In the Approaches

9

Mr Franklin D. Huff

I don’t know why, but I have the distinct feeling that Mrs Barrow knows more than she’s letting on. When she arrived for work this morning (pristine gingham housecoat, Dr Scholl wooden sandals combined with thick tan tights, brown nylon A-line skirt, trusty emu-feather duster held incongruously aloft like the proud baton of a Marching Band leader) the whole cottage was still shrill with the hyperactive buzz of bluebottles.

I had found some brief respite, overnight, in the small, spare room (the ‘box’ room as I casually refer to it) which seemed like the only place in the whole cottage not utterly overtaken (doused, eclipsed) by the rank odour of rotten fish. The flies were everywhere – everywhere – yet this was also the only place in the entire cottage that they didn’t seem to feel especially drawn to. Not a single fly came in to pester me as I fitfully slumbered (or if they did, I had no inkling of it), although the door had – somewhat stupidly – been left ajar for the best part of the night after a lumbering visit to the bathroom.

I showed Mrs Barrow the damage (almost with a small measure of pride – a secret hankering for approval: Mrs Barrow! Observe my suffering – my confusion – my persecution!).

‘The bin has been dumped on top of the Look Out.’ I pointed.

‘The bulb on the front porch is gone … Presumed stolen.

‘A tiny pebble has been thrown through the bathroom window …’ (Of course I didn’t take her in there, the rabbit being hidden, temporarily, under an upturned washing-up bowl.)

And finally … the Pièce de Résistance! I led her out on to the little back porch (the postage-stamp-sized – and badly fenced – scrap of garden to the fore; a lovely mess of blue and mauve: wild asters, bugloss, scabious and sea holly; cusping a sheer, thirty-foot drop to ground level, but still hemmed in from the beach proper by yet more dampness: some swampy common ground, the thin end of the not-so-Grand Military Canal, the road beyond and, of course, the sea wall) where the big fish is currently in situ on the old bench (which I broke the back slat of two days ago while removing a boot). She pinches her nose.

‘It was hidden in my suitcase under the bed,’ I explain.

She thinks for a short while. ‘You’re sure as you didn’t put it in there yourself, Mr Huff,’ she wonders, ‘and then forget?’

I am – quite frankly – incensed by this question.

‘What earthly reason d’you imagine I might have had for doing that?’ I demand.

She shrugs.

‘This is a shark, Mrs Barrow! How exactly do you expect I might go about acquiring a shark in these Godforsaken environs?’

‘Oh I think you’ll find as they’re very common in these parts, Mr Huff,’ Mrs Barrow insists. ‘When Mr Barrow worked out on the fishing boats we would eat sand shark very regular. Once or twice a week. I’d have thought a cosmopolitan gentleman such as yourself, Mr Huff, might be quite partial to the odd plate of good quality shark meat.’

I stare at her, astonished.

‘A nice bowl of shark fin soup,’ she persists. ‘Surely them Mexicanos are all wild for shark fin soup.’

‘Shark’s fin soup is a Chinese delicacy, Mrs Barrow,’ I stiffly inform her.

‘Shark is very edible, Mr Huff,’ Mrs Barrow doggedly continues, wafting her hand gently in front of her face, ‘although the mistake you made here, Mr Huff, was to leave the internal organs in place. Always be sure and gut a shark on the beach. Mr Barrow is oft wont to say that.’ She smirks. ‘Then the gulls’ll kindly do the rest of the work for you.’

‘I think you misunderstand me, Mrs Barrow …’ I start off.

‘Or they makes a fine bait,’ she continues, ‘if you can only bear the stink, mind.’

She winces.

‘I have never eaten shark, Mrs Barrow, nor have I ever considered eating shark,’ I maintain.

‘Well if the urge ever takes you again, Mr Huff, might I suggest as you soak the gutted fish flesh in milk or bicarbonate,’ she volunteers. ‘The worst of that honk is the ammonia, see …?’

Again? If the urge ever takes me again?!

‘Like I say,’ I repeat, quite sharply, now, ‘I have never eaten shark and I have never—’

‘Well you can eats it in all manner of ways, Mr Huff!’ she promptly eulogizes. ‘Tastes just like mackerel, it does. You can have it fresh, frozen, dried. The liver is specially prized for its oil. A person can even make leather goods from the hide if they so feels the urge.’

‘My point is—’

‘I just deep fries it in a nice, light batter, Mr Huff. Better still, after soaking the steak in milk, dip it in beaten egg, then a thin layer of flour, then pop it in a hot, oiled pan …’

‘While this is all very educational, Mrs Barrow …’

‘Or make yourself a plain stew, Mr Huff, with chopped carrots, onions, leeks, parsnips, potato …’

‘… I fail to see how …’

‘… nice tin of plum tomatoes …’

‘… this has any relevance with regard to …’

‘Salt. Pepper. Basic stock. Bay leaf …’

‘… the rotting carcass of a shark suddenly appearing …’

‘Celery. Did I forget celery?’

‘… as if by magic …’

‘Be sure to only throw in the diced fish at the last minute. Big handful of chopped parsley to serve …’

‘… or … or voodoo …’

‘Then hey presto, there you have it: sand shark stew, Mr Huff!’

‘Gumbo,’ I interject (broken).

‘Pardon me, Mr Huff?’ Mrs Barrow looks a tad offended.

‘Gumbo,’ I repeat.

‘You can call it mumbo gumbo if you likes, Mr Huff’ – Mrs Barrow is still more offended – ‘but a regular-sized sand shark such as this one here will provide a good hearty family meal, and without breaking the bank, neither.’

‘No, no, gumbo, Mrs Barrow! Gumbo: an American fish and meat dish. A stew.’

‘Oh.’ Mrs Barrow doesn’t look convinced.

‘Although gumbo has plenty of garlic. And it’s generally accompanied by a handful of rice.’

Mrs Barrow’s eyes widen in horror. ‘I’m afraid as Mr Barrow won’t tolerate garlic, Mr Huff! Makes him belch something rotten, it does! Nor rice, neither, except in puddings of course, and even then he generally prefers some sago. He don’t have no stomach for all that foreign muck, Mr Huff. A plain English stew is perfectly all right by him, thank you very much.’

Mrs Barrow rocks back on her wooden soles, arms crossed.

‘Garlic is the mainstay of South American cuisine,’ I stolidly maintain, ‘and it actually has many impressive anti-bacterial qualities …’ I suddenly find myself listing them, almost as if the list itself will somehow validate the feelings of hurt and distress I’m currently experiencing as a direct result of my perceived ill-treatment by the vindictive, bin-stealing, fish-hiding, garlic-hating people of the Great British Isle: ‘It’s good for wounds, Mrs Barrow, ulcers, colds, bladder problems …’

Mrs Barrow starts at the mention of bladder problems. ‘I’ll as thank you to please refrain yourself from trespassing into areas of such a deeply intimate complexion, Mr Huff!’ she exclaims, turns on her heel and heads back inside, affronted. I remain on the balcony for a second, momentarily nonplussed, then turn and follow. She disappears into various rooms and can be heard banging the wide open windows shut.

‘D’you think it’s a good idea to be closing all the windows, Mrs Barrow?’ I call through. ‘Isn’t it better to give the flies every opportunity to disperse?’

Mrs Barrow stomps back into the kitchen-diner, shaking her duster around. She marches into the sitting room, still wafting, and slams the window shut in there, too.

‘Mrs Barrow?’ I follow her into the room.

‘Mrs Barrow? D’you not think it might be better if we …?’

As I irritably address her I am slightly bemused to observe a series of skittish, disparate bluebottles suddenly unify and cohere (like a swarm of wild bees, or pre-roost starlings) on to an expanse of the whitewashed chimney breast behind Mrs Barrow’s shoulder, then doubly bemused – nay, astonished – to see them forming into a coherent shape. A large … a large … what? Uh … An … an X? Yes … an … uh … Then they busily adjust, and the X … well, it tips … it tips on to its side and what were formerly the two ‘horizontal’ lines are fractionally reduced to produce … How fleeting is this moment? I blink. Nope. Nope. Still there … still there …

A kind of cross shape! An actual cross! Large as life! On the chimney breast! A big, black, buzzing cross!

The hairs on the back of my neck promptly stand on end.

Mrs Barrow is speaking.

‘There was none of ’em in the little room,’ she ruminates, ‘did you happen to see that, Mr Huff?’

She turns and double-checks that the window is properly shut. I merely gape. I am inarticulate. Does she even notice the deafening cross of flies – right there – immediately to her left? I lift my arm and start to point vaguely as the cross shifts again; a diagonal line forms between the top of the vertical line and the further reaches of the horizontal line to the left and a … yes … it’s now a four. A perfect four. A four!

Mrs Barrow finally satisfies herself that the window is properly closed, spins back around swishing her duster (like a hoity-toity priest on Palm Sunday condescending to scatter holy water on to the unwashed masses), disperses the flies, quite unthinkingly, then pushes past me and disappears once again into the back section of the cottage. Three seconds of silence, before:

‘Euceelyptus!’ she bellows, victorious.

‘Sorry?’

I start to follow her. She is standing on the threshold to the small, box room.

‘In the little girl’s room!’ She points with her duster. ‘Euceelyptus! That’s her smell. Well I never!’

Mrs Barrow seems delighted. I push past her and step inside the room, sniffing.

Eucalyptus! She’s right. I have no idea why I didn’t notice it before! It’s stringent. Clean. And very powerful.

‘Well Carla’s as told me on many an occasion how she can’t abide the smell. She’s allergic! Disinfectant, see? She always says as the whole place is full of the scent of it. The little girl’s smell! Orla’s smell. Although they was as thick as thieves when that poor child was still alive – if you could call it a life, as such,’ she cavils, ‘and it was no different then, neither. Not as I’d know, mind. I was off in Dymchurch that entire summer nursing my sister-in-law – God bless her soul – who was down with the dropsy. Terrible it was – for a while. We all thought as she’d miss the birth of her first grandchild. She was quite frantic about it as I recall. Then she suddenly got herself better. Died one year later of a heart attack. But it was very quick. Blessedly so, Mr Huff.’

Mrs Barrow crosses herself and heads back to the kitchen.

‘Euceelyptus!’ she chortles. ‘Flies can’t abide the smell of it! Wait till I tells Carla about this!’

I remain in the room – inhaling suspiciously – and am soon drawn to my suit jacket which is slung over the back of a small, rickety whitewashed chair by the bed. I check the pockets (pure instinct) and draw out several handfuls of leaves – eucalyptus leaves. Eucalyptus leaves! Remember? From my little Hastings misadventure?

‘Mrs Barrow?’ I yell through, but am interrupted by a scream. Mrs Barrow has finally discovered the little rabbit in the bath.

‘It’s a rabbit, Mrs Barrow!’ I yell. ‘Just a rabbit – a dwarf variety.’

Mrs Barrow comes storming back through. ‘We has a strict no-pets policy, Mr Huff!’ she chastises me, hands on hips. ‘It’s right there in the contract: large print! Miss Hahn could happily evict you for less!’

‘It’s not mine!’ I insist. ‘I found it!’

‘Whereabouts?’ she demands.

‘In … in … in …in my vest,’ I respond (but not all that convincingly).

‘It’s been doing all its jobbies and what-not in the bath, Mr Huff!’ Mrs Barrow is not remotely mollified. Then, ‘In your vest?!’ she echoes, a few seconds later.

‘Yes. In amongst my vests,’ I modify. ‘Inside the small chest of drawers. I’m planning to phone the local constabulary,’ I say, ‘to investigate.’

‘You think it’s a matter of sufficient import to be bothering the police with?’ she asks, taken aback.

‘Why not, Mrs Barrow?’ I demand. ‘This was breaking and entering! Trespass! It’s not just a small matter of a couple of kids having a little bit of harmless fun at my expense. The bin alone – yes, fair enough. But this? It’s far more … more focused, more personal than that. These are the actions of a man or a woman with a serious grudge; these are acts of pure spite – considered acts, Mrs Barrow, and I naturally feel duty-bound to treat them as such.’

‘Trespass?! But you left all them doors unlocked, Mr Huff!’ Mrs Barrow interjects.

‘How’d you know that?’ I demand.

‘Lucky guess.’ She shrugs. ‘You always as leaves ’em open, Mr Huff. Old habits dies hard. I imagine that’s as what comes of living loose among all them free-and-easy types in the slums.’

‘An act of … of vengeance,’ I persist, refusing to be waylaid.

‘To put a rabbit in your vests, Mr Huff?’ she scoffs.

‘No. No! Not that so much as …’ I start to correct her, then, on second thoughts, ‘Yes! Yes! The rabbit! To move the bin and steal the bulb and … and the fish and the rabbit. Yes. Exactly.’ I nod.

Mrs Barrow considers all this for a few moments, which prompts me, in turn (I mean what’s to be considered?) to raise the stakes a little. ‘I don’t want to say anything that might alarm you unnecessarily,’ I murmur, ‘but I think it only fair to warn you that during my time working as an investigative journalist in South America I had a measure of involvement with …’ – I lower my voice a fraction – ‘with operatives from the higher echelons of the CIA – the highest echelons, in fact. This was a long time ago – ’68 – and they were by no means my finest hours, Mrs Barrow; I was sacked, ignominiously; disgraced – I can’t stand here and pretend otherwise – but there are still … there are wounds, festering wounds …’

‘You think as the CIA went and put a rabbit in your vests, Mr Huff?’ Mrs Barrow is naturally sceptical at the prospect.

‘Not literally, Mrs Barrow, no.’ I shake my head. ‘All I’m saying is that I’m highly practised at reading signals – understanding gestures – I’m au fait with the subtle language of revenge – of tit-for-tat – at a very basic, very primitive level. In Mexican gang culture the concept of retribucion is at the very heart of how—’

‘Now you look here, Mr Huff,’ Mrs Barrow interrupts, plainly startled, ‘I has a great deal of sympathy with your predicament, don’t nobody ever dare tell me otherwise …’

I humbly nod, gratified.

‘I got two eyes in my head, Mr Huff, and I can plainly see as how upset you is, like as if you saw a ghost, almost, Mr Huff …’ – she inspects my grief-strewn visage with some attention – ‘but all’s I need you to understand is that poor Miss Hahn – Carla – don’t need the burden of your problems with the CIA weighing down on her shoulders right now. That girl is burdened enough already: what with the rental problems because of all the cranks what comes here and takes the right royal mickey out of her decent nature, her crazy dad with his bad feet and his fat dog, not to mention the awful landslip which swallowed up her shed – full of all her tools and such – not two days since up there in Fairlight …’

I start.

‘Sorry? A—’

‘I don’t know as if you realize, Mr Huff,’ she continues, ‘how precious this little cottage is to poor Carla. Mulberry might not look much to folks such as you and I, Mr Huff, but to poor Carla …’ She frowns. ‘It’d be no exaggeration to say as it was her life, her … her world, her … her very soul, Mr Huff.’

‘Well we can’t have rotten fish and … and broken windows and stolen bins and deeply distressed residents impinging on our poor, dear Miss Hahn’s fastidious soul, Mrs Barrow, can we?’ I blithely respond (yes, yes, there is an element of facetiousness). ‘Perish the thought!’

‘Rabbits, Mr Huff!’ Mrs Barrow maintains. ‘Don’t you forget them rabbits, neither!’

‘Just so, Mrs Barrow.’(I am finally now beginning to understand Miss Hahn’s former contention that Mrs Barrow is generally wont to find the least important detail in any course of events to be the most significant. In this instance the actual offence of these recent developments to myself – my dignity – as opposed to Miss Hahn’s perceived offence at second-hand.) ‘Which is exactly why I am determined to alert the relevant—’

‘Although now I comes to think about it, Mr Huff,’ Mrs Barrow reasons, ‘this is as likely to be an attack on poor Miss Hahn as it is on you! All the crackpots what comes to this place, you know, such as yourself. All those difficult cases, the religious maniacs and the Irish and the gypsies and the swindlers. And as if that’s not bad enough, there was always the problems with her mother when poor Carla was growing up; her being a German and what-not, a foreigner, very bossy, always sticking her oar in, working for the council and taking pleasure – active pleasure it seemed like – in tearing down people’s beach huts and little homes on the marshes over yonder, though she paid for it in the end, I suppose. Went totally doolally with dementia, poor soul. Not to mention her father being such a difficult, work-shy Jew. I mean piano-tuning isn’t a way to make a proper living, Mr Huff. It’s dreadful! Even carneys got more self-respect! Who cares if the piano is a little bit off key, anyways? You can still bang out a good old tune on it … Yes’ – she nods – ‘I do think as it’s our duty as to protect her from these curious developments, Mr Huff. In fact …’

She wanders off, wafting the duster. ‘I should telephone Rusty. He’ll know what to do. Rusty Bickerton always has Miss Hahn’s best interests at heart, Mr Huff. Forget the constabulary. They’re as good as idiots in these parts anyways. Rusty’ll set things straight and we won’t need to bother dear Carla with none of it. I think that’s the best course. I really does.’

‘But Mrs Barrow …’

‘Put yourself to good use, Mr Huff. Go out and build that rabbit of yourn a cage. And it’ll need a run, to boot: two by four at the very least I’d have thought.’

‘But Mrs Barrow … I really am determined to … Mrs Barrow!’

Silence.

‘Hello?’

More silence.

‘Mrs Barrow …?’

I stand and quietly scrutinize this unfolding scenario for a moment with my dispassionate, journalistic eye. Is Mrs Barrow actually on to something here? Is this not actually about me after all? Am I simply overreacting – lashing out – because I’m so upset … because I haven’t properly processed … because I won’t openly admit to the depth of my real feelings about …? Well? Am I?

Mrs Barrow is standing in the living room as I meekly approach her, gently wafting her duster as she speaks on the phone.

‘Hello there, Mrs Bickerton, this is Mrs Barrow up at Mulberry. Yes, hello. I was wondering if I might have a quick word with Rusty if it’s all the same to you? Oh. Well, when you sees him will you tell him as I needs him to come and see me up here, pronto? It’s a matter of some delicacy. Yes. Yes. Thank you.’

She places down the receiver then glances around the room, deeply gratified.

I fail to see any reason for such high levels of satisfaction. In fact I find myself at quite the opposite side of this emotional scale. I am disgruntled. Momentarily dead-ended. Stoppered.

‘D’you hear that, Mr Huff?’ She places her hand to her ear.

I frown. I listen. Eh?

‘Hear what, Mrs Barrow?’ I respond.

‘Nothing!’ She grins.

‘Nothing?’ I echo, exhausted.

‘They’s all gone! See?’ She chuckles royally at my mystified expression (is it just me, or has life suddenly become horribly … I don’t know … loud? Angular? Bald? Cracked? Convoluted?).

‘Buzz, buzz, buzz!’ She kindly offers me a clue.

What?! Oh. Yes. Yes! The pesky flies! I glance around me. She’s right. They’re gone. They’ve vamoosed! All of them. Every single one of the little blighters.

‘Never give ’em too many options, Mr Huff.’ She taps the side of her nose with her finger. ‘My old Mam taught me that. Don’t be opening all the windows. Don’t spoil ’em. Be sparing. Just open the one – or a door …’

She trots over to the back balcony door and gently pulls it shut.

‘Always put something beyond it as a lure, mind. Flies is like livestock, Mr Huff – and some folk an’ all, come to that! Skittish, they are, plain skittish! So just give ’em clear directions’ – she winks at me, broadly – ‘and then they’ll do as they’s told, right enough.’

10

Miss Carla Hahn

I am going to speak to Mr Huff.

I am going to speak to Mr Huff.