A Grand Entrance for Margaret Pennington
“Mary! This is not a stew its an unidentifiable jumble. Darling, youre a wonderful solicitor, so do get back to the job you do best! Leave the kitchen to those of us with less intellectual capital, will you?”
“Maggie, I am not a woman!” wailed Mary, her face on the verge of tears.
Why did cooking elude her, even the simplest of dishes? Shed long since accepted that culinary talents missed her gene pool entirely. In their family, everyone had their allocated roles ages ago.
Vera was the homebody, Mary the clever one, and Susan, well, Susan was the daredevil, the only one who could make even the most stubborn cogwheel spin in whichever direction she fancied. Which is why, for family get-togethers, it was always Vera in charge of the kitchen, while Mary and Susan manned the trenches: tidying, groceries, child-wrangling (the latter being Susans arena). Only Susan could organise the “Pennington Posse” well enough that Veras home, the regular family headquarters, and garden wouldnt require a total refurbishment or an extension after every gathering. The children in the Pennington clan were adored, spoilt rotten, but in theory brought up with discipline (which had little to no effect).
All seven grandchildren, whom Margaret Pennington loved with unshakeable devotion, were cut from the same cloth as their youngest aunt, Susan. Despite already having two tearaways of her own, currently whizzing round the lawn pretending to be Vikings, or possibly the last Cornish rebels, Susan remained unfazed. She perched on the steps, sorting out the plums destined for Margarets next batch of compote, eyeing the mayhem with obvious temptation to join in herself, only pausing at Veras hard stare. Vera, hacking tomatoes for yet another salad, muttered into the chopping board her endless commentary:
“Not so much a woman as a mischievous lad! Susan, when will you finally calm down? Look at Mary solid, respectable. I dare say, Im not shabby myself. And you? Are you planning to bounce through life like the Easter Bunny, roaring about on your motorbike, telling everyone how marvellous life is? The children are growing, Susan! What sort of example do you set? Fine when theyre six, but in a couple of years? Theyll be embarrassed to look you in the face!”
“Vera, you exaggerate,” Mary said, peeping doubtfully into her unsuccessful attempt at stew, which had consumed her entire morning, and snapped the lid back on. “At least Susan gives them something to be proud of. Whose mum here can take a motorbike apart and reassemble it? Can you? I certainly cant. I cant even manage a flaming soup! Am I not to be proud of myself too?”
“Of course you are. Youre hopeless in the kitchen, but in the courtroom? Youre a superstar.”
“See? My point exactly.”
“And whats that?”
“That everyone should stick to what they do best.”
“Well said! boomed Margaret Pennington, who had wandered in partway through and now swept onto the veranda, causing the women to gasp and the children to freeze mid-pirate-battle to stare at their grandmother in full regalia.
“Blimey!” Susans twins clicked their tongues in perfect sync, so loudly that Margaret flinched.
“Effect achieved, Id say.”
Margaret spun gracefully, giving her audience a thorough look at her new dress and heels (“only for proper occasions, darlings”). Today very much counted.
“Ladies, opinions? Can a woman of, lets say, a certain Jane Austen vintage, appear thusly at a rendezvous with a man she hasnt seen in forty years?”
“Maggie, youre stunning! The poor chap wont know whats hit him.”
“Lets hope its not too terminal,” Margaret intoned, strutting a few paces for effect before planting herself, hands on hips, nose to the wind. “What would I do with a man in a swoon, anyway? Im only going to discover why after all these years, hes summoned me. What use does he have for me now?”
“Gran, maybe hes hoping youll still have… some use as a woman?” Veras eldest, fifteen-year-old Annie, perched next to her aunt, plum in hand. “What?!”
The laughter that followed sent the sunbathing cats flying from the veranda rail and terrified the shivering bundle Vera called a Yorkshire terrier under the table.
“Annie, youll be the death of me,” Vera chuckled, dabbing her eyes with a tea towel as Mary consoled the traumatized terrier.
“Come off it, Maggie! What happened between you two?” Mary shushed the children, who wisely legged it to the far end of the garden.
“Oh, Mary! We had a romance!”
Margaret delivered the word romance with a sigh, enough to make Annie plop back onto the stairs with a dramatic sigh, causing Susan to erupt with helpless laughter.
“Annie, youve plenty of time for such things!”
“Really? When exactly is plenty of time? How old were you, Maggie, during this grand romance?”
“Sixteen! Maggie spread her arms, catching Veras eye. “Whats with the look, young lady? Yes, I was foolish, innocent, and well completely daft. Annie wont have that problem shes clever and beautiful, always has been. But she must know the perils of men and the consequences of early infatuations, mustnt she? Or do you disagree?”
“Maggie, do just get on with it!” Susan, wiping her tears, urged her on. “She wont budge now, you might as well let her learn from the master.”
Annie, bestowing a grateful look on her aunt, settled in, green eyes sparkling with anticipation, absurdly like Margarets own (a mystery often pondered by anyone who knew the family since blood relations they were not). Nor was Margaret actually related to the three sisters, Vera, Mary, and Susan; shed simply, over time, become their mother.
Margaret Pennington had entered the sisters chaotic world not long after their own mother departed unexpectedly. Their father, lost and lifeless, had no idea how to carry on. His universe had collapsed into an abyss after his wife died so quickly and pointlessly after a brief illness.
At only eight, Vera had been forced to care for her sisters by herself. Any plea for help met with the same refrain:
“Oh, love, Mum would know what to do If only I could ask her”
Those words made Vera sick with terror. It seemed to her he was unravelling completely. So, she stopped asking and took charge of the children.
Mary was manageable at five, reasonably sensible, but two-year-old Susan was an uncontrollable force of nature. Their grandmother, summoned to help, gave up after a couple of months.
“Sorry, son-in-law, I simply cant do it! Im too old, too achy Your young ones are incorrigible. Ill go home. I suppose I could take Vera, if you want, but the other two youll have to manage.”
Vera, terrified at the prospect of being parted from all she knew and loved, clung to her sisters.
Even Susan, usually oblivious, dissolved into noisy sobs, and Vera cuddled her, paralysed with fear.
“Dont cry! I wont go! Ill hide shell never find me!”
Luckily, Grandmother hadnt the strength to bother looking. Their father merely muttered and nodded, and his mother-in-law sailed off, believing her lifes work complete.
A few months later, Margaret appeared.
Susan had come down with a nasty fever and Vera, who hadnt left her bedside, knocked on her dads office door for help.
“Vera, not now! Is it important?” The voice sounded so strange, Vera nearly broke down fear had become her constant companion.
But she knew she couldnt afford to be afraid now. Susan thrashed on the sweaty pillow, wailing for Vera or Mummy.
“Yes, Dad, its important! Susans dying!”
Whether it was the phrase or the panic in her voice, the office door finally opened. The GP was called, and for the first time since her mother died, Vera felt some relief.
Margaret Pennington, the local paediatrician, was covering another doctors home visits. Cursing the council for digging up half the borough, she arrived at the Penningtons battered doorstep.
“Pennington family?”
That question, delivered with a certain tone and authority, unlocked every local tongue. In moments, Maggie had a potted history of the family and their various crises.
And just like that, Margaret swept into their lives. She quickly called an ambulance, then rode to hospital with Susan and the girls father, who received such a blistering lecture from this bossy, boisterous woman that he could do nothing but mumble and then explode:
“But what do you want from me?”
“To be a father, for heavens sake! Do you care about these girls at all? Shall we lose you as well as their mother? For pitys sake, pull yourself together!”
Margarets bellowing made even Veras father pale, but he finally woke up, and Vera could start being a child again. She was, in fact, happy when she learned that Margaret was staying for good.
Maggies arrival was met with mixed feelings by the sisters.
Vera, pragmatic as ever, adored her for restoring stability. After Margaret lined up the girls and informed them, firmly, that their mum would always be their mum, and thats that but shed be their friend, not their mother Vera knew theyd found a rare gem amongst stepmothers.
Mary, however, was less easily consoled, her bond with her own mother having been nigh unbreakable. No argument from Vera could convince her life had improved. She would clap her hands over her ears and drone loudly, “Go away! I only want Mum!”
Vera struggled to keep the peace until even Susan began imitating Mary; then she snapped:
“Mary! I dont know what to do with you! Stop being so selfish! Mum isnt coming back! I want her back too, but shes gone, and I cant be your mum! Im only a child myself!”
Margaret found the girls sobbing in separate corners. She scooped them up, ignoring Marys resistance, and held them close, smoothing hair and hands and sniffling noses.
“Dont cry, my loves. Youre right, your mums gone. But Im here! I cant be your mother, but I will be your friend and I will not let anyone hurt you. Understood?”
They sobbed for a long time, openly, no longer trying to hide it. Even Mary, who tried to escape at first, eventually yielded. Susan actually fell asleep in Margarets lap, still hiccuping now and then. A page had been turned.
It took years for the understanding to truly settle. Yet, childless after a failed surgery of her own and always longing for children, Maggie became if not by name, then by heart their true parent.
Their father died not long after marrying Margaret. He stepped off the kerb one foggy morning and vanished beneath a London taxi.
Margaret, told by phone at work, paused for only a heartbeat before bolting out of the surgery, in flat shoes and no coat, sprinting to the school. Sweating and out of breath, she intercepted the alarmed headmistress just outside Veras classroom.
“Ill do this myself.”
She fetched the girls home, made them tea, then sat them down.
“Girls your father well, youre not alone! Not ever. Im here, and Ill never leave you.”
They nodded, clinging to each other and to her their new family forged in shared loss.
She kept her promise. Maggie formally adopted them, thanks to paperwork shed begun before her husbands death. She quit the surgery, took posts at two private medical centres, and just about managed to cover everything, investing all her hopes in her little sparrows.
And they were sparrows energetic, headstrong, full of wild ambitions. Whatever they wanted, Margaret made happen, even against her better judgment.
“An actress, Mary? Well, fancy that! One doesnt become one just by wishing, but hang on” Out came the phone, and a few days later, Mary was signed up for the Young Actors Theatre auditions (directors are sentimental when it comes to doctors and their children). After two years of drama lessons, Mary changed her mind, to Maggies deep (and silent) relief.
“Susan! If you must break your neck, do it properly!” So Susan got a racing helmet, a proper bike, and after the proceeds from selling Maggies little inherited bungalow expert lessons from a real stuntman. Susans safety was Maggies only true concern. Eventually, the rest of the money paid for a garage, and Susan opened her own workshop. When neighbours gasped, Maggie simply shrugged:
“Why not? It pays the bills, makes her happy, and who decides what counts as a suitable job anyway?”
Vera alone never gave her any trouble wise beyond her years. Sometimes Margaret would hug her tightly, whispering:
“Relax, little one, Im with you.”
Vera cherished those rare moments, magically able to feel small and protected, just for a while.
Maggie did her level best to help, to shield, to inspire. It didnt always work, but years on, she could look back, see the family shed raised, and feel no regrets. There were husbands and grandkids and life what more could anyone want?
Life trundled on smoothly until a phone call three days ago. A voice from long ago, quavering and uncertain, called her name. Maggie dropped her favourite mug, elbowed Annie aside, and collapsed not into her favourite chair, but next to it, staring at the ceiling and ignoring her granddaughters worried questions.
“Annie, ring your mum! I require emotional and psychological backup. STAT!”
Half an hour later, Vera burst in, breathless, coat half on, half off, with Susan on her heels.
“Maggie, what on earth is going on?”
“I think Ive lost my marbles.”
“Breaking news that is not,” Vera quipped, tossing her jacket aside.
Susan, balancing her helmet atop the indignant cats cushion, shot back, “Look whos talking! You never see the cat until you need the pillow.”
The family staged an intervention (with a pot of tea, naturally) and, by Saturday, Margaret had assembled the troops at Veras country house for a formal briefing.
“What do you want to know? He was my first love! Oh, he was marvellous. That hair! That height! And a voice that made my knees turn to jelly before hed said anything more coherent than Hello.”
“Did you love him, Gran?”
“Desperately!” Maggie rolled her eyes heavenwards. “And I suffered for it!”
“But why? Surely love is meant to be wonderful?”
“Well, darling, this love was not only unrequited, but became the source of endless misfortune. I lost myself in that feeling! Oh, thats poetry! I should compose a ballad for the minstrels of Chelsea!”
“Oh do!” Annie pleaded. “Or at least tell us the story!”
Maggie fanned herself with Annies abandoned maths book. “No more drama, Susan, or youll be rewarded with a certain British gesture that confuses anthropologists to this day, but we all know exactly what it means around here.”
“Mum!” Vera called, still managing accompaniments for salad duty.
“Yes, yes, I know. Now, listen carefully, my darlings: as is traditional, my first love did not end at the altar. How could it? I was sixteen, he was seventeen and the girl who came between us was already eighteen.”
“She was older?” Annie clapped a hand over her own mouth as Susan mimed zipping her lips.
“Now it seems trivial, but then, a year was a gulf! She was a student, I was still at school. Her mother was best friends with mine, so of course we knew each other. Heres Lesson One, Annie: never tell a friend all about your wonderful chap. Envy, my dear, is the most British of failings, slipping in like damp under the wallpaper. At first, you barely see it, but soon everythings ruined.”
“So, what happened?” Annie asked, eyes wide.
“Well, she got him. I found out when I was already smitten. I brooded, I suffered, I kept quiet. I loved him in silence no tragic Tatiana for me; Id read my Austen too well. Perhaps that was a mistake. If Id told him, maybe things would have been different. But what sort of future could we have had? A few months of moonlit kisses? He was planning the Navy; I wanted to study medicine. I suppose we both got what we wanted, in a way. He wrote to me twice! In the first reply, I dared to confess my love.”
Annie flung her arms in the air, nearly toppling off the steps in delight.
Susan caught her, but watched Margaret warily; there was pain in her tone that made all three sisters shiver.
“And then?” Annie asked, holding her breath.
“In my second letter, I told him it was impossible”
“Why?” Annie demanded, incredulous.
“Because, my dear, I couldnt give him anything but my love. Sometimes a man wants more than that.”
“What more?”
“Children, darling. And I couldnt provide him with those life had made other arrangements. And its selfish to think only of your own happiness in love. When you truly love, you think about the other person, what they need. So thats Lesson Two. When you find someone who thinks about you more than himself, take his hand and dont let go! Thats your person.”
Annie sat quietly, caressing a plum.
“And after that?” she whispered, seeing tears rolling freely down her grandmothers cheeks. Annie leapt up, hugged Maggie, and kissed away her tears. “Dont cry! Youll ruin your make-up!”
“Youre quite right, darling. I must rest and look fresher than the Chelsea Flower Show by this evening. Big night, you know. Grand entrance!”
The sisters, for once, were silent. There was nothing to add. Maggie had always told them to turn the page and move on, whatever the story.
Susan finished with the plums and carried them off. Vera cleared the table. Mary collapsed in the hammock, book in hand, the unusual hush unsettling her for a moment before she drifted off. Shed regret ignoring that uneasy feeling later.
A couple of hours on, a car pulled up outside, and an indomitably stylish elder in a flat cap strode to the gate, checked his note and knocked.
“Good evening! Im here to see Margaret Pennington?”
Vera, sizing up the visitor, allowed him in (“Margarets not due for another two hours, but who knows, perhaps you need medical attention”). When he gave his name, Vera nearly burst out laughing. This was the legendary hero of Maggies old romance.
“Werent you meeting Maggie in London?”
“Yes, but I had a gap in my diary, so I thought, why wait?”
“Ill fetch her. Sit tight.”
Vera turned to call her, but stopped dead in awe.
Maggie swept onto the veranda, the result of her grandchildrens improvements magnifying her usual glamour a thousand-fold: thick, black eyeliner (the twins had discovered permanent markers), making her look almost wild. Annie fetched a cloth for the inevitable clean-up, and the terrier fled under the table, howling as if doomed.
Her hairdo, performed by the youngest, was an eccentric tower of pins and flowers, more like a winners creation at a Royal hairdressing competition than anything seen before.
“Good gracious, Maggie!” Vera gasped, before dissolving in giggles, utterly losing her composure when their guest removed his cap, revealing a shining bald head in the evening light.
“Her hair!” Vera gasped, clutching her sides, and even the confused guest joined in.
“There was a time when I was a dashing curly-haired threat, but alas all things pass! Maggie, dear, its wonderful to see you!”
Maggie, blinking now well awake, glanced at Annie, who looked part impressed, part horrified, and bolted inside. A strangled howl burst from within, followed by so much laughter the walls shook.
Susan leapt up. “Ill be first to the bathroom!” Slamming the door behind her.
When calm returned and Maggie had made herself as presentable as possible, the whole family gathered round as dusk fell, and another chapter in the Pennington saga began.
Yet another page was turned.
The sisters, once alone, quietly agreed: you can never have too many good people. And if this chap, so unlike Margarets long-spun legend, had driven here himself, stayed through all the chaos, and laughed along with them, maybe just maybe he really was worthy of the woman in whom the familys heart had settled.
Time would tell, but for now, as Vera set another mug of English Breakfast before her stepmother, she gave her a gentle squeeze and whispered,
“Go on, then dont be afraid of anything. Were all right here, behind you. Shine, Mum.”
