Behind the Scenes at the Museum Read Free Page A

whole world is trying to climb on her body.
    ‘Shop!’ George returns. The budgerigars rise up and flutter in their cages.
    Shop! Why ‘Shop!’? George and Bunty always say this when they come in at the Shop door – but it’s supposed to be what the customer says, not the shopkeeper. Are they addressing the shop in the vocative case (‘0 Shop!’) or naming it in the nominative? Reassuring it of its existence? Reassuring themselves of its existence? Pretending to be a customer? But why pretend to be the thing you hate? ‘Shop!’ I fear, like the thing it signifies, will remain an eternal, existential mystery.
    But now we are freed from our enslavement to the counter (Bunty has just sold the Shop Cat, but she doesn’t mention this to George. Poor cat.) and we can go and discover the world beyond the Shop. First we have to go through the ritual of dressing Gillian so that she’ll be able to survive in the alien atmosphere outside the Shop. Bunty doesn’t trust the month of May so Gillian has her liberty bodice securely strapped to her still cherub-new skin. Then a petticoat, a thick red woollen jersey knitted by Bunty’s never-idle fingers, followed by a Royal Stewart kilt and long white cotton socks which cut her fat little legs in half. Finally she puts on her pale powder-puff-blue coat with the white velvet collar and a little white woollen bonnet tied with ribbons that slice into her double chin. I, on the other hand, am free-floating, naked and unadorned. No mittens and bonnets for me yet, just the warm, obliging innards of Bunty’s unconscious body, which is still unaware of the precious package it’s carrying.
    No-porridge Patricia has already been hurried up the road to school by George a couple of hours ago and is at this moment standing in the playground drinking her little bottle of milk and going through the four-times table in her head (she’s very keen) and wondering why noone ever asks her to join in their skipping games. Only five and already an outcast! Three-fifths of the family are now walking along Blake Street towards Museum Gardens, or rather Bunty walks, I float and Gillian rides her brand new Triang tricycle which she has insisted on riding. Bunty feels there’s something indulgent about parks, something wasteful – holes in existence filled with nothing but air and light and birds. Surely these are spaces that should be occupied by something useful, like housework?
    Housework must be done. On the other hand, children are supposed to play in parks – Bunty has read the childcare section in her Everything Within book (‘Bringing up Baby’) that says so – therefore, some reluctant time has to be given over to fresh air so she pays a precious sixpence at the gate of the Museum Gardens and guarantees that our fresh air will be exclusive.
    My first day! All the trees in Museum Gardens are in new leaf and high above Bunty’s head the sky is solid blue; if she reached out her hand (which she won’t) she could touch it. Fluffy white clouds like lambs pile into each other. We are in quattrocento heaven. Swooping, tweeting birds dance excitedly above our heads, their tiny flight muscles at full throttle – miniature angels of the Annunciation, avian Gabriels, come to shout my arrival! Alleluia!
    Not that Bunty notices. She’s watching Gillian, who’s riding round every twist and turn in the path, following some magic tantra all of her own. I’m worried that Gillian might get trapped amongst the flower beds. Beyond the park railing a broad calm river can be glimpsed and ahead of us lie the pale fretworked ruins of St Mary’s Abbey. A peacock screeches and launches itself off its perch on the Bar Walls and down onto the grass at our feet. Brave new world that has such creatures in it!
    Two men, who we will call Bert and Alf, are employed cutting grass in the park. At the sight of Gillian they pause in their work and, resting on their huge mower for a minute, regard her progress with