O Caledonia

Hector refused to accept that he was responsible for these disasters. He claimed that it was the fault of the hydroelectric and its minions; they had not wired the place properly. Although he was not a practical man, he loved gadgets. He had become deeply attached to the Goblin and would hear no criticism of it; indeed, according to Constance, he had identified with it, “and I have to say, Vera, that this makes me a little anxious for you both.” Vera, looking into a bleak future of dawns shattered either by the Goblin’s manic triumph roar or by Hector’s fulminations, began to ponder the chances of some form of mutual extinction or electrocution as she lay awake, earlier and earlier, in dread of day. And so it was that at three o’clock on a summer morning she wandered silently in her dressing gown down the steep tower staircase, along the galleried corridor above the hall, down the great stone steps. The moon was still high and shining through the stained-glass window. Her dark shadow obliterated the rubies and emeralds which it cast on the flagged floor. She passed through the green baize door into the passage which led to the kitchen. The back door stood wide open and a host of feral cats fled through it as she approached. She slammed it shut. No one ever locked the doors, but they could at least close them. In the kitchen she found the pony Blackie eating a geranium; wearily she pushed him out, ignoring his swishing tail and bared teeth. The geraniums had been another of Vera’s attempts at domesticising Auchnasaugh, doomed as usual to failure. Miss Wales had been annoyed. She didn’t want to water them; in fact she never had watered them and now most of them were shrivelled brown stumps. As she waited for the great domed kettle to boil on the sullen Aga, Vera was overcome by yearning for a normal house, of a normal size, warm and bright, and cheerful, with doors which could be locked at night, and a cooker not subject to the wayward whims of the wind. Three friendly children (not one of them being Janet) would sit smiling round the tea table and her husband would go out in the morning and return in the evening. How tired she was. She made tea and set it with one cup on a tray. It was her intention to create her own tea-drinking scenario in her bedroom, in defiance and anticipation of the Goblin/Hector. With reluctance she turned away from the meagre warmth of the Aga and out into the draughty passages. Wind skittered about her ankles, lifting and flapping the hem of her pink silken gown, a garment ill suited to the climate of Auchnasaugh. Someone must have left the boiler room door open too, and now she would have to go and shut it. This was ridiculous. She put her tray down and hurried around the corner, just in time to witness Jim, the hunchbacked gardener, emerging stealthily from Lila’s room.

Now Vera no longer felt cold. Her heart thumped; adrenaline pulsed through her body. Forgetful of the tray, she sped up the stairs, burst into her bedroom, and woke Hector. Hector was not impressed by her news. He felt that it could have waited at least until the hour of the Goblin. “She’ll have to go,” shrieked Vera. “This absolutely clinches it. We have the children to think of, let alone the boys in term time. How could she do such a thing, and under our roof.” “Or Jim could go. After all it takes two to…” mumbled Hector. “Don’t be so disgusting. It doesn’t bear thinking of. Of course Jim can’t go. It’s all Lila’s fault. Anyway, no one else would ever do a fraction of what he does. Though if his mother finds out she’ll never let him near us again. No, you must arrange something with Lila. Or I will.” But where could Lila go? A sense of numbing hopelessness descended on Vera. Around and around in circles her brain scurried; Hector made the occasional monosyllabic comment. But there was no escaping the fact that she could think of no place for Lila. The room reverberated to the Goblin’s cry of victory.

Neither Jim nor Lila went. For a while nothing much happened, as was so often the case at Auchnasaugh. Hector, staring at a point three feet above Jim’s stooped head, told him that he believed he had been working late into the night and although of course he appreciated his selfless efforts, his duty after five in the evening was to be with his old mother. Jim, staring at Hector’s conker-brown brogues, nodded wordlessly. Thereafter he ignored Lila, even when he was working on the lawn outside her window and she was standing there, framed by her torn curtains, glowering at him.