‘I hear myself doing it, you see,’ he went on. ‘I suppose everybody has a sort of private armoury of tones from which they choose to suit the occasion. I know I have, at any rate. And they’re all genuine, it seems to me. I’ve behaved quite differently with all the people I’ve seen so far this morning. Why, only just now, just a few minutes ago as I was on my way here, a man stopped me and asked me for some skulls …’ He told her about Bailey. He was not a very good mimic, being far too wrapped up in himself, but he managed to bring out Bailey’s unwieldly, conspiratorial delivery and the horridness of that request.
Barbara laughed harshly. ‘Did you say he had a very small nose? I have a theory about men with small noses, a theory of correspondences. It’s still only in the experimental stage, of course, but some day I shall publish my findings.’
Foley smiled again, on a smaller scale, waiting for the ripples of these remarks to die away. It was part of his policy with Barbara never to take up such allusions, partly because they led away from himself to some other subject of discourse, and partly because he sensed they might damage the essential chastity of his relations with her. After some moments he said:
‘Nobody knows much about other people’s tones. One always tends to think that the tone employed towards oneself is the true one, that is, the one most expressive of the other person’s nature. But the person I know with the smallest range of tones is Moss. He only seems to have one.’
‘Ah, yes, Moss. Still going strong, is he?’
‘He certainly is,’ said Foley, with feeling. He paused again. It was Moss he had been wanting to talk about, but he felt unable for the moment to go on. Discussing Moss was not something to be entered on lightly. It was difficult, for one thing, to know where to begin. There was no one but Barbara with whom it would have been feasible to discuss Moss at all.
‘You’re the only person I can talk to about it,’ he said. ‘As you probably know,’ he added, looking gratefully across at her. This acknowledgement should gratify her, surely. He wondered suddenly whether Barbara really did know how much these visits meant to him. He knew very little, really, of what she felt, but he didn’t wish to know more. She suited him so well precisely because he did not care unduly about the impression he made on her. By not attracting him, she freed him from shams. There was, in fact, something in the composure of her figure, the bony deftness of her hands and feet, the hard, almost warrior-like, sexuality she exuded, which repelled and at times even horrified him a little. He liked soft, exploitable women within whose indulgence he could machinate. Barbara was too avid, too discerning, too experienced. But the absence of tenderness between them was favourable to the austerities of his self-analysis. Sometimes, it was true, because he could not help looking for pitfalls, Foley grew uneasy, wondering what she got out of it all.
‘I feel at ease with you,’ he said. ‘I suppose it’s because you expect nothing from me.’
‘But I do, dear boy,’ Barbara said. ‘I expect great things from you. Not that it matters now. Tell me about Moss.’
Foley thought for a moment, or rather, while he paused, into his mind came a vision of Moss as he had been that morning, his features constructed round the habit of jovial surprise. He said: ‘Moss has been behaving very oddly lately. This morning he actually seemed to resent my coming to see you.’ He told her briefly about his argument with Moss, sharpening up the epigrammatic quality of his own observations, reducing the offensiveness of Moss’s.
‘And you defend me against him? That is very touching. He was quite right though, in the main.’
‘Well, I can visit whoever I like, surely.’ Foley brooded for a moment. ‘I have the feeling that he’s watching me all the time these days, as though he suspected me of something. It’s making me terribly secretive. I never tell him a thing now if I can help it. What can it be, do you think?’
‘I don’t know. Perhaps he’s worried about you, seeing your weaknesses.’
‘That’s exactly what he doesn’t do. He thinks I’ve got quite different weaknesses from the ones I have. Actually he doesn’t see me at all. He made up his mind about me a long time ago. You know, when Moss gets an idea of you, it’s just like being lassooed. Well, he decided that I am a completely irresponsible person. Glamorous, in a way.’ Foley spoke deprecatingly to disarm Barbara’s irony. ‘My own worst enemy, that sort of thing. He’s always trying to protect me. The trouble is, he hasn’t a clue himself really.’
‘Well, he’s certainly wrong if he thinks that about you,’ Barbara remarked. ‘You’re a schemer, if ever there was one.’
‘Perhaps I am,’ said Foley, rather pleased. ‘The trouble is, though, that I played up to Moss at the beginning. It seemed easier, then, to get together a few working suppositions about each other, not necessarily true, but viable – comfortable, so we could get on with things.’
‘And now you’re beginning to find his idea of you oppressive?’ ‘It’s not that so much,’ said Foley. Of course, in a way I always disliked him a bit for thinking he understood me so well. But I was very anxious that nothing should go wrong. It meant a lot to me that we should make a success of the business. It meant a lot to him, too. So I was prepared to put up with things, you see. And then Moss believed in his idea of me so much that I began to myself, a little. It was quite pleasant, really. I mean I knew what I was like and I knew what Moss thought I was like, so it gave me something – an extra dimension. And I never had to do anything disagreeable to back it up. No, it’s not that. But now Moss is turning sour on me. He says nasty things to me. Only the other day he asked me if I didn’t sometimes worry about what would happen to me when my looks were gone. He suggested I should start building up what he called “inner resources”. “I’ve got plenty of inner resources already, thank you very much,” I told him.’
Foley stared at Barbara solemnly, to mark his sense of outrage.
‘You two are so dissimilar,’ Barbara said. ‘It always amazes me that you should have gone into partnership at all.’
‘It was largely an accident. We didn’t know each other before. We met here in Lanruan. I had this idea, you know, for a pixie business, and I needed someone dependable to go in with me. I happened to meet Moss just at the right moment.’
‘You must have summed up his character very quickly.’
‘I suppose it was taking a chance,’ Foley said. ‘But we have to sometimes, don’t we?’ He smiled at her, his Old Campaigner smile, which involved stretching the lips without opening them, and screwing up his eyes attractively. He did not find it necessary to add that in any case the chance had not been taken by him, but by Moss, since Moss had put up all the money.
‘He’s getting so possessive too,’ Foley said. ‘We had a real row last week. It was that I wanted to tell you about. We went to the “Jubilee” for a drink. We sometimes go there mid-week, you know, it’s really the only place we ever do go together, during the season. Lesley Garland was there. I don’t know if you know him. He used to be in a cabaret act, “The Top Hatters” they called themselves, very crummy. Then he married one of the Richmond girls. Gentleman farmer he calls himself now, but he does nothing much except hang about the pub and natter about the doggy old days. Not a bad chap. Anyway, he asked five or six of us at closing time if we’d like to come back home with him for a few drinks, and I said straight away, “Yes, thanks very much we’d love to, wouldn’t we, Moss?” Moss had hardly opened his mouth all evening. Now, after I’d already accepted, mind you, he said he thought we’d better be getting back home, we had work to do next day, and so on. You don’t know how sort of heavily Moss can say things like that, as though everyone else is idle and frivolous. The others all looked at me in a most peculiar way. I felt embarrassed. In the end I said I’d come anyway and Moss could go home if he wanted. He did go home too, which I hadn’t expected. He was waiting for me when I got back. I didn’t want to argue but he started on at me the moment I got through the door. He said didn’t I know there was such a thing as
loyalty and I said he had no right to try to dictate to me. We had a regular set-to. I don’t think he had expected me to answer back, because I don’t usually, you know, but this time I got very cross. Moss went as white as death and kept swallowing. It was terrible.’
An enterprising but misguided bluebottle had got in through the window; after one brisk tour of the aseptic walls its buzzing contained a trapped note. Behind Barbara’s head Foley saw the sea, green and glistening and faintly corrugated, salted in patches with motionless gulls.
‘It was terrible,’ he repeated. ‘We haven’t really recovered from it yet. In point of fact,’ he added with an excess of candour, ‘I would have gone back with him if only he’d given me a loophole. As things were, I couldn’t, it would have been too undignified. But that’s Moss all over, it would never occur to him to make things easier for one. He’s got no tact.’
‘Was it a good party?’
‘What? Oh, no, not very. There was another row at the party, only I wasn’t in it. We met Max Nugent outside the pub, or rather we didn’t meet him. We found him there. He was drunk.’
‘He is always drunk, isn’t he? At least he never seems to show himself unless he is. He is a sweet man, I think, don’t you? I think it’s very wrong of that actor of his to keep him cooped up all alone here in the country. It’s like buying someone’s life.’
‘Simon Lang you mean, yes, but he pays Max’s rent and keeps him, you know. I don’t know what would happen to Max if Simon stopped sending the money. It must be twenty years since there was anything physical between them.’
‘I don’t think you quite see what I mean, Ronald. Never mind, tell me what happened.’
‘Well, as I said, we found Max outside. He was on his hands and knees in the shrubbery that runs alongside the car park. He said he was looking for a pair of yellow woollen gloves. It wasn’t cold enough for gloves, you know. We all started looking and someone asked him where he had dropped them, and he said he hadn’t dropped any, he was just looking for some. In he end we took him with us. It wasn’t so bad at Garland’s at first, we all had some whisky, but he would insist on playing these old records of “The Top Hatters” – terribly dated, and feeble anyway. It became rather a bore, because Garland kept laughing out loud at these ghastly songs and expecting everyone else to laugh too. Then Max suddenly started saying that Simon Lang was a great artist and Garland was annoyed at having his songs interrupted and said Danny Kaye was a greater artist and Max got absolutely furious and started shouting and one of Garland’s children woke up and cried and Garland told Max to clear out. Max slammed all the doors and that woke Garland’s other children up – he has four altogether. Garland jumped up and went after Max but Max had disappeared, and in the confusion one of “The Top Hatter” records was broken. No, it wasn’t a good party, really. Perhaps that’s why I flung out at Moss as I did.’
Barbara asked suddenly, ‘Has Moss had many girl friends?’
‘I’ve never actually met any in the flesh,’ Foley said. ‘We both go up to London fairly frequently in the winter. I don’t know what he gets up to there. There’s a photograph of a girl in his room but I’ve never asked him about it. He told me once she was in South Africa. We never discuss that kind of thing. I somehow can’t picture Moss actually doing anything. It seems to daunt the imagination, it’s like blasphemy, difficult to explain really. I’ve always thought of him as a confirmed bachelor.’
‘It doesn’t do to go by appearances,’ interrupted Barbara. ‘He might be quite a thruster. My first husband looked good enough to be used for stud purposes, a high-coloured man he was, with the most sensual mouth. He really looked capable of feats. He was in a body-building club, too. Twice a week they used to go and lift weights and talk to one another about their laterals and things like that. I was only eighteen then and I had led a sheltered life. I was crazy about him. I’d have done anything he wanted. I told him quite frequently during our engagement that I’d do anything he wanted, but he said he respected me too much. He was waiting for our wedding-night. I thought at the time he seemed a little too resigned. I expected him to chafe more, because it was quite a long engagement, but I didn’t know very much about these things.’
Barbara paused, fixing Foley with a regard of ironical steadiness. ‘You’ll hardly believe it,’ she said, ‘but I was still a virgin after the honeymoon. He only managed it half a dozen times all the eighteen months we were married and even then I hardly knew it had happened.’
‘Probably something psychosomatic,’ said Foley.
‘Call it what you like,’ Barbara said, ‘but there was all that gorgeous hulk, quite useless. I’d have been better off with a randy dwarf. He used to kneel down beside the bed and pray every night before he got into bed with me. I always wondered what he was praying for. It was wearing me down, seeing him there night after night, kneeling in his night-shirt. He always wore a night-shirt. God, how I hated those big strong shoulders of his and his hairy legs. What I wanted more than anything to do, was creep up behind him while he was praying, lift up his night-shirt and jab him as hard as I could in the bottom with my finger. I was a very high-spirited girl.’
‘Good Lord,’ Foley said, ‘what an extraordinary impulse!’ He glanced at Barbara’s nails, blood-red and of inordinate length.
‘I don’t know why I wanted to do it so much,’ Barbara said. ‘It was something that mounted up night after night, seeing that great big back turned on me.’
‘Did you do it in the end?’
Oh yes, I did it. I had to do it.’
‘What did he say when you did it?’
‘Well, what with wanting so much to do it, and wondering all the time if I was going to do it that night or the next night, and putting it off, when I finally did it I was overcome. I jabbed him as hard as I could and then I just burst into tears. He turned round and looked at me. I was crying so hard I could hardly see. “I am saying my prayers, Barbara,” he said in a sort of reproving voice. He didn’t say anything else. I hated him after that. I hate him now, terribly, although he’s dead.’
Barbara looked down for a moment at her fingers. ‘I suppose I could have got a divorce for denial of rights or incompatibility or something, but the war came. Victor had been a keen Territorial and he was commissioned immediately in the Somerset Light Infantry. He looked marvellous in his officer’s uniform. He grew a little blond moustache. It must have suited him down to the ground while it lasted. All those comrades and no sex to bother about. Doing press-ups and having showers. I should think he was in his element. He was killed in the second year of the war. In France. They gave him a medal with a ribbon. Well, they gave it to me actually. I mislaid it years ago. D.C., I think it was, but I always get it confused with the electric currents. Victor had behaved with what they called conspicuous gallantry. It seems he gave his life to retrieve a wounded lance-corporal who shortly afterwards expired.’
Barbara smiled and looked unblinkingly at Foley. ‘Poor Victor,’ she said. ‘He was always a bungler. I didn’t really know what I was missing in those days …’
Foley cleared his throat. There were times when Barbara’s sheer lack of piety filled him with something like awe. Such vindictiveness made her seem for the moment more than mortal. Ever since the day he had died she must have been punishing Victor. Over and over, whenever people tolerant enough were gathered, she must have told her little story of the impotence and the night-shirt and the praying and the pointless death. Hatred for Victor had disturbed her judgement and she did not see that dying for somebody is not ridiculous even when it is pointless. Foley thought of Victor, big and fair and red-faced, some of his stuffing mislaid no doubt, but not that which determines courage. Perhaps he had insisted on dying, just as earlier he had insisted on praying. ‘Well, it’s time I was going, I’m afraid,’ he said. ‘I’m coming down again on Friday morning so I’ll drop in again then, if I may.’
‘Yes, do,’ said Barbara. ‘By the way, those skulls you were talking abou
t – do you think you could make an extra one and sell it to me? I sometimes think this room needs a bit of brightening up. It would do as a memento mori too, wouldn’t it? Whenever I felt tempted to join a book club or keep a budgerigar, I could look at it and remember that I’m going to die some day.’
4
Before setting out on his Sunday afternoon walk, Moss always spent half an hour or so in his workroom, engaged in what he described to himself as reviewing the incidents of the past week. Sundays had an objective quality which made them best for this. Lately, however, he had not been very successful at marshalling the facts and getting them into perspective: efforts to do so seemed to stir up an emotional residue, a kind of silt, which clouded everything and took a long time to settle again. Today he felt it was particularly important, indeed vital, that he should keep his calm – not an acquiescent calm, but the poise of a wrestler – because today for the first time Ronald was bringing the girl home. He had been hinting at the possibility of this for almost a month, and now that it was happening at last Moss felt the need for complete self-possession. Not that he expected to be favourably impressed by the girl. Her very name, when he had finally learnt it, had seemed to confirm his worst fears about her. He said it softly to himself again now, Gwendoline: the bogus lisping homeliness of the opening syllable, the mindless pause in the middle, the factitious sweetness of the close – in which there seemed to lie also a threatening, abrasive quality. It was no good saying anything to Ronald. He had already departed to collect her, far too flimsily dressed for the time of year. May wasn’t out yet after all, but it was no good saying anything. The two of them were to go for a walk first and come back about tea-time, the actual provision of tea being, of course, his concern.
Count your blessings, Moss told himself. He was fond of adages and all pegs for thought. At least the business was doing well. They had enough work already to keep them going through the summer, more than enough. People from further and further away were asking for their work; they were getting a name. It had to be admitted that Ronald was good when it came to business, very good. He never minded working hard and he was keen too, full of ideas. Take the money-box line for example, that had been a first-rate idea of Ronald’s – as an idea. He had wanted to embark on a difficult, complicated group of pixies clustered in different attitudes on top of a large hollow toadstool, each pixie to have a little slot for sixpences in its belly, so that all the coins slipped down into the toadstool. But he had listened, that was the point, he had taken notice when Moss had suggested instead a single, large pixie with a crafty sack over its shoulder, the slot for the coins at the neck of the sack; so much easier, and cheaper too. ‘You are right, Michael,’ he had said, just like that. He recognised the value of a cooler judgement. That was the way things should always be between them, give and take. That was what a partnership was for.
The Partnership Page 6