First, I opened the windows. The house smelt of polished furniture that has not been aired. Unlived-in. The woman who came twice a week had covered the sofa and armchairs in the sitting-room with dust sheets. She had arranged two piles of letters, one Jonathan’s, one mine, on the desk. She had left me a note on the kitchen table. I have taken the liberty of throwing away the piece of Stilton, it had gone mouldy. Dated two months ago. It was the first time I had been in the house for three months, and that was only to collect more clothes. There was nothing in the fridge. Only two tins of soup in the larder.
Next, I had a bath. It was a pale blue bath. The wallpaper had matching pale blue roses. Jonathan liked blue. All his pyjamas were blue, with white initials on the pockets. He kept his pyjama tops on while he shaved in the mornings, while I was in the bath, but he took great care never to wet the collar. He hummed while he shaved. He was rather good at humming. Never out of tune. One Christmas I had found some blue after-shave lotion for his stocking. There was still a little at the bottom of the bottle on the shelf above the basin. I would get a new bottle, later to-day.
I dried in a huge navy towel, then walked naked into the bedroom. I sat on the kidney-shaped chintz stool in front of my dressing-table. The chintz seat felt cold for a moment. Half a dozen snapshots were stuck under the glass of the dressing-table. I studied them, tracing my finger on the cold glass round their frames: there was Jonathan with his arm round me in some Swiss mountain restaurant, a ski-ing holiday, our faces made harshly black and white by the flash bulb. We had drunk a lot of gluwein that night, and danced, and laughed. Enjoyed ourselves. There was Jonathan in his mother’s rose garden, hands on hips, face screwed up against the sun; Jonathan sailing a small boat in Devon, slightly out of focus because of the choppy sea; Jonathan aged twelve, with smarmed-down choirboy hair, receiving a huge silver cup for swimming from a distinguished old woman in a velvet hat. There was one of me alone that Jonathan had taken with his Polaroid camera, a little faded. I sat on a rug in an indeterminate garden. I wore a cotton dress with a billowing skirt, and a cardigan. My hair was short and curled, and I smiled widely. It must have been a week or so after I first met Jonathan – perhaps the first weekend at his mother’s house. I remember laughing at something he was saying while he took the photograph. He hadn’t asked me to smile.
I looked at myself in the looking-glass. My face was much thinner, now. My hair much longer, straighter, straggly. It needed new highlights. There would be time, to-morrow. To-morrow in the morning. To-day I would shop, dust, clean, arrange roses. They would be expensive at this time of the year, but still. They were Jonathan’s favourite flowers. He would hate to come back and find the house dusty, untidy and without flowers. It would have been so much easier if we could have met somewhere, caught a plane and flown away. Anywhere. Anywhere so long as it avoided all these preparations. But Jonathan expected preparations.
He would expect me to be ready for him, neat, in his favourite dress, the ice out – the ice tongs. I mustn’t forget the ice tongs. Where were they? He would expect us to welcome each other home, and to forgive one another, and to make it all up over one gin and tonic. Or, knowing him, champagne. Well, we would. We would go on from there. I would heat up the veal escalopes cooked, as he had taught me, in cream sauce with brandy and mushrooms, and we would eat in the unused dining-room. Drink special wine. Candles. I must remember to get candles. By the end of dinner we would probably find ourselves laughing. In the past, it had always been easy to laugh together, in the end. If we could start laughing, if we could find something to laugh about, it would be all right. But which was his favourite dress?
I went to the cupboard. Everything hung limply. Thin, dim dresses they all seemed. Lifeless. They needed starch and ironing and air. They needed to be worn again. I took out a green dress covered with blue cornflowers. He liked that. I put it on. It was too long, drab. Side view, my bottom stuck out. My breasts sloped down and did something ugly to the front. I looked terrible. But perhaps with shoes, and a bra, and my hair done, to-morrow night, it wouldn’t be so bad.
I took off the dress and hung it outside the cupboard to remind myself it needed ironing. I put on a pair of jeans and a shirt, and went downstairs, barefoot. Sat at the neat desk, found a piece of paper, and began to make a shopping list. 2 grapefruit pt. double cream roses veal sugar tonic water frozen peas coffee matches – I could write with mechanical ease. I didn’t have to think. The words appeared on the paper by themselves. Hair lotion apricots soap candles I love you Jonathan Lyall I am your wife Clare Serena Lyall and this time it will be for ever more sempre toujours tomatoes salted peanuts and all the usual things like butter.
All afternoon I shopped.
By the time I arrived home again it was too late to go and see Mrs Fox. I would go on Wednesday, perhaps even take Jonathan. She would be missing Joshua, I thought.
I dumped my shopping bags on the kitchen table and began to put things away. Very slowly, very methodically. Then I re-arranged the shelf of cookery books so that they were in order of height. The kitchen seemed to be paler green.
When there was nothing left to do in the kitchen I went back to the sitting-room. There, I re-arranged two more shelves of books. Five other shelves were filled with leather-bound volumes all the same height. I began to replace them so that the titles were in alphabetical order. But halfway through it seemed pointless, and I stopped.
I lit a cigarette, sat at the desk. Pulled open one of the drawers. It was neat with bundles of letters. Jonathan’s writing, spidery and black. I pulled out one of the letters. It was written four years ago, from Manchester. He was up there seeing a man who had liked one of his plays.
My own darling, I read, It’s nice to be feeling as happy and as optimistic as I do at the moment about Screwball, but why does genius have to take one to God-forsaken places like Manchester? I miss you so much I can’t tell you. I think of you all day and wonder what you’re doing and I’m writing this because there’s still another two hours until I can decently telephone you again. If the play is put on you will come up all the time, even for rehearsals, won’t you? Just to say I love you, I love you, I love you, your silly old husband J.
In those days he rang me every few hours if ever we were forced to be apart, and wrote every day. I found the letter that told of Screwball’s fate.
After all that waiting about, wasted days away from you, the beastly Mr Lewis said I was on the right lines but he saw no hope of actually putting the thing on. I could have cried. I needed you to be there to love and comfort me. Oh my darling, do you mind my constant failures? You say you don’t, but I only half-believe you. I will stay till Monday when he says he will see me again – it just might be worthwhile. I do want to surprise you one day. Wait for me. The only thing I feel I’m good at is loving you. God knows what I’d do without you. Please don’t ever leave me, darling. All love as ever your adoring husband J. P.S. I’ve bought an electric mixer in a cut-price shop.
I wound up both clocks. Checked the telephone to see it was working. Smoked several more cigarettes. Put the roses, expensive scentless buds, into a bucket of water.
Upstairs, I began to unpack my case. Slowly, again. I came to the box with the star-sapphire ring. Tried it on. Not strong enough light to force the star. I put it in a drawer under a pile of scarves. Then I found two notes from Joshua – the only notes he had ever written me.
Joshua Heron crept out because he didn’t want to wake Funny Face. He doesn’t apologise for not washing up his coffee cup and will be back at six to take various people to a theatre if they would like that.
The second one was written on the back of a restaurant bill, three months old.
Joshua Heron came back hopefully at lunchtime but found no-one. Would F.F. please ring J.H. as soon as she gets back to make up his mind about buying a corduroy jacket the colour of best quality hay?
I tore them up, into very small pieces, and threw them away. After that, I couldn’t unpack any more. I left the rest of my clothes half in the case, half strewn about the floor. Then I went to bed. I had forgotten what a comfortable bed it was. At eight-thirty I turned out the light.
*
Four drum-majorettes skated across a huge rink towards me, holding up a striped canopy. Under the canopy, dressed in a dinner jacket, Jonathan skated in time with them. They stopped at the edge of the rink, in front of my seat. I rose, and moved the few paces towards them. As I did so, the huge audience, massed round the rink, began to applaud. Under the canopy I smiled at Jonathan and he gave me his hand. His fingers crackled and stung with ice. We began to skate away, looking for the exit to the wings. But it had disappeared. We skated round and round and the applause became louder. We kept passing Richard Storm, Mrs Fox and Joshua, sitting together in the front row. They had their arms intertwined, like people about to sing ‘Auld Lang Syne’. They were laughing and laughing.
*
I woke at nine-thirty. I drew back the curtains and a cold grey light revealed the extent of the confusion on the floor: books, clothes, a pair of gum-boots still muddy from Norfolk. I would clear it all up, slowly, later. There were nine and a half hours to go.
I lay in the bath for a long time. After a while I thought I heard the creak of footsteps on the stairs. I listened again. Silence. Then a soft knock on the half-open door.
‘May I come in?’
Ridiculously, I answered: ‘Yes – who is it?’
Jonathan opened the door.
I stood up so fast the water swayed over the edge of the bath and onto the floor. It streamed down my stomach and thighs, and I felt myself crossing my arms over my breasts.
‘Darling! Wait a minute. Here’s a towel.’ He held it in front of himself like a shield, and came towards me. We kissed, lightly, the towel still between us. Then I put my wet arms round his neck.
‘Jonathan,’ I said.
‘Hurry up and get dry.’ He seemed to stiffen a little, and moved away from me. I took the towel from him and stretched up to flip it over my shoulders. In the few seconds that I was naked to him his eyes flashed up and down my body. ‘Heaven’s, you’re thin,’ he said.
‘So are you.’ His hair, as well as his face, seemed thinner. I climbed out of the bath, sat on the edge, and began to dry. ‘I thought you weren’t coming till to-night,’ I said. ‘I’m afraid nothing’s ready. It would have been, by to-night.’
‘Well, there didn’t seem much point in hanging around for another day, doing nothing, knowing you were back.’ He sat on the lavatory, hitching up both legs of his trousers as he did so. It was a new suit, trim grey flannel. He fiddled with his navy silk tie. ‘Do you mind?’
‘Of course not. I’m just sorry I haven’t got the house organised.’
‘That doesn’t seem very important.’
I raised my eyebrows.
‘You look very brown,’ I said, ‘very well.’
‘I am. I’ve had so much sun that I actually turned from lobster to brown. I bet you never imagined the day when that would happen.’ He laughed and I smiled. He had a nice face.
‘No,’ I said. He folded his arms, leant back against the cistern and looked at me.
‘I’m all right, too.’
‘It’s been a funny old six months.’
‘Yes.’ I was dry. ‘I’m just going to put on some clothes. I won’t be a moment.’ He followed me into the bedroom.
‘I’ll go down and put on some coffee.’
‘That’s a good idea.’ When he had gone I quickly made the bed. He might not want to wait until to-night.
By the time I went downstairs Jonathan was in the sitting-room, a tray of coffee set on the low table in front of the sofa. He had found the best cups, the ones I used when his mother came to tea. Suddenly I realised I was hungry and thirsty.
‘How lovely,’ I said. I sat beside him on the sofa. The chintz cushion crackled beneath me. ‘Where’s your luggage?’
‘Still in the car.’ He smelt of unfamiliar after-shave. Too sweet. He poured the coffee and hot milk, put in the sugar and stirred mine as well as his own.
‘Well, well,’ he said. ‘Six months to the day. I heard from David you were well and happy.’
‘I heard the same about you.’
‘I think he quite enjoyed his self-appointed role of keeping us in touch. He doesn’t change, David.’
‘No, he doesn’t.’
‘He doesn’t change.’ He sat hunched up on the edge of the sofa, his knees wide apart, his hands clasped between them. ‘Well, it’s strange to be back.’ He looked down at my hands. ‘Where did you get that ring?’
‘It belonged to Mrs Fox.’
‘Who’s she?’
I paused for a moment.
‘Mrs Fox is an old woman I met. A friend. You must meet her.’ I fingered the ring, imitating her gestures, the gestures I knew so well. Then: ‘It’s nice to have you back,’ I said.
He turned to me, smiling.
‘Look darling, you don’t have to pretend. After these six months, we might as well be honest with one another.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You know perfectly well what I mean.’ He put a soft hand on my knee. ‘Let me tell you something, Soo. Let me try to tell you something. That is: it’s all right. You needn’t worry any more. You needn’t feel guilty any more, you know. I know what your decision is, and I want you to understand and believe me. I don’t mind. I really don’t, this time. No pretending. So long as you are happy, I’m happy for you. I mean that.’
‘But darling, you’ve got it all wrong.’ I put my hand on his. ‘About my decision, I mean. What on earth made you think I wouldn’t want you back? Why did you think I wouldn’t want to come back to you?’
‘I just assumed, from your behaviour before we parted. I hoped for a while you might change your mind. Then I heard you were happy with Joshua Heron. So I gave up hoping.’ A long silence. Then:
‘In that case, I’ve got a surprise for you,’ I said.
‘Oh?’
‘It’s all over with Joshua. There wasn’t really any question of – anything permanent. He’s gone to Mexico. I told him I was going back to you, and he was pleased.’
‘You mean? – You want us to stay married? Is that what you mean?’
‘Of course.’ A look of something like fear crossed his face. He patted at his soft, sandy hair with a hand that shook a little, then bent his head and pressed his eyes into his palms.
‘Oh Christ, my love,’ he said quietly. ‘Oh Christ, what a mess. What a bloody awful mess.’
‘Why?’
‘Why? Because it was true what I said earlier. Absolutely true. About my not minding about your not wanting me any more. You see, the thing is, I’m fixed up elsewhere, as it were.’
‘You mean–?’
‘I’ve found somebody else.’ He sat up then and took both my hands. Lowered his eyes. His eyelashes had gone very blond in the sun. ‘I’m sorry, Soo.’
‘Somebody else?’ I said.
‘Somebody else.’
‘I see.’ I tried to draw my hands away but he held them firmly.
‘Don’t run away from me.’ I flopped back in the sofa. He let go of one hand to stroke my hair. ‘I thought you’d be so pleased. I thought you’d be delighted when I told you I had booked an appointment with my solicitor this afternoon, and we would get divorced as soon as possible, and you could go back to Joshua. But what an irony of timing. What a cruel irony.’
‘You want to marry her, then?’ I asked.
‘That’s the plan.’
‘Is she Italian?’
‘No. She just lives in Rome. I think you met her once, actually. She says she remembers you, at a party you apparently went to with David. She’s called Rose Maclaine.’
‘The American? But I thought she and David–?’
‘They did. A rather one-sided little affair. David was dotty about her. But she never pretended the feeling was mutual.’
‘Then he introduced her to you?’
‘Then he introduced her to me. And that was that. Very awkward for David and me, being such old friends, as you can imagine.’
‘I imagine.’
‘Still, it seems to be all right now. He’s forgiven me. I took him out to dinner last night and he drank our health and said he hoped we would be happy.’
I smiled.
‘Last week he rang me to say he hoped we would be happy.’
‘He changes.’ Pause. ‘Oh Christ, Soo. What a mess. What are we going to do?’
‘What do you want to do?’
‘Don’t sound like that. Here, let me kiss you. You’re shaking.’
I let him kiss me. He kissed me on the eyes and the cheeks. Then he ran the hard point of his tongue round my closed lips, trying to make me smile. A trick he hadn’t practised since before we married. But I didn’t smile and he soon gave up.
‘I can’t very well fall out of love with Rosie and come back to you just because – ’
‘Of course not.’
‘So what shall we do?’
‘You had better go ahead with your plans.’
‘How would you feel about that? I thought you were in love with Joshua, anyway? So it wouldn’t matter to you very much, would it? I’m sure he’d have you back.’
‘Don’t worry about me.’
‘Don’t be silly, Soo. I do worry about you. I still care about you, you fool. It’s just that living with Rosie did the trick. It made me see all the things that were missing in our marriage. It made me realise that I was looking for something in you that didn’t exist, and making do with all the things you thought I minded about. And it also dawned on me that I was absolutely the wrong man for you. I drove you mad, remember? I don’t wonder, really, when I think back on it.’
‘You’ve got it all nicely worked out.’
‘Oh, my love. Forgive me.’
‘There’s nothing to forgive. Does Rosie make you happy?’
‘Very. She’s a marvellous girl. So – organised.’ He looked suddenly hopeful. ‘Do you think we could all be friends?’
‘I expect we probably could.’
‘Are you going to make a fight for me? Try to get me back?’
‘I don’t see any point, if you want to go.’
‘Quite.’ He smiled again. ‘The trouble with you, darling, is that you’re so bloody reasonable you’d drive any man to despair. Let me give you one bit of advice. If ever you fall in love with anyone again, be unreasonable.’ He stood up and hitched up his trousers. ‘You’ve taken so much trouble. Those lovely roses, and I saw there was veal in the fridge. It could have been a marvellous homecoming.’
‘Don’t put off your solicitor,’ I said. ‘And you might recommend one to me.’
‘Are you sure? I’m sorry, darling.’ He paused. ‘As a matter of a fact, what I had planned to do was to fly back to Rome to-night and settle a few things over there, then come back again next week. But I could go later.’
‘No. Go to-night. You might as well.’ I stood up and picked up the tray. He took it from me. ‘How’s the writing?’ I asked.
‘Going rather well, actually. I’m working on a little play called Back to Front. Rosie’s keen to play the lead, so we’re going to try to organise that. I showed part of it to David, and he’s really enthusiastic. He says he knows a new young manager who might like it.’ He smiled wryly. ‘So nothing’s changed.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘I hope it gets put on.’
We went into the kitchen. A light rain sprayed against the window.
‘Bloody English weather,’ said Jonathan. ‘It looks nice in here, though, darling. I always thought this kitchen was my pièce de resistance, didn’t I?’
‘Yes.’
‘You can keep the house if you like. I mean, I don’t want any of my money back.’
‘You’re very generous. Thank you.’
‘And you can cite Rosie, of course.’
‘All right, if that’s easiest.’
‘But we could talk about all those sort of arrangements when I get back next week. I don’t really feel much like going into them now. I mean, I’m bloody happy and all that, I really am. But it’s always nasty, having to make the actual break.’
‘Quite.’ He came and stood very near me. There was a long thin scratch on his chin where he had cut himself shaving. It was covered by a delicate scab of barely dried blood.
‘You must think I’m a terrible shit,’ he said.
‘Oh no. It was my fault just as much as yours. More, probably.’
‘But I don’t think, feeling like I do about Rosie, and you feeling like I suppose you do about Joshua, that there’s any point in our trying to make a go of it any more, do you?’
‘Absolutely not.’
‘Besides, six months apart kills a lot of things.’ He kissed me on the cheek again. ‘Oh darling. What a confounded mess. I think I’m going to cry.’
‘Don’t do that.’
‘Well, there’s not much point in my hanging around any more, is there? It’ll only upset both of us. I’ll call you next week.’
‘I’ll be here.’
‘Will you be all right?’
‘Of course.’
‘I don’t think you really mind.’ He took the clean white handkerchief from his breast pocket and blew his nose very loudly. ‘What fools we are.’ We went to the front door. ‘You must put on some weight,’ he said. ‘You’re too thin.’
Outside, his old blue Vauxhall was covered with a million drops of rain that weren’t heavy enough to run down. A leopard printed scarf lay on the back seat.
‘Bloody English weather,’ Jonathan said again. ‘Always the same in this country.’ He squeezed my hand. ‘Well, darling, I’ll be off, then.’
‘See you next week.’ We kissed each other on the cheek once more.
‘I was so convinced you wouldn’t want me. Funny how wrong you can be, even about someone you’ve been married to for six years.’
‘Go on,’ I said, ‘I’m getting wet.’
He got into the car and started the engine. Its muffled rumble was horribly familiar. Jonathan’s thumbs met at the top of the steering wheel. He had often said he thought it was the most comfortable way to drive. He raised one hand to wave. I waved back. The car drew slowly away. Puddles spluttered beneath the wheels for a moment, then were still again. I shut the front door.
*
It was definitely cold in the sitting-room now. I sat on the sofa again and wondered how to get warm. I had forgotten to ask Jonathan to turn on the central heating.
I blew on my hands. The crayon drawing of Richard Storm smiled down at me. Later, I would take it down. Jonathan smiled from a silver frame, too. It was his favourite picture of himself, taken when he was in the Coldstream Guards by a Bond Street photographer who had touched up his pale eyebrows. I would take that down as well.
I thought how I had felt quite proud when Jonathan had walked into the bathroom this morning. He had looked so agreeable. I was pleased he was back.
I wondered what to do with the veal and the roses.
I listened to the clocks ticking, sometimes together, sometimes one just a little ahead of the other.
I don’t know how long I sat there.
But after a while I went to the kitchen and turned on the cold tap. The water pattered on to the zinc bottom of the sink, louder as I turned the tap faster. I held my hands so that the fingers drooped under the cascade of water. It was so cold, they soon felt quite numb. I turned the tap off with the palm of my hand.
A walk, I thought. If I walked fast I would get warm.
I put on my mackintosh and left the house, slamming the door behind me.
It was raining harder now. I walked carelessly, not bothering to avoid the puddles, so that water splashed up my legs. Soon my hair was soaked and drips kept on running into my eyes.
It took about half an hour to get to Mrs Fox. Surprisingly, the downstairs front door was ajar. I pushed it open and went in. The landlady was coming downstairs, her huge slack breasts rolling about under a pink jersey.
‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said. ‘Another of her friends.’ She slapped the banisters with a fat hand and heaved herself down the last few steps.
‘Is she in?’ I asked.
‘No dear, she’s out. Out for good. Didn’t you know?’
‘Know what?’
‘Oh, I see. You didn’t know.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Mrs Fox passed away Sunday night, they reckon.’
‘She’s dead?’ I said. The landlady’s eyes hardened with power.
‘Dead as a doornail, dear. Heart attack. She might have been there for days if yours truly hadn’t noticed her milk still outside her door yesterday dinner time. She always took her milk in, regular. So I thought, I thought to myself: my, something funny’s up. I banged on the door, noisy as you like, but not a cheep. So I phoned the police. They come up, of course, and break the lock. They found her on the bed. Hat still on and all.’
I leant against the wall. A bit of plaster crumbled behind my shoulder and fell to the stone floor. The landlady’s face erupted into a huge sun of crumbling white flesh that sprouted from the grey stone stairs rising behind her.
‘They took her away, ambulance men, not long after. They asked me if I knew any of her relations. Course, I couldn’t help them.’
‘Where did they take her to?’
‘Blow me if I didn’t ask. Fulham, I should imagine. The hospital.’ More plaster broke and fell away from the wall behind my shoulder. ‘Careful,’ she said, ‘that wall’s coming down.’
‘So it is,’ I said. The landlady opened the front door. She looked at the rain, diminished to a drizzle now.
‘Ooh, it isn’t half coming down cats and dogs, isn’t it? Well, I must be getting back to work. See that other man shuts the door behind him when he leaves, will you? You know what men are.’
‘What man?’
‘There’s another of her friends upstairs. Don’t know for the life of me what he expects to find, poking about up there. The door’s locked, but he asked me to leave him on his own – I don’t know.’
She went out, shutting the front door. I went to the well of the staircase, held on to the banisters and looked up at the regular flights of stairs. Quietly, a man was coming down from the top, his footfall clacking gently on the stone. As he came nearer I saw that it was Cedric Plummer. The man from the R.S.P.C.A.
‘Hello,’ he said, as he saw me.
‘Hello.’
He came down the last flight, leaning heavily on the banisters. He wasn’t wearing his uniform, but the dark suit and plum tie he had worn at Mrs Fox’s party.
When he reached the bottom he stopped beside me. We stood looking at each other in the dim light of the drab hallway. There were rims of yellow crust at the roots of his eyelashes. The eyelids themselves were red and puffy.
‘The landlady told me she was dead,’ I said.
Mr Plummer shrugged his shoulders, unclenched his hands, and held them up like two heavy white flags.
‘Who could conceive such sadness?’ he replied. ‘Who could conceive such sadness?’ He moved away from me, towards the front door. ‘I’d just come up to take her home to us for the day. She had always wanted to see Epsom. Nancy had baked her special sponge cake, and we had the place all looking spick and span.’ He paused. ‘She always said she wanted to see Epsom, Mrs Fox did, you know.’ He paused again. ‘To think, she never saw it.’
He turned his face quickly from me, pulled the door open, and went down the steps.
Alone in the hall I listened to the silence. For the first time, no music came from the top floor. The Japanese mobile that hung from the naked light bulb swung a little in the draught, faintly patterning the dingy walls.
It was cold and damp. Rain from my wet hair ran down the inside of my mackintosh collar.
I went on holding the clammy banisters, until a moment of dizziness passed, and then I followed Mr Plummer through the front door.
Outside, the rain had almost stopped. The sky was brightening. I began to run in the direction of Fulham. Somehow, I had to find a brass band.