22

Babar, Apollo, Contrition

That evening, although it was meant to be his evening off, James insisted on taking care of the boys, corralling them into their bath and then reading them their bedtime story – not only one, but two Babar books. There were tears from Rognvald when the old king of the elephants ate a poisonous mushroom and succumbed – tears that proved infectious, as Tobermory and Fergus soon joined in. This led to a prolonged discussion about mushrooms, death, and the role of prime ministers in a constitutional monarchy, which James assumed was the prevailing governmental system in de Brunhoff’s Land of the Elephants. The story, with interruptions and questions, lasted a long time.

The help provided by James allowed Elspeth to go to bed at seven – at Matthew’s insistence – and, with the aid of the drugs provided by the hospital, to fall asleep by eight. Matthew brought her dinner in bed – vegetable consommé, fortified with a drop of sherry, and scrambled eggs on Marmite toast – fare that he thought ideal for one only just discharged from hospital and advised by the doctor to take things easy for a few days.

“You really must rest,” he said, as he placed the tray on her bedside table.

Elspeth smiled weakly. “I will. I promise.” And thought: what right have I to promise anything, who went off this morning and did the very opposite of what he imagined I had promised not to do? Although I did not actually promise: I never said that I would not try to find out what Iain knew about Bob. I never actually said I would not, and if Matthew interpreted my silence as acquiescence, then that’s not my fault: you are under no moral obligation to correct the misapprehension of others, even of your husband. She closed her eyes, and tried to remember the name they gave that sort of reasoning. Casuistry? Sophistry? Were they much the same thing? Did the classification of a wrong make any difference?

Matthew sat on the side of the bed while she ate her dinner. The consommé was improved by the sherry and when she had finished it she went on to the scrambled eggs. Matthew had chopped up pieces of smoked salmon and mixed them in with the egg.

“I know how much you like Marmite,” he said. “I hope that that’s all right.”

“It’s perfect,” she said. “The comfort food par excellence. Eggs and Marmite are naturally complementary flavours.”

“Americans don’t like Marmite,” he said. “Canadians too, in spite of being a parliamentary democracy. Like Plato’s prisoners in the cave, they don’t know what they’re missing. It’s hard to believe, but they think it’s disgusting – I was at uni with a guy from Connecticut who said that he thought that Marmite was grease when he first saw a bottle of it. He put some on his bicycle chain.”

Elspeth began to laugh, and immediately winced from the pain. “Don’t make me laugh,” she said. “It hurts.”

He leaned forward and placed an apologetic kiss on her brow. “I won’t say anything more about Marmite,” he said. “Nor Vegemite – the Australian version. I quite like Vegemite, but I still prefer Marmite.”

“It’s what you’re brought up with,” said Elspeth. “A lot of things we like because we’ve been brought up to like them.”

“No choice, then?”

“Some, but not as much as we’d like to think.”

“Oh, well. I remember being told at school that Poussin’s paintings were cold. We had an art teacher who said that, and I wrote it down in my art notebook. Poussin – cold painter. I accepted his judgement. And then, a lot later, I was in London and I went to the Wallace Collection. I saw A Dance to the Music of Time, and I stood there and fell in love with it.” He smiled. “Really in love. Like I’m in love with you.”

She caught her breath. “That painting…” she began.

“It has those figures dancing in a circle and then, up in the clouds, there’s Apollo in his chariot – in the clouds. Apollo is all golden.”

She closed her eyes. Like I’m in love with you…And I’ve lied to him.

“Apollo is one of my favourite gods,” Matthew went on. “Have you got a favourite?”

Elspeth opened her eyes again. She stared at her plate, with its traces of scrambled egg round the rim. “Diana, I suppose.”

“Good choice.” He smiled again. “Actually, that’s a pathetic thing to say: good choice. I sound like a waiter in a restaurant who says Good choice after you choose the sea bream.”

“But sea bream is a good choice.” Anything – even sea bream – was a welcome diversion from the guilt she felt.

“Apollo’s terrific,” Matthew went on. “You know, I’ve just read a poem about him. Angus wrote it. Could I read it to you?”

She nodded. She did not want to talk too much, because it hurt her, and if Matthew wanted to read poetry to her, she would be happy to listen. He sometimes did that, and she enjoyed it.

He left the room and returned with a piece of paper. “Listen,” he began. “ ‘Apollo’.” He began to read:

Glittering Apollo, usually depicted

In complimentary terms, capable with his lyre

Of charming leopards, quieting tigers,

Subduing angry seas, encouraging Poseidon

To forget about the ships he planned to sink;

A hypnotist, perhaps, who preceded

The discovery of hypnosis and its tricks

By several millennia, or more;

He, that same Apollo, of impeccable taste,

Welcome in any cultivated salon

Still thought each day of Hyacinth,

Felled him with his discus, accidentally,

Wept bitter, inconsolable tears,

Cried buckets for his innocent friend,

As Achilles later wept on that desolate beach

For the loss of Patroclus; scholars

Sought to sanitise and make safe this loss,

Argued friendship and love were different things,

In classical times at least: so patently untrue,

Identified as such even by the innocent,

Who know what’s what, and always have.

Matthew lowered the book. “It was a terrible accident. The wind blew his discus off course and it killed Hyacinth. Apollo felt terrible. That’s why Angus says he wept…”

“Cried buckets,” interjected Elspeth. “There’s something very moving about that expression: crying buckets.”

Matthew agreed. “It’s heartfelt. You only cry buckets if you mean it. Real tears.”

He looked at Elspeth fondly. He thought she looked tired. He leaned forward and kissed her again. “I should let you get some sleep.”

She felt drowsy. She would tell him tomorrow morning, she decided. She would say, I’m really, really sorry. I wasn’t thinking. She would tell him how much she loved him and how she would never again hide anything from him, or engage in sophistry, for that matter.

There were so many words that would have to be uttered; words that would be like flowers sent in apology, filling the room with the scent of contrition.