Tea With Marnie

“It’s called a gas poker”

She leans down and I watch as she presses a button on the large metal canister. A pipe leads from the top of it into the fireplace in which a large log is balancing precariously. I try not to flinch as there’s a hissing noise from the end of the pipe and a large flame shoots out sideways into the room. I have never seen anything quite so terrifying before.

“…marvelous invention. They’ve stopped making them now” She takes her hand off the canister, sits back in the armchair and takes a sip of tea.

I’m not sure what to say. I wish he was here – we could have made faces at each other while she was out of the room. Not to make fun of her at all, except perhaps a little bit– it’s too sad for that really. I just wish he was here so maybe we could think together how to fix this. We must do something.

It’s stiflingly hot. This is a big room – or at least it used to be in my memory. Spacious, lots of bookshelves, a couple of sofas, a colourful rug. Shabby chic before it was fashionable. Now; dear god - now it’s awful. It’s crammed full – every inch. The only walkable space is a tiny passageway from the door to the fireplace which has two armchairs placed either side of it. The gas canister is in between them, and that’s it.

There are three enormous desks. At least that’s what I think they are. I can’t see the surfaces because they’re piled high with books, papers, computers, boxes. In every other space there are great towers of stuff. Every inch of the walls is covered with framed photographs, posters and paintings. I look around and catch my breath every couple of seconds as I recognise another thing from the flat – the big painting of David – her husband, staring out at us with that haunted look he had, the little sketch of Joe in the gold frame, eyes closed in concentration. The John Lennon poster that always hung above their dining table. It’s as if I am almost, almost back in the past - but not quite, because Marnie’s an old lady of nearly eighty now, and although she’s still elegant in her cowboy boots - she must have worn them specially – you can see she can hardly walk in them anymore, and when she lifts her arm you can see the holes in her pullover.

She puts her tea down and passes me a black file.

“This is what I was telling you about- I co-wrote it with my friend and it seems to have worked quite well. She’s very clever – wrote for the New Yorker and so on, but most of her life she’s had to do other things.”

She makes a sweeping gesture with her hand

“… estates in North Africa, various poets, large staff – you know. So she hasn’t really had time for much else. Do have a look and tell me what you think”

I take the folder, open it and it’s a script of some kind. I’m not sure what to say. I can see the synopsis mentions neo-fascists, a dead sheep, and a thinly disguised character who is obviously the mad earl who lived in the big house here until he put one last line of coke up his nose and died of a heart attack in his forties.

I tell her I’d love to read it, and that I’ll do it on the plane since it’s a ten hour flight. It’ll certainly take my mind off things. I’ll show it to him too when I get there. Maybe he’ll know what to do with it – or perhaps I can ask someone else. I don’t want to let her down.

She leans forward and presses the button on the canister again. The flame shoots out in the other direction this time, then she takes a metal poker and stabs at the log with it, until it rocks precariously and nearly falls onto the canister. I wonder how much longer she can possibly stay alive in these circumstances.

Now that I have her script in my handbag, she starts to talk about him again, as I knew she would, telling me how glad she is that I’ve decided to go, then listing more reasons – mostly very odd ones, for why she never liked his wife. “…the way she always spoke to him for instance – and then the brother was an athlete….” she says this last word as if it’s some kind of moral failing and I have to try very hard not to laugh

She breaks off

“I hope you don’t think I’m interfering?”

I shake my head vigorously.

When it’s time to go, I try not to look around me too much. It’s too sad. We walk through the dining room, with the long wooden table and I remember the dinner parties, the shouts of laughter, the endless talk, the sound of corks being pulled, the chinking of glasses, the wonderful food. I can see why she didn’t want me to come here at first.

She walks with me to my car. It is still so beautiful from the outside – with its thatched roof, little mullioned windows, and roses around the door. I say as much, and she strokes the sun-warmed wall as if it were a child .

The mist is beginning to rise as I leave. It’s been unseasonably warm and sunny for October, but that means the evening will be cold. I look back in my mirror and it couldn’t be more picturesque. There’s no other house for miles. I remember how Joe and I used to be terrified there when it got dark – all the country noises we couldn’t understand. I think of her there alone at night and I wonder how much longer she can go on

The sun’s sinking fast and before I reach the park gates, I have to turn my sidelights on. The chill of the evening makes me shiver. I pull the sleeves of my jumper down over my hands. We must think of something. We have to.