Page 105 of The House of Hopes and Dreams
I didn’t go into the studio after that, but instead put on my cheering coat of many colours and set off for the workshop. I asked Fang if he’d like to come with me, but he was still curled in his basket by the stove and only opened his eyes long enough to give me an ‘At this time of the morning – you can’t be serious?’ look before firmly closing them again.
I’d remembered that the workshop needed to be cleaned and ready, because Grant and Ivan were coming over after lunch with their long ladders to remove the Lady Anne window and bring it down. I wanted everything straight and workmanlike for them … much as I intended my relationship with Carey to be from then on.
Firmly back on the old footing.
When I got there I found there wasn’t too much to do, since most of the debris had been taken up to the house last night. I wiped down the plastic tablecloths and folded them up when they were dry, rounded up a few missed empty paper cups and plates and swept and mopped thefloors. Then I only needed to take down the fairy lights and it was as if last night’s party was but a slightly bizarre dream.
By then, a bright, wintry sunlight was pouring into the room, lightening my mood and making me count my blessings: here I was in my own workshop and living in a lovely house with my very best friend. How lucky was I?
And if things changed … well, I had yet to explore the chauffeur’s flat over one of the stables, but whatever state it was in, I was sure it could be updated so I’d be able to move there when Carey found someone else to share Mossby with.
Lunch up at the house was a scratch meal of the last of the party leftovers and lots of coffee to wake Carey, Nick and the gang up: they’d stayed up late in the old wing, waiting for an apparition that never appeared, while telling each other ghost stories so they jumped at every creak the old house made.
But they quickly revived and were ready to film the Lady Anne window being removed, once Grant and Ivan had arrived.
I was on tenterhooks watching as they carefully removed the three panels of the tall, narrow window and laid them on a board, even though putting in and taking out leaded lights was something they were well used to. Grant had previously measured the window opening and brought a sheet of plain glass to keep out the weather, until the old window was reinstalled.
While they had the ladders up, Grant checked the tie bars, wires and mortar on the side windows, too, some of which were loose.
‘But they don’t look too bad at all. I think someone’s been up here and done a few repairs at some point. And the condition of the glass is surprisingly good, given the age.’
‘I expect the way the hill rises behind this wing protects it from the elements a bit. These panels certainly don’t look as if they’ve been exposed to the elements since the seventeenth century,’ I said, anxiously hovering over my treasures. ‘Well, apart from the hole the bird made.’
‘At least that’s in the small triangular top panel, so there’s just that one to repair,’ Grant said. ‘And now you’ve got the original cartoon, it should be a doddle.’
I wasn’t entirely sure ‘doddle’ was the right word when it came to repairing priceless old windows, but I’d have to do my best. Carey helped me to transport it down to the workshop in the back of his estate car, leaving Ivan and Grant to finish glazing the empty window.
Once the three precious panels had been transferred to a glazing table, I quite forgot I had an audience of Carey and the film crew and I took a rubbing of it to show the position of the leading. Then I propped each panel carefully against the clear plate glass on the easels over the studio windows and stood back to study them.
‘Everything’s watertight and shipshape up at the house, Angel,’ Grant’s voice announced, breaking into my reverie.
‘Oh … are you back?’ I said, turning round to find not only Ivan and Grant, but the film crew lined up watching me. ‘Thank you both for doing that.’
‘It was nowt,’ said Ivan. ‘Shall I make us all a cup of tea?’
‘That would be lovely, thank you. I don’t know where Carey’s got to.’
‘I think he went through the back room into his workshop,’ Nelson said. ‘I’ll give him a shout when the tea’s up.’
‘What exactly are you going to do with the window?’ asked Nick.
‘As little as possible. I only want to repair it, conserving what’s left and I have no intention of doing anything that can’t be undone later. An expert in glass restoration is coming over tomorrow to have a look at it and perhaps give me some advice – and by the way, I emailed and checked with her if she’d be happy to appear in the documentary and she said no, so you can’t film in here tomorrow.’
Nick looked resigned. ‘Oh well, maybe we’ll do a bit more in the old wing instead – that priest-hole in the Great Hall, for a start.’
‘This window’s not in poor shape at all, considering,’ Grant said, having a closer look at the panels on the easel. ‘But you might as well re-lead all of it while we’ve got it down.’
‘Yes, I suppose so,’ I said. Taking an old window apart isn’t always the easiest of tasks. Sometimes you’re in luck and the lead and cement simply gently peel apart from the glass, or the cement has turned to dust and crumbles easily away. But occasionally it’s solidly accretedon and then you have to painstakingly remove it with a sharp blade, without damaging the glass.
I hoped this would be an easier one.
Over the tea, Carey promised to do his best to record the various stages of the repairs when the crew were not there, on the camera Jorge had loaned him. His filming had been a bit hit and miss so far, since when he’s flown with enthusiasm for something he entirely forgets to record it.
Grant and Ivan went home after the tea, but I have no idea where the others got to. I went up to the house to make an exact black and white copy of the Lady Anne cartoon to take down to the workshop and saw no one.
It was strange that the bird that’d broken the window appeared to have burst right through that strangely spiky sun, as if it had aimed for it.
Perhaps it had.
