| |
MARK PULLED UP AT THE beach with five minutes to spare. Lek adjusted her make-up in the sun-visor mirror, Edward sat in the back holding the baby. On the sand, Georgina talked to George, who was wearing his sunglasses. Noonie was standing alone at the edge of the surf. A portable font rested on the sand and six helpers from the Christian Centre gave out service leaflets and smiles.
They all got out of the car. Lek took the baby. Mark went to talk to George and Georgina. Edward walked over to Noonie as casually as he could, but Lek overtook him when he was within speaking distance.
“I’m ever so pleased you came,” she told Noonie.
“It’s an honour,” she replied. “Thank you again for thinking of me. Hello, Edward.”
“It’s good to see you again,” he said.
They shook hands. His heart sank and he cursed his poor judgement. He’d walked into one of nature’s oldest traps. She was perfect.
“Oh bloody hell, the king and queen are here,” Lek said. “I need you two to come and meet them, act as a shield. Here, Edward, you take the baby.”
A bright blue four-wheel drive had stopped at the beach. The front doors opened and two minders got out and opened the rear doors.
“Your parents, I presume,” Edward said.
Mr and Mrs Kogwatmai got out of the car. Mr Kongwatmai adjusted his shirt collar. He wore a grey suit with a blue tie and brogues. His wife was six inches shorter than him and when she stepped onto the sand her stilettos sank in. Instead of taking them off, she linked arms with her husband and used him for support. The bodyguards pretended not to notice. A crowd was building.
“I see you’ve hired a gangster to do the necessaries,” Mr Kongwatmai told his daughter, in Thai, indicating George.
“Why’s he wearing those sunglasses?” Mr Kongwatmai asked.
“He’s got a pair of black eyes.”
“Oh.”
“Gangster,” Mr Kongwatmai said.
“And who’s this man holding our beautiful granddaughter?”
“This is Edward, Mark’s friend,” Lek said, switching to English. “And my friend. He’s going to be Lek’s godfather.”
“You’re still determined to call her Lek then?” Mr Kongwatmai said, in Thai.
“We’ve had the khwan, so like it or lump it,” said Lek. “I haven’t had much sleep lately so don’t pick a fight with me, father dear.”
“Is it really that bad, darling?” Mrs Kongwatmai said.
“It’s worse. The terrible thing is she’ll only be quiet with Edward. I don’t know how he does it.”
“Oh tush, she’ll be quiet for her grandmother,” Mrs Kongwatmai said. “She switched to English. “Edward, could I hold the baby, please? I’m Nang, by the way, Lek’s mother.”
“Sure. Pleased to meet you.”
Edward transferred Lek II to Mrs Kongwatmai who tickled her chin and kicked off her heels and ambled away with her. Mr Kongwatmai and the bodyguards folded their hands behind their backs and followed her in a group, chuckling.
Mark came and put his arm round Lek. “Shall I take a photo?”
Lek clenched her fists. “If that little bitch doesn’t cry, she needn’t think she’s coming home with us. I mean it Mark. I’ve had it up to here with bloody Lek now.”
Lek II began to cry. Mrs Kongwatmai looked taken aback for a moment, then rocked her backwards and forwards and sang. But this only seemed to enrage Lek II further.
“I love our daughter,” Lek said. She bit her lower lip.
“Go and get her quickly,” Mark said. “Get your breast out if you have to. Sod the locals, it’s your trump card. And it’s natural.”
But Lek didn’t have to be told. A second later, Lek II was suckling and Mrs Kongwatmai was trying to force a smile.
“She would have been quiet eventually,” she said.
An hour later, the ceremony was at an end. Over a period of twenty minutes, thanks to Lek’s subtle positioning of the guests - inviting them to come and talk with her, to meet one another, or move - Edward and Noonie found themselves alone.
“The party seems to have left us behind,” Edward said.
“Hello again, Edward. How are you?”
“I’m sorry about the Lunch Party.”
“Which one?”
“The one where Charles introduced you to me and I shook your hand and dropped it, and Lek took your hand and squeezed it too hard, and you disappeared for a while and I sat in the corner looking grim and getting rat-arsed.”
She smiled. “Oh, that one.”
“Sorry.”
“All’s well that ends well.”
“If it’s any consolation, I’m moving house, back in England. Hopefully, it’ll be done and dusted by the time you come over to join Charles, so you won’t have to see me again after today.”
She nodded. “Well, I hope it goes smoothly.”
Edward took out his gift. “I wasn’t able to be at your wedding and I didn’t get to see the present list. I’ll give Charles something later. This is for you.”
She took the small rectangular package and unpicked the sticky tape. It was a hardback copy of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. As she held it up, her lip trembled. She swallowed. “Thank you. I did enjoy that night.”
“I know we’ve still got the copies Lek gave us, but this might last longer.”
“Yes, good.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yes, yes. Look, I’m sorry I’m being distant, Edward. I like you a lot, we could be great friends, but – well, I’m married to Charles now. We don’t have any mutual friends in England. Except Charles. And that might make things worse rather than better. We’re roughly the same age, people would talk and neither of us wants that. I’m sorry you’re moving. I’m think it’s for the best, though.”
He nodded. He’d had the same thoughts himself.
“Why are you moving?” she said. “If that’s not too personal a question?”
“Property prices.”
“Perhaps we should say goodbye now.”
He had no expectation of ever setting eyes on her again but he knew now that he was irremediably in love with her. Her long hair waved towards the sea. They shook hands again.
After dinner that night, Edward took a nap, Lek read and Mark did a crossword. Then Lek II awoke. It was Mark’s turn to see to her. At nine, Lek took over. They went to bed at ten, leaving Edward on the veranda. Last night’s pattern reasserted itself. Cry-sleep-cry-sleep at thirty minute intervals.
Edward intervened when he couldn’t take it any more and Mark and Lek turned in for the night.
At eight o’clock, Lek and Mark came into Edward’s room. Edward was sitting on a chair, watching the baby breathe.
Lek went down on her knees. “For God’s sake, tell us your secret.”
“Name your price,” Mark said.
They kept an observational diary and pored over it when Lek II was asleep. Tape recordings were made, numbers crunched, hypotheses devised and discarded, thermometers read, goggles worn.
It soon became clear that Edward’s secret was as mundane as it was brilliant. He talked to Lek II as if she were an adult. He bored her to sleep, not just by telling her about the plumber and the plasterer and the estate agent, but by speaking in a monotone.
But there was more. Edward taped Mark and Lek singing lullabies and used a tuning fork to prove that they were apt to slip from major to minor keys without warning. To a newborn baby, this was probably excruciating.
The solution was for Mark and Lek to stop singing and start droning. After a few trial runs, they began to generate the sound they were all looking for. Lek II began to sleep through the night. They made a recording of Edward reading from the Phuket Gazette, for good measure. Emergencies happened.
They all agreed that this was a huge victory for Science. They’d solved a seemingly intractable problem by an empirical investigation where everyone left their personal prejudices at the door. And the great thing was, it proved Lek II was rational too. She could take her place alongside the Buddhas.
Four days later, it was time for Edward to go home. He and George met at the airport and Lek and Mark took leave of him much more passionately than they had last time. Lek burst into tears and held him. Mark grabbed his hand in both his and hugged him.
Next time they met, they’d be real parents, really in charge.
He, on the other hand, would be exactly where he was now.
