Another Life Altogether: A Novel - By Elaine Beale Page 0,50
sport we bloody well invented. I don’t know what this country’s coming to. If you ask me, it all started to go down the drain when we ended national service. Well, that and letting all those Pakistanis and West Indians in.” He puffed on his cigarette for a few seconds, then, as an afterthought, added, “At least they don’t play rugby.”
“But they’re damned good cricket players,” my father said.
“Yes, well,” said Granddad, stabbing the air with his cigarette. “That proves my point then, doesn’t it?”
“What point?” I asked.
“That we should keep England for the English,” he responded. “None of this colored immigration. None of this racial mixing. They’re sneaking in everywhere these days.”
My father heaved a sigh. This was a theme that Granddad revisited almost every time we saw him.
“Watering down the English culture, they are,” Granddad continued. “And that’s what made England great, you know. The culture. There’s only one Shakespeare. Only one Winston Churchill. Only one …” He cast about for a few seconds, frowning and taking a puff of his cigarette. “Only one Tom Jones.” He gave a satisfied nod.
“And he’s got a lovely voice,” my mother said. “But that’s what they say about the Welsh, isn’t it? They might have a bit of a funny accent, but they don’t half know how to sing.”
Granddad let out a loud dismissive snort.
“We read Shakespeare at school,” Tracey said. “It was dead boring.”
“Yes, well, I’ve never read him myself,” Granddad admitted. “All those to bes and not to bes, all that wherefore art thou Romeo rubbish. It’s a bit much, really.” He paused to take a loud, long sip of his tea, wiping his lips with the back of his hand before going on. “But it’s the English have made the biggest contribution to world literature, there’s no denying that. I mean, England’s produced all the world’s best poets. I mean, there’s … Wordsworth … Keats, and that bloke—you know, the one they have as the poet laureate, the one that writes poems for the Queen’s birthday. It’s not as if them West Indians have produced any great writers.”
“How do you know?” I asked, guessing that Granddad was even less qualified to make pronouncements about foreign literature than of his native tongue.
“Yes, how would you know?” my mother echoed, leaning toward Granddad in an effort to ensure that he heard this particular question quite clearly. “I mean, you already said yourself you’re not much of a reader.” She gave a triumphant nod.
“You know, you’re right about that, Evelyn,” Granddad said, turning toward her slowly, a smile itching at the edges of his pale lips. “But then I don’t have the time. Not like some people. I mean, if I managed to get myself put in the nuthouse for a couple of months, then I’d have plenty of time to catch up on my reading.” He looked at Tracey, smiling wider now. “Yes, that’d give me enough time to get through the entire works of Shakespeare, don’t you think?”
“Well, I suppose so …” Tracey began, looking a little confused as she eyed my mother, then me.
I began pulling at a loose thread in one of the settee cushions. As I felt the heat of Tracey’s questioning eyes on me, I tugged hard and a wide patch of the cushion’s fabric began to work loose. I feared that our friendship would unravel as easily as that thread. Within seconds, Tracey would learn the awful truth about my mother and she’d run screaming from the house. I wanted to do something to stop it, but I felt paralyzed. Instead, I watched the stitching on the settee come undone and waited for the inevitable.
“I don’t think people in nuthouses are allowed to read,” Tracey said matter-of-factly as she turned back to Granddad. “I mean, don’t they lock them up in straitjackets and padded cells? I saw one on the telly once, and it looked a bit like a prison, it—”
“Right, then,” my mother declared, springing up so abruptly that Tracey and I knocked against each other at the other end of the settee. “I think we’d better be leaving. Come on, Mike, we’ve got to get over to Mabel’s now. Jesse, you and your friend get yourselves ready. I’m off outside. I think I need a breath of fresh air. Bye, now, Dad,” she said, the words falling behind her as she strode down the hall.