Why is she strutting like that? Class 43, Bridgecastle Show...

HERMIONE is cock of the walk (if that is the appropriate expression in reference to a lady) at the moment. And rightly so goddammit. Is she walking tall because she won at rummy last night? Is she lording it because she has been promoted at work? Is she wearing that ghastly self-satisfied smirk on her face because she had the winner in the 2.40 at Bellewstown? No. No. And thrice No! Rather Hermione is behaving like the cat that got the cream on account of her performance at the Bridgecastle Show, the annual local highlight of the horticultural and domestic year. Never mind that I starred, or at least performed creditably, in the vegetable classes. Never mind that her chocolate cupcakes did not appeal to the adjudicator, left languishing among the also-rans while the red rosette went to an enterprising rival who topped her buns with maraschino cherries. Never mind that young Persephone caused a stir in the photographic section with a selfie of herself kissing The Pooch on the nose.

The mistress of Medders Manor has assumed this air of smug superiority all on account of Class 43. I fear it may be quite some time before the ugly mask of triumph is wiped from her normally innocent and lovely expression because Class 43 is where husband meets wife. On this occasion husband was bested by wife and now I find myself being reminded of the outcome in Class 43 just about every second of the waking day. Goddammit again.

We take the Bridgecastle Show seriously in our house. It’s an opportunity to exhibit the fruits of many months’ labours. And not only the fruits but also the veg, the art, the baking and the preserves.

My own contenders tend to be in the marrow categories. I have discovered that any eejit with a bottle of plant food and a grow-bag can produce marrows. The trick lies in forgetting to cut the fruits when they are young and tender at the stage when they may be passed off as courgettes. Forgetting is my strong suit.

People are happy enough to eat courgettes. But the grower who turns his back on the courge tte plant may return to the greenhouse to find his courgettes have ballooned out to become hulking great marrows best admired rather than consumed.

I have a nice savoury recipe for marrows stuffed with mince but the children would rather eat cow pats. It is reportedly possible to make marrow jam but I have never actually met anyone who admits having tasted the stuff. Marrows are for display – not for dinner.

The drill as always at the Bridgecastle Show this year was that competitors turned up at the hall early in the morning with their jars of honey, their flower arrangements and their water-colours of the sun rising over Collybanagher Strand. Whatever.

Struggling under the weight of my hefty specimens, I made my way to a trestle table already groaning under the load of marrows, each one more pumped up than the last, and laid out my contenders. Hermione, meanwhile, was putting the best side to the fore of her collection of fresh herbs and administering a final dusting of icing sugar to her jam sponge.

We met up again at Class 43 as we plonked our respective jars of marmalade down in the allotted space. Hers light in colour. Mine richly dark. Her fruit peel finely minced in a food processor. Mine laboriously hand cut to achieve a chunky effect. Hers made from a recipe found online. Mine a version of the marmalade my mother used to make. Not a word was spoken as our eyes met over the assembled preserves. Not a word was needed.

Suffice it to report that the adjudicator at the Bridgecastle Show is not the dark and chunky type. Goddammit.