More Cats In The Belfry

  According to Mrs Adams, on the occasion of Mrs Binney's acting as accompanist for the first time, he bowed to her afterwards, led her forward by her fingertips as if they were dancing a minuet, and presented her to the audience, who supposed they must be meant to clap and obligingly did so. 'And then,' said Mrs A. with meaning, 'he kissed 'er 'and.' I could just imagine it. Mr Tooting doing a pint-sized impression of the conductor of the London Philharmonic at the last night of the Proms.

  What did Mrs Binney do?' I enquired.

  'Turned red as a beetroot and showed her teeth,' said Mrs Adams.

  I could imagine that, too. Mrs Binney's smile, fortunately rare, was the result of somewhat antiquated dentistry and reminded most people of a horse about to bite.

  Mr Tooting, still busy bowing to the audience, must have missed that bit. From then on all the Singalong Half-hours ended with his leading Mrs B. forward for applause, escorting her to her chair in the front row while he returned to the platform to read out the notices, and afterwards helping her on with her coat and walking with her to her front door, which was only a few yards up the lane, on his own way home, and anyway he had a torch. It didn't fail to arouse comment in the village, however.

  'Tryin' to hang her hat up there all right.'

  'Fancies herself livin' in thic bungalow.' 'Flatten he like a steam-roller on thur weddin' night', was Fred Ferry's country-candid observation to me outside the post office one day as we watched them walking up the village street together.

  They were walking up the street together – big, brawny Mrs Binney and bantam-sized Mr Tooting – because she'd spotted him from behind her curtains as he passed her gate and had nipped out to catch him up. Mrs Tucker, who lived opposite her and kept a watchful eye on village goings-on from behind her own curtains, said she was always doing that.

  Given that she'd decided he was interested in her, Mrs Binney was obviously doing her best to further matters – to which end, rocking the village to its stolid foundations, and as suddenly as she'd volunteered to play the piano, one day she abandoned the chamber-­pot hat and drainpipe coat she'd worn ever since I could remember and appeared, first of all in the post office and later the same day in the valley, wearing a Picasso-patterned summer dress and a hairdo of violet bubble­curls.

  Father Adams was talking to me at the cottage gate when she came somewhat self-consciously down the hill. 'Gawd, Mod,' he said, stopping in mid-sentence to stare at her in feigned astonishment. 'Thee'st look like a hyacinth wrapped up in a Tesco bag. What on earth'st thee bin doin' to theeself?'

  Ignoring him, she patted her curls complacently and asked me how I liked it. 'I... er... hardly recognised you,' I stammered, which was obviously the right answer because, while Father Adams faded quietly into the background and disappeared – no doubt to tip his cronies at the top of the hill not to miss on her way back – she confided to me that Shirl had done it. Took all last night, she had, doin' the perm. And made the dress for her. Very handy with her sewing machine, was Shirl. Appreciating the effort needed to construct a dress that fitted Mrs B.'s large and angular form in any material, let alone matching up sections of white nylon patterned with red, yellow and green triangles, I said she certainly must be.

  Shirl, I would explain, was Mrs Binney's son Bert's girl-friend. Twenty years back she would have been living with her parents in the nearby seaside town where she was a hairdresser, with Bert zooming over on his motor-bike to court her in the evenings and at weekends. In these days of couples no sooner fancying each other than moving in together, however, Shirl and Bert were ensconced in a caravan behind the Barage on the main road where Bert worked as a mechanic, while they looked around for something permanent.

  Twenty years back Mrs Binney would have disowned Bert and written off Shirl as a brazen hussy, if not a daughter of Jezebel, but as they were only emulating what went on on the telly, and even, if rumour was to be believed, in some of the yuppy-owned big houses around the district, what, Mrs B. demanded of her neighbours, not without a touch of pride in her Bert's being among the avant-garde, could she do about it?

  It was none of my business. Indeed, what with the dress, the violet hairdo and the piano-playing I began to wonder about her own intentions towards Mr Tooting. Did she see herself as Thoroughly Modern Maude, sharing his bungalow as Shirl shared the caravan with Bert? And if so, with her being a member of the Mothers' Union and Mr Tooting a churchwarden, what would the Rector say?

  For the moment, at any rate, it made my life considerably easier. She gave up coming down the hill quite so often to bemoan the condition of the cottage garden or tell me that I'd never raise Tani – and Tani, almost magically, started to thrive.