A Twist in the Tale Read online

  I knew he was perfect for me the first time I heard him order a pint of mild. A pint of mild—I can’t think of a better description of Roger. In those days the barmaids used to flirt openly with him, but he didn’t show any interest. Until Madeleine latched onto him I wasn’t even sure that it was women he preferred. Perhaps in the end it was my androgynous looks that appealed to him.

  I think I must have been the only one in that pub who was looking for something more permanent.

  And so Roger allowed me to spend the night with him. I remember that he slipped into the bathroom to undress while I settled on what I assumed would be my side of the bed. Since that night he has never once asked me to leave, let alone tried to kick me out. It’s an easygoing relationship. I’ve never known him to raise his voice or scold me unfairly. Forgive the cliché, but for once I have fallen on my feet.

  Brr. Brr. Brr. That damned alarm. I wished I could have buried it. The noise would go on and on until at last Roger decided to stir himself. I once tried to stretch across him and put a stop to its infernal ringing, only ending up knocking the contraption onto the floor, which annoyed him even more than the ringing. Never again, I concluded. Eventually a long arm emerged from under the blanket and a palm dropped onto the top of the clock and the awful din subsided. I’m a light sleeper—the slightest movement stirs me. If only he had asked me I could have woken him far more gently each morning. After all, my methods are every bit as reliable as any man-made contraption.

  Half awake, Roger gave me a brief cuddle before kneading my back, always guaranteed to elicit a smile. Then he yawned, stretched and declared as he did every morning, “Must hurry along or I’ll be late for the office.” I suppose some females would have been annoyed by the predictability of our morning routine—but not this lady. It was all part of a life that made me feel secure in the belief that at last I had found something worthwhile.

  Roger managed to get his feet into the wrong slippers—always a fifty-fifty chance—before lumbering toward the bathroom. He emerged fifteen minutes later, as he always did, looking only slightly better than he had when he entered. I’ve learned to live with what some would have called his foibles, while he has learned to accept my mania for cleanliness and a need to feel secure.

  “Get up, lazybones,” he remonstrated but then only smiled when I resettled myself, refusing to leave the warm hollow that had been left by his body.

  “I suppose you expect me to get your breakfast before I go to work?” he added as he made his way downstairs. I didn’t bother to reply. I knew that in a few moments’ time he would be opening the front door, picking up the morning newspaper, any mail, and our regular pint of milk. Reliable as ever, he would put on the kettle, then head for the pantry, fill a bowl with my favorite breakfast food and add my portion of the milk, leaving himself just enough for two cups of coffee.

  I could anticipate almost to the second when breakfast would be ready. First I would hear the kettle boil, a few moments later the milk would be poured, then finally there would be the sound of a chair being pulled up. That was the signal I needed to confirm it was time for me to join him.

  I stretched my legs slowly, noticing my nails needed some attention. I had already decided against a proper wash until after he had left for the office. I could hear the sound of the chair being scraped along the kitchen lino. I felt so happy that I literally jumped off the bed before making my way toward the open door. A few seconds later I was downstairs. Although he had already taken his first mouthful of cornflakes he stopped eating the moment he saw me.

  “Good of you to join me,” he said, a grin spreading over his face.

  I padded over toward him and looked up expectantly. He bent down and pushed my bowl toward me. I began to lap up the milk happily, my tail swishing from side to side.

  It’s a myth that we only swish our tails when we’re angry.

  THE STEAL

  CHRISTOPHER AND MARGARET Roberts always spent their summer holiday as far away from England as they could possibly afford. However, as Christopher was the classics master at St. Cuthbert’s, a small preparatory school just north of Yeovil, and Margaret was the school matron, their experience of four of the five continents was largely confined to periodicals such as the National Geographic and Time.

  The Robertses’ annual holiday each August was nevertheless sacrosanct and they spent eleven months of the year saving, planning and preparing for their one extravagant luxury. The following eleven months were then spent passing on their discoveries to the “offspring”: the Robertses, without children of their own, looked on all the pupils of St. Cuthbert’s as the “offspring.”

  During the long evenings when the “offspring” were meant to be asleep in their dormitories, the Robertses would pore over maps, analyze expert opinion and then finally come up with a shortlist to consider. In recent expeditions they had been as far afield as Norway, northern Italy, and Yugoslavia, ending up the previous year exploring Achilles’ island, Skyros, off the east coast of Greece.

  “It has to be Turkey this year,” said Christopher after much soul-searching. A week later Margaret came to the same conclusion, and so they were able to move on to phase two. Every book on Turkey in the local library was borrowed, consulted, reborrowed and reconsulted. Every brochure obtainable from the Turkish Embassy or local travel agents received the same relentless scrutiny.

  By the first day of the summer term, charter tickets had been paid for, a car hired, a slightly larger hotel room booked and everything that could be insured comprehensively covered. Their plans lacked only one final detail.

  “So what will be our ‘steal’ this year?” asked Christopher.

  “A carpet,” Margaret said, without hesitation. “It has to be. For over a thousand years Turkey has produced the most sought-after carpets in the world. We’d be foolish to consider anything else.”

  “How much shall we spend on it?”

  “Five hundred pounds,” said Margaret, feeling very extravagant.

  Having agreed, they once again swapped memories about the “steals” they had made over the years. In Norway, it had been a whale’s tooth carved in the shape of a galleon by a local artist who soon after had been taken up by Steuben. In Tuscany, it had been a ceramic bowl found in a small village where they cast and fired them to be sold in Rome at exorbitant prices: a small blemish which only an expert would have noticed made it a “steal.” Just outside Skopje the Robertses had visited a local glass factory and acquired a water jug moments after it had been blown in front of their eyes, and in Skyros they had picked up their greatest triumph to date, a fragment of an urn they discovered near an old excavation site. The Robertses reported their find immediately to the authorities, but the Greek officials had not considered the fragment important enough to prevent it being exported to St. Cuthbert’s.

  On returning to England Christopher couldn’t resist just checking with the senior classics don at his old alma mater. He confirmed the piece was probably twelfth century. This latest “steal” now stood, carefully mounted, on their drawing room mantelpiece.

  “Yes, a carpet would be perfect,” Margaret mused. “The trouble is, everyone goes to Turkey with the idea of picking up a carpet on the cheap. So to find a really good one…”

  She knelt and began to measure the small space in front of their drawing room fireplace.

  “Seven by three should do it,” she said.

  Within a few days of term ending, the Robertses traveled by bus to Heathrow. The journey took a little longer than by rail but at half the cost. “Money saved is money that can be spent on the carpet,” Margaret reminded her husband.

  “Agreed, Matron,” said Christopher, laughing.

  On arrival at Heathrow they checked their baggage onto the charter flight, selected two nonsmoking seats and, finding they had time to spare, decided to watch other planes taking off to even more exotic places.

  It was Christopher who first spotted the two passengers dashing across the tarmac,