Goose At The White Feather

Everything was the same the day they came. The hum of the fridge, the soft voice of the radio, the eight o’clock sun. Same breakfast of warm bagels and fruit. Same headlines about gypsy camps on our people’s land.
+++++“They won’t come here, Mother, will they?”
+++++“No, darling, of course not. Father checks every night. They wouldn’t dare.”
+++++I skipped to school that morning. Down the avenue, past the caravans and camp fires, big leather satchel bouncing on my back. The top of my head was baked by the heat. At lunchtime I played Bad Gypsies. No one wanted to be a gypsy, so we made the little ones join in and told them to huddle round a fire and roast a hedgehog. They cried about eating it even though it was only pretend. They wouldn’t let us black their teeth with felt pen. When we tried to lightly scratch numbers on their arms and ink them in, Miss made us break up the game.
+++++Mother sat at the table that day, as she always did, and smiled as she cut slices from our Tuesday apple cake.
+++++“Gypsies are dirty, Mother, aren’t they?”
+++++“Yes, darling. Very.”
+++++She glanced at the paper and shivered. It was folded next to a pile of blinding white socks. I had elastic garters. They bit into my legs, but my socks stayed up all day. It’s about keeping up appearances. That’s why Mother scrubbed the door step and polished the knocker. All the families here did that. Mustn’t let the side down, my Father said every Sunday after church, when he changed into his overalls to wash the car. The other fathers copied him. He set the trend, Mother said, as she massaged the chicken with butter. Once she forgot to defrost it and we had to have Succulent Braised Beef in Gravy in a frozen red packet from the corner shop.
+++++“If anyone asks you at school tomorrow, say you had beef. Don’t mention the packet.” Mother said.
+++++I liked everything being the same. The day they came, my milk wasn’t cold and I didn’t like it. Mother said that the milkman hadn’t delivered ours, so she had bought Long Life from the corner shop.
+++++“But I saw the milkman, Mother. On my way to school.”
+++++“I hope you wished him a good morning, darling.”
+++++“Why do I have to? He scares me. I don’t like his funny eye.”
+++++“Because it’s polite. We must accept that not all people are the same, like us.”
+++++“Girls at school say that gypsies are stealing milk from doorsteps.” I watched my Mother’s face go all stiff. “They say this is a time of Uncertainty. But you said they wouldn’t come here. You said they wouldn’t dare.”
+++++“People should be more careful with their milk these days.” She kept smoothing the pile of socks and was quiet for a long time. Then she said loudly that my Father wouldn’t stand for it and I shouldn’t listen to rubbish from girls who lived in the maisonettes by the railway sidings. I couldn’t interrupt to say I didn’t really talk to them, only the girls from Cohen Crescent or Luther Court. A lot of milk had gone from there.
+++++There was a knock on the door. We wondered whether it was a charity collector or the parcel delivery man. Maybe Uncle Aaron wheeling himself round for a visit.
+++++Mother took off her apron and patted her bun as always. I followed her to the door. There was a man in a suit like my Father’s, only the sleeve hems were all dangling threads and the trousers higher than his shoes. He wore a grubby red neckerchief, not a silk tie. He had his hands clamped together like someone praying and his smile was gappy, but nice and stretchy across his shiny brown face. There was a gold hoop in his ear.
+++++“Madam, could I trouble you for a few directions, please? I’m a newcomer, you see, to Helfgott Heights. I want to show the family around. Meet the neighbours. Settle ourselves in. Feel like our feet are under the proverbial table, so to speak.”
+++++He looked at me and laughed. I smiled politely.
+++++“Best get the kids adjusted nice and quick, don’t you think, Madam? Name’s Tobar, by the way. How do you do?”
+++++“How do you do?” Mother shook his hand a bit limply.
+++++She stood back and let him come into our home. He brought a strange smell in with him. Smoke and roasting meat and fresh air all mixed together. Mother left the front door open. I felt she wanted him to leave soon. But she couldn’t have said that. It wouldn’t have been right.
+++++“Nice of you, Madam, very kind. Can’t be too careful, can you, what with all this talk about gypsies worming their way into people’s houses?” He winked at me.
+++++“Where have you bought?” It was a relief that Mother was speaking normally.
+++++“Just up yonder.” He took a skinny cigarette from behind his ear. Mother was bursting for Tobar to say more. But he didn’t.
+++++“I can write down the way to the town centre, the nearest convenience store and the school of course. Or would you like the park?” He didn’t answer. “The gymnasium? The bank? The duck pond? The local inn?”
+++++He kept looking at us and grinning. For ages and ages. Mother was raising her eyebrows kindly as if all these choices were overwhelming him. Her smile was a bit unreal, but he didn’t notice that. Only I could tell.
+++++“Do sit down.”
+++++You should always ask visitors to have a seat, even if you don’t want them to stay. Wait two or three minutes before asking and hopefully they will have gone by then. If not, at least you will appear well-mannered. Not if you wait more than five minutes though. They’ll be able to tell that you don’t mean it.
+++++“Wouldn’t dream of it, Madam. You park yourself and I’ll get brewing. Don’t mind us staying for a bit, do you?”
+++++“Of course not.” Mother spoke in a shrill way, but politely of course.
+++++“Some round here think every new face is a gypsy, you see. Can’t think why there’s no faith in folk these days. Uncertain times, they keep sayin’. Hiding behind their net curtains, ‘fraid of making friends. Seems they’d sooner make enemies.”
+++++Our guests were normally invited to sit on the striped chairs in the drawing room while Mother made tea. Tobar clamped his hands on Mother’s shoulders and pressed her into a kitchen chair.
+++++Then he marched into the hall and whistled from the front door. It was ear-splitting. Back in the kitchen, he snatched up our teapot and cut the cake into large pieces. He asked Mother for the tea caddy.
+++++Into the house poured a tribe of really rough children in nasty clothes, followed by a lumpy woman feeding a baby.
+++++New neighbours can be disappointing, but you have to accept people as they are. Mrs Rosenblum at number three, for example, hung out her washing on Sundays. Father was very strict with Mother about that. It was a shame we could see Mr Rosenblum’s pants flapping while we ate our roast, but at least no one saw ours.
+++++These children wanted me to skip in the garden. Mother didn’t really like me spoiling the lawn, but two girls were already swinging the rope, telling me to be first. Very respectful of them, I supposed, as they were actually our guests. They sang to accompany my jumps, whirling the rope faster.
+++++“My Mother said, I never should,
Play with the gypsies in the wood.”
+++++The rope was whipping my legs. I kept hoping Mother would call me in for tea. I got all tangled up and fell over. There were grass stains on my socks and they laughed at me. And one of my garters snapped. I tried to look amused, but inside, I cared very much. Enough to feel my eyes scorching.
+++++By then there were more visitors. Babies were squealing from the patio, toddlers paddling in the ornamental pond, boys dangling from the washing line and launching into the topiary feature. Women called Kizzy and Nadya in bikini-tops and flouncy skirts were sitting on the grass, the sun turning their meaty arms brown. Nadya’s breast flopped out and a passing child pulled it to his mouth.
+++++I ran indoors, removing my sandals on the step, as always after playing outside. We didn’t walk germs into our carpet.
+++++The smoke was suffocating. Meat and chips were frying. Cupboards were hanging open. Furniture was being moved. In the drawing room there were men in a circle, playing cards and passing round a bottle. They didn’t even wipe the neck before they drank from it. Upstairs, beds were being dragged into new positions and someone was running a bath. Mother’s cake was on the stairs and trodden into the new carpet.
+++++Mother was on her knees in the hall with a dustpan and brush. She had forgotten to put her apron back on. Then again, she never wore it in company. Mind you, she never did housework when we had guests. It was strange to see her behave differently in our own home. She could be odd in other people’s houses. She used a high-pitched laugh. At Aunt Leah’s, she talked like a duchess and kept her shoes on. But this was our home and she was not like my Mother now.
+++++“What will your Father have for tea? They took a fancy to his chops.”
+++++She looked very small kneeling there, wisps of hair straggling from her plaited bun. My glass of milk was waiting, warmer than ever. I felt like crying then, but you never let people see you being wet, do you? Then I heard the key in the door. It was a magical sound.
+++++“Father will know what to do.” I saw Mother mutter a prayer.
+++++Father must have seen the tyre-mark trenches in his front lawn and the tangle of metal deposited by the front door, but he still removed his hat and hung up his umbrella just the same. Mother had tidied her hair and smoothed her dress. Tobar’s greasy jacket was on Father’s hook, so I squeezed Father’s black coat alongside. Tobar’s pockets felt as though they were full of small furry animals.
+++++Father ruffled my hair and asked how I was, how was school. He kissed Mother’s cheek. She told him about the chops and he said it didn’t matter. He suggested we ate supper in town. He didn’t want Mother to worry.
+++++We had a meal of goose at the White Feather Inn in the square. Lots of our friends were there, hunched in groups. Then we bought food and cleaning products at the late-night store. I wondered whether our visitors might have left or would we be sharing our blintzes. Father ignored the question and stroked his little beard.
+++++“Poor chap at the office is at his wit’s end. Says these gypsies are in his cherry orchard. Washing lines strung across the trees, fires burning, drunken singing half the night. I don’t know, I really don’t. Police’ll help eventually, I expect. They’ll have them for criminal damage.”
+++++“Will you help him, Father?”
+++++“Oh, he’ll have to ask his landlord to help. But we have rights, those of us who own our homes and pay our taxes, darling. Never fear.”
+++++“But Father, are those people at our house gypsies and shouldn’t we ask them to go?”
+++++“Shouldn’t think the worst of people, should we?”
+++++“Will someone help us?”
+++++“We must have a little trust, show good will. Then all will be well. We are safe, my dear, don’t you worry.”
+++++“But they’ve moved my bed out. There’s a basket with a baby in it. At school they say the devil has invaded our town.”
+++++Father and Mother linked arms and spoke as if I were slightly retarded.
+++++“The devil has long since come and gone. We are the survivors. So are the gypsies. The devil came for them too. They have suffered. Now those remaining must do their best, the same as we do.”
+++++We linked arms then and walked home silently. I felt Mother shiver as we came near to our road. Odd, as it was stifling from the bonfires. Incinerating dead stuff from their shrub borders. That’s what Father said about it.
+++++I thought of my broken Uncle Aaron and the blurry blue marks on his arm that look like a set of numbers he has to remember. I knew he had only just survived. But Father said we didn’t live with fear and uncertainty now. And I smiled to think that the devil had been chased away forever so that the we could live happily ever after.

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Joanna Campbell is a forty-nine-year-old wife and mother of three daughters.  She loves spending time in her cottage in the Cotswolds, which includes three cats and a mini Shetland pony who is an expert escapologist. She is rather a hermit and loves to read, write and play the piano, which she started to learn a few years ago. She has just passed Grade Four. In the Eighties, Joanna had big shoulder pads, big hair and worked in sales. She was very bad at it, but thought she should blend in with the era. It didn’t suit her at all.  She is now supposed to be her husband’s company secretary. She is very bad at that too. She plans to concentrate on writing. Her dream is to see her own book of short stories published one day.