Narrow Margins by Marie Browne Read Free Book Online

completely stress-free.
    If I had known at the time how lucky and coincidental the timing of that phone call was, I would have probably become very religious on the spot; however, I didn’t find out until some months later that the only reason we got a mooring was that someone had left in a hurry, exactly ten minutes before my call. So instead of becoming a nun, I just became very smug.
    I took a few deep breaths (just to make up for the ones I hadn’t let escape throughout the phone call) and, acting as nonchalantly as I could, wandered into the living room. Geoff looked up at me from his book.
    â€˜No luck, then?’ he asked.
    I dropped onto the sofa and picked up the paper.
    â€˜Hmm? Oh no, it’s fine, all organised, one mooring with electricity waiting for us when we get there. I had to pay the first quarter in advance, is that OK?’
    â€˜Sure,’ he agreed and looked back down at his book. ‘What?’ he threw the book down. ‘You got one? How?’
    Laughing at his cartoon-like double take, I affected surprise and shock; this was ‘me’ we were talking about, Mrs ‘Anything is possible’ (well, obviously it is if you have no idea what you are doing). As if I could do nothing other than get a mooring at the first attempt, I snorted and innocently continued to scan the paper.
    â€˜Immense personal charm, I suppose.’ I looked over the top of the paper and frowned at him. ‘Um, Geoff? What’s an “in-line” mooring do you think?’
    September 5 found us all loaded, yet again, into our still overflowing vehicles and after declining a third cup of tea, the offer of lunch and a second offer of cake and biscuits from Lillian, who was obviously unhappy at the idea of us leaving to start a weird, transient life, we were on our way.
    We had already said a slightly relieved goodbye to Herbert who was spending a couple of weeks with Helen. I didn’t think at his age he would have coped very well with being on a boat. Although being on the boat wouldn’t have been any trouble, it was being in any situation that restricted him from getting onto some grass for his fifteen wees a day, which he seemed to need at this point in his life, that would have been the problem. Despite the initial excitement about Happy, Sam wasn’t entirely eager to leave Grandma’s and head off into some weird and hazy future; he, unlike us, had agreed to cake, biscuits and anything else she was offering and I think would have been quite happy to wave us goodbye from the door of her house. He was a little tetchy for the first part of the journey, but music from the Goodies and a hand-held electronic bleepy game soon raised his spirits. By the time we reached Braunston (for the third time) we were all in quite a hopeful mood, although Sam was a little manic and wide-eyed due to an over-abundance of sugar coupled with staring at little moving characters for three hours.
    Leaving our tired-looking, over-laden vehicles in the car park, we wandered into the office to finalise all the bits and pieces. I was in such a good mood that Sam finally got his duck and exactly 15 minutes later we were officially ‘Water Rats’.
    The marina had allocated us a three-day mooring in the basin; this would give us time to unload the vehicles and generally get ourselves sorted out. Sam and I went to find it, accompanied by Mary from the office.
    Mary was an odd character. We had met her on all our previous visits and had never seen her smile; she was also terrifyingly and angrily efficient. I found myself treating her like a headmistress, nodding and smiling at her every instruction, trying hard not to upset her. Geoff had gone off with a very capable-looking man to bring Happy Go Lucky , our boat, our very own boat, around to meet us.
    Mary sat us down on a bench and pointed toward the gap in the basin from where we could expect Happy to appear, and then, spotting a