had, of course, already done two whole sets of matching jacket, pilchers, and bonnet, one in white and one, slightly bigger, in yellow.

    Veronica took a chocolate and passed the box to Damian. “’Ve a schoc!” she offered indistinctly.

    Damian hadn’t expected to be offered one. “Ooh, ta!”

    “You’ll get spots,” warned Helen.

    “Worth it, though,” said Nat, peering into the box.

    “Have a choc, Nat!” said Veronica with a grin.

    “Ta,” said Nat simply.

    “Want a choc, Helen?” offered Veronica.

    “No, thank you,” said Helen firmly—she was wearing a girdle. “I said, have you thought any more about names?”

    “No,” replied Veronica. “I think he’s gonna be called ‘Baby’ till he’s eighty, at this rate.”

    Damian giggled.

    “Timothy’s a nice name,” said Helen.

    “Nah, it’s soppy,” said Nat. “Anyway, he’d only get called Tim.”

    “John,” said Helen.

    “I suggested that,” said Veronica gloomily, “but Peter won’t hear of it; he says it’s an American word for a lavatory.”

    Damian giggled again. Veronica grinned and passed him the chocolates again.

    “Sebastian,” said Helen.

    “WHAT?” hollered Veronica.

    “Sebastian,” said Helen defiantly. “I think it’s a lovely name.”

    “It’s Goddawful,” said Nat, just as Veronica was about to.

    “No, Sebastian is not possible,” said Peter from the doorway. He came over and kissed his wife on the mouth. Damian politely looked away, Helen went on knitting, unmoved, and Nat watched them with interest.

    “Why not?” said Veronica, when he’d finished.

    Peter sat down beside her and slipped his arm round her. “I know a Sébastien in France, and he was a horrid boy.”

    “‘Knew’,” Veronica corrected him automatically.

    “What did he do?” asked Damian interestedly.

    “He—uh—I forget the English word—he is mouchard—eugh—rapporteur; no?”—They all looked blank—“When one has done something wrong, this Sébastien, he tells the parent or the teacher—no?”

    “Aw, yeah, I getcha,” said Damian. “You mean he was a sneak—he told tales.”

    “Sneak!” said Peter pleasedly. “What a mean word! Yes, this Sébastien, he was sneak.”

    “A sneak,” said Veronica, Damian and Nat automatically.

    Helen sighed. ‘‘Well, I suppose Sebastian’s out, then.”

    Peter laughed suddenly and said: “I am so sorry, Helen—Nat—Damian: I forget moy manners! How are you all?”

    The Weintraubs and Damian hadn’t noticed his lapse. Nat said robustly that they were all fine, but poor old Mel had a Helluva cold and so they hadn’t let her come. And he’d got the old people home okay, had he?

    “Yes,” said Peter, twinkling madly: “and Belinda, she sends Jerry upstairs immediately for a noice loie-down, she tells him he is looking peak-èd!”

    Nat sniggered delightedly, not bothering to correct this last to “peaked.”

    Helen said thoughtfully: “What about Ludovic?”

    “NO!” howled her relatives.

    “Simeon,” said Peter thoughtfully.

    “That’s not bad,” said Veronica.

    “I like it,” said Nat.

    “Yes—we were going to call Pauline Simeon—do you remember, Nat?” said Helen. “Only she was a girl, of course.”

    Damian said gloomily: “It wouldn’t work; I know a Simeon—Simeon Meyer—you know the Meyers, don’t you, Aunty Helen?”

    “Yes, of course, dear. Simeon’s their middle boy, isn’t he?”

    “Yeah, that’s right.”

    “Why wouldn’t it work, old mate? What’s wrong with this Simeon Meyer?” asked Nat kindly.

    “There’s nothing wrong with him, Uncle Nat; it’s the kids at school; they don’t reckon Simeon’s a name; they keep calling him Simon.”

    There was a puzzled pause.

    “The goyim,” said Nat heavily at last.

    “Don’t say that— Oh!” said Helen.

    “Yes,” agreed Damian, flushing. “It’s not so bad, now; but at first... Me and Simeon kept telling them there was a Simeon in the Bible, only they wouldn’t believe us.”

    “Ignoramuses!” said Veronica.

    “Da: I have noticed that the standard of general education amongst our students has fallen increasingly over the last twenty years,” said Peter thoughtfully.

    “Not to mention the spelling,” added Helen grimly. “When Melanie was at primary school she had a teacher who told her—actually told her—that it didn’t matter how you spelled words, so long as you used them colourfully—do you remember, Nat?”

    Nat chuckled. “Yeah, and I remember I told her she’d get a colourful bottom if I caught her not bothering to check her spelling!”

    They all chuckled, though Damian, looking at his uncle’s hefty fist, couldn’t help feeling a bit sorry for Melanie and her bottom.

    Then the nurse brought Baby in, and the subject of names dropped for a while, until Peter, admiring his son as he lay in his mother’s arms, said: “One of our students is a noice boy called Patrick: h’what do you think?

     Nat gave a shout of laughter. “Not Patrick Riabouchinsky! God save us!”

    “I have put a foot in it, no?” said Peter, twinkling.

    Helen glared at Nat, to no effect, and at Damian, who was sniggering—also to no effect.

    “Don’t! You’ll curdle me milk,” said Veronica weakly.

    “What is the joke?” asked Peter plaintively.

    “Patrick’s an Irish name,” said Helen in a repressive voice. “You can’t possibly call a Jewish boy Patrick.”

    “Oh,” said Peter meekly. “But our student, he is Patrick Smith, and Smith is not an Oirish name.”

    “Nevertheless,” replied Helen at her most magisterial.

    Veronica was cuddling Baby Riabouchinsky. She sighed. “Well, what does he look like? Does he look like a Vernon, Goddammit?”

    “No,” said Helen, Nat and Damian firmly.

    “More loike a Simeon,” said Peter, his head on one side.

    Veronica sighed again and kissed the baby’s forehead softly.

    “I still like Sebastian,” said Helen defiantly.

    “No, he does not look loike a Sébastien, not possibly,” said Peter.

    “Jonathan?” said Nat hopefully,

    “Soppy,” said Veronica firmly.

    “David, then,” suggested Helen.

    They all looked hopefully at the baby, because David, now they came to think about it, was a nice name.

    At last Veronica said glumly: “It’s an awfully nice name; only he doesn’t really look like a David.”

    “William?” offered Nat doubtfully. “No, he doesn’t look like that, either.”

    “I think he looks like a James,” said Damian suddenly, going very pink.

    “James,” said Veronica softly.

     They all stared at the baby again.

    “You could call him Jim for short; or Jimmy, maybe,” added Damian.

    His elders, all of whom had been wondering about that, let out stealthy sighs of relief.

    “Not Jimmy; that’d be like that ghastly gay that cooks those ghastly messes for Mum,” said Veronica firmly.

    “Jim might be nice when he’s a bit older,” said Nat. “Only he does kinda look like a James—doesn’t he, Helen?”

    “Yes, he does,” said Helen firmly. “I think it suits him.”

    “James,” said Veronica softly again. She kissed the baby’s head again. “What do you think, Peter?”

    “I think he looks exactly loike a James,” said Peter firmly.

    No-one said anything about disciples or James being a Scottish name, to his relief, so he said to his son: “Would you loike to be James, Baby Riabouchinsky?”

    “He says yes,” said Veronica.

    “Roight.” Peter touched his son’s cheek gently and said something that Nat, at least, recognized as Hebrew.

    “What did you say?” asked Veronica suspiciously.

    “I said, ‘Now he has a name’, did I not, Baby James?”

    So he was James Riabouchinsky from then on.

Next chapter:

https://themembersoftheinstitute.blogspot.com/2023/01/the-great-detective.html