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More Tea Vicar |
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“More
tea vicar?” enquired Veronica, straining to hold up a large metal
teapot with over stewed tea inside. She squinted in the afternoon sunshine,
her thick glasses magnifying the slanted rays as they filtered into the
canvas tent, already stuffy with stale air. She smiled her broadest smile
at him, showing off wonky, lipstick stained teeth. The vicar, impeccably
dressed in cream linen and a new panama hat, looked at her teeth and shuddered.
Everything about her repulsed him, from her lank hair and badly knitted
cardigans to the way she fawned over him and followed him about, walking
silently behind him and kowtowing whenever he looked at her. Every parish
had a village oddity, and Veronica was it. He declined the offer of tea
and purveyed the view beyond the tent with satisfaction. He did enjoy
the annual church fete, it embodied the very essence of english country
village life. Lady Burleigh had kindly let them use her garden grounds
again to set up the usual array of tents and stalls. Mrs Bramley was selling
jams and chutneys this year whilst Mrs Pentwhistle, on the cake stall,
was selling strawberry meringues hand over the fist. Ted Baker was doing
well with his prize vegetables and Mrs Plumley was running the tombola
and the pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey stall together, looking hot and harassed.
The whole village was here and children ran from stall to stall, faces
smeared with jam and cream, squealing with delight at the pony rides and
slides. Later on there would be the result of the raffle and Revd Farley
would enjoy taking centre stage to announce the winners. He scanned the
crowd for his wife and daughter and saw them at the cake stall and tutted
to himself. Felicity, his wife, was consuming a large slice of Victoria
sponge, stuffing it hastily into her mouth, jam oozing from the sides.
She really needed to lose weight, it was not becoming of a vicar’s
wife to bulge out of her clothes like she did, as he had told her many
times. Beside Felicity stood his only daughter Emily, aloof, twiddling
her long brown hair and staring out of the tent with a distant look on
her face. She was a disappointment to him. Despite his best efforts, paying
for her to go to a private school, for violin and piano lessons and everyone
knows that a vicar’s wages are not the best; she had not turned
out as he had wanted her too. She had become sullen and withdrawn and
started to do badly at school, something he would not tolerate at all
and he often lost his temper with her about it. She had even pierced her
ears. He berated Felicity for her lack of backbone with the child, but
she usually retreated to the kitchen in search of more cake to consume.
Yesterday he had been shocked to have been informed by the headmaster
of the school, that his daughter, his daughter, had been playing truant,
for hours at a time apparently. He was seething with rage but had decided
to do nothing about it before the fete, but rather to have it out with
her tonight after supper. Still, as least she was smartly dressed today,
in a tweed skirt, cotton blouse and a pretty hair band that made her look
younger than her seventeen years.
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