Foxy's not at home

Spectator New Writing Prizewinner 1971 PAMELA HAINES

This entry was awarded the first prize of 000

" You've to stay out while half five," said Arnold's mam, giving him a last minute shopping list. "Else you fuss our Billy."

They were leaving next day for the holiday camp, his parents for the ballroom dancing contest, his brother Billy for the junior talent. Arnold wasn't looking forward to it at all. "Fruit machines," said his dad, angrily, "dodgems, a bloody great switchback — and a lad of twelve can't amuse himself!"

A steady August rain splashed the city pavements. He'd already been out once, to collect his new glasses: they had big horn rims and when he'd come in for his dinner, Billy had called, " Tu-whit tu-whoo, Fatso!" holding his spoon up like a microphone. When Arnold said, "Give over," his mam had got cross. She didn't want Billy upset. "He's all nerves," she said. "He's not like you, Arnold, isn't Billy."

Sheltering in the chemist's doorway, he held the list close up to his nose: she wanted chlorophyll tablets, hair spray, liver salts, Rennies and Quells. Afterwards, he queued for his bus opposite the old cinema done up like new. This week it was showing Sexy Capers for Kirthy Cats.

When he got home, he'd bought the wrong hair spray. "It says for greasy hair, Arnold. Can't you read? G-r-e-a-s-y." She was draping polyfilm over her lemon tulle dress with the eleven underskirts, ready for the contest; two others lay on the armchair beside her.

At tea, Billy just messed his kipper about, hardly eating at all. And the next morning they were an hour late setting off because he'd wet the bed; in the car, too, Arnold had to watch him in case he was sick. Yet up on a stage Billy was always calm as they come. A face like rubber, and the voices of Cilia Black, Tom Jones (" don't strain yourself, Billy love "), Gracie Fields, Mary Hopkin; and this year a little Chinese uke to give the old folk George Formby. Even at eleven, you could see Billy'd a great future.

Everything was all right till they got back in the car after their dinner; then, just as they turned off the Scarborough road, it was: " Quick, Arnold!" Only Arnold wasn't able to get the window down far, enough so that a lot of the sick blew back in his face, all over his new glasses.

Billy was still a bit white when they arrived at the camp. They had to drive the car right up to the chalets, on account of the ball dresses. Arnold carried the black one with the jet sequins and the diamante bodice, the polyfilm flapping in the wind. By the time he got to his own chalet Billy was already swinging his legs from the top bunk.

"I'll not sleep at the bottom," declared Arnold loudly. "Not with our Billy wetting."

"You'll sleep where you're put!" snapped his mam, lifting up Billy's little tartan holdall, "and don't you back answer me either, Arnold!"

But just then Billy jumped down, complete with holdall, and did a Harry Worth by the chalet mirror. "There," said his mam. "He's a nice nature, has Billy."

When they went off to explore, Arnold stayed behind, lying up on the top bunk reading Beano. Outside there was a lot of clattering up and down the iron staircases to the rooms above, and after a while he grew restless. He thought he'd go out and look for a sweet shop, because usually he read Dennis the Menace with a sherbet dip.

As he came out of the chalet, he saw some new arrivals a few doors down. A boy of about eight was standing with his mother, while a plump flaxen headed baby waved and kicked from a sling on her back, although she looked too spindly for the weight. She was wearing long shiny purple boots, and from them her legs seemed to stretch on endlessly up to the hem of her short flowered skirt; her hair, from the back, was a cloud of brown frizz. They had lots of luggage which they were pushing inside: rucksacks, bursting carrier bags, a big hamper; but just as he got near, they banged the door to.

Later in the evening he thought he saw the boy again, going into the amusement arcade, near the big switchback.

The first day, Sunday, was chilly and dam and Arnold didn't know what to do with himself. After breakfast, he thought he'd go swimming. But the indoor pool was crowded and steamy; he took off his glasses too soon and, mistaking " Lasses " for "Lads," he was laughed at by two big girls wearing only navy blue pants. After that, he went and stood outside the pool where there was something like a giant fish tank. Really it was an underwater window and in it you could see the swimmers, some flippered and goggled, moving like seaweed in the bluey-green. He liked it so much that he stayed there quite a while.

Then Billy, who had his audition in the afternoon, wanted to go to the beach by rope railway, and Arnold was told off to take him. In spite of the weather they'd to wait twenty minutes for a go; Arnold stood tense, trying not to look at the little cages hanging in the air, while Billy fooled about making the queue laugh with his Ken Dodd face.

Their turn came, and the attendant looked at Arnold.

"You fourteen, sonny?"

Billy cut in quickly. "I'm his grandad, Mister!" and the attendant laughed, tweaking his ear. But he wouldn't let them up.

Billy didn't want to walk to the sea, so instead they wandered towards the amusement arcade. There, Arnold soon lost him. Like the pool it was very crowded and there was a deafening rattle of money pouring do'wn the chutes all the time, but when he clanked the arm of his own machine, nothing happened. Then a big boy behind poked him in the ribs. "Shove over, owl face!" The friend with him said, " owl turd, you mean."

Arnold decided to go back to his chalet. But when he tried to find the way, even with all the signposts he nearly got lost. It was record time on the tannoy, and a girl was singing 'Raindrops keep fallin',' "I'm never going to stop the rain by complainin'," she sang, " Because I'm free — nothin's worrying me."

When he came past the chalet where yesterday he'd seen the new arrivals, he noticed the door half open. Inside, the mother was bending over a cot, and as he came by she turned round, a safety pin in her mouth. "Hey — you!" she called, "Would you know if this dump has a chemist's shop?"

Arnold went in, and she picked up the baby and showed him the reddened skin and white blisters on its bottom.

He ran all the way to the shops for her. The Sunday opening was nearly over, but in the chemist's section he found a jar labelled 'for napkin rash.'

"But that's lovely!" she cried, dipping her hand at once into the cream. Today she was wearing tight, faded pink jeans, and her eyes, which were huge, had big mauve smudges round them; otherwise her face wasn't made up at all.

"Come in and be introduced," she said. "I'm Arabella, and this is Christian."

Her voice was lovely, the sort of casual laughing one he'd heard sometimes when, trying to find Victor Sylvester for his mam, he'd tuned into a talk or a radio play.

The chalets weren't very roomy so he sat down on the rough matting near the chest of drawers. She wanted to hear all about him, she said.

"But Arnold's a nice name!" she exclaimed. Her other son was called Matthew, and he was the real reason, she said, that they were here. "He'd a school friend coming, and he just pestered and pestered me, Arnold, till I gave in."

By now she'd put Christian in his cot and she was sitting on the bottom bunk, her shoulders hunched by her height.

"Why are you here, Arnold? Just a holiday?"

He told her about the ballroom dancing, and about Billy and the talent contest.

"It's not just his impressions. Me dad says they're two for a penny, and remember Carroll Levis? He says it's how what he holds an audience — they all go Billy's way like."

There was a warm and spicy smell about her, and the chalet was full of it. As he sat there, she told him that she was thirty and that her husband had been killed in a car crash six years ago. Just now, she said, she was living in Sheffield; Matthew went to a state school there. "What about you, Arnold?"

"That grammar entrance," he said, talking quite easily, "I'd five questions done from forty — it were no go. And our Billy's not got it neither. Though me mam says he won't need schooling — not with his future."

"Shall I get you a coke?" she asked, getting up and stretching, very tall. " Must we keep talking about Billy? It's you I'm interested in, Arnold."

But just then, over the tannoy, they announced the first sitting, and she asked him, at once, would he like to come to the beach with her tomorrow? " Matthew'll be at the fruit machines, as usual," she said.

All the meal, Arnold was distracted, thinking about her. Only last night he'd so admired the steward with the sideburns who could swing his rack, five plates at a time and never a spill; yet today he hardly noticed the apple pie and thick yellow custard landing safely in front of him.

Hi mam kept yawning. Before the meal, she'd been an hour in the Hawaian Bar.

" I don't know what we were about," his dad said, looking at Arnold, " not putting him in for the Happiest Smile of the Week."

" It's them new glasses." said his mam, and she yawned again.

The next day Arabella was as good as her word, waiting for him on the grass by the chalets, Christian sitting up in a hired pram. She was wearing a long brown coat and a purple woollen scarf which trailed along the ground back and front. When they set off, lots of people turned to look at them.

"This is my Isadora," she said, tossing the scarf over her shoulder. " Just imagine, Arnold, strangling yourself — one end of this is a car wheel — and gone, done, finished!"

In the open, an icy wind came at them and Arnold pulled up the pram hood; overhead, the gulls wheeled and screeched. Getting near the rope railway, and so as not to look at it, he began telling her about Billy's audition. "He'd only half done with 'When I'm cleaning windows,' and they had him in —"

"Please let's talk about you, Arnold," she said, smiling. Another day, she said, she wanted to take him up on the railway. "I adore that sort of thing, Arnold — even though some people in our hotel, when we were honeymooning in Switzerland, had the most terrible accident in a ski lift. The details were ghastly, Arnold! I think it quite upset Richard. He made the most incredibly sick jokes about it, and normally he'd no sense of humour whatever. Do you know, Arnold, that when he talked, he never moved his head? Can you imagine that — talking and never moving his head?"

She didn't seem to need answers. That was why really, he liked being with her. All along the straight path to the beach, she talked; then again, while they sat on a sheltered part of the sands. A lot of it was about her husband, Richard. He'd been a wine merchant, she said, and they'd lived in Kensington. She wasn't at all well off now, she told him. "If you can believe it, Arnold, Richard didn't insure himself properly. And we always lived in these expensive, rented places."

They took Christian in to paddle during a freak burst of sunshine. Arnold held him while he squealed with pleasure; later, he lifted him into a pannier on one of the beach ponies.

"My God, if it should bolt," said Arabella. "If it should want its freedom, Arnold, and dash madly over the sands to Filey!" As she lifted Christian down, she hugged him to her fiercely, while he pulled playfully at her purple scarf.

" You should put him in for Bonniest Baby," said Arnold, shyly.

He wheeled the pram for her on the way back. Once again it was record time on the tannoy. Today the girl was asking what you got when you fell in love. "Don't tell me what it's all about," she sang, "I've been there, and I'm glad I'm out!"

"Of course, I married much too young," Arabella said, as they came up to the roller skating rink. "Only eighteen!" she shouted, above the clatter. "But everyone approved. They don't like two eighteen year olds to do it, Arnold. You see, they might change, grow apart. But Richard was thirty-five and set (my God, he was set!) and he was going to mould me too. Times, Telegraph and a sixth of a page in the Tatter — that was my goose cooked, Arnold."

They were passing a kiosk; she bought him a three-coloured lolly which he sucked as he pushed 'the pram, while, high up, the switchback cars rattled past, screams of excitement rising above the clank and whirr of the machinery.

At the door of the amusement arcade, she said that she'd better rescue Matthew. " This gambling, Arnold! It's the only trait he's inherited from Richard — a sort of solemn, quite unlikely addiction to games of chance. Most of the time, Richard was

just plain pompous. Especially so between the sheets, Arnold."

She reappeared with an excited Matthew: he'd bought a coke with his winnings, and back in the chalet he sucked it noisily, while Arnold poured out blackcurrant for Christian.

"Why's a lion called a lion?" he asked. "I don't know, Matthew treasure," Arabella said, weakly.

"Because he spends half the day lion around!"

"Arnold," said Arabella, laughing, "you do better!"

Arnold could never remember jokes, but after thinking very hard, a trick from primary came back, and making a sort of lattice with two fingers of each hand, he said to Matthew: "Put your finger in Foxy's hole — Foxy's not at home!" Then as Matthew's finger went in, he jabbed it with his thumb nail. "Foxy's at the back door," he cried, " picking at a bone!"

Matthew jumped; then, pushing the hair from his eyes, asked vengefully, "Why do cars have wheels?" When Arnold couldn't answer, he said triumphantly: "They'd look funny with legs!"

Arabella said, "Matthew, darling!" Then as Arnold got up to go, she came to the door with him.

" Come again tomorrow," she said. "Please — Arnold!"

"Who's your fancy friend, Arnold?" asked his mam. She was wearing her pink chiffon dress with the pearl motif, ready for the evening's contest. Billy had already come first in his heat that afternoon. "What you want to push a pram out for? I've never seen you helpful like that at home, Arnold! And anyway," she said, spraying her hair vigorously and spotting his glasses, "you shouldn't do it only she pays you. It's daft!"

He went to the ballroom, but he was never happy watching them dance. Their speciality was the quickstep, and as he saw them go round, his mam doing little skips with her stiletto heels, a surprised look on her face, he became afraid that like a couple he'd once seen, they might fall flat on the ballroom floor, legs in the air, undignified.

He wandered instead into the olde time dancing: it was dark in there, and he could sit unnoticed. He joined in for 'Daisy Daisy' and Beside the seaside' and Put ori your tata, little girlie.' Then his glasses got misted up, and when he took them off he thought in the blur that he saw Arabella swaying with the veleta dancers. Even when he saw it wasn't, he pretended, and sat there eyes screwed up, quite happy, till the end of the evening.

Next day it was cold again, the wind still blowing from the east, and Arnold pushed Christian out while Arabella lay on her bunk reading. Then on the Wednesday, a watery sun came out, and Arabella, carrying Christian in his sling, told Arnold they were going to the beach by rope raillway.

Full of dread, he climbed into one of the seats and they rose slowly into the sky, while opposite him Christian moved restlessly in Arabella's arms, little heels drumming her knees: the gaps between the wooden slats seemed to Arnold immense. " Do look down!" Arabella cried. Then, "Christian darling, keep stilt!"

A dizzy distance below, Arnold saw the ground and, feeling his stomach heave, he grasped at the sides of the cage. He had begun to tremble and behind his eyes was a black, sick thudding.

"But how selfish of me, Arnold!" she exclaimed. "We must hoof it back, of course."

But on the beach nothing went right. The tide was further out today, and Christian grizzled when they took him to paddle. Arabella burst out: "1 don't think sometimes I can stand this unhappiness, Arnold!" Then she was quiet, till suddenly, looking over towards the long natural pier of Filey Brig, she said excitedly, "Years ago a family got caught there by the tide, Arnold! They tried to shelter but the waves just smashed them to pieces against the rocks!"

She didn't talk any more after that, and he thought that perhaps she was angry with him; but then on the way back, she bought him coke and crisps.

"Come to Scarborough, tomorrow," she said. "Just for the day, Arnold!"

But Thursday was Billy's finals.

"I am sorry," she said, " Christian's dad, you know, hails from Scarborough."

He said, puzzled, "but I thought he were dead like—" "Silly darling — I'm not talking about Richard!" She laughed, wrinkling up her nose. They were back In the chalet and she was sitting on the bunk unfastening her sandals, leather ones, lacing halfway up her leg.

" I had Christian quite accidentally, Arnold. At the time, I was living with Tar Christian shouted indignantly for a drink and she poured him some blackcurrant, then took a swig herself from the sloping baby mug. Purple juice ran down her chin, and mopping it with a nappy, she said, "At least, Arnold, I've never had to mess with bottles. I just flowed for them both — milk and honey and all that." Then lifting Christian out of the cot, she said, "with this one though, it wasn't quite so simple. Last spring Tarquin and a whole crowd of us wanted to go to India in a truck. I'd have taken Matt from school quite happily, for the experience, but one of the party made the strongest objection to a nursing mother. So," she said, pulling Christian's head towards her, "I had to choose, Arnold."

Later when Christian was back in the cot, she said, "some people, you know, Arnold, get the most depressing boobs after feeding. But I was lucky — two apples still. I was wondering, Arnold — would you like to see them?"

"Sexy Capers for Kinky Cats," he said to his mam. She was wearing her lemon tulle with the eleven underskirts, ready for tonight's finals.

"You do talk quiet, Arnold," she said. " Wait now while I get my furries on." She planted each lash carefully with the tweezer. "Any road, whatever it is, Arnold, you've not to be late. And you've to see last thing Billy throws his water. We'll not get a mattress dried this weather." She fluffed talc over her hands and down the front of her dress.

Billy rushed in, over-excited, grinning.

"Do ye call her Auntie? Fatso Arnold," he jeered, giving him a sly pinch, " Champi,on Pram Pusher!"

It rained all that night; splashing down the iron balustrades, running in rivulets along the edges of the paths. In the morning, Billy was wet.

They thought an outing might calm him, so they drove into Filey hoping he'd not be sick, gave him a cup of tea in a café, and drove back. Arnold worried all the time about Arabella, going to Scarborough by bus in the pouring rain.

Billy's finals that afternoon were a walkover. He opened with George Formby (" she doesn't always get away, I don't know if she'll get away ") followed by Gracie's ' Aspidistra '; and then when he'd got them where he wanted them: Mary Hopkin. You couldn't believe it was Billy, his voice came out so gentle. And he'd all the audience singing with him. " Those were the days, my friends . . ."

Afterwards there were the congratulations, and his mam crying with pride, and then a celebration blow-out for Billy in the fish restaurant. By the time Arnold was free and pushing his way among the sodden lolly wrappers and greasy chip bags down the main thoroughfare, it was nearly eight o'clock.

Arabella, barefooted and wearing a long crimson dress, was sitting curled up on the bunk; Christian was already asleep, two fingers in his mouth.

"I missed you, Arnold," she said. "I let Christian eat sticky pink rock, and he loved the fishing cobles. But otherwise--" She was drinking wine out of the chalet tooth mug: there was an open flagon on the chest of drawers, a big basket of fruit beside it. "Have some plonk, Arnold."

He went through to the bathroom for the other mug. When he sipped at the wine, it seemed to him very sour.

"Didn't your Matthew go?" he asked, going and leaning over the cot, touching Christian very gently.

"No," she said, "he stayed with his friends, gambling. He's at it again now. Have a fig, Arnold, and tell me if you think I'm bringing him up properly?"

Juice and seeds from the purple fruit ran down Arnold's chin and hands, and while he wiped them on his tee shirt, she filled both their mugs again. It was very warm in the chalet tonight, and her spicy smell was stronger even than the bitter fumes coming up from his drink.

" You're a wonderful listener, Arnold," she said, playing with some beads round her neck. "I don't think honestly, that I could have got through this awful week without you. Although sometimes, Arnold," she said, taking a big gulp of her wine, "I get the feeling 'that you can't quite place me. Am I right? It's much easier, I know, when you cart put labels on people. Richard was quite lost when he couldn't. There was a cousin of mine used to puzzle him horribly. Then one day, Eureka. 'Ah,' he said, 'Angry Young Man!' And from then on, Arnold, he really quite liked him."

She refilled their glasses: Arnold was surprised to see his empty because he'd scarcely noticed drinking it.

"What about you giving me a label?" she said. "How 'about Trendy Arabella?

No — I don't care enough, Arnold. Hippie Arabella then? Hardly. Arabella's Adventures Underground?" Her voice seemed to him slower than usual. "A couple of ma crobiotic meals, Arnold. Hung-up Arabella then? Possibly." She leant forward. "Don't look so bloody far away, Arnold sweet. Sometimes, you know, I wonder if I'm real at all? I mean, you are, Arnold. I can see the sweat on your dear fat face . .

Her voice drifted on. His head began to swim a little and when he looked up at the ceiling, he saw floating just above the door, two enormous 'A's intertwined. Hardly listening, he sat gazing at them.

"I more or less drifted up to Sheffield," she was saying. " Tarquin had a temporary lectureship. Now, I live in this snot very elegant pad. Seedy, immense. Some nineteenth century wool magnate's. There are lots of us coming and going, and we're all messy, Arnold. Plates of half-eaten pasta under the chairs. Someone's grubby bra down the sofa. You know the sort of thing, Arnold."

His mug was full again. "I've no freedom," he heard her say. Then, " Not much money either. And whatever anyone says, money is important, Arnold, Richard's family are disapproving of me, and kind — only they haven't much themselves. My parents are dead, Arnold."

On his third mug of wine, muzzy in the warmth, Arnold realized suddenly what it was he should do. And to think better, he shut. his eyes.

It he did a paper round, he could pay the fare to Sheffield Saturdays. Each week he could take Christian out for her: two hours with the pram, then give him his tea and a cuddle, then his bath and a drink and a tuck-up. All that time she'd be free. Every week for half a day, she'd be free.

There was a steady knocking going on at the window. Arabella leapt up. She said, laughing, "You were asleep, Arnold!" Munching crisps, Matthew came stockily into the room. "What's two robbers?" he asked. "A pair of nickers! Knickers — see?"

Arabella offered him the dregs of the flagon, but he didn't like the taste. Both boys should be in bed, she said. Arnold, who could hardly hold his head up, washed the mugs for her; then walked back, unsteadily, to his chalet. Billy was already asleep, grinding his teeth and whimpering like a puppy.

Next morning after breakfast, Billy's mattress was put out on the grass to air. The warm weather had come at last.

Arnold, who'd woken with a headache, a dry mouth and a feeling as if he were floating, set out with his family for Billy's prizegiving. Already, a heat haze was beginning to form over the camp. He lagged behind and then broke away, wanting to go and tell Arabella about helping her Saturdays. But she was out; and when he got to the hall, most of the seats had gone. Up near the front he could see Billy and his dad, and his mam with her hair just done. All he could manage was a place by the door, squashed up against a fat woman. The camp's Uncle Fred was already handing out prizes: the Happiest Smile of the Week, the Bonniest Baby, cup after cup for swimming.

The heat was oppressive. He tried breathing through his mouth, then letting the air out very slowly. That made the stink a bit less. He wondered, desperately, where Arabella was. Without him, she'd probably taken the railway to the beach, Christian on her knee.

Uncle Fred has his arm round Billy now. "You've not seen the last of this little lad." Billy was grinning proudly. "A great little trouper is Billy! How about we give him a really big hand?"

There was a burst of clapping and calling. And at exactly that moment, Arnold saw Arabella. In his mind she was looking down from the railway, Christian squirming in her grasp, one of his legs poked through the slats. Then suddenly it was both legs; then a body hurtling through the air: a kicking, twisting Christian dashed to the ground below. He heard Arabella scream.

They were yelling for Billy. "Billy — give us Gracie!"

Thinking of Christian's little bones, Arnold screwed up his eyes in horror. "I've to get out." he said, frantically, pushing at the fat woman.

"What's up wi't ye?" she said angrily, elbowing him back. "Ruddy barger! Are ye took queer?"

But he struggled free. Then out through the door, clattering down the stairs, past the indoor pool, hot gusts of chlorine hitting him. Then out into the sunlight, blinking.

The tannoy followed him as he ran towards the chalets. "Up, up and away!" the girl sang. "Would you like to fly in my beautiful balloon?"

He was sobbing by the time he got there. Inside, she was sitting alone, reading a book.

"Where's Christian?" he shouted, hiccuping, taking great gulps of air to his dry mouth. "Where's Christian?"

"Arnold — whatever is it? Look. Sit down, darling. I bribed Matthew to take him out. For five bob—" He began to cry again. Then it all tumbled out: everything he'd imagined, all mixed up with his Saturday plan. "I thought your baby were . . . it was like I'd seen it . I wanted to help you and all He was only halfway through, when she began to laugh. She laughed and laughed, curling up on the bunk, exclaiming between breaths: "But Arnold, really! I mean —Arnold!" then, "Oh but Arnold, what an idea!"

She couldn't seem to stop laughing. He didn't even know which of the things she was finding so funny, because she just kept saying : "The very idea, Arnold!" Shaking with laughter, gasping, tears in her eyes.

After a while, it began to sound almost like crying. Her voice became very high, and she beat her fists on the shabby bedcover. "Oh my God! Oh my God!"

He stood quite still, where he'd stood so often, over by the chest of drawers. It was as if he weren't there. She was banging her head against the pillow, rocking herself from side to side, her voice muffled, moaning. "Oh my God! Oh my God!"

In the end, he just crept out. There didn't seem anything else he could do. He went back to his chalet, and lay the rest of the morning on his bunk. "Are you poorly?" asked his mam crossly. There was a lot of clearing, pack ing up to do in the afternoon. Arnold put the polyfilm over her three dresses, and took them out to the car for her.

Early next morning, they left the camp,