The Dilemmas of Harriet Carew

Guy does mental arithmetic: ‘A car like this would be … more than two years’ school fees.’

The mere prospect is enough to crumple Guy, and he sits down with a sigh. Shirt collar frayed, shoes scuffed, he looks worn out by the effort to live up to his forebears, do the best for his offspring and keep up with his peers.

‘If only …’ he begins. The boys and I ignore him. We’ve already heard every possible dream that Guy could unfurl before us, and know that he will finish that sentence with one of the following: they make a film of Lonely Hunter (an option on the book did pay for our boiler last year, but we haven’t heard anything since); the Carew parents’ family home in Somerset is suddenly valued at ten times last year’s modest estimate; Rajput proves a sensation and sells millions.

There are unspoken hopes too. Aunt Sybil dies: ruthless, I know, but Guy’s widowed great aunt is apparently worth a fortune and allegedly considers him her favourite relative. So far, though, she has come to stay on countless occasions but has never so much as hinted at a legacy. Or that Guy’s agent, Simon, reverts to treating Guy as a great writer with a great future. He doesn’t need to take him out to the Ivy every week, which is how he courted him in the days when Lonely Hunter was a bestseller, but he could show more interest than the annual Happy Winter (‘Best Eid, Hanukkah, and Christmas wishes to all of you’) card.

CRASH! We all jump. The kitchen window rattles as if we’ve survived an earthquake. Before the boys can run to the kitchen door, Ilona walks in, her tattooed boyfriend and a string of expletives in her wake.

‘Some idiot has parked his Mercedes next to your house!’ Pete swaggers, vest tight over his chest. ‘He’ll have a right shock – nasty scratch all down the side. Cost him a pretty penny, that will, cheeky bugger. We’d better be off before he notices, Ilona …’

2

‘It was a disaster.’ Guy shakes his head as he lovingly dries one of the crystal tumblers that he inherited from his aunt Amelia. I’m standing at the sink, hands in foamy water, wondering, once again, what is the point of owning a dishwasher when half your crockery is so fragile that it has to be washed by hand?

‘It went well.’ I rinse the third tumbler. ‘Oliver made you an offer.’

‘Not the one I wanted,’ replies Guy bitterly. ‘In fact, it sounds daft.’

‘Nothing to be sniffy about.’ I remain stubbornly upbeat. ‘And despite the shock announcement, it was quite a success.’

‘Hmmm …’ Guy examines a tumbler against the light: mercifully, no chips.

‘“Hmmm” nothing,’ I snap, exasperated. ‘A job offer doesn’t happen every day. You didn’t even try to look interested.’

‘I’ll ring him, I promise.’ Guy sounds despondent. ‘And the pork belly was delicious, darling.’

Not just the pork, I think: the Merlot was excellent and for once I didn’t have to whisper ‘FHB’ (Family: Hold Back) to Guy in the kitchen. And the peculiar sea-buckthorn juice which he had brought back from his trip to Lithuania gave my trifle an almighty kick. In fact, Guy should be grateful because, once again, we have managed to pass off our threadbare household as a proper, middle-class one.

‘I don’t know …’ Guy sets down the tumbler on the tray with the rest. ‘Maybe it was the news that Pete’s not insured and that ours kicks in only for damage above £600. We don’t need another expense.’

‘We certainly don’t,’ I agree.

Five hours earlier, at eight o’clock, I find my one remaining pair of tights without a run hanging in the children’s bathroom. I sniff a strong, familiar scent: the Lynx ‘Africa’ antiperspirant which Alex insisted on buying during our last shopping expedition.

‘Alex?! Why are you putting on antiperspirant at night?’

My eldest pops his head through the door. ‘I never remember to put it on in the morning.’ He wolf-whistles as I wrench on my tights.

I rush back to our bedroom to get dressed, wondering if my thirteen-year-old is now too old to see his mother only partially clothed.

The doorbell goes.

‘Whaaaaat?’ I ask, disbelieving.

‘No … it can’t be …’ Guy is outraged. ‘Who shows up on the dot at eight when dinner is eight for eight thirty?!’

I sneak a peep from our bedroom window: the Mallards are at our front door. ‘Your guest of honour, that’s who.’

‘Harriet!’ Guy panics. ‘Get dressed!’ Still trying to fix his cufflinks, he rushes downstairs, three steps at a time.

Quickly, I zip up my navy-blue Paddy Campbell dress, a £14 find from the Sue Ryder shop on Clapham High Street last summer, and put on some mascara. I’m nervous: by the time the pork belly is crispy, we will have spent almost ninety minutes in one another’s company – and how can I be entertaining for that length of time? Guy manages these occasions as if they were a school play and he the enterprising and determined Head of Drama who knows how to get the best out of little Joey as Bugsy Malone. All those Carew clan gatherings, school debating societies and Cambridge sherry parties, all those trips to Uganda, Uruguay and Uzbekistan have prepped him to win over an audience – from the cantankerous old cow to the acid-tongued megalomaniac.

I, on the other hand, feel like the tone-deaf girl in the school choir: caught between faking it and hitting a false note. God, let the pork be ready before anyone finds out I don’t know the name of the dictator in Belarus, or what’s on at Tate Modern, and before I’m outed as the one who prefers to talk to her children rather than to a well-known entrepreneur.

I draw a deep breath and walk downstairs.

Our dinner parties, Guy always says, are more about trompe-l’œil than truffle oil: a candlestick hides the mend in the linen tablecloth; Guy and I have the sagging chintz-covered chairs; a drape covers the split sofa cushion. But in the candlelight, the drawing room, as Guy grandly calls our living room, looks inviting. The carpet, from a long-ago visit of Guy’s to Tehran, has withstood admirably the pitter-patter of tiny feet and paws; and the portrait of Great-Grandfather Hector in his major’s uniform smiles protectively upon the room. Even the Carews’ mahogany monstrosities, an over-sized dining table, a matching sideboard, and a chaise longue that cannot be sat on without first undergoing a medical check-up, gleam elegantly. Perhaps Guy’s vigorous weekly polishing, which he insists on carrying out with beeswax, makes a difference after all.

Once upon a time, I dreamt of a home with sleek and contemporary furniture, neutral walls and pale wood floors. It would be a mixture of Scandinavian and Conran, and bear witness to the smooth, serene family life unfolding within its neat confines. What I live with today is an inherited jumble of battered antiques and flowery fabrics, a mix of High Victorian pieces and low-cost foreign finds, a home that bears the brunt of three children, one dog, ever-changing au pairs, and a husband caught between copy deadlines and school fees. I sometimes feel there is too little of me in these rooms – a few photos, my silver christening cup, a painting by a friend who went to the Slade and then disappeared from sight. The rest is all Carew. Then the boys burst in, or I find Maisie cuddling Rufus on the chaise longue, and I realize they bear my imprint, even if the interiors don’t.

‘In the Carpathians, I came across a mother wolf looking for food for her cubs …’ Guy is entertaining the Mallards. ‘She was medium size, with a dark longish pelt. We looked each other in the eye … I tried to explain that I was a parent too.’ Oliver, a big bear of a man, chortles appreciatively. He’s brought us a bottle of Veuve Clicquot and stands by the fireplace, champagne flute in hand, eyes taking in everything from the push-button television to the overdue bills glaring red on my desk by the window. Everything has confirmed Oliver’s image of his Cambridge friend being in need of his largesse, and he beams kindly in our direction.

Oliver’s wife Belinda, decked out in enough Dolce & Gabbana to start her own boutique, is something glamorous in PR. Before I can find out what, she has dismissed my fund-raising for HAC with ‘You are good’, which means frumpy and worthy. I can tell that she finds me unsettling: what she sees as my do-gooding, as well as my part-timer status and unfashionable clothes, make her as self-conscious as if I’d announced that I would be kicking off the dinner party with a Latin grace.

I nervously check the grandfather clock in the corner: it’s only eight thirty. Another hour to go. Belinda’s PR skills fail to conceal her dissatisfaction with the situation. Guy has dragged Oliver into the study for a viewing of the ancestral medals and I am scrabbling for a topic of conversation. I remember vaguely Guy warning me not to raise the subject of children with the Mallards – a terrible accident? A bitter custody battle? Belinda doesn’t look the gardening sort, or the country type. I can’t remember what’s on in the West End. What about books? I belong to a book club, after all.

‘Have you read …?’ I venture.

‘Oh, I haven’t read a book in ages. Simply don’t have the time!’ Belinda looks through me. Then, searching for a crumb of praise to cast my way: ‘Very nice glasses.’ She holds up one of Aunt Amelia’s crystal tumblers, half full of her G and T.

‘Yes … from one of Guy’s aunts …’ And I find myself babbling about Amelia Carew and life in Delhi during the last days of the Raj.

I realize how little I’ve engaged Belinda when she suddenly squeals, ‘There you are!’ and rushes up to the two men, who’ve surfaced from the study.

The doorbell goes: Hallelujah! Charlotte and Jack bounce in, looking lively and in a good mood. My friend’s haircut, manicure, and Marni jacket reassure Belinda that here at least is someone who understands.

Guy pulled a face when I suggested Jack and Charlotte be included. He is fond of Charlotte, but Jack makes him wince. ‘Sorry, HarrietnGuy, I know it’s rude,’ Jack will mutter as he dives for his ever-throbbing BlackBerry, ‘but this is a big one …’ And then, after a few minutes, he’ll explode: ‘Ben, boy! You’ve got yourself a deal!’ But we have to invite the Collinses because, as I reminded Guy, we owe them. They invited us to La Traviata at Glyndebourne last summer, which would have been a truly wonderful treat, had it not been that we had to buy them programmes at £20 each and champagne at £10 per glass. Guy and I had to pretend we were on a mid-summer detox and made do with tap water.

Jack is one of our few friends wealthy enough to impress Oliver: his bonus last year was five times our combined incomes. Despite the personal trainer Charlotte has signed him up with, who takes Jack out on the common twice a week like a well-trained dog, Jack remains stubbornly portly. Although Charlotte tries valiantly to derail his train of boasts tonight, within minutes he manages to work into the conversation the new Porsche and the Tuscan villa they rented for a fortnight last month.

‘Back in your box, Jack!’ Charlotte wags her finger as her husband is about to launch into the price of villa rentals in the Tuscan-Umbrian region.

‘Yes, love.’ Jack nods and bites his tongue.

Guy, I can see, breathes easier. Oliver, who had been asking a lot of questions about real estate near Florence, looks disappointed.

‘Now, tell me about your company – sounds so high-powered …’ Charlotte turns her large, awe-struck eyes on Belinda. A successful career woman is calculated to fill my best friend simultaneously with fear and fascination. We both left university with only the vaguest idea of what we’d like to do professionally: something in the arts – which translated into both of us waiting on tables at the Chelsea Arts Club for that first summer. The minute Charlotte married Jack and it became clear she wouldn’t have to work, she luxuriated in her status of stay-at-home wife as if it were a bath full of Aveda essential oils. But every now and then, when confronted with a tough-talking, high-gloss success story in heels, Charlotte feels a pang of dissatisfaction. These women talk knowledgeably about profit margins and annual returns on investments, but they also have two storybook children, can wear a sleeveless dress without fear, their YSL Rouge Velours is without chips, and they have read the latest bestselling biography of Stalin’s chef. Scaaaaareeeee, as Charlotte would say. Happily for her, Jack constantly reminds his wife that, in his book, career women are ball-breakers, and mums who work child-wreckers. He likes her, he assures her, just the way she is. And he shows his appreciation with countless expensive gifts, weekends away, and ‘second honeymoons’. Charlotte basks in these attentions, while I resent them as reminders that the last time Guy organized a weekend away, we ended up camping with the children in a muddy Devon field; and the last gift he gave me was a clumsily mounted and rather smelly wolf ’s head from Moldova.

The conversation proceeds like a school run: everyone sets off confidently if carefully, certain of where they want to get to and by what route. But little by little we are held up by other people’s dithering, or inconvenienced by their selfishness, and all propriety is ditched as we grow irritable, fearful, and aggressive.

The first to grow irritable is me.

‘HarrietnGuy, this will come as a bit of a surprise to you two,’ Jack practically does a little jig of delight as he tells us, ‘but we’re moving to Chelsea.’

‘Chelsea?!’ I gasp.

‘Chelsea,’ Charlotte confirms. She doesn’t meet my eye – she knows this is darkest treachery. We’ve always lived in Clapham, we’ve always joked about being a short bicycle ride from one another’s kitchen … and now … The clock’s brassy gong calls me to the pork belly.