Home life
Wee, tim'rous beasties
Alice Thomas Ellis
Iwill put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.' Thus the Lord to the serpent after the initial contretemps in the Garden of Eden. I recalled these words the other day when a seed — the fifth son purchased a boa constrictor as a 17th birthday present to himself. I am not actually phobic about snakes, but neither do I greatly care for them. It wouldn't have occurred to me to buy one as a present — I think more in terms of T-shirts, underpants and improving works of literature — but he loves it devotedly, boiling and sterilising broken shards of earthenware for it to lurk beneath and slough off its skin against, drying broken branches in the Aga for it to cling to and warming it inside his shirt when he thinks it might be feeling chilly. It made a determined effort to slither up his nose the other day and he said fondly that it was very affectionate. I am doubtful about this. I think that if something so small (it is only a baby, about two feet long and quite slender) entertained a wistful desire to throttle and swallow something 80 times its own size its modus operandi might well appear like affection: ardent hugs and coilings and so on.
We are having trouble thinking of a name for it. Suggestions range from Satan, Rambo and Agrippa, to Cuddles and Columbine, since both the son and I have a strong impression that the creature is female. The dealer said it was, but it seemed indelicate to inquire how on earth he could tell, and apparently it is very difficult to differentiate between sexes in serpents. It is simply that there seems to be something intensely feminine about her;
her movements are controlled, her clothing neat and precisely patterned; she has a maidenly puritanical refinement, and I am informed that her table manners are im- peccable. I had to be told this, as although I quite like her I drew the line at watching her having her tea, which must consist of a mouse. I'm not mad about mice either, but it does seem perfectly rotten to buy a poor old mouse in a pet shop and carry it home to its death. (I think I'm going to cry.) Everyone was very reassuring about it. They said Dorcas (privately I call her Dorcas) delivered the coup de grace with matchless speed and skill, striking in the time it would take to blink an eye, whip- ping herself round its body and swallowing it head first in the politest possible fashion. I'll take their word for it.
I have the usual parental suspicion that the son may tire of her as all his brothers and sister wearied of their hamsters, tor- toises, rabbits, goldfish etc, leaving me to look after them. That was annoying enough, but it seems that boa constrictors can live to be 30, by which time they are 15 feet long and have proportionately grown in girth, which would mean that in extreme old age I should have to procure for it live goats and young gazelles, and I really don't see myself doing that. I might give her to Janet as a present since Janet likes snakes and lets Dorcas wrap herself round her arm among the bracelets.
I find this interesting as, if Janet has a fault, it is her reaction to spiders. I don't think anything else frightens her, but every now and then there will come a terrible shriek should she have encountered a large spider; or if it is a little one she will come to me, holding herself grimly in control and saying through stiff lips, 'There — is — an — arachnid — in — the — sink.' Then I take a sheet of paper and a glass and transfer the thing to the garden.
The other day, having been alerted, I set off with my usual equipment and Janet said she was afraid it was totally inadequate. She implied that I would need a sheet of metal and a bucket to cope with the present incumbent of the laundry sink. She said she could see the muscles rippling in its legs and its eyes were standing out on stalks. It was rather big. It buckled the sheet of writing paper, and my courage deserted me. I said we would have to call the eldest son, and Janet said she'd tried that before and he was frightened of them too. It seemed excessive to call someone from his place of work; as is always the case when we really needed people, the place was deserted and it looked like stalemate. No washing would be done that day. Then Simon, who is a friend of the fifth son, appeared and we informed him that he had been nominated. He was a bit reluctant but bravely took a stout magazine and manoeuvred the monster on to it, dropping it outside on the path. Janet swore that for some time afterwards she could hear the sound of its receding foot- steps. Perhaps we should have bought a spider-eating snake.
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