In early October Jude Davis said to Godfrey: ‘ Spencer’s out on the 10th, the X-rays show a splintered bone. Think you’d like to tackle Vic Miller?’
‘I’ll tackle anyone,’ said Godfrey. ‘Give me half a chance.’
‘I’m putting you in, then.’
Godfrey knew all about it. A welter-weight title fight at the Albert Hall. Nobody cared much who featured on the undercard: you drew the crowd in for the big fight, and the rest was any old thing you could scrape together. But it was the Albert Hall, and even if half the spectators had not yet come, because the big fight wasn’t due until nine, or had already left, because the big fight was over, you still boxed before several thousand people, with a few of the Press at their tables, and if you put up a good show it was worth a lot publicity-wise. Miller he’d never seen; he was from Dundee and had only turned pro about a year, but they all said he was a rising man and he was managed by Karl English, who had one of the best stables in the business.
That night he wrote a short letter to Pearl: ‘I’m fighting at the Albert Hall Thursday the tenth. Thanks to you. A title bill. I’m in the groove. Regards. Little God.’ He walked over and pushed it under her door.
Pearl showed the letter to Wilfred. ‘It was addressed to you but I opened it by mistake. Awfully sorry, dear.’
Wilfred stared at the note. ‘ Little God. I wonder if he thinks he is, with those striking looks and that small physique. Strange young man.’
‘I think he’s got a crush on you,’ she said. ‘ Shall we go?’
‘Where?’
‘To watch the boxing. The Albert Hall is nice and easy to get to.’
‘It’s a Thursday, I can’t. My bridge night. And anyway seats at boxing matches are very expensive.’
‘I thought you’d never been.’
‘Nor have I. But one gets to know prices.’
‘Sometime I’d like to go. Just for the novelty.’
‘Sometime you shall, my dear. There’ll be other opportunities.’
The next morning, mindful of Wilfred’s exhortation not to take taxis, Pearl walked to the top of Sloane Street and took a bus to the Albert Hall. When she had bought her ticket she put it deep in her handbag where it would not be pulled out by mistake.
Since his marriage Wilfred had given the occasional dinner at home – the Portugals had been twice, the Hones once and the Warners twice – but had refrained from asking people to bridge. But this evening he had told Pearl he was bringing three of his club friends back with him. Pearl had not met any of the three men before; one was a County Court judge, one was an antique dealer of great repute, one was the editor of a literary weekly. They were all scrupulously polite to her, their manners had been long groomed in unobtrusive courtesy. She liked them all. The youngest was sixty.
She watched the bridge for a time and noticed how the game affected Wilfred. It brought out the aggressiveness of his nature: this was the sort of combat he enjoyed, an intellectual battle which released his adrenalin and while there was no physical risk to carry it beyond the limits of enjoyment, there was a small financial risk which added to the agonies of failure and the zest of victory. Perhaps these qualities made him a good lawyer.
When she went out to get coffee and sandwiches she heard his voice above the others; it was the voice he would use to gain attention in restaurants, to put a case in the lower courts, to silence a group if he wanted to recount an anecdote. During supper the three men were again beautifully deferential towards her, but she wondered if they would be so kind when discussing her among themselves.
After supper she cleared away and washed up, then slipped upstairs to bed. But she did not sleep and heard them leave about 1.30.
The next morning at breakfast she said: ‘You never told me you’d been in the army.’
‘What?’ He looked up from his Times, his lip damp and discoloured with coffee. ‘Oh, yes. Didn’t I? I think I did. What makes you ask?’
‘Judge Snow last night said something about you being in the Western Desert.’
‘Oh, yes. It is not a period of my life I look back upon with pleasure.’
‘I didn’t know you were old enough.’
He blinked uneasily. ‘I was just. It interrupted my university career. I told you.’
‘Tell me about it again sometime. It’s a bit hard …
‘What?’
She was going to say she found it hard to imagine him with a trim figure and a youthful step undergoing the hardships of a campaign. ‘It’s a bit hard to think what the war was really like. I – wasn’t born, you know.’
‘I do know. Well, even for me, my dear, it seems to belong to another age, as if I were not born and it all happened to somebody else.’
‘But you weren’t in the fighting, were you?’
‘I was in a non-combatant unit – the Pay Corps. But the war in the desert was so fluid that distinctions of that kind did not always work out. I was in considerable danger at times. And of course the hardships were endless. Have you more toast?’
‘I’ll get some. But there’s Ryvita.’
He grunted and looked at his watch. ‘Don’t bother, then. I’ll make do.’
Godfrey neglected his Flora for the week before the fight, as she predicted he would have to. Although he had kept in training of a sort all summer, he needed to be tightened up for a fight that, whatever the bored audience thought, might be a turning point in his career. Jude Davis’s trainer was Pat Prince – an ex-middleweight of fifty-odd, with scar tissue sewn into the bags under his eyes, and a throaty voice. Godfrey despised him at first, but when it came to ring craft you had to hand it to him that he knew his job, and he put Little God fairly through his paces during the last week. He confided to Godfrey that if he had had his way Godfrey wouldn’t have been in a single fight for the first six months while he unlearned his bad habits, but Davis had overruled him and said the boy needed extending and could learn while he fought. Godfrey was all with Davis in this.
He met his opponent for the first time at the weigh-in at the Dominion Theatre at midday on the day of the fight. Miller, a dour tough Scot, was making his first appearance in London and therefore was more dour than ever. In the evening they were told they would have to appear just before or just after the main bout, depending how the preliminaries ran. But in fact the preliminaries went their full time so it was after. Godfrey cursed his luck. More people are there just before: just after they all go out to the lavatories or the bars. He sat in the long shabby changing room with its dreary unshaded bulb and its endless shelves to contain the belongings of the orchestras and massed choirs of other evenings, and he listened to the sustained roar: one of the title fighters was Welsh and the hall was full of half drunken Welshmen singing and shouting at the top of their voices. And the top of a Welsh voice is very loud indeed. The coloured heavy-weight, Tom Bushey, who was one of Davis’s coming boys, had just won on points, but he said to Godfrey that he had hardly been able to think how to box, the row had been so great. The audience wanted the main bout, and screamed incessantly and deafeningly for it.
Godfrey would have liked to see the title fight, but they weren’t allowed out of the dressing rooms. If there was a sudden and unsatisfactory end they would be thrust on immediately to help divert the crowd from their frustration.
So he waited around talking to Pat Prince, hands ready bandaged and taped, gloves hanging from a convenient nail to be slipped on at the last moment, gum shield, Vaseline and towel on a ledge, green and white towelling coat over his shoulders with Little God stamped on the back. The din outside grew worse and worse. Jude Davis had been in the dressing room beforehand, but like nearly everyone else he had crowded out to watch the big fight.
‘Nervous, kid?’ asked Pat Prince, stopping his endless almost silent whistling to let out the two words.
‘No more than usual. I know I’m good. That’s all I care.
‘Well, take care you keep your temper. I saw you sparring last week when Nevil fetched you a nasty little upper-cut.’ He started whistling a tune out of Oklahoma.
‘Nevil’s a big head. One of these days he’ll get it cracked open.’
‘Well, I’m only telling you. Better now than after.’
Just then the screaming suddenly broke in a new wave and carried on. Bushey said: ‘Sounds as if someone’s got it! And it isn’t Evan Morgan!’
After a few more moments of pandemonium a trainer came pushing in. ‘ Referee stopped fight! Lopez got a cut eye. Morgan’s got the title!’
‘Shouldn’t never have been stopped! Lopez was only cut on the eyebrow!’
‘Lucky it was that way round! Welshmen’d’ve wrecked the hall if it’d been their man.’
In the chaos that followed, Pat Prince jerked to his feet. ‘ We’re on, boy.’
They fought their way through crowds of shouting Welshmen and got near the ring. Someone was singing ‘Land of my Fathers’ and everyone in the hall stood up. Then gradually the new champion was escorted out of the hall by half a dozen policemen, and Godfrey saw his opponent climbing into the ring. He followed, while people thrust their way out towards the bars and the few that were left settled into their places. The master of ceremonies appealed for quiet and announced the next contest.
The applause was as perfunctory as the interest. The arguing point of the evening was clearly going to be whether the referee stopped the fight too soon or whether Evan Morgan was a true champion. The arguing point would have nothing whatever to do with the two unknown, untried and undersized men in the ring.
The referee had spoken to them, they had touched gloves and gone back to their corners, backs to each other waiting for the bell. Godfrey hated a crowd that had no interest in him and he hated men with freckled skin and red hair. Anyway, unlike many boxers, he always hated the man in the opposite corner. When the bell went he came out into the middle like a demon king, only the green lights and the fiery breath lacking. He dropped his defence and went for Miller with both hands as if this was a fight in a back alley. Miller had only time to raise his guard, and this was swept away and he was back against the ropes. Being no fool, he fought and blocked and dodged his way out of a hail of blows, but was pursued ceaselessly round the ring, as he tried to collect his skill. But there was no stop for the three minutes, and although at the end he had made up some ground he went to his corner puffing and sweating, his light skin reddening on shoulder and arm and rib and cheek where the blows had landed or where he had gone back against the ropes.
Somewhere in the middle of the round the audience had become aware of the fact that something interesting was still going on in the ring and had paid attention. At the end there was a ripple of applause that was more pleasant in Godfrey’s ears than the string of curses that Pat Prince muttered in his ear with warnings that he would be pumped out by the end of the third round. Godfrey didn’t mind now; he’d drawn attention to himself and was feeling fine. The second round went more steadily, with each man taking the look at his opponent that Godfrey’s wild beginning had prevented. Miller was a good stylish boxer but didn’t seem to have a really dangerous punch. Like a pawky farmer gathering windfalls, he picked up points just when they came along. He was taller than Godfrey and his extra reach was useful. In the third round Godfrey played him at his own game and encouraged him to make the running. He found that Miller didn’t use his right a lot, but when he did he threw himself off balance for a second before he covered up. In the fourth round Godfrey invited a right cross, got it, shifting his head an inch to take it high up, and then hit the Scot with all his force, first to the body and then to the jaw.
Miller crumpled and was down for a count of six. Godfrey waited, his black hair springing, then went in to finish it off. There was a lot of noise in the hall now, and quite a few people had come back from the bars to see what was on. Miller survived the round and recovered quickly in his corner, and the next round made a determined comeback. At the end of it there was a roar of applause.
The sixth round began in the same fashion, but Miller had shot his bolt. He was on one knee for a count of five and got up visibly unsteady. The referee was moving to stop the fight but Little God was ahead of him and a right to the jaw put Miller down for the count.
Pearl, lonely in the early bouts among a crowd of bellowing Welshmen, had sat through the controversial title fight, and after it had suddenly found vacant seats all round her and a chance to breathe and stretch. So to the six rounds of the fight between Vosper and Miller, triumphantly won by a flamboyant Vosper, who left the ring shaking hands with himself in mid-air. Then, feeling conspicuous in her isolation and not wanting to make it obvious which bout she had come to watch, she sat through eight rounds of a dull middle-weight fight before getting up and climbing towards the exits at the back.
Round to the front door, where a lot of people were milling. Taxis would be hard to get but a walk would do her good: she was hot and sticky and empty of emotion, glad of a chance to peer at herself before she got home, ask, why come? Why risk exposure to a virus? Why want someone to win? Why foster unspecified discontent? Why get into this position at all?
As she was leaving: ‘It’s Mrs Angell, isn’t it?’
A stocky dark-eyed woman with a silk Picasso scarf round her head: she looked dreadfully ill but her voice was strong.
‘Yes … I …’
‘Flora Vosper. We met at your wedding party.’
‘Of course! I was just going to say Lady Vosper.’
‘Didn’t know you were interested in prize-fighting.’
‘Well, no. But Wilfred was out – I thought a title fight might be interesting.’
‘Bit of a fiasco, eh? I came to see my chauffeur – that virile little devil with the hair – he was on after the championship bout and won in six rounds.’
‘Oh, yes. I remember. Is he your chauffeur? Yes, he knocked the other man out, didn’t he.’
‘Good win, I thought. Bit of a showman, of course, but the crowd like that. I’m just waiting for him. He’s gone to get the car. Can I give you a lift home?’
Panic. Don’t show panic. ‘Oh, thanks very much, it’s awfully kind of you, but I’m – I’m visiting a friend before I go home. I was just going to get a taxi.’
‘Not our way? Can drop you off.’
‘Thanks, no. As a matter of fact, it will be quicker to walk. Are you keeping better, Lady Vosper? I heard you’d been ill.’
‘Death’s door, my dear. But I kick like hell on the mat. And you? Enjoying life?’
Two more cars drawing up. But neither the car she knew so well. ‘Thanks, yes. Lovely. Well, I must be—’
‘If you’re free an hour or two sometime drop in for a drink. D’you mind sick visiting?’
Pearl smiled brilliantly. ‘Of course not. Perhaps I will—’
‘I suspect your husband does. So come without him. Come next Tuesday. To dinner. Can you get away?’
‘Oh, yes, but it’s not necessary to—’
‘I’ve got two people coming. Miriam, my daughter, – she’s about your age – and Salvator the pianist. He’s amusing and it would make the four.’
Was that the jade-green car edging its way towards the steps? Wasn’t it rude to give a second refusal? Did it matter if one went to dinner, with him in the kitchen? Anyway one could always cancel. Get away now. The important thing was to get away.
‘Thank you. I’d love to come. Tuesday Wilfred dines at his club so I could probably manage it. If I—’
‘Seven-thirty for eight then. I’ll drop you a card to confirm. You know my address? 113 Wilton Crescent.’
‘Thanks. Thank you, Lady Vosper.’ It was the green car. ‘Seven-thirty for eight. Goodnight, Lady Vosper.’ Good-bye Little God. Merge into the crowd. Why am I so tall? Try to become anonymous. Milling people. The boxing wasn’t over but more were leaving. Green car just moving up to the steps.
But she was well away now, hidden by trilby hats, tall upturned collars, umbrellas being raised against a freckle of rain. He hadn’t seen her. Would Lady Vosper say anything? Very improbable. Of course her relationship with her chauffeur was over-familiar and she might say: guess who I met on the steps. But still improbable. Much more likely: well done, Little God, well boxed, well fought – well won; beautifully poised olive-skinned body, naked lithe skin but muscular, strong hairy legs; perfectly balanced engine of destruction; black fine hair bouncing with every thrust and blow but never falling in the eyes, petite regular handsome features with full and jutting bottom lip and one flaw on the black eyebrow, one scar like a duelling scar, making the perfection bearable. The will to kill always in his eyes, the intent to hurt or defeat or disable in every coordinated thrust of the two deft hands. Well done, Little God, she would say, well done, well killed, now drive me home.
Because, for all their differences, Pearl sensed something vaguely similar between Flora and her chauffeur. Flora was not a killer, but she was a dare-devil, stick-at-nothing kind of woman, the sort who would ride at a five-barred gate knowing she was likely to fall rather than accept defeat by going round it. It was not an attitude Pearl understood but she could recognize its existence.
Several times during the next days she came to the point of mentioning her meeting with Flora Vosper to Wilfred and asking him if he knew why she was ill and what was wrong with her. Once she dropped the name into their conversation but he was preoccupied with his food and did not respond. Always Pearl was afraid of letting out that she had been to watch the boxing.
The little card confirming the invitation arrived. Several times she got as far as the telephone to ring Lady Vosper to cancel the date, but each time she found the excuse she had concocted unconvincing to herself. And perhaps it was unkind to refuse to visit a sick woman. And the company did sound interesting. Since her marriage she had formed no friendship with any young woman of her own age except Veronica Portugal whom she met from time to time – and she saw Hazel once a month. Wilfred’s friends were her friends but, except for the Portugals, they were all middle-aged or old. So Miriam might be a good person to meet. And musicians always fascinated her, although she wished Salvator could have been a clarinet player.
Up to the Monday she had not told Wilfred of the invitation out, which created a sensation of deceit where no deceit was necessary. And by Monday it seemed too late to say. She made an appointment for a wash and set and a manicure for 4 p.m. on the Tuesday, but not at D. H. Evans; she had never been able to force herself into the shop since she left.
And on the Monday night Wilfred went to bed with her.
Tuesday was a windy day, which is always a nuisance when you’ve had your hair just done.
Pearl took a taxi back, braving Wilfred’s displeasure, but she was home before him. He was not in a very good mood because some option agreement he was negotiating with a man in Switzerland was being held up by the sloth of a London solicitor.
‘If I could have earned my living in art!’ he said. ‘Even perhaps by dealing in art! I should be a more satisfied man!’ He rubbed his finger and thumb together, getting rid of the imaginary crumb. ‘To create art, of course, is the ultimate in fulfilment.’
‘But aren’t you satisfied?’ she asked. ‘You always seem so.’
There was no intended irony in the remark, and he saw none.
‘Satisfaction is a relative term. I flatter myself that I have made something of my life, that a degree of distinction attaches to me, that my success is not just a hollow term. But the profession of law is so often stultifying, in the slowness with which it creaks into motion, in the ancestral precedent which determines the motion, in the absence of original and creative thought. Sometimes one yearns for a freer and more bracing air. I have always had a vigorous and inquiring mind, and possibly my late marriage has stimulated that. Like satisfaction, youth is a relative term. Isn’t it, my dear. Isn’t it?’ He patted her head. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing. Why?’
‘You seem to shrink away.’
She laughed. ‘I’ve just had my hair done! Didn’t you notice?’
‘I saw it was a new style, but I thought you had done it yourself. Isn’t it very expensive having it done in the West End?’
‘No. Not where I go.’
‘I remember a case I was involved in a few years ago. My client was claiming damages against a hairdresser in Bond Street far loss and discolouration of hair following a permanent wave. I think we got £350.’
‘Do you want anything before you go off to dinner?’
‘Food, d’you mean? I thought you were asking me not to eat between meals.’
‘Oh, yes, sorry. I forgot.’
‘But since you ask, a few biscuits with a glass of sherry would be sustaining.’
‘Ryvita?’
‘If one must.’
‘What time are you leaving?’
‘The usual. I shall not be back late. About eleven.’
‘I may have gone to bed.’
When he left the house she changed slowly into a black silk dress, a bit longer than the fashion, with sleeves buttoned tight at the wrist and lace covering the low neck. She rang for a taxi at 7.25 and took the fur she had bought last week.
She wondered if he would open the door to her and if he knew she was coming. It didn’t matter. His presence was immaterial. He was just a servant in the background. She was there to dine with Lady Vosper and her daughter and Salvator the famous Spanish pianist. The fact of Little God being there was only a tiny flavour of spice added to the dish.
He did open the door. She had paid off the taxi and only touched the bell once, and he was standing there, expression pleasant but non-committal. He was in a good grey suit she had not seen before: no chauffeur’s uniform: there was a bruise on his cheekbone from last Thursday’s fight, just the one.
‘Come in,’ he said. ‘I’ll tell Lady Vosper you’ve come.’
She followed him into the hall and then into the front room, which was a drawing room. It was a rather dark room; the lights were too darkly shaded, or not enough were on. She took her fur with her but it was warm.
‘Lady Vosper’ll be down shortly,’ he said. ‘She said I was to get you a drink.’
‘Thank you. I’ll have a gin and tonic.’
He poured it, his back to her, then brought it across. ‘ Lady Vosper’ll be right down,’ he said as he handed it to her.
‘Thank you.’
Their hands brushed, and he moved a foot or two back. She turned away from him and sipped her drink, knowing he was looking at her. She glanced at her watch. A quarter to eight. It was a bit fast.
He said: ‘ Lady Vosper told me you was at the fight.’
The drink was pretty strong. When he had gone she would help herself to some more tonic.
‘Oh, yes … You wrote to me about it. I told Wilfred how pleased you were to get a good fight, so he asked me to go and see how you went on.’
‘I went on proper, didn’t I?’
‘Yes. You won. I told him you won.’
‘I always do win.’
‘It would be good pay for you.’
‘Yes, it was good pay.’
‘Have the other guests come yet?’
‘No, not yet. They’ll be here at eight.’
‘Perhaps you’d tell Lady Vosper I’m here.’
‘Oh, she knows. But she’s not been too well today. It takes her sometimes.’
She walked towards the table where the drinks were set out and looked for the tonic water.
‘Can I get you something?’ He had come up close behind her.
‘This is a bit strong.’
‘Sorry. It was a half bottle of tonic water. I’ll get another from the kitchen.’
When he was half way to the door, she said: ‘Does Lady Vosper have a maid or – or a cook?’
‘A woman comes every morning. Then we have a cook when there’s people to dinner in the evening, see. If it’s just her and me I do the cooking.’
They looked at each other and he suddenly grinned. ‘ Not to worry, Oyster. I’ve not done no cooking tonight.’
When she was alone she moved about the room looking at the pictures. After some months of Wilfred’s training, she was already fancying herself as a student of painting. These were mostly old works and badly lit, not like the house in Cadogan Mews where lights were directed tactfully upon the walls. She wondered what Wilfred would make of them. One or two had gilt lettering underneath: John Opie, J. S. Sargent, so that there was no virtue in recognition.
She sipped at her glass and felt the gin going down strongly. By the time Godfrey came back she would nearly have finished it. But that did not matter: she was ill-at-ease and drink would help.
He came back. ‘Sorry to be s’long. Couldn’t find another bottle of the old tonic. Here we are. Oh, you’re half done. Shall I wait till you’ve finished?’
‘No, top it up, please.’
He did so. ‘That’ll have no taste at all. Here, I’ll put a drop of the old stuff in as well.’ He took the glass from her and darted over to the table, unstoppered the gin, put some in, brought back the glass.
‘Why’d you really go to the Albert Hall? It wasn’t to please your old man, was it?’
She looked at him, her eyes an inch or so higher than his. She felt very poised. ‘Maybe it was curiosity. I’d seen you fight once. But I don’t know why you fight. What’s the reason?’
‘Reason?’ His eyes took her in admiringly. ‘It’s my job. Why not? What other reason d’you need?’
‘But d’you like hurting people? Do you like hitting people with your fists, hoping to damage them, make them cry out? Do you go for their eyes hoping to make them swell up, or their noses hoping to make them bleed? I thought in that match last week …’
‘Yes?’
‘I thought the referee was going to stop the fight, but you got in just in time, knocked the other man out. Why couldn’t you have waited?’
‘Waited? …’ He shrugged. ‘I often get swindled.’ Member the fight you went to before – the ref stopped that too soon. This time I made no error – Miller went down on his backside with a real clump. Wham! It was smashing. That’s what I’m there for. That’s what he’s there for too. Don’t forget he’s trying to do the same to me. It’s fabulous when they go down – twice as much fun as a points decision or an r.s.f.’
‘Yes, but do you like giving pain? Did you – were you a bully as a boy? Did you twist other boys’ arms? Did you torture cats and throw stones at dogs? Did you knock down old ladies? Did you—’
He smiled and took her arm above the elbow. ‘Listen, Oyster, it isn’t like that—’
She pulled her arm free. ‘Remember your promise!’
‘O.K., O.K.’
‘But even that! … You take my arm as if it was a – an iron rail! Why have you always to be so violent?’
‘I’m not always so violent. Honest. I know it seemed like it that first time, but it was you taking fright that was half the trouble. I was clutching to stop you running away. Honest, I’m not violent with women. And what you say …’
‘Well?’
‘Maybe you were brought up gentle. I wasn’t brought up gentle. I was brought up in a world where things was tough and the only way not to get trod on was to be tougher than anyone else around. I soon learned that. And other lads – and men! – learned to leave me alone. Soon I could fight anyone. It was fun to fight – lovely! There’s nothing like it for making you feel good. But bullying – that’s different! I don’t twist people’s arms or knock down old ladies. Why should I? Me, Little God. I don’t bully. I like taking on bigger than myself and beating them! I never was a bully in my life – you don’t understand, Oyster, you don’t understand.’
Pearl took a longer drink. It was still potent. ‘And me? Don’t you feel you tried to bully me?’
He fingered the bruise on his cheek. ‘I was groovy about you – no mistake. I got it bad. So when I scared you that night I was sorry, real sorry, and I tried to make it up, see. I called with a box of chocolates. I met you on the train. I prowled round in the car and stopped you when you was walking home. But it was only trying to be friends. Why can’t we be friends?’
She smiled briefly. ‘ I was scared, you know. Still am a bit.’
‘You don’t need to be. I played it wrong that night, that’s all.’
‘Perhaps,’ she said. ‘I’ve never been so afraid of you since my marriage. I feel – safer.’
‘Yeh. Mrs Angell. It sounds different, don’t it. And you’re rich now – it all makes a difference.’
‘Being rich doesn’t make the difference.’
‘Tell me, Oyster, just tell me – I’ve often wondered, like. It’s not me, to worry, but I’ve often wondered …’
‘What?’
‘This marrying old Mr Angell. You know. Because he is old – or getting on anyhow. You didn’t marry him because you was scared of me? Did you?’
She smiled at him properly for the first time since their first meeting in the dance hall. ‘Good heavens, no! I married him because I was – fond of him, because he was so kind. He’s always such a gentleman, so considerate, so …’
‘All the opposite of me, eh?’
She took another drink and glanced towards the door. ‘Isn’t it time Lady Vosper was down? If she’s not well, perhaps I could go up and see her.’
He went to the window, peered out, pulled the curtains across again. ‘ Well, I’m sorry, Oyster, but you can’t. She’s not here. She’s in hospital.’
‘What?’ Heart thumped and stopped and restarted.
‘In that old clinic place where she went once before. I says to her, stay out of that place, you never been well since you went in before; you stay here where I can look after you proper. But this Matthewson, her doctor, he says she’s got to go in and be—’
‘When? When did she go?’
‘Yesterday. I went to see her this morning, but she wasn’t looking too good—’
‘But there must have been time to let me know—’
‘Oh, she wrote. She wrote to you and to this pianist bloke. Her daughter was here so she didn’t have to be told.’
‘I never got any letter! Aren’t the others coming, then? Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you tell me when I came so that I need not have come in?’
‘Well, I thought it funny, Oyster, you coming the way you did. I thought, I wonder why she’s come pretending that she knows nothing about it, pretending to ask for Lady Vosper—’
‘But I didn’t know, I tell you! No letter came—’
‘So I said to myself, perhaps, seeing she went to watch Little God box, maybe she’s come to have a chat with Little God, making the excuse, like—’
‘You never posted the letter!’ Perfect anger driveth out fear.
‘I did. I swear I did! You know what the post is like these days. Why only last month Lady V got a letter from Norfolk that’d taken five days. You’ll see if it doesn’t come in the morning—’
‘Well, you should have told me! When I came to the door you should have told me!’
He ran a hand through his comb of hair. ‘You can’t blame me, can you, for hoping? Still hoping.’
She stared at him. ‘It was a trick, wasn’t it. You found I was coming to dinner and when Lady Vosper was taken ill it fitted perfectly. This is what comes of trusting you! This is the way you keep your promise not to – not to—’
‘You came to see me box. Nobody made you do that. It made me think things again, hope things, see. That’s all. What else have I done? Let you come here and have twenty minutes’ talk with me. Why are you so mad at me? I haven’t laid a finger on you. Or only one finger, just for a minute. What are you scared of?’
‘I’m not scared!’
‘Yes, you are, even now. Sit down, Oyster. Let’s talk a bit more.’
‘I’ve nothing more to say.’
‘Why don’t you relax? Why don’t you give way a bit – be easy?’
She moved past him and he put his hand on hers. She pulled it away.
‘What’s the matter with Lady Vosper?’
‘It’s her kidneys. I’m sorry for her. She’s a good old sport.’
‘Is she to have an operation?’
‘They’ll decide tomorrow.’
‘Very well, I’ll ring up the Clinic later tomorrow.’
‘Won’t you stop a bit now?’
‘No. I’m sorry.’ She went to the door, turned the handle. ‘This door is locked!’
‘Yes. I’ve got the key. I’ll give it you in a minute.’
‘Give it me at once! I’ll call the police!’
‘You’re not scared of me, Oyster. Honest you aren’t. You’re scared of yourself. I wouldn’t hurt you. Why don’t you let yourself go?’
‘Give me the key!’
‘I’ll give it you if you tell me why you came to see me box last week.’
‘I’ve told you! Wilfred wanted me to!’
‘That’s an old falsehood. Truthfully.’
‘I was curious myself just to see how it went! We’d arranged it for you. My God, how sorry I am I took the trouble!’
She moved away from the door and walked to the telephone by the fireplace. She picked up the receiver and heard him come behind her. He kissed her neck. She slewed her head away and began to dial. He put his fingers in the dialling holes and made nonsense of the call. She turned and hit him across the face. He smiled and turned the other side of his face. She hit at him again. She was a strong girl and this time she used her fist, but he rocked his head two inches and the blow slid across his forehead. She picked up the telephone and threw it at him. He fended it off with his hands, half catching it, then it fell to the floor with a loud clang.
‘Drop your fists, Oyster,’ he said. ‘That’s the end of the round.’
She stared at him with wide angry eyes, out of breath. He looked her over admiringly, with particular interest in the movement of her breasts. Then he looked at his watch.
‘Half a minute yet … Seconds out of the ring. Time.’
He feinted to put his hands on her throat, and she hit at him again, but he slipped under her guard and took her round the waist and began to kiss her. She beat at his shoulders and the side of his head, but to his relief did not kick his shins. She tried to turn her mouth away but was not too successful.
‘This,’ he said, breathless himself now, ‘is where – in the old movies this is – where the bird always gives in.’ His mouth against her cheek, his hard body pressing against hers. ‘Give in. Go on. Give in, Oyster. Just for the fun of it. We’ve always – had this date. Give in.’
She clutched his hair and began to pull at it. He didn’t seem to feel normal hurt. His mouth was finding hers more successfully. She thought she should bite him but her mouth didn’t want to. Only her hands wanted to go on destroying him. Jees, he thought, it is like the old movies, it’s working. I’m going to get away with it, I’m going to get her. That old sofa bed of Flora’s, drag it up to the electric fire, how’m I going to get her clothes off without her going scared on me again? Just go on like this, get her to a state when she won’t think any more. Not tear her frock, I got to be gentle, but does she really want gentle or can she take it rough? Gentle at first, mustn’t scare.
Pain, she thought, pain and pleasure have a frontier where they meet. Do I want to hurt him or be hurt myself or kill him or be killed? Dagger, if I had a dagger, not to kill but to draw blood, his blood. Vile little God, vile God, conquering, compelling. Cheap shoddy mind, cheap trick, making me cheap, myself cheap. But what is this to do with what is happening? Fine body, clear, fresh skin, young arms, smooth slim easy muscles, light, strong, beautifully made. Is there cheapness in beauty or beauty in cheapness? Youth in age or age in youth? I can’t stand here, I can’t stand here, half naked, like a prostitute in a brothel, while he pulls a couch which unfolds. How has he got out of his clothes, I never saw him, they seemed to slip away. Wilfred stepping out of his pants, breathing heavily, the roll of fat, the particular roll of fat at the base of the abdomen which creases up when he bends, the slow ponderous climb into bed. Slim and light and vital Little God, like Mercury, olive-skinned body gleaming like pewter in the low light. ‘Here, let me help you, Oyster, little Pearl, lovely Pearl, oh, lovely Pearl, aren’t you fabulous. I’ll take your things. Pearl in the oyster. Smooth Pearl, silky Pearl, satin Pearl, velvet Pearl, sleek Pearl, soft Pearl … oh, aren’t you fabulous, just like that, just like that …’
Little God, great God, conquesting, searching, probing, finding. Pleasure in pain, pleasure in pain, pleasure in death, pleasure in ecstasy. God, great God, great God, great God, great God.