When Charles called me the next day to tell me what he had seen and heard at the cinema I wasn’t as worried as Charles thought I ought to be. I knew they were very friendly, but this? “It wasn’t just kissing and stuff” Charles had said “he had his hand up her blouse.”
“Did you know this was going on?” Charles was angry and accusing.
“Charles, they are young, they will grow out of it.”
“But what if they don’t?”
“He’s her cousin, it’s a close relationship, but not too close.”
“It’s far too close.”
“Henry was your father’s cousin, Charles, that makes Charles and Susannah second cousins. I know there’s been a lot of rumour and tittle tattle but even with your father’s marriage to Kathleen they’re only step brother and sister. I don’t think that is a legal impediment. The relationship isn’t close enough to cause any problems.”
“But they’re not second cousins, not even cousins. I know they aren’t. I’ve known for years that they aren’t. Didn’t my mother ever tell you? “
“What do you mean?”
“Henry wasn’t Carl’s father.”
I hoped I was wrong, but I thought I knew the answer almost as he spoke, but I had to ask the question anyway. “So, who was?”
“Father. Carl, is my half brother. Susannah is his half sister. What they are doing is immoral, totally and completely wrong.”
I should have known, but up to this moment I had had no idea.
“If what you say is true, Charles, what they are doing is more than immoral it’s illegal. Are you sure you are right? We can’t possibly say anything unless you’re absolutely certain of your facts.”
“Of course I’m right. I’ve known since that day before my 16th birthday.”
Why hadn’t I thought of that possibility? I knew Kathleen and Arnold had been close. Kathleen had married Henry quite unexpectedly, Carl had been born very soon after the wedding. But the thought that Carl was Arnold’ son had never occurred to me.
“Absolutely. Mother told me. She admitted it. She said Carl and I were so alike she wondered how no one else had realised.”
“Who else knows? Max?”
“I haven’t told anyone but he must know.”
All manner of thoughts went through my mind. If what Charles said was true why hadn’t Arnold and Kathleen stopped it. They must know what’s going on under their noses – or were they so self absorbed, that they didn’t care what was happening to their children.
I really hoped they had no idea. I didn’t like Arnold and I knew he was completely self-centred, but was he capable of allowing his son and daughter to get so close in such an inappropriate way? I really hoped he was not.
It seemed that the people who knew the secrets of the parentage didn’t know the nature of their relationship and the people who knew the way the relationship was going didn’t know the problems of their parentage.
That is, until Charles had gone to the cinema the previous evening.
And now it was my problem.
I didn’t think I could discuss it over the phone so I drove straight round to see Arnold and Kathleen. Arnold was out, it was Sunday and Arnold always went out on a Sunday afternoon.
Kathleen was distant when she answered the door. The children were out but Arnold was bound to be back soon if I cared to wait.
I hadn’t seen them for several years, but it seemed that we only ever met at times of crisis. Kathleen, to her credit, did try to be civilised.
We made polite conversation.
“How are the children? Hardly “children” any more I should think.”
“They’re fine, but growing up far too fast. It’s all this odd music now, Arnold can’t bear it.”
“I should think it’s all boyfriends and girlfriends now.”
“They do seem to spend a lot of time in that coffee bar, listening to the juke box and meeting up with some very strange people, not our sort at all. It’s impossible to control them any more. Still, they stick together so they’ll be looking out for each other, making sure the other one doesn’t get into any trouble.”
It seemed obvious that she didn’t know what was going on.
How could I tell her? How could I explain?
“It’s such a blessing, their being so close. They seem interested in the same things, they go everywhere together. I do sometimes wonder if they aren’t a bit….” she hesitated a little too much “… too close.”
Maybe she was suspicious but was keeping up a brave face.
I decided to take the bull by the horns.
“Kathleen. You know don’t you? You know they’re brother and sister. If there is anything, anything, beyond just spending a lot of time together you must stop it.”
She turned to me with such a great sadness in her eyes. This woman who had loved the wrong man and won him at the wrong time, whose life had never been straightforward or easy, realised that the sins of the parents were now being visited on their children. I wondered how long she had worried about this, how long she had wondered how she could explain to her son the lies that they had always lived. Her life was about to fall even further apart, and she knew that she had no one else to blame.
“Is it so well known then?”
“Not widely, I should think. But people do talk and perhaps some others have drawn their own conclusions about you and Arnold and your children. I didn’t know until this morning, maybe I should have guessed – you and Henry got married so quickly, it all happened in a rush and then Carl was born nearer the wedding than perhaps he should have been.”
“But it was happening a lot at that time, just at the end of the war, all sorts of people were getting married quickly.” She was clutching at straws, and we both knew it.
“But ever since Henry died you and Arnold have been together, as if you didn’t care what people thought. My mother tells me what the women in the town say, they remember and you weren’t always as discreet as perhaps you might have been. Mind you I didn’t put two and two together. But maybe I just don’t think that way.”
“Who told you?”
“Charles.”
She seemed to take that in her stride.
“I suppose Alicia told him. She never did care how much she hurt other people. What’s brought all this out now?”
I ignored the dig at Alicia, if it ever came to a contest as to who had used more people, and who had treated their children worse, then I think it might have been close between the two of them, and I believe Alicia had better reasons for her behaviour.
“Charles saw them at the cinema yesterday.”
“They said they were going.”
“Yes, Kathleen, they were in the back row. Kissing and cuddling, and probably a lot more.”
Kathleen had to accept that and all its implications but all she could say was “Oh dear. We’re going to have to do something aren’t we? We can’t hide our heads in the sand any longer.”
So they had suspected something was going on but had chosen not to do anything. I believe they would still have backed out of saying anything if they could possibly have got away with it.
“Kathleen you have got to tell them.”
“He won’t. I’ve tried to persuade Arnold to tell Carl he’s his father but he won’t hear of it.” She began to explain what I think I already knew. Arnold was too ashamed to tell his son of his behaviour, to tell Carl that he and his mother had had a longstanding affair, that they had arranged for her to marry Henry only because she was pregnant.
His weakness was that he could not bear to lose face with Carl. He needed the respect and admiration of the only son that mattered to him. He had lost so much with the business going down he couldn’t bear to lose any respect and love Carl might still feel for him.
“He’d rather they had an illegal relationship.”
Kathleen had no answer. She just sat there and shrugged her shoulders helplessly.
When I had first known Kathleen she had been such a strong woman, independent, intelligent and extremely likeable. Then, as Carl had grown older, she had appeared grasping and opportunistic. Now she just appeared broken.
“Do you want me here when you tell them – for tell them you must if Arnold won’t?”
“No Ted, I must do it. I will do it.”
I hoped that the old Kathleen, the woman she had once been, would come to the fore and that she would not let the family down.
Kathleen showed me to the door and I drove away, leaving her to it.