Free Last Guests of the Season by Sue Gee Page B

today?’ he demanded.
    â€˜I –’ Tom faltered.
    â€˜Is there?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜Look at me.’
    Robert and Claire exchanged glances; Tom, his face scarlet, looked at his father and then away, across the shimmering field.
    â€˜All right,’ said Oliver. ‘Now, you follow your mother and apologise, and I don’t want to have another word of nonsense or cheek out of you for the rest of the day. Is that clear?’
    â€˜Yes.’ Tom’s voice was barely audible, thick with tears.
    â€˜Go on, then.’
    He set off ahead of them, stumbling a little as he tried to catch up with Frances, rubbing his face, the fishing net abandoned. Robert bent to retrieve it; there was a silence.
    â€˜Well,’ said Oliver stiffly, ‘it seems I must spend the day apologising for Tom’s behaviour.’
    Robert shook his head; he and Claire, almost in the same breath, made noises: children … family life … just settling in …
    Oliver shook his head, unsmiling. ‘There are times …’
    â€˜There are always times,’ said Claire. ‘Come on, Jack, leave the ditch now.’ She held out her hand. ‘And bring your net, okay?’
    He came, dragging it behind him, bumping over the stubble. They set off, she with the children, and Robert, in neutral male gear, explaining to Oliver that the ditches related not only to irrigation but to inheritance: as each parent died, the piece of land was redivided among the children, the family portions, over the generations, thus growing ever smaller. Oliver nodded, apparently listening, swinging the bag. In the middle of the field Tom had caught up with Frances; they were walking side by side.
    And at last they came to a low stone wall, screened by trees and dusty blackberry bushes, with a gap. Their feet sank into warm grey sand, and before them was the river: broad, peaceful, cool. It flowed between this field and the one on the opposite bank, where thick stooks of hay stood drying; it flowed beneath a great outcrop of pine-clad cliff. In patches of gleaming light and deep shade it made a sweeping curve down from their right, and moved towards rocky shallows far down on their left, where shining dragonflies hovered and darted in the sun; it curled round the side of the mountain and disappeared.
    â€˜At last.’
    â€˜Thank God.’
    â€˜Hurray!’
    Later, no doubt, teenagers and older children from the village would appear; for now, they had it all to themselves. The children raced to the water’s edge, pulling their clothes off, and Jessica, quicker and more graceful than the boys, emerged from her shorts and T-shirt in a smooth green swimsuit, pushing back her hair.
    â€˜You look nice,’ said Oliver.
    She smiled at him, and waded in; stopped by the sudden cold, she stood there, the water just above her knees, and was taunted by the boys, who were ready now and raced in, shrieking.
    Robert swam like a dog, steady and purposeful, making an effort; his round white shoulders and head of thinning hair pushed in a determined breaststroke towards the rocks beneath the cliff on the far side. Jess, a strong swimmer, kept pace beside him. For Tom’s sake, the boys had been instructed to stay in their depth, Jack pulling faces which his parents affected not to notice. He and Tom were out of the water now, digging a trench.
    Claire, who had had a brief, satisfying dip, and now wanted nothing so much as to feel off duty for a bit, sat dripping in ruched Liberty print, beneath her sunhat, her arms round her knees, absently watching them. Oliver had taken off his cotton jacket and said he’d swim in a little while; he had wandered off along the bank, downriver, taking his book, which Claire, squinting, saw was the Collected Poems of Larkin. How nice. How nice to be able to disappear to a shady spot with wry reflections on sexual and surburban loneliness, leaving your child to the care of