consulted his list before continuing.
“Oh, yes. I think I’m quite a good lover. I’m gentle with women. A lot of women don’t get pleasure out of sex but I make a real effort and I always have some chocolate to hand in case of disappointment. I bought a bar of Dairy Milk from Neville earlier today. There’s no history of dread diseases in my family and I think I’m quite normal …”
Fundiswa had stopped walking and was staring at William. He stopped too and looked at her earnestly.
“Anyway, you can see all the other stuff I’ve written here.”
He tried to hand the page to her but she did not take it. Instead, she let out a gasp of indignation, turned on her heel and marched away from him. Then she paused and faced him before speaking.
“How dare you! Quite apart from your impertinence, in even imagining yourself in the same bed as that lovely young girl, is your stupidity! You think you’re such a scientific person with your constellations and your indigenous whatnot! Ha! Do you even know what a sperm donor is? Have you never heard of the expression ‘artificial insemination’? Artificial, William! Do you know what that means? Let me spell it out, Einstein: It doesn’t matter if your grandfather invented the bladdy motorbike, you’re still not going to get to stick your thing into her! For God’s sake, go home and look in the mirror.”
She left William standing there and only looked back when she was outside the gate of Cockle Place. There was something of the outcast baboon in his gait. His shoulders drooped; his big hands dangled.
But Fundiswa was without sympathy. The impudence, she thought. On the very day of her doctor’s warning about how her weight and her blood pressure were a threat to her heart, this madman came to push her over the edge. Calm down, she told herself. Just breathe. Camomile tea. Half a tin of tuna for supper, or maybe just some steamed veg.
Chas and his mother remained unaware of Nina as they picked their way across the now dew-damp grass and turned down the sandy path to Midden House. Nina trailed behind them.
“You could give me your arm,” she heard Mrs Fawkes complain.
Chas grudgingly opened the crook of his arm.
“It would be nice if you could occasionally show some maternal pride in my work,” he said, “instead of bringing up your everlasting homophobia.”
“You need to be more aware of what people think and how they’re judging you.”
“Like Great Uncle Ernie, I suppose.”
“Don’t bring that up. The walls have ears.”
Sensing Nina’s presence behind them, Chas turned around. “Nina – sorry, I’d forgotten all about you!” He put his free arm around her. “Nina saved my cake,” he told his mother.
“I don’t know why you had to have such an expensive confection,” she said. “The Spar makes perfectly good tray bakes for a very reasonable price.”
Nina thought Chas would make light of this familial gripe, but his mood switched instantly.
“Oh, for God’s sake! Do you never think of anything but cheeseparing?”
“It takes a miser to know one,” retorted Mrs Fawkes.
Chas unlatched the gate and called out his customary “Hello, hello, hello!” to the guests on the lawn.
Nina had only ever seen the house from the beach. This close, it was a fairy palace; the windows all lit up and the garden humming with human voices and music, the day’s gaudy beach towels hung over the stoep railings like the flags of foreign countries she had never visited. Everywhere there were knots of people who seemed to know each other very well, laughing, touching each other, letting out the occasional shriek of surprise at the turn of the conversation or the arrival of another guest.
A threesome sitting around a card table on the stoep called out in greeting: “Mrs Fawkes!”
Nina helped Chas’s mother walk up the grassy slope and made sure she was settled in the most comfortable chair around the green baize.
“Now, how far had we got?” asked Mrs Fawkes.
The novice bridge players recited the lessons they’d learnt so far: “Cover an honour with an honour,” “Second player plays low” and “There’s many a man wandering the Thames embankment for not having drawn trumps.”
Mrs Fawkes gave a dry laugh. Then, looking up and seeing Nina still hovering nearby, she said: “So sorry, my dear, to abandon you like this. I’m teaching these three to play bridge. Find Emmanuel and get him to pour you a glass of that Italian punch of his. And tell him to bring me a brandy and soda.”
Nina went inside to find Emmanuel. At least she had an errand. Emmanuel smiled at her as he took Mrs Fawkes’s order. Nina wanted to ask him if he was happy with the library books, but he was surrounded by bottles and glasses and a crush of people asking for things. He needed his hands free in order to talk, she knew. She took a glass of sangria from a man who showed no other inclination to engage with her. Then, since she was in the way of other people who wanted drinks, she withdrew to a less occupied place on the floor.
When had she last been among so many people? Sometimes on a Saturday morning the library became uncomfortably crowded and she had to deal with complaints: someone had been hogging one of the computers for too long; a popular DVD – Riverdance, usually – or a school project book on short loan hadn’t been returned; the local prostitute was touting for business outside the toilets in the foyer again. Despite the signs, cellphones rang and were answered. Mothers let their toddlers climb through the roped queue barriers, which then toppled over.
But this crowd at Midden House was quite different, relaxed by alcohol and familiarity. Except that she was not part of the familiarity. Nina made her way slowly around the room, hoping that someone kind would catch her eye and invite her to join their group. The remains of Chas’s birthday cake lay amidst other snack debris on the dining room table. Even in its current state of dismemberment it was the most edible-looking thing there. Nina had imagined elegant canapés, clever party dishes like anchovy and olive compote. But Chas seemed to have bought several packets of spongy, bright orange maize snacks.
She cut a sliver off what was left of We love you, Chas. No one turned to her and said: “Good, isn’t it?” The coterie of friends who’d requisitioned the chairs around the table was engaged in the sort of gossip that did not brook interruption. The main speaker, a young woman, was actually sitting atop the table, cross-legged, her skirt rucked up around her hips.
Nina turned away from this uninvited view of another woman’s crotch and pretended to be interested in the paintings on the walls. One showed a young man in a Basotho hat and blanket setting off alone on horseback.
Either the group around the table didn’t mind her eavesdropping, or they hadn’t noticed her at all, because they continued to speak without lowering their voices.
“Do you remember the time she insisted on sunbathing with no top on next to the tidal pool and that Muslim woman complained?”
“What did Chas do?”
“Oh, he thought everything she did was hilarious up to a point. But when they came to arrest her, he definitely thought she’d gone too far. The
