Doris argued for Will going to Cambridge and me either staying at home or going somewhere ‘to gain more experience of life’ before we lived together. ‘You’re still very young to be settling down, you’ve plenty of time, a year is a long time at your age, and you’ve still a lot of growing up to do. Why tie yourselves down yet?’
Dad was for us being together, whether with Will at Cambridge or here at home or anywhere. ‘Being together doesn’t mean you’re settling down, you don’t have to swear that it’s for ever, and yes, you do change a lot at your age, but you love each other, and nothing is more important than that, make the most of it while you can. If it doesn’t work out, so what? You’ll regret it for the rest of your life, if you don’t give it a go.’
Arry kept saying it didn’t have to be either/or, there had to be a way of working things out to suit both of us, but when asked how, he didn’t know, but was sure we could find an answer if we thought about it.
Will kept saying he didn’t care what we did so long as we were together, and I kept saying Will had to go to Cambridge.
It’s funny how a group of reasonably intelligent, reasonably educated people can chew over a problem and get nowhere for ages because they are so determined to stick to their own ideas and prejudices. On this occasion it was Dad who broke out of that trap first.
‘Look,’ he said, adopting his business manager’s voice, ‘let’s take some things as read. First, Will and Cordelia want to be together. Second, Will has a place at Cambridge but says he can postpone taking it up till next year. Third, Cordelia says she wants to be with Will but not to commit herself permanently, because she isn’t sure yet, and needs more time to sort herself out.’
‘I didn’t quite say that, Dad.’
‘No, but it’s what you meant. Correct me if I’m wrong.’
‘No, I suppose you’re right. It just sounded bad putting it like that.’
‘Problem: the question of money. If they go to Cambridge this year, they’ll be strapped for cash, and there’s nothing more depressing than struggling to pay for essentials when you’re setting up together and trying to study at the same time. If they had enough money to set themselves up properly and for Cordelia to do whatever she decides she’d like to do, going to Cambridge straight away would be okay.’
‘This we know,’ Doris interrupted. ‘Get to your point.’
‘I’m trying to. You should know better than any of us that until you’ve listed all the items on a balance sheet you can’t compute an accurate total.’
‘But it’s obvious, darling. The problem is money and the answer is money.’
‘As so often.’
‘So, George,’ Will said, ‘you’re saying what we have to think about is how to get enough money?’
‘Maybe. Yes, maybe that is the answer.’
‘And,’ Arry said, lightbulb of inspiration flashing in his pretty eyes, ‘there’s a way you can do that, and be together while you do it, if you don’t mind taking a year out.’
We looked at him with question marks.
He went on, ‘Will’s qualified to do tree maintenance. You know – planting, pruning, tree surgery, removing diseased trees, tidying hedges – that kind of thing. So am I. There’s plenty of that sort of work around here. And you’ve made contacts, haven’t you, Will, when you were on work experience?’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’
‘Like where?’ Dad said.
‘Scotland, on a private estate. A wood on a farm in Devon. A couple of other places.’
‘You got on okay with the owners?’ Arry said.
‘Sure, apart from one.’
‘I bet you could pick up work from some of them, if you tried.’
Doris said, ‘You mean, he could start a business.’
‘I don’t know about a business,’ Arry said. ‘I just meant he could drum up enough work to make some money for them to go to Cambridge together next year.’
‘And that means he’d have to declare his earnings for tax, and there’s the question of VAT and insurance for himself and his clients, and a stack of other rules and regs that have to be dealt with, so what you’re talking about is a business.’
‘There’s the question of gear as well,’ Dad said. ‘You’d need tools and equipment and proper clothing, for a start.’
Will nodded.
‘And,’ Dad went on, ‘a vehicle to get you about in and carry the gear.’
Will nodded again.
Doris said, ‘Which means money to set you up and get you started, before you even do any work.’
‘Forget it!’ Arry said. ‘I’m sorry I mentioned it.’
‘No no,’ Dad said, ‘it’s a good idea.’
‘He’d need publicity as well, or how’s he going to get enough work quickly?’ Doris said. ‘That’s another start-up cost.’
‘There’s money around for that kind of thing,’ Dad said.
‘You mean,’ Doris said, ‘business start-up grants from the government?’
‘Yes. Why not? You’ve helped people get them, haven’t you? So help Will. Family first. And he’ll need a good accountant. The least you can do is take him on on a delayed-fee basis. You get paid when he makes enough to pay you.’
By this time Will and Arry and I might as well not have been there. We sat slumped in our seats while D&D held a business conference.
‘And what are you going to do for him?’ Doris said, her competitive side taking over.
‘Right, okay, let’s see. There’s the office. He can have a desk there, if he wants to. We’ll do his secretarial work, take messages, keep accounts, send out invoices. No charge till he gets going.’
‘And what about a vehicle?’
‘That’s a bigger problem, but we can think about it.’
‘And where would they live? They can hardly say they’re living together if they go on as they are now. It’s no more than serious dating. And if one of the reasons for taking a year out is to see how committed they want to be, they can only do that if they live together.’
‘They can live with us, can’t they? I wouldn’t mind. Would you?’
‘No. But if I were them, I’d want a place of our own. Otherwise, for Will, it’d be like living with the in-laws, and you know what trouble that can lead to.’
‘True,’ Dad said.
‘Besides that, we’re only talking about Will earning some money for a year, whereas what you’re talking about is setting up a permanent business.’
Dad didn’t say anything. I could see Doris thought she’d won, and that riled me enough to put my mind to work.
‘I don’t see why Will shouldn’t start a business. It doesn’t mean it has to stop being a business when he goes to uni. Arry could carry on. He needs a proper job as well. Will can still work for it in the holidays. And he might want to do it all the time when he’s finished at uni. Or he might develop it into something else to do with trees. What’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing,’ Dad said, brightening up and returning to the fray. ‘And, what d’you think, Will? Would your dad give you any help to start you off?’
‘He might. I could ask him.’
‘Help with a vehicle maybe?’
‘Maybe. I’ve got the Polo. That can carry basic gear for small jobs, which is about all I could manage to start with.’
‘And,’ Dad said, turning to Doris, ‘some of your clients own houses with granny flats that aren’t used, or rent out property?’
‘Yes.’
‘Okay. Make some enquiries and do some persuading.’
Doris gave him one of her disapproving looks. But I knew she only did that because Dad was setting the pace and telling her what to do. She’d come round, and once she did, she’d be keener than Dad on the project and do a lot more to make it work. Dad liked inventing ideas and tossing them around, but doing the spade work afterwards wasn’t always quite his forte.
‘What about it, Will?’ Dad said. ‘Are you game?’
‘Sure,?
?? Will said, ‘if Cordelia is.’
‘I am,’ I said. ‘I think it’s a wonderful idea. Thanks, Arry. Why didn’t you do it yourself? You could have been a businessman by now.’
‘Didn’t think of it. And anyway, I’m a follower not a leader. I’d never hack it on my own. But with Will –’
‘We’ll go into partnership,’ Will said to ease the difficult moment.
‘And so long as I have a part in it as well,’ I said, only joking. ‘We could call it The Tree Care Company.’
‘Great!’ Will said.
‘No reason why you shouldn’t,’ Dad said, taking everything seriously today. ‘You know a bit about office work. You could keep the business side running.’
‘And the publicity,’ Doris said, warming to the possibilities quicker than I’d expected. ‘You’re good with computer design. You’ve helped Julie with the school magazine, doing the word processing and design. You’ll need a leaflet. You could get going on that straightaway, and the three of you could deliver it to the houses around town that look like they need some help with trees or hedges or whatever you can offer.’
Will started to laugh. And once he got going I did. And then Arry caught the infection. We knew why, but Doris and Dad couldn’t see it.
‘What are you laughing about?’ Dad said.
‘You two,’ I said. ‘Sitting there, arranging our life like we were your employees and it had nothing to do with us. And it’s so much pie in the sky.’
‘No it isn’t,’ Dad said.
‘No it isn’t,’ Will said.
‘No it isn’t,’ Doris said.
‘Too right it isn’t,’ Arry said.
And I knew a decision had been made, pie in the sky or not.
But I talked it through again with Will in bed that night; I had to be sure he really did want to take a gap year and hadn’t been hustled into agreeing by Dad. He assured me he was excited by the idea of starting a business and us working together to make it a success and to earn the money we needed to live on our own.
‘A break from studying will do me good. I’ve been feeling that for a while, to be honest. I need a change and I’d like to do something with what I’ve learned. Plus I’m fed up with being financially dependent on my father. Doing this solves everything. We get to live together, we get to do what we both want, I get to work with trees, and I get free from sponging on Dad. I wish I’d thought of it myself.’
‘Your mother will hate it.’
He chuckled and said, ‘Hard cheese. That’s her problem, not ours.’
‘She might try to make it mine. You know she’ll blame me for leading her favourite son astray. When are you going to tell her?’
‘Tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow!’
‘Why not?’
‘Don’t you want to wait a few days to be sure?’
‘We’ve decided, haven’t we? Why waste time? There’s a lot to do. Take the bull by the horns and strike while the iron is hot.’
‘You mix your clichés with abandon.’
‘And talking of hot and horns and mixing it—’
Next day, Sunday, there was an unholy row in the Blacklin residence. Mrs B. went ape. Will gave her what for. Mr B. tried to mediate, without success. Will departed for college leaving his mother in tears and a huff. But his dad tipped Will the wink when out of sight and sound of his wife that he thought what we were doing was right and that he’d help however he could, though nothing must be said of it to Mrs B. I was not there to witness this to-do, thank heaven; Will reported it during our evening call. I expected to be the object of retaliation by a resentful mum, however, and wasn’t wrong. But before it came:
On Monday I talked to Julie after school. I told her what had happened and asked for her advice. She thought the plan a good one but could foresee problems. The two thorniest were: (a) where we would live; it would need to be somewhere local but if it was too close to home, it would end up being hardly more than an annexe, and Will and I would never actually be living on our own emotional and practical resources; and (b) I would soon become depressed if I hadn’t something purposeful to do, something that would engage my mind.
She didn’t have anything to suggest re (a) but did have re (b).
‘I’ve been thinking about this anyway,’ she said, ‘because of you taking a gap year. I’ve made a few enquiries, done a bit of research, trawling the Net, and the long and short of it is this. As we know, you don’t have the grades for Cambridge. That being so and after hearing what you’ve just told me, it seems to me the best thing would be for you to do an Open University degree in English literature. It probably sounds a bit dull but the people I’ve talked to who’ve done it say it’s much more interesting than it sounds, you do meet other students from time to time, the tutors are good and attentive, the tv programmes they use for teaching are well made, and from what I can see of the courses, they’re the kind that will interest you.’
‘Like what?’
‘Well, there are two on Shakespeare, for example, and one on the nineteenth-century novel, which I think you’re ready for, and besides the main courses you can take related courses in writing poetry and fiction, which might be useful.’
‘Sounds good. The only thing that worries me is that I’m not sure how disciplined I’d be on my own, especially if I have a job as well, which I’ll have to because we’ll need the money.’
‘I have another idea about that. I’ve been thinking that I’d like to do a doctorate. You get intellectually stale teaching at the same level all the time. I’ve been down quite a bit recently, as you know, and that’s why. I’m not learning anything new. I need to do some regular study that will stretch me and excite me again, not for work or promotion but for the sake of it. The OU do postgrad courses. Why don’t I sign up for a PhD and we’ll work for our degrees together? Then we can help keep each other’s nose to the grindstone.’
What need was there for discussion? After a few minutes of telling each other how brilliant we both were, and having a drink on it, and me feeling breathless relief and thanking Julie, we calmed down and logged onto the OU website there and then, printed out the details, and started the process for registration.
‘And,’ Julie said, ‘as my contribution to help you and Will, I’ll pay your OU fees, so you don’t need to worry about that.’
Mrs B.’s retaliatory attack came the following Wednesday. I was sent for just before the end of school. She’d turned up and conned the head into allowing her to see me ‘on a private matter of some urgency’. The head even vacated her room so that Mrs B. could talk to me there. (‘No surprise,’ Doris said, when I told her what had happened, ‘she buys her clothes from Mrs B.’s shop and I’ve seen them in convivial chats at Mario’s.’ Again: not what you know but who you know.)
She was vile. Didn’t I realise I was ruining William’s entire future? Didn’t I realise he was way out of my class academically, not to mention, she might add, socially? How could I behave so crassly? Was I utterly selfish, not to mention arrogant? Had I no consideration for other people? Couldn’t I see what distress I was causing? Wasn’t it obvious we were making a terrible mistake? She couldn’t imagine why my father was colluding in it. William and I were far too young and inexperienced to live together (she might have been talking of a hideous disease). Couldn’t I see that William would very soon realise his mistake and then he’d resent me for the rest of his life? She had appealed to me once before and had thought I had seen sense. But not at all! I had deliberately deceived her. Even so, she was appealing to me again. ‘Give up this misconceived plan. Leave my son alone and allow him to do what is clearly best for him, and take his place at Cambridge.’
This time I was ready for her and didn’t stand meekly by and say nothing. Besides, I was older and not so malleable after Edward and Cal. And if I had even a smidgeon of doubt about what we planned, Mrs B. banished it.
‘Mrs Blacklin,’ I said, when she eventually drew breath, ‘I don’t want to m
ake an enemy of you. I know you resent me. I’m sorry about that. But you’ve no right to speak to me the way you just have. I don’t know whether Will and I are making a mistake or not. People I trust think what we’re doing is right. And Will wants it as much as I do, as I’m sure he has told you. Even if it turns out to be a mistake, it won’t ruin Will’s life – or mine. If I thought it would I wouldn’t do it. I have too much respect for myself as well as for Will and I love him too much to hurt him like that. As you’ve pointed out, we’re still young. If we are making a mistake we’ll have time to put it right, and Will has assured me his place at Cambridge won’t be lost. I wish you could accept it and help us. But whether you can or not, I won’t give up. And that’s all I can say.’
If it were possible for a human being to breathe fire, Mrs B. would have despatched me in a puff of smoke. As she couldn’t she merely glared at me for a while, uncharacteristically speechless.
And then with words spoken with even greater venom, she said, ‘You are despicable,’ turned on her elegant heel and stalked from the room.
That night I told Will his mother and I had had an exchange of views but kept the venom to myself. Why stoke up the cycle of resentment? Somewhere someone has to break the circle or there’s never any hope of change.
How I hate exams! They came and went in a haze of worry and sleepless nights and panic revision and sweated days and the certainty of failure. I hadn’t the energy or the confidence even to think of our plans, never mind to do anything more about them. Will, a lover of exams, finished at college without either a flicker of worry or a touch of sadness that he was leaving, and was back home before mine were done. He and his mother were so at loggerheads he couldn’t stand the atmosphere at home, so he lodged with us, and with his usual singleness of mind, turned his attention to the organisation of Tree Care.
I’d never thought of him as a businessman, but I quickly saw how much he enjoyed it. Doris set him up with accounts and record books. They decided he should wait to see how things went before applying for a business start-up grant. Dad fixed him up with a desk and a phone in the office. He and Arry toured the area, noting the addresses of properties that could do with some tree or hedge maintenance. He visited the arboretum and let them know what he was doing, in the hope that they might put some work his way.