The Misadventures of Margaret Finch, page 16
By some miracle, she arrives at the Pleasure Beach on time. James is already waiting, looking at his watch. ‘You’re here,’ she says, not intending the words to sound so much like an accusation.
‘Thought I’d get up early. Before the crowds. Take a slow walk over …’ Margaret has an urge to reassure him, to touch his arm, but she doesn’t. ‘And I had something to tell you. Well, show you really … Thought you’d find it interesting. But it’s … I wasn’t sure whether it was … How can I put it?’
She sees colour rise to his face, and any curiosity she feels is overpowered by her desire to rescue him from his discomfort. He looks around, as if planning a route of escape. ‘Have you had breakfast?’ she says, nodding towards the food stalls lined up either side of the entrance to the Pleasure Beach.
‘No,’ he says. ‘Have you?’
‘No.’
‘Then why don’t we …?’
She can’t explain the awkwardness between them this morning. He seems nervous, as if they are strangers meeting for the first time. They begin to walk, pausing in front of a pie stall. ‘Ninety-eight,’ he says, studying the display with an intensity that makes her wonder if he can see right through the pastry and identify the filling inside.
‘Sorry?’
‘A typical stall has ninety-eight pies arranged in fourteen rows. Wasn’t that what you wrote in your report?’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘Yes, something like that.’ But she knows full well that he has quoted her words exactly and she can’t help smiling.
‘Your notes make my mouth water,’ he says. ‘I sit in my office and I can almost imagine I am smelling these pies.’ These outings are probably the closest he comes to anything resembling proper food, Margaret thinks, unless his landlady is accommodating enough to leave him a cold plate for when he gets in at night. He still seems to exist largely on boiled sweets. ‘Some extraordinary details,’ he says, ‘people making sandwiches of them. What do they call the bread rolls they put them in?’
‘Barm cakes.’
‘That’s it. A pie barm!’
‘Are you going to try one?’
He pulls a face. ‘Far too heavy for this time in the morning. Now, oysters on the other hand …’
She points. ‘That’s the place. Always busy. The end stall, over there.’
‘There’s a queue. Let’s get started with the observations before it—’
‘No, please, you’ll be no good without breakfast.’ She wants him to have oysters if he’d like them. She wants him to enjoy being here with her.
‘Only if you’ll join me,’ he says.
The thought makes her stomach turn. She has never tried one herself, has always considered the act of eating them performative. The idea that you should tip your head back and let them slip down your throat is a challenge, a test she is not sure she can pass. ‘I have an incredibly sensitive gag reflex.’ She hopes this will be sufficient reason to excuse her. But he seems amused. He looks towards the oyster stall but does not move. ‘Come on,’ she says, leading him into the small clutch of people gathered in front. Most have come to look rather than buy, and Margaret has little problem getting to the front while James follows. He clears his throat, holds up three fingers to the stallholder to indicate his order, then digs around in his pocket for payment. Taking his first shell, he douses it in vinegar and, instead of bringing it to his lips, lifts the flesh of the oyster between forefinger and thumb. ‘When in Rome,’ he says, turning to her before biting off a corner and starting to chew. He is imitating the way the workers eat them: taking their time, making them last.
‘I wonder if they actually enjoy them,’ he says, ‘or if they eat them just to say they’ve done it. Not that there is anything wrong with that. That’s what life’s supposed to be about, isn’t it? The experience.’
Margaret considers his question. It has never been her approach. There are very many things she has no desire to do. She doesn’t need to try them to know that they aren’t for her. She has always thought that people put themselves under too much pressure to be exciting, to be brave, to be reckless. That they make themselves look foolish by bowing to it.
‘Are you sure I can’t tempt you?’ he says.
As long as she can nibble it slowly, Margaret thinks she can manage one. Following his lead, she takes a small bite, braced for her body’s reaction and determined to overcome it. She must concentrate on chewing and swallowing as though she feels perfectly relaxed about it. The meat yields between her teeth. It is lukewarm and fleshy but relatively tasteless beneath the tang of vinegar, and she finds, to her surprise, that it is not unpleasant. Juice is running down her chin and she wipes it away hurriedly. But James doesn’t seem to notice anyway, too busy concentrating on keeping his own shirt free of stains.
‘Another?’ he offers.
‘Go on then.’
She still can’t understand what all the fuss is about, why they are considered such a luxury, but she is enjoying the act of sharing them. There is novelty in the flavour: subtle yet unique, briny yet earthy, leaving a residue of rust in her mouth when she swallows. When they have finished a half-dozen between them, he looks for something in his pockets, a handkerchief probably, and when he fails to find one, she produces her own, wipes her hands and gives it to him to do the same.
They walk on towards the Pleasure Beach and begin their mission proper. She’s had no cause to come here for work before, and no desire to come for leisure. ‘What do you think, Margaret?’ he says. ‘Best if we pick a family and follow them? That’s how you usually do it, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘You choose then. You’ve got a much better eye for these things.’
For the good of the study, she should pick a family that looks lively, and is relatively small (larger families being less likely to be able to afford the number of tickets required).
‘Do you think they’ll ride the Big Dipper?’ James says, looking up at the string of cars that rattles above their heads. ‘I’ve always fancied that.’ He sounds excited but there is something in his expression that Margaret can’t quite resolve. ‘I bet you’ve already had a go.’
‘You want us to go on with them?’
‘We’ll have to, won’t we? To observe.’
Margaret had assumed they were going to go as far as the entrance to each ride, then wait for them at the exit. She has no wish to be strapped into a carriage, thrown around at speed, dropped down dips or flung around corners. Now she scans the crowd for possible targets with her own criteria in mind: younger children will be too small to ride on the more thrilling attractions. She needs to find a family with little ones.
‘There,’ she says, pointing at a young couple walking towards them. The man is carrying a boy, who looks to be around three years old; the woman smiling as she runs behind a slightly older child, a girl – five perhaps – who is making a beeline for a rock stall. Taking Margaret’s lead, James hangs back, keeping distance. For just under two hours, they follow the family. Margaret suspects that they don’t have sufficient funds to go on the rides themselves, but they show no resentment or envy, apparently satisfied to watch others have fun. They spend nine minutes watching people hurtle down the sheer drop slide. Margaret notes that courting couples use the moment of peril as an opportunity to clutch each other tightly: young men place their hands on a breast or thigh in those few seconds of falling; young women hastily rearrange a lifted skirt as soon as they land.
From there, the father stops to study ‘The World’s Most Tattooed Woman’, who is on a walkabout among the crowds. He accepts her invitation to try and rub the drawings off her arm, but declines her suggestion to step into the tent a little way along the prom and have one of the pictures inked onto his own skin as a souvenir.
‘That was a lucky escape,’ she says to James as they walk away.
‘Was it?’
‘If we were doing everything they do, you would have had to join the queue and get a tattoo yourself.’
‘Not necessarily. This is your observation. Surely you’d have been the one to do it.’ He touches the bare skin of her forearm for a moment. ‘Now let’s see. A ship or an anchor – what would suit?’
Up ahead, the parents are lifting both children up to peer in at the clockwork clowns outside the Fun House. Margaret risks stepping closer to listen to their reaction, but becomes distracted by James. He is fascinated, staring at the tableau as it jerks into life: a large clown holding a smaller one on its knee, both with faces powdered, large mouths that open in bursts of mechanical hysteria. The girl starts to imitate them, the laughter seeming to pass between the members of the family, infecting each in turn. And James too succumbs. Margaret is embarrassed for him. He is making a show of himself. This is infantile, an entertainment made for children – he is a grown man. She nudges him, but he reads it as a gesture of encouragement and laughs all the more, clutching his belly and throwing back his head to entertain the little girl, who begins to copy him.
‘Stop it,’ Margaret whispers under her breath. ‘We’re supposed to be blending in.’ But he does not take any notice. She is becoming angry now; people are staring at him. At her. ‘Stop it!’
‘It’s a marvel, isn’t it? Just a machine, just a series of cogs and gears, but the effect it’s having!’ He turns to look at Margaret and his expression is so earnest, so joyful, that her anger is pacified. The family have made space and James has stepped forward to get a closer look at the clowns. They are all laughing again. All but Margaret. She cannot perform to order, cannot provide the response they expect from her. She tries to muster a modest giggle but the sound is strange, strained.
James is too busy with the children to notice when she turns and walks away, finding a spot on the other side of the carousel. Their laughter felt like something that was being done to her; something she was required to surrender to. Frustration rises to panic, reminding her that she is barren, lacking the vital components that others seem to have been built with. The clowns were mocking her. They all were. She takes a sip from her hip flask, and a deep breath. But she can’t hide for ever.
‘There you are!’ he says, when she gets back. ‘I was worried.’ He does seem to draw a little closer to her than before. ‘We could easily lose each other with so many people. Here – would you like a go with the camera?’ He takes the strap from around his neck and places it around hers, their heads almost touching for a brief moment before he steps back. She is grateful to be able to hide her face, and makes a show of studying the scene in the viewfinder. ‘Can you spot our little family?’ he says. ‘Left a bit and you should—’
‘Got them!’ She can’t help but admire his skill in creating such a clever contraption.
‘What can you see?’
‘The mother is holding both children by the hand. The father is standing behind her with his arms wrapped – no wait, he’s bending down. Picking something up off the floor. What is it? Something small. I can’t see what—’ She clicks the shutter and takes a photograph.
‘A coin,’ James says.
‘He must have dropped it.’
‘No. Guess again.’
‘Someone else’s then.’ She watches but the man shows no sign of looking around him, of trying to identify who the money might belong to. ‘He’s put it straight into his pocket. Typical.’ She is excited now. ‘He’s stolen it. I think I got it on camera. Just the sort of thing Harrisson’s looking for.’
‘I don’t think we can say he has stolen it.’
Margaret takes the camera from her face and turns to him. ‘Of course we can. He has taken money that doesn’t belong to him. I’ll bet he’s going to spend it in the pub. Or on the gee-gees.’ She looks through the viewfinder again. ‘There look – he’s off. Come on.’
24
They follow the family to an outcrop, as tall as a building, which has grown out of the pavement. It looks as though it has stood on that spot for millennia, carved by the waterfalls and streams that spring from coves on its surface. The bare rock is almost colourless, a mass of weathered grey, pitted like pumice. It’s the lack of vibrancy that makes it stand out so conspicuously in the patchwork rainbow of the Pleasure Beach. Margaret reads the sign leading to a queue of people. ‘The River Caves of the World.’
‘That rings a bell,’ James says. ‘I think this was one of the first rides here. Little boats running on a track under the water …’ The family join the queue, the two children jumping up and down with excitement. Margaret and James hang back to allow a young couple to go ahead of them. ‘Must be a variation on the Tunnel of Love.’
Must it? She thought it was something like a fairy grotto, for children. But sitting on a ride that has a link (however tenuous) with love? The two of them. Together. Turning, she finds that several more couples have already joined the queue behind them, blocking any means of exit. James, meanwhile, seems transfixed by the mechanism which is transporting the boats so efficiently. ‘I wonder how many people can ride at the same time,’ he says. ‘How many they could get round in the space of an hour. And how do they get everybody out if it breaks down?’ They watch the mother and son climb into one boat, the father and daughter into a second. Up close, the rock looks artificial and the water unnervingly blue. Margaret can see palm trees stuck at intervals along the riverbank. ‘Looks like it’s our turn,’ he says, rather too enthusiastically, as a bright pink vessel draws up level with them. ‘Are you all right? I was only joking – I’m sure it won’t break down.’
That’s not what worries her. But she doesn’t say so. He steps in first then offers his arm to help her down beside him. It rocks as they settle onto a bench with only just enough room for two; the sides of their bodies briefly touching as the boat jolts into motion.
‘We’re very low in the water, aren’t we?’ He reaches out and runs his fingers across the surface. Margaret tries not to think about how dirty it might be, of all the diseases it might be harbouring, not to mention the fact that his hand could get dragged into the moving parts beneath the boat. It feels as though they are being swept along by a current, until they reach a bend in the channel and there’s the juddering shunt of metal against metal beneath them; vibrations pass through the thin gap of air between their bodies. Up ahead is the yawning mouth of a tunnel. She wants to step off but there is no walkway running beside them here, steep rockfaces looming either side to give the impression that they are heading underground.
‘Here we go!’ James says, craning back to see the arc of rock in relief against the sky as they enter. There’s a wall of water falling from a crack in the roof. Margaret covers her head with her arms, but it stops automatically the very moment they pass under it.
‘Are you sure you are all right?’ James says. ‘You’re very quiet.’
‘I’m fine. If those children can do it, I’m sure that I can.’
She welcomes the darkness that envelops them. There is music playing up ahead, and coloured lights. Now that the ride has begun, she will have something to concentrate on. Something to distract her. ‘I really thought the father would keep that money for himself,’ she says. ‘Would have been a good example for Harrisson.’
‘Perhaps. But I’m glad he didn’t. That wouldn’t have been the point at all.’ She thinks she can hear a smile on his lips.
‘The point?’
He says nothing.
‘Wait …’ There is something he is not telling her. ‘How did you know he was picking up a coin?’
Still nothing.
‘You left it there, didn’t you? You dropped it deliberately.’ Now she thinks of it, it was a rather clever idea: create a moral dilemma and observe how the subject reacts. But it is not in their remit to interfere. James told her so himself at her inter-view. They are there to observe. A zoologist wouldn’t step in to save a gazelle from a lion. They only watch and learn.
‘I wanted them to have the means to go on a ride,’ he whispers. ‘Just one. I could see how desperate they were to do it themselves, not just stand and watch everyone else.’
‘But we’re not supposed to get involved,’ she says. ‘When you were laughing at those clowns, they could see us; they were looking.’ The embers of her anger catch again. There is something growing between them. A charge in the air.
‘Come on, Margaret, we can’t be invisible all the time.’
Why not? That’s exactly what she works so hard to be. And she was succeeding, until he started to take notice. ‘They are on holiday. We are here to work.’
‘We are. But I’ve been thinking – shouldn’t I try to experience the lives these people lead? To feel the things they feel?’ How does he expect her to quantify that in her report? Emotions are subjective, highly distorted, unreliable. It is her job to stick to the facts. ‘Working with you, Margaret. Reading your reports. You make me feel …’ His words are swallowed by the tunnel. ‘… You moved to Blackpool. Alone. You’re fearless.’
Fearless? She cannot respond without telling a lie. What could she say that wouldn’t disappoint him, or betray herself? So she does not speak at all, allowing the word to reverberate. It’s as if she can feel the corridor of air between her body and his start to quiver. She doesn’t want to lose his admiration, even though it is undeserved.
But the moment is brief; interrupted by the increasing insistence of emerging light ahead. Margaret feels resentful of their little boat now, which carries them forward into the glare of a cave. Inside, a striped dinosaur is bending towards a hatchling in a large egg. An interval of darkness and there’s another tableau.
‘Triceratops,’ says James, ‘my favourite!’
‘Completely inaccurate,’ says Margaret, shaking her head at the caveman hunting with a spear. ‘Homo sapiens did not roam the Earth until 65 million years after dinosaurs disappeared.’
‘Indeed. But I would have loved this as a child,’ he says. ‘All little boys love dinosaurs, don’t they?’
‘I could name them all by the age of seven. I borrowed a book from the library.’
