Narrow Minds (19 page)

‘Oh hang on a mo.' Geoff stepped through the front doors and into
Minerva
's dark interior. ‘I just want to get some gloves, I've got really slippery sweaty hands and I wouldn't want to drop it.'

I nodded and leant on the fire. The day was definitely warming up and I glared up at the sky. I was hoping to be walking around some woods by now, there were some listed on the map and they looked a good place for a cool picnic.

Lost in my reverie I didn't notice when the boat first started to move. It was only when I felt the fire move beneath my hand that the first panic-stricken jolts of adrenaline started racing through my body.

The mooring lines were far too long and with the weight of the fire pushing her,
Minerva
moved gracefully out toward the centre of the canal and at the end of her tether there was just enough space for the fire to topple slowly and elegantly into the cut. I tried to stop it, I really did but once it passed its balance point there was absolutely nothing I could do. Without the heavy weight of the fire pushing her outwards Min moved slowly back to bump into the moorings again, she covered even the ripples that the falling fire had left behind. It had all happened so slowly there hadn't even been a significant splash.

Geoff emerged back on the sunny deck flexing his muscles in a Popeye fashion. ‘Right,' he said ‘I've had my spinach, let's go.' He looked at me with raised eyebrows. ‘What's up.'

I pointed down toward the water, I really didn't know whether to laugh or cry. ‘Fire.' Was all I managed.

Geoff's grin faded. ‘What?'

‘The fire fell in the water.' I could feel my stomach begin to churn.

Geoff leaped over the side and on to the canal path. ‘Fire? Water? What?' He stared at the side of the boat.

I explained what had happened and watched my poor, put-upon, husband sink down on his haunches beside
Minerva
and began, very gently, to bang his head on the side of the boat. I winced with each dull thud.

When he had finished driving my burgeoning guilt firmly home, he stood up with a large, false smile. I noticed there were little bits of weed and grit stuck between the ever deepening wrinkles that had appeared over the last few years and winced again.

I tried to make light of the situation. ‘Look, it can't be very far down, it's a canal they aren't very deep are they?' I laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. ‘It could have been worse, I could have dropped it in the river.

Geoff swivelled his head toward me and just stared ‘No.' Geoff gave me a long look with absolutely no expression on his face at all. ‘No they aren't deep, but we now have to get into the water, find the fire, pick the damn thing up and get it back on to dry land. We then have to dry it out and hope that it hasn't landed on something awful in the water and cracked.'

‘What do you mean we have to get in the water?' I stared down into the chocolate-coloured murk. ‘I'm not getting in that, can't we just reach in and pull it out, get a rope round it or something?'

Geoff glared at me. ‘We've got to find it before we can get a rope round it, unless of course you have a huge electro-magnet somewhere about your person.'

By this time the raised voices had alerted the kids that something interesting was going on and they wandered up to ‘help'.

‘You dropped the fire in the river?' Sam looked horribly confused. ‘Why did you do that?'

I sighed. ‘I didn't do it on purpose, Sam, it was an accident.' I continued to glare at the water.

Charlie was much quicker to catch on and sat down on the bank to get a good view. ‘And now Sam,' she said laughing, ‘she has to go in and get it. You know the rules, “you broke it, you replace it”, “you messed it up, you clean it”.' She gave me a great big grin. ‘You dropped it in the river, you go get it. This I have to see.'

I shuddered. ‘I'll give you twenty quid to go in for me.' I sighed as she shook her head still grinning like a maniac.

‘Have you got to go in the water, Mum?' Sam stared horrified into the cut. ‘Oh yuck, it's all brown and slimy.'

Geoff gently moved him out of the way. ‘Yes, thank you, Sam, I think your mother has realised that and she can see that it's really horrible in there.'

‘Yes, yes, thank you, all of you.' I stared at the river. ‘Can we all shut up about it now?'

I have always prided myself that I would do anything it took to make a situation right, but this really was a step too far and I could feel myself beginning to panic. I couldn't go in that water, the footing was going to be all slimy and slippery and if I took my shoes off the sludge at the bottom would squelch between my toes. I felt sick.

Geoff gave me a hug. ‘Don't worry.' He kissed me. ‘I'll go in for you.'

I stared at him, really very tempted to take him up on the offer, but I couldn't. If the children hadn't been there I would have given in immediately and let him jump in twenty canals for me; let's face it, a husband has to prove how much he loves his wife on occasion and he owed me one after the coal in the stocking incident at Christmas. I sighed and shook my head.

Rules were rules and they applied to everybody, there was no way I was going to be the parent exposed as a complete hypocrite. If I shied away from this I was going to open myself up to a whole world of pain and argument from the two horrors over every little thing they didn't want to do. ‘No, I dropped it and I'll fetch it. Anyway we need you on the bank to hoist it up.' I turned toward the boat, ‘Let me just get my wellies.'

Charlie stared over the side. ‘Mum, I think it's deeper than your wellies.'

I ignored her. I knew it was going to be deeper than my wellies but at least they'd fill with just water and I wouldn't be able to feel the yuck at the bottom.

While I was wasting time getting into an old pair of jeans and putting my wellies on, Geoff and the kids moved the boat back about ten foot, giving me a free fire-finding-point. Sam stood with a stick in the water to mark the place the fire fell in.

Soon I was standing on the bank staring into the water. There was no going back now, sitting on the side I dangled my wellied feet into the murky water. Then with Geoff hanging on to me just in case it was deeper than Sam's stick said it was I dropped into the water.

Argh! Good God it was cold. Ha! It only came up to my knees. OK my wellies were full of water but really, it wasn't that bad at all. I turned around to grin at my worried-looking family, took one step backward and fell off the fire that I had obviously landed on. With flailing arms and a huge scream I measured my length in the canal. Cold water closed over my head and for a moment I panicked and thrashed. Suddenly a big strong hand grabbed my shoulder and pulled me upright.

My hero! For a moment I stood staring at my husband as I spluttered out a mouthful of muddy water and used my hands to push my wet hair out of my eyes. Then hearing the cheers from the bank as the kids leapt up and down, I started to laugh, Geoff looked confused for a moment then started as well. We must have made a mad sight, two middle-aged loonies standing hip-deep in the cut laughing like hyenas with baby hyenas baying from the bank.

‘Ah well.' Geoff finally managed to get his breath back. ‘At least we know where the bloody fire is.'

After half an hour of pushing and shoving we were no nearer to getting the fire ashore than when we started. We could get it up the side of the canal but even with Charlie pulling from the top and Sam shouting encouragement, we just couldn't lift it above chest height to get it on to the bank. Despite the warm sun, we were both beginning to shiver.

Two men and a retriever wandered along the footpath, they stopped, uncertain, next to the boat. They couldn't see the fire, all they saw were two cretins standing in the water.

‘Need a hand?' one of them enquired hesitantly.

As soon as we had explained what had happened they rushed over and pulled the fire out as we pushed from the bottom and within seconds the whole soggy, muddy, affair was thankfully a thing of the past and with continued help (I have to admit we were definitely playing the pathetic card now), we managed to get the sopping fire on to the front of the boat.

Having beautifully averted a prolonged disaster the gentlemen and their dog continued their walk warmed by the sun, our gushing thanks and a huge amount of karmic wellbeing. We took ourselves inside to have a wash, then, warm and dry (but still smelling faintly of mud), we dragged the picnic out on to the towpath and ate it on the grass.

By about half past twelve we had finished cleaning out the fire and the kids and I did manage to take the walk we had been promising ourselves, leaving Geoff behind, we spent a happy afternoon among the trees.

By the time we came back, tired, hungry and slightly sunburned, Geoff had managed to cut a hole in the roof and had placed the flue through it. He had set the fire on its plinth and as we entered was happily sealing around the top.

Charlie stared at the fire and then out at the still blazing, setting sun and shook her head. ‘And this day happened because we obviously needed a fire so badly.'

Geoff frowned at her. ‘Hmm, I can see that it's a stupid idea.' He paused for effect. ‘Let's see, we could do it your way. We should have waited until the weather turned, and then sat on the roof in the freezing rain and howling wind trying to get a hole in the roof. Then, while we were cold and wet waiting for the sealant to dry we could have started the fire and sat around the five small fires you need to create to get the thing running and burn off all the awful new fire smell.' He raised an eyebrow at her. ‘So this way, the fire's in, we'll have the small fires and then when we need it, it will be ready to go, all installed correctly and just waiting for the right moment to light it.' He shook his head sadly. ‘Stupid way to go about things but there you go, that's the old for you.'

Charlie narrowed her eyes at him then flounced off up the boat.

‘One of these days,' I said, watching her grab the laptop then turn her back to us to plug it in, ‘your sarcastic gob is going to get you in a whole heap of trouble.'

Geoff just laughed.

‘Is it ready to go?' I looked at the fire sitting proud on its new plinth. ‘And this is probably entirely the wrong time to tell you that I hate those tiles, isn't it?'

‘Yep.' Geoff grinned. ‘You chose 'em, you're stuck with them, and no we're not quite ready to go, I've run out of heatproof sealant, but that's all right, we should be at Midland Chandlers the day after tomorrow. Let's hope the weather holds out until then, eh?'

For the next two days we puddled along, locks, locks and more locks; it did occur to me on more than one occasion that it might be nice to do a trip where we weren't under time constraints but I supposed that would have to wait until Geoff and I actually had some time to ourselves. Staring out of the window I gave a wry smile, about ten years then.

We reached Midland Chandlers at about 4.30 p.m. on a Thursday afternoon. The weather, for the last three hours had certainly begun to threaten that proposed change. The sun was still shining but a strong wind had blown in and was pushing us gently backwards and forwards as we tried, with increasing desperation, to get our seventy-foot monster on to the moorings by the Chandlers. As there was another boat already there we had to leave
Minerva
's bum sticking out into the river and make a huge jump on to dry land. The kids and Geoff managed it without any problem at all but I dithered and shuffled up and down the gunwales trying to find a good launch point.

‘Oh come on, Grandma.' Charlie held her arms out. ‘Jump! Don't worry I'll catch you.'

Geoff picked her up physically and moved her aside. ‘How about ‘I' catch you.' He laughed.

I really don't know what happened, wet gunwales? A strong gust of wind? Vast natural incompetence? It really could have been any of them or all of them but as I jumped I sort of twisted and completely failed to lift my feet up so I kind of fell forward with yet another scream.

To give him his due Geoff did actually catch me but the only way he could stop me from face-planting myself into the gravel of the car park was to throw himself gallantly beneath me. Consequently we both ended up in a dusty pile on the ground.

Charlie stepped over us shaking her head as she did so. ‘The idea of jumping, Mum,' she said, ‘is to actually go ‘up' before you come ‘down'. You jump like a ninety-year-old.'

‘Or an elephant,' Sam chimed in. ‘Look, you jump like this,' he demonstrated by jumping up and down on the spot. ‘Did you know the elephant is the only animal in the world that can't jump?'

‘That's not true.' Charlie poked him. ‘The elephant is NOT the only animal that can't jump.'

Sam frowned. He really hates it when his ‘interesting facts' are challenged. I remember that he was upset for over a week because a little girl at school told him he was stupid for believing that there was a particular crab that can climb trees (it's called the coconut crab). Consequently his voice rose, ‘The elephant IS the only animal that can't jump, Charlie.'

‘No, no.' Charlie grinned at his outraged expression. ‘The elephant can't jump and neither can Mum. So that makes two animals doesn't it?'

This logic stumped Sam for a moment then he laughed. ‘Elephants and mum can't jump,' he said.

Finally managing to extricate myself from on top of my poor flat husband I groaned as I brushed the dust and muck from my jeans and T-shirt. Sticking my lower lip out for sympathy, I watched as a dark stain spread around a rip near my knee.

Charlie stared at it as well. ‘Mum, you're bleeding.'

‘Yes, thank you, I realise that.' I pulled the ripped material aside and winced at the hot tingle of pain which ensued.

‘Wow,' she said, staring at my knee, ‘I haven't had scabby knees since I was about six, even Sam doesn't have scabby knees any more.'