Two Caravans Part 2

The worst thing is, I seem to have picked up her habit, even though I know you shouldn't judge people by appearances, but sometimes you can't help it. Take us strawberry-pickers, for example.

Although they are Chinese, the Chinese girls are definitely cultured types. One is a student of medicine and one is a student of accountancy. I can't remember which is which, but medicine is more cultured than accountancy. The Chinese Chinese girl has her hair cut short like a boy's, and she's quite pretty, but her legs are too thin. The Malaysian Chinese girl is also pretty, but she has a perm, which looks stupid on that type of hair. Maybe it's the other way round. They are friendly towards me, but they talk and giggle together all the time, which is annoying when you don't know what they're giggling about. Their English is terrible.

Next come Tomasz, Marta and Emanuel. Tomasz is some kind of boring government bureaucrat, though he has taken leave of absence from his job because he says he can earn more money picking strawberries-stupid, isn't it? He claims to be a poet, which of course is extremely cultured, though there is little evidence of this, unless you count those dreary songs he sings whenever Yola is around. And besides he is quite ancient, he must be in his forties, and he has a pathetic little beard and hair almost down to his shoulders like a hippy. Koshmar! Koshmar! And there's a dire smell about him. And there's a dire smell about him.

Marta is educated, and she even speaks a bit of French, but that Roman Catholic-type education is full of rules and mysteries and lacking practical content-like Western Ukrainians. Anyway, Mother says that Catholic is less cultured than Orthodox. Marta is nice and friendly, but she has a big nose. Probably that is why she's still unmarried at the age of thirty.

Emanuel is adorable, but he is not quite eighteen and also a Catholic, though he appears to be an intelligent type, and he wears a horrible green anorak even when it's not raining. Of course he is black, but this does not make him any less cultured, because as any cultured person knows, black people are just as cultured as anybody else. He often sings as he picks strawberries in the field, and he has a beautiful voice, but he only sings religious songs. It would be nice if he sang something more amusing.

Vitaly is mysterious. He never gives you a straight answer. Sometimes he disappears, no one knows where. He is clearly intelligent because he speaks good English and several other languages, but his manner is rather coa.r.s.e and he wears a gold chain with a silver penknife dangling round his neck. His eyes are dark and twinkly with cute curly eyelashes, and his hair is black and curly. In fact he is not bad-looking in a flashy curly sort of way. I would give him seven out often. Though he is not my type. Maybe he is a gipsy.

Near the bottom is Ciocia Yola (strictly speaking she is only Malta's aunt, but we all call her Ciocia). She is a vulgar person with a gap between her front teeth and obviously dyed hair. (My mother's hair is dyed too, but it's not so obvious.) She claims she was once a nursery school teacher, which is not a proper teacher at all, and she also claims to be the supervisor, and puts on airs which are unwarranted and extremely irritating. She likes to sound off about her opinions, which are generally not worth listening to.

Right at the bottom is Andriy, the miner's son from Donbas. Unfortunately miners are generally primitive types who find it difficult to be cultured, however hard they try. When he works in the field I can smell his sweat. He takes his s.h.i.+rt off when it gets too hot and shows off his muscles. OK, they may even ripple a bit. But he is definitely not my type.

As for me, I'm nineteen, and everything else about me is still to-be. Fluent English-speaker to-be. I hope. Romantically-in-love to-be. Are you ready, Mr Brown? World-famous writer to-be, like my Pappa. I have already started to think about the book I will write when I get back home. But you have to have something interesting to write about, don't you? More interesting than a bunch of strawberry-pickers living in two caravans.

Yola's eyes narrow as she watches the Ukrainian girl wander along the strawberry rows as if she had all the time in the world to fill those punnets. Out in the strawberry field it's the hierarchy of the check-in that matters. Several times a day, the farmer counts the trays of punnets, checks them in, stacks them on pallets in the prefab, and notes down who has earned what. The women generally earn less. The men earn more. The supervisor of course earns the most.

Yola is both the gang-mistress and the supervisor. As a former teacher, she is a person of natural authority and a woman of action. It is her belief that maintaining a pleasant s.e.xual harmony within the picking team is the key to success, and for this reason she encourages the men to take their s.h.i.+rts off in the sun.

She doesn't want any griping or unpleasant comments behind her back, especially from those Ukrainians, now there are two of them. Not that she has anything against Ukrainians, but it is her belief that the high point of Ukrainian civilisation was its brief occupation by Poland, though the civilising effects were clearly quite short-lived and superficial. To be fair, this Ukrainian boy Andriy is quite a gentleman as well as a good picker, but he is inclined to moodiness, and he thinks too much. Thinking is not good for a man. He is quite nice-looking, though of course he is much too young for her, and she isn't the type of woman to seduce a boy half her age, though she knows some who are in Zdroj, which she will tell you about later.

Yes, if only there were more good pickers like that. n.o.body understands the problems she faces, for her pay depends not just on her own efforts but on the performance of the good-for-nothing team she supervises in the field. She tells them-but will they listen?-to pick strawberries just right. Too white and farmer will reject. Too ripe and shops complain. And you have to handle correctly, and drop gently-don't throw-into punnet. She tells them, and they just carry on exactly the same as before. Really, she is getting too old for this game.

This is her second summer as a supervisor, her seventh summer in England, and the forty-seventh summer of her life. She is beginning to think she has had enough. During those seven summers she has picked almost fifty tonnes of strawberries for the Dumpling, and the income from this, added to the extra sums paid for additional services of a private nature, have allowed her to buy a pretty three-roomed bungalow on the outskirts of Zdroj with half a hectare of garden that leads down to the Prosna River where her son Mirek can potter around to his heart's content. She has a photo in her purse of Mirek in the garden sitting on a rope-swing that hangs from the branch of a cherry tree in full blossom. Ah, those little smiling eyes! When he was born, she had to make a difficult choice-give up her job or put him in an inst.i.tution. Well, she has seen those inst.i.tutions, thank you very much. Then someone at the school said they were recruiting strawberry-pickers for England, and her sister said she would look after Mirek for the summer, so she seized the opportunity. And what woman of action but of limited choices would not do the same?

Last autumn she invested some of her strawberry money in a pair of Masurian goats and this year there are two snow-white kids running about in the garden, bleating, jumping over each other, nibbling at the dahlias and generally causing mayhem. She was thinking of those kids as she lay on the straw in the back of the Dumpling's Land Rover last night looking up at the swaying roof, while he toiled and puffed away above her. And she smiled to herself and let out some delightful bleating noises, which the Dumpling mistook for cries of pleasure.

Usually Yola brings a team of pickers she has recruited locally in Zdroj, for there were always people desperate for a bit of cash since they closed the millinery factory, but this year n.o.body wants to come, because now Poland is in Europe marketing why should they work for that kind of money when they can earn better money legally? Three friends who were supposed to be coming let her down at the last minute, and she has brought only Marta and Tomasz to England with her. The Dumpling has had to find additional labour through other agents of a more shady character, and has even hinted that he will not renew her contract. Just let him dare-we will see what the wife has to say.

Being a supervisor is not as easy as you think. You have to deal with all types of personality. That Tomasz, for instance, has been hanging around making eyes at her, well, that is in itself not so surprising, as she is generally thought to be an attractive woman, but at the end of the day he has come to England to pick strawberries, not for any activities of a more carnal nature, for which there are plenty enough opportunities back in Poland, Lord help us.

Or take Marta, her niece-her religious airs are enough to put anyone off sainthood.

"Are you OK, Ciocia?" she asked, the first time she saw Yola lying on the ground with her shapely legs stretched in front of her, breathing deeply with her eyes closed.

"I am letting the sun enter my body to warm me from inside like a good husband. Why don't you do the same, Marta?"

"Why would I want the sun for a husband?" Marta said sniffily. "I will let the spirit of the Lord warm me from inside."

Probably her excessive piety is not her fault. She could only have learnt it from her mother, Yola's sister, who although very kind when it comes to looking after Mirek, can be extremely irritating. Well, it's one thing to go to church and ask for forgiveness for your own sins, but quite another thing to rub other people's noses in theirs.

And while we're on the subject of noses, it is of course not Malta's fault that hers is so big, but maybe it is why she has so little discrimination when it comes to men, for she seems to be drawn to the most unsuitable types and obvious sinners, like Vitaly, for example. Yes, Yola has observed the way Marta's eyes follow him about the field, and she doesn't want the poor girl to be taken advantage of. She knows that type of man. She was married to one, once.

As for this new girl, Irina, she is far too free and easy with that dimply smile of hers, and Yola has noticed the way the Dumpling's eyes linger on her longer than is strictly necessary. She picks strawberries that are more white than red, and answers back when Yola politely draws this to her attention, and sniffs when Yola tries to teach her the correct handling technique, which is like this, you have to cradle them in your palm from below, never more than two at a time, like a man's t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es. Don't squeeze them, Irina!

OK, I admit I wasn't the fastest strawberry-picker, but I didn't need that bossy Polish auntie to point it out to me in that vulgar way.

This was my fourth day here, and I still couldn't believe the pain in my back and knees every time I bent down to strawberry level. When I stood and straightened up, my bones creaked and groaned like an old woman's.

The Ukrainian boy would slip fruit into my punnets when the men's rows and the women's rows came together, which was nice of him, but I wished he wouldn't stare at me like that. Once when I sat down for a rest, he came and sat beside me and popped a strawberry in my mouth. Well, I could hardly spit it out, could I? But he'd better not start getting any ideas, because I haven't come all this way to spend my time fending off the advances of a miner from Donbas.

I had enough of it fending off advances from the boys at school. They were generally primitive types who just wanted to grab all the time-not very romantic-and they had no idea whatsoever about tender words and gallant gestures. In my opinion, everyone should read War and Peace War and Peace, which is the most romantic book ever written, as well as the most tragic. When Natasha and Pierre come together at last, it gives you a feeling inside that is quite fiery in its intensity. That's the sort of love I'm waiting for-not a quick thrash behind the bushes which is what all the boys seem to be interested in.

"Love is like fire," Mother used to say. "A treasure, not a toy." Poor Mother, she is getting very middle-aged. Her mouth would pucker up in a disapproving lipsticky pout when we pa.s.sed those girls on Kreshchatik wearing skirts that were just a little strip of cloth between their navels and their knickers, laughing with their mouths open as the boys splashed them with beer. Although it is more romantic if a girl saves herself for the one the one, still there was something unsettling, something knowing about those open-mouth smiles. What was it they knew and I didn't? Maybe here in England, away from my mother's prying eyes, I would be able to find out. Watching the ripple of that miner's arms as he lifted the pallets of strawberries got me wondering about all that again. Just wondering, Mother. Nothing more Just wondering, Mother. Nothing more.

There is a lay-by further up the lane that forks to Sherbury Down, sheltered by a row of poplars, from where you can look down over the field through a gap in the hedge. From this vantage point Mr Leapish the farmer sits in his Land Rover and surveys the rustic scene with satisfaction. The men, he observes, like to race each other along the strawberry rows, while the women are attentive to each other, and don't want anyone to get left behind. Mr Leapish is mindful of this difference, and has given the men new rows to pick, while the women he a.s.signs to go over the rows that have already been picked by the men. The women earn less, of course, but they are used to that where they come from, and they don't complain. Thus by working with the grain of human nature, he maximises both productivity and yield. He is pleased with his skill as a manager.

Today is Sat.u.r.day, pay day, and he will have to fork out for their wages later, so his mind is particularly focused on issues of arithmetic. Eight punnets per tray, half a kilo per punnet, eighty kilos per picker per day on average, six days a week, over a twelve-week season. His brain ticks over effortlessly in mental-arithmetic mode. When this field is picked out, they'll move on to another one down in the valley, then back up here again after the plants have re-berried. Pickers are paidsop a kilo, before deductions. And each kilo sells at 2. Not bad. All in all, it's not a bad little business, though he doesn't make as much as that newcomer Tilley up the road with his acres of polytunnels. He could get more if he sold to the big supermarkets, but he doesn't want the inspectors poking around in his caravans, or asking questions about the relations.h.i.+p between Wendy's business and his business. The beauty of it is that half of what you fork out in wages you can claw back in living expenses. And he's helping these poor souls make a bit of money that they could never get their hands on back where they come from. So that's a bonus.

At one o'clock precisely, he will drive up to the gate and honk the horn and watch the strawberry-pickers pick up their laden trays of punnets and make their way down the field. He should really pick up the trays more often in the warm weather, and get the fruit into the cold store. That's what you have to do to sell at 2.50 a kilo to the big supermarkets. But the local petrol stations that are his outlets don't ask questions.

Maybe the Ukrainian boy will already be down there, waiting to open the gate. Keen. Good picker. Hard worker. Wish they were all like that. This new girl seems a bit of a dead loss, but maybe she'll speed up a bit when she picks up the rhythm. Nice-looking, but not very forthcoming-at his age, he needs someone who knows what she's doing to get the old motor started. Don't know why Vulk sent her-he'd asked for another man. Now Vulk wants her back. Maybe he'll put her to work in another of his little businesses. Well, he'll have to see how she performs at the check-in. If she's useless, he might have to let Vulk take her off his hands.

After the check-in he'll let the poor souls have half an hour for lunch, which he has brought in the back of the Land Rover. As always, it's sliced white bread, margarine and cheese slices. Today he's particularly pleased because he's found a new supplier that sells a white sliced loaf for ipp. He was paying 24p a loaf before. Eight loaves a day-two for breakfast, which they eat with jam, two for lunch, which they have with cheese slices, and four for dinner which they eat with sausages-over several weeks-it all adds up. The new girl is small, and he reckons she won't eat much, so he hasn't deemed it necessary to increase the provisions, except for an extra loaf of bread. This feeding regime, he has calculated, provides a perfectly balanced diet at minimum cost, with carbo-hydrate, protein, sugars and fats, all the essential energy-giving nutrients they need. The fruit-and-vegetable requirement is present in the strawberries, which they eat naturally during the course of the day, and which also help to keep them regular. Some farmers let their workers buy their own food, and don't let them eat the strawberries, but Leapish reckons his system is more cost-effective. They soon get sick of the strawberries. Yes, even with the commission he pays Vulk for living expenses, he reckons he can still make on it.

Each worker pays 49 per week for food, including tea, milk, sugar and as many strawberries as they can eat (where else could you live like a lord for less than fifty quid a week?), and 50 per week rental for their caravan bunk, which in this part of the country and at the height of the summer holiday season is extremely reasonable. In fact maybe too reasonable. Maybe he should be charging 55. At least, in the men's caravan. The women's caravan, admittedly, is rather small. But it has a special place in his heart.

He looks at it, perched there at the top of the field like a fat white hen, and his eyes go a bit misty. This is the caravan that he and Wendy went off in for their honeymoon, more than twenty years ago-a Swift Silhouette, latest model, with bags of storage s.p.a.ce, built-in furniture and fully equipped kitchenette complete with two neat gas rings, a miniature stainless-steel sink and drainer with a lift-off worktop, and a compact gas-powered fridge-how Wendy had loved it. That caravan park above the cliffs at Beachy Head. Spaghetti bolognese. A bottle of Piat d'Or. They had certainly given that fold-out double bed some hammer.

When they had gone into the strawberry business, seven years ago, Wendy had been in charge of the caravans. She had set up a separate company to provide the accommodation, food and transport for the pickers-that's how you get round the red tape that restricts how much you can deduct from wages. This is what's crippling the country, in his humble opinion-red tape-as though making a profit is a dirty word-he has twice written to the Kent Gazette Kent Gazette about it. Yes, it had been more than a marriage, it had been a real partners.h.i.+p. Of course things were different now. Pity, really, but women are like that. Jealous b.i.t.c.hes. Anyway, not his fault. What man wouldn't do the same? No point in being sentimental about it. Yes, it was a good size for two people, could fit four at a pinch. Five? Well, they'd managed all right, hadn't they? But the men's caravan-it's a static Everglade in pale green, the sort you can hire ready-sited in scores of windswept caravan parks on cliff tops overlooking the English Channel-that had once been an abode of great luxury, with ruched pink satin curtains and quilted velvet seats, now admittedly more brown than pink, and propped up on bricks since one of the wheels had gone missing. Probably those New Zealand sheep-shearers, though heavens only knows what they wanted a spare caravan wheel for. Acres of room in it. An extra 5 each-that would bring in 20 per week. He needn't tell Vulk. And that would be 20 a week nearer to achieving his dream. about it. Yes, it had been more than a marriage, it had been a real partners.h.i.+p. Of course things were different now. Pity, really, but women are like that. Jealous b.i.t.c.hes. Anyway, not his fault. What man wouldn't do the same? No point in being sentimental about it. Yes, it was a good size for two people, could fit four at a pinch. Five? Well, they'd managed all right, hadn't they? But the men's caravan-it's a static Everglade in pale green, the sort you can hire ready-sited in scores of windswept caravan parks on cliff tops overlooking the English Channel-that had once been an abode of great luxury, with ruched pink satin curtains and quilted velvet seats, now admittedly more brown than pink, and propped up on bricks since one of the wheels had gone missing. Probably those New Zealand sheep-shearers, though heavens only knows what they wanted a spare caravan wheel for. Acres of room in it. An extra 5 each-that would bring in 20 per week. He needn't tell Vulk. And that would be 20 a week nearer to achieving his dream.

Yes, although Mr Leapish is a practical man, he too has a dream. His dream is to cover this whole sweet south-sloping sun-bathed strawberry hillside with polytunnels.

At six o'clock the shadows were lengthening across the field. When the horn of the Land Rover sounded again down by the gate, I picked up my tray of strawberry punnets and carried it down to the prefab.

"How many you got, Irina?" asked Ciocia Yola, sticking her nose into my tray. OK, I admit I had only filled twelve trays all day. Marta had filled nineteen. Yola and the Chinese girls had filled twenty-five each-you should see the way they go at those berries. Anyway, they're smaller than me, and they don't have to bend so far. The men had filled fifteen trays each that afternoon, and another fifteen in the morning. Each tray carries about four kilos of strawberries. I could see the farmer was annoyed. His face was red and lumpy like a strawberry. Or maybe, according to Yola, like a t.e.s.t.i.c.l.e. Anyway, I kept my face absolutely expressionless as he told me that today I'd earned 14, barely enough to cover my expenses, and I was going to have to do better. He spoke slowly and very loudly, as though I was deaf as well as stupid, waving his hands about.

"NO GOOD. NO b.l.o.o.d.y GOOD. YOU'VE GOT TO PICK FASTER. ALL FILL UP. FULL. FULL." He swept his arms wide, as if to embrace all his pathetic punnets. "DO YOU UNDERSTAND?"

No, I didn't understand-the shouting was fl.u.s.tering me.

"OTHERWISE YOU'RE DOWN THE ROAD."

"Road?"

"ROAD. DOWN THE b.l.o.o.d.y ROAD. YOU GET IT?"

"I get blood on road?"

"NO, YOU SILLY COW, YOU YOU GET ON THE ROAD!" GET ON THE ROAD!"

"I get silly cow on road?"

"OH! FORGET IT!"

He slammed my tray onto the pallet, dismissing me with both his hands in a way that was quite uncivilised. I could feel tears p.r.i.c.king at the back of my eyes, but I certainly wasn't going to let him see that. Nor Yola, who was standing behind me in the queue with her full tray and her smug gap-tooth smile. And behind her was Andriy, gawping at me with a grin. Well, he could go to h.e.l.l. Nonchalantly, I sauntered up the field to the women's caravan and sat down on the step. They could all go to h.e.l.l.

After a while, I heard the farmer's Land Rover pull out of the gate and putter away down the lane. A pleasant stillness descended on the hillside. Even the birds were taking a break. The air was warm, and sweet with honeysuckle. An evening like this is a gift to be treasured, I thought, and I wasn't going to let anything spoil it. The sky was pale and milky, with s.h.i.+ning streamers of silvery clouds over in the west-a real English sky.

Vitaly and Andriy were relaxing on the back seat of Vitaly's car enjoying a can of lager-apparently the rest of the car is disintegrating in a hedge somewhere on the Canterbury bypa.s.s. Typical Vitaly. Tomasz had disappeared into the next field to check his rabbit traps. Emanuel was sitting on a crate outside the men's caravan with a bowl of strawberries beside him, writing a letter. The Chinese girls were curled up on Marta's bunk, reading their horoscopes. Marta had already lit the gas under the pan of sausages, and our little cabin was filled with a smell that was both mouth-watering and disgusting at the same time. Yola was having a shower. I stretched out on her bunk just for a moment. I was feeling so tired, every muscle in my body was aching. I would just have a little rest before dinner.

I AM DOG I RUN I RUN I KILL RABBIT I EAT ALL I LICK BLOOD GOOD BLOOD MY BELLY IS FULL GOOD BELLY-FULL FEELING I FIND RIVER I DRINK GOOD WATER I DRINK SUN IS ON ME WARM I REST I LAY MY HEAD ON MY PAWS IN THE SUN I SLEEP I DREAM I DREAM OF KILLING I AM DOG I AM DOG I RUN I RUN I KILL RABBIT I EAT ALL I LICK BLOOD GOOD BLOOD MY BELLY IS FULL GOOD BELLY-FULL FEELING I FIND RIVER I DRINK GOOD WATER I DRINK SUN IS ON ME WARM I REST I LAY MY HEAD ON MY PAWS IN THE SUN I SLEEP I DREAM I DREAM OF KILLING I AM DOG.

It is Marta's belief that our daily food is a gift from G.o.d, to be prepared with reverence, and that eating together is a sacrament. For this reason she always tries her best to make a pleasing evening meal for the strawberry-pickers, but tonight is Emanuel's eighteenth birthday and she has made a special effort to rise to the challenge of the unpromising ingredients provided by the farmer.

In the pan, the sausages have already turned bright pink and a greyish gelatinous fluid is oozing out of them and soaking into the bread, which Marta has cut up into strips and put to fry with the sausages and some potatoes that Vitaly found by the roadside. There are some wild ceps, and some green leaves of wood-garlic waiting at the side of the pan, which she will stir in at the last minute. The remainder of the bread she has pressed into dumplings with a sprinkling of mauve thyme-flowers and a pair of pigeon's eggs which Tomasz found in the woods. They are boiling merrily in a pan. Marta is cooking up all the sausages-the men's as well as the women's. Why? Because Polish women are proper women, that's why.

Ciocia Yola is taking a shower, preparing herself for another sinful night of love with the farmer. The sun must have warmed the water in the barrel to a pleasant temperature, for Ciocia Yola is singing as she rubs herself with perfumed soap, a tuneless wordless song. Ciocia Yola is not a good singer.

Then there is a tap-tapping on the side of the caravan and a man's voice speaking in Polish. "Lovely ladies, I have here a small offering with which you may enhance our supper." It is Tomasz, with the bloodied body of a rabbit in his hands. "Maybe the lovely Yola would accept this small token of my affection."

"Leave it on the step, Tomek," Ciocia Yola calls from the shower. "I'll be ready in a minute."

"Maybe you would like me to skin it for you?" He looks hopefully towards the shower. There are some holes in the plastic screen, but they are in the wrong places.

"It's OK. You can leave it. I know how," says Marta.

She takes the dead rabbit from him with a sigh, and strokes its fluffy fur. Poor little creature. But she has already worked out a nice recipe in her head to send it to the next world. Tomasz is still hovering on the doorstep, and a moment later is rewarded by the sight of Yola emerging, wrapped only in a towel.

"Go away, Tomek," she says briskly. "Why are you hanging around here like a bad stink? We will tell you when dinner is ready." He slopes off down the field.

In Marta's opinion, her aunt would be better off with a decent serious chap like Tomasz, even if he does have some oddities, than with some of these ex-husbands and would-be husbands she seems to go for. But Ciocia Yola has her own ideas about men, as about everything else.

Marta picks up the rabbit, and with a sharp knife makes a deft slice up the creature's furry belly. She skins it and cuts it up into small pieces which she tosses in the pan with some fat from the sausages, and some leaves of wood-garlic and wild thyme. A delicious aroma floats down the field. At the last moment, she throws in the fried sausages, ceps and potatoes, and adds a can of Vitaly's beer to make a mouth-watering sauce. She tastes it on the tip of her tongue, and closes her eyes with sheer good-Polish-woman pleasure.

Andriy and Emanuel have built a fire in a gra.s.sy spot at the top of the field. Although there is plenty of dry wood in the copse, and small twigs for kindling, it still seems to take them a lot of huffing and puffing and flapping of branches to get it going. When it has caught, and the smoke has drifted away, they arrange a circle of logs and crates and the old car seat to sit on. The Chinese girls have set out the plates and cutlery (there are only six sets, so some people will have to share or improvise). Emanuel has picked a huge bowl of strawberries, and Marta sets them to marinate in cool tea, with sugar and some wild mint leaves. She finds she is increasingly having to modify or disguise the taste of the strawberries to make them more palatable to the pickers. These she will put into a bowl lined with slices of white bread, and this will be turned out onto a dish as a birthday pudding instead of a cake for Emanuel, of whom she is especially fond. There are no candles, but later there will be stars.

Emanuel is watching as Tomasz tunes his guitar. Then Tomasz pa.s.ses him the guitar and starts showing him some basic chords. Vitaly gets out his stash of lager and his cash box. Ciocia Yola has put on her clean mauve-ribbonned knickers from the was.h.i.+ng line, a short frilly skirt and a low-cut blouse. No doubt this is all for her lover's benefit. Marta doesn't know what her aunt sees in the farmer. Dumpling, she calls him. He is more like a suet pudding. If you're going to commit fornication with a man, you may as well choose one who is nice-looking. But no doubt G.o.d will forgive her. He's good that way.

Then Chinese Girl One bangs the side of a pan as though it were a gong, and they all take their places around the fire in antic.i.p.ation of Malta's feast.

Down in the valley, a summery haze s.h.i.+mmers over the treetops and shadows are already gathering. The cut-crystal brilliance of the light becomes soft and muted, as though s.h.i.+ning through layers of silk. The silver streamers of clouds have turned to pink, but the sky is still bright, and the sun has an hour or so to go before it touches the treetops. It is almost midsummer. A thrush sits on the branch of an ash tree in the copse, singing his heart out, and from the far side of the copse his mate calls back. It is the only sound to break the stillness, apart from the sound of a dog barking in the woods far away.

An evening like this is a gift from G.o.d, thinks Marta, as she gives thanks and prepares to celebrate.

Only Irina is missing. Andriy goes to look for her, and finds her still curled up asleep in the caravan. Her hands are folded together under her chin, and two circles of colour have fallen like rose petals on her cheeks. Her lips are slightly parted. Her orange ribbon has come loose and the stray strands of dark hair are streaming on the pillow. He gazes for a moment. Really, for a Ukrainian girl, she has some quite positive features.

"Wake up. Dinner's ready."

He has it on the tip of his tongue to say, "Wake up, sweet one." But why would he want to say a thing like that? Fortunately the words get stuck in his mouth before they can emerge to embarra.s.s him. Irina yawns, stretches and rubs her eyes. She rolls off the bunk, still a bit wobbly from sleep. He takes her hand to help her step down from the caravan, and she rests her weight on him briefly before drawing it away.

The strawberry-pickers have seated themselves in a circle and are pa.s.sing round the steaming plates of food: dumplings, rabbit and sausage stew with fried bread, garlic, mushrooms and potatoes. The delicious smell of each dish strikes him like a miracle; his body s.h.i.+vers with readiness; he is incredibly hungry. After Marta has said grace, Vitaly sells everyone a can or more of excellent lager at a special discounted price. At first they all eat in silence, listening to the birdsong, watching the magical s.h.i.+fts of light as the sun slips towards the horizon. After a while, conversations break out in a babble of languages.

He is sitting next to Irina on a low log, watching her from the corner of his eye. He likes the way she eats, tucking into the food with enthusiasm, only stopping from time to time to flick back her long hair when it slips down over her face.

He leans and whispers into her ear, "Have you got a boyfriend back home, then?"

She turns her head, giving him a hard look.

"Yes I have, of course. He is two metres tall and he is a boxer."

"Really?"

"Of course."

"What is his name?"

"His name is Attila."

She doesn't look the type to have a boxer boyfriend, but women are notoriously unpredictable, and he has heard that sometimes the most refined types are drawn to the roughest of men. So maybe he stands a chance with her after all.

To his left, Tomasz is trying a similar approach. He sits up close to Yola on Vitaly's car seat and murmurs, "Is there someone waiting for you back in Poland, beautiful Yola?"

"What business is it of yours?" Yola replies briskly.

"Only that if there is, he is a lucky man."

"Not so lucky as you imagine. What do you know about luck?" she snaps. "Better to keep your mouth shut, Mister Poet, unless you know what you're talking about."

On the other side, Emanuel and Chinese Girl Two are each trying to find out where the other comes from. Emanuel discovers that she is not from China, which seems odd, while she discovers only that he is from Africa, which everyone knows already. Then Vitaly presses another can of beer on them and Marta intervenes, chicling him gently for taking advantage of Emanuel, who is too young and has clearly had enough already. Chinese Girl Two starts to giggle uncontrollably, and soon they are all giggling, even Marta.

Now Tomasz takes up his guitar and starts to sing a terrible rhyming song he has composed himself about a man who sets out to find the woman of his dreams. Yola tells him to shut up. Andriy turns to Irina.

"Will you sing something for us, Ukrainka?"

She gives him another hard look.

"Why don't you ask Emanuel?" She sinks her teeth into a piece of rabbit.

Hm. He doesn't seem to be getting anywhere with his girl.

Dear sister, Dear sister, I wish you were here for in Kent the strawberries are even more delicate than the strawberries of Zomba. I wish you were here for in Kent the strawberries are even more delicate than the strawberries of Zomba. Today being my eighteenth birthday we have enjoyed an outstanding party. My mzungu friend Andree and I made a big bonfire which we lit upon much fevered flapping and smoking and there was a delicate feast prepared for us by a good Catholic Martyr though she is not yet ascended and after feasting we sat upon the hillside to behold the beauteous sunset (though not as beauteous as the sunsets of Zomba) with the sun setting like a firey disk and die first star of the ferment twinkiling like a diamond in the sky and the hills cool in their darkening. And when our hearts were opened everybody began to sing. Today being my eighteenth birthday we have enjoyed an outstanding party. My mzungu friend Andree and I made a big bonfire which we lit upon much fevered flapping and smoking and there was a delicate feast prepared for us by a good Catholic Martyr though she is not yet ascended and after feasting we sat upon the hillside to behold the beauteous sunset (though not as beauteous as the sunsets of Zomba) with the sun setting like a firey disk and die first star of the ferment twinkiling like a diamond in the sky and the hills cool in their darkening. And when our hearts were opened everybody began to sing. The Poland mzungu named Toemash has a guitar which is of extreme interest to me and he sang a ballad of a man with a tambourine and his many jangly followers. Then the two China girls sang in high soprano an ineffable song of great beauty. The Ukraine girl also sang sweetly with choral accompaniment from Andree who eyed her eagerly. Then the Catholic Martyr sang a song of praise with a.s.sistance from her auntie. And I sang my song Oh come Oh come Emanuel which I learnt from Sister Theodosia. And at the end everybody sang Happy Birthday Dear Emanuel and it came to pa.s.s that this outstanding song is available not only in English but also in Ukrainian Polish and Chinese!!! And so united in song we enjoyed the Radiance of the evening. The Poland mzungu named Toemash has a guitar which is of extreme interest to me and he sang a ballad of a man with a tambourine and his many jangly followers. Then the two China girls sang in high soprano an ineffable song of great beauty. The Ukraine girl also sang sweetly with choral accompaniment from Andree who eyed her eagerly. Then the Catholic Martyr sang a song of praise with a.s.sistance from her auntie. And I sang my song Oh come Oh come Emanuel which I learnt from Sister Theodosia. And at the end everybody sang Happy Birthday Dear Emanuel and it came to pa.s.s that this outstanding song is available not only in English but also in Ukrainian Polish and Chinese!!! And so united in song we enjoyed the Radiance of the evening.

I had drunk two cans of lager, which is more than I'm used to. Whenever anyone poured a drink, Mother always used to put on her preachy voice and say, "Irina, a drunken woman is like a blighted rose." In fact everyone, even Marta, had drunk too much. Marta was doing the was.h.i.+ng up now. Yola was supposed to be helping, but she had disappeared. The Chinese girls had drunk two lagers each and had gone back inside the caravan-they are very sensitive to midges. Emanuel had drunk eight, and had fallen asleep, stretched out in front of the embers. Tomasz had drunk six, moaning all the while that he would much rather have a gla.s.s of good Georgian wine, and now he was strumming another miserable dirge about how much the times are changing. Vitaly was gathering up the empty cans and counting his takings for the evening. Andriy had drunk at least eight, I noticed, and when I pushed his hand away from my knee he wandered off a bit unsteadily down the field. A drunken miner is not very appealing.

As the sun went down the air started to turn cool, nipping my bare arms and legs, so I went back inside the caravan to find my jumper and jeans. Yola was sitting there, combing her dyed hair and daubing on cheap pink lipstick in preparation for her date with that podgy farmer. She kept jumping up to look out of the window like an over-excited poodle dog. Suddenly she yapped, "Look at that, girls. We have a visitor."