Human Croquet (36 page)
went the ducks as Mina stood up suddenly, shedding biscuit crumbs and tears – there was
another woman
with him. Not just any other woman, but Agatha, the disgraced nursemaid – a scarlet woman. A fallen woman. Behaving in a very familiar way with Bradley. How long had she been behaving in this familiar way with Bradley? Mina strode off to question, to berate, to cling tearfully to Bradley and beg for the return of his affections, and if not the return of his affections then at least a little money to help bring up the disgrace he’d seeded in her neat, round nursemaid belly. For Mina was also a fallen woman. Unbe-known to Mina and Bradley, Agatha is also a seed-pod, carrying Sir Edward’s baby. So many fatherless babies concentrated in one London park. Baby Esme sleeps on peacefully.
Who was coming along the path now? A shabby woman, overweight and old for her years. A dingy brown coat that had never been in fashion, a big man’s umbrella, a big Gladstone bag. Here was Maude Potter, wife of Herbert Potter, a clerk in a shipping company. The Potters had no family, only each other. Mrs Potter had lost four babies in the womb and had just come out of a charity hospital where she’d been delivered of the fifth, a dead little girl. Mr Potter’s employers would not even give him the morning off work so he could come and accompany her home. In her big Gladstone bag she had her hospital nightdress and the baby clothes she’d hopefully taken in with her. Her breasts were leaking, her fat empty belly was wobbling, she was utterly distracted, thought she might throw herself in the boating pond.
Quackquackquack,
went the ducks. Here was a turn up for the books, thought Maude Potter, a big posh baby carriage like you would see the royal family’s babies in. Maude Potter looked inside the baby carriage. Lo and behold – a baby! Poor baby, surely it belonged to someone? She looked around, there on the other side of the pond a man and two women, one of them a nursemaid by the look of it, shouting and screaming and spouting language that no decent person would ever use. ‘You whore!’ Mina screamed at Agatha, ‘You slut!’ Agatha screamed back, while the footman tried to make himself invisible. Such people were clearly not fit to be in charge of a baby. Poor Baby.
The baby gave a little whimper in its sleep. Maude Potter thought she would just lift it out and give it a little cuddle. The baby opened its eyes and smiled at her. ‘Oh,’ said Maude Potter. Her breasts ached, her womb contracted. This baby didn’t really belong to anyone, she thought, lifting it gently out of its covers, had maybe been abandoned? Had maybe been put in this park by God himself, to give Herbert and herself the child they deserved (Maude was very religious)? Yes, the baby had come down to earth like a fallen cherub. Or, now Maude becomes very fanciful, a gift child, like little Thumbelina, a present from the fairies … nightclothes tumbled from the Gladstone to make room, a little nest, a walnut shell …
‘Father,’ Maude said in a gently reproving voice, ‘don’t upset Baby.’
Maude lay in her bed, propped up on her pillows, the baby feeding at her breast. Herbert averted his eyes. ‘God has been very good to us,’ Maude sighed happily. ‘Now a name, Father – what shall we call her? Violet Angela, I think,’ she said, without waiting for an answer. ‘That would be a lovely pretty name, for a lovely pretty baby.’
‘We’ll move then,’ Maude said shortly. Herbert had never seen his wife so powerful. Maude gave him all the baby’s expensive finery and he burnt it on a bonfire in the backyard.
‘Three – nearly four,’ Maude answered proudly.
‘Bossy little thing, in’t she?’ Mrs Reagan said, casting a doubtful eye on the way Violet Angela sat on a stool and got Beryl to do all the work in their pretend house. ‘Oh, she knows what she wants, our little Vi,’ Mrs Potter said. ‘It’ll be nice for her to have a little friend in the house.’
Violet Angela offered to sing Mrs Reagan a song, which she lisped very prettily, Mrs Reagan agreed. ‘Quite a little actress, in’t she?’ she said stiffly. Personally, Mrs Reagan didn’t like children that were allowed to show off, but there you are, each to their own.
Mrs Reagan wondered to herself how two such dull, drab people as Maude and Herbert Potter managed to produce such an attractive child. She was like a little sprite, all quicksilver energy, with those big brown eyes and a head of jet-black curls that made Mrs Reagan very jealous when she saw it next to Beryl’s dull brown bob. She was the kind of child who ought to come to no good, but probably wouldn’t.
‘God knows,’ Mrs Reagan said.
see
how stupid she was, make her sorry for it. She put her face an inch in front of Beryl’s and said, ‘Oh yes you are,’ in a weird voice, rasping and high-pitched, ‘because I’m a wicked brigand who’s going to tear your heart out and eat it.’
such
a coward, Gilbert Boyd!’ Gilbert steeled himself and said, ‘All right then, tell you what, Vi – we’ll burn her like a witch instead.’ All the boys wanted to be liked by Violet Angela, none of them wanted to be thought a coward. ‘Stop that silly nonsense, Beryl,’ Violet Angela said crossly.
‘Yeah,’ the other boys chorused, growing excited. ‘Who’s got a match then?’ a voice said. ‘Ere,’ another one said. They all crowded around the tree excitedly bringing bits of old wood and packing cases for the pyre. Violet Angela held the matchbox aloft so that Beryl could see it. ‘This’, she hissed, ‘is what people get for being stupid.’ The boys were all chanting like savages, they started to do a war-dance round the tree, Beryl began to scream.
‘Oswald!’ Mrs Reagan shouted to her husband, ‘I think you’d better get out there, sounds like our Beryl’s being murdered.’