I could have gone to Mr. Lipton’s shop the previous day; the thought had certainly occurred to me. But I’d felt scared. Now I saw timidity should play no role in any area of this enterprise. (And it was shameful I should even have to remind myself: I wonder who’s kissing her now, I wonder who’s showing her how ... !) If Mr. Lipton didn’t still have that portrait, tucked away in some dark corner and patiently awaiting me exactly as the book had been, and if he couldn’t remember or didn’t know to whom he had sold it... well then, too bad: at least I could still advertise. And if my advertisements were to prove no more successful... then again too bad: at least I still had the Adam fireplace and my intuitive vision of a friendly dark-haired young man gazing reflectively into the flames. I had seen him there again this morning, just as vividly as yesterday. I even had the distinct sensation, uncanny but in no way frightening, that one day he might actually turn round.
I found the shop without difficulty. Miss Eversley’s directions had been entirely lucid. I saw the portrait in the window.
I laughed out loud. I laughed right there, standing on the pavement, a spontaneous burst of laughter that was partly the effect of my ecstatic recognition of him and partly an aid to his more sober recognition of me : an easy, quite informal greeting, in mature contrast to that clash of cymbals and full celestial chorus which as a girl I had so often imagined would accompany the arrival of my one true love: would announce to the stilled and awestruck world, as well as to our own two selves, the eternal importance of that first meeting of eyes across the crowded room or shop or station concourse.
Nor was this all. For partly, too, my laughter was a message to the passersby that even when you momentarily lost your faith you were reprimanded in the most lovingly gentle and generous way.
You see, I had told myself, hadn’t I—and without too much conviction—that the picture might be awaiting me in some dark corner exactly as the book had been? But had I forgotten already? The book had been awaiting me under strong electric light and at virtually the centre of an eye-level shelf and even, very slightly, jutting out!
And then I had also said to myself, quite doubtfully again, “Mmm, a whole eighteen months since the bungalow was cleared... ?” (Because the deacon who had given me Miss Eversley’s address had told me of the date of her employer’s death.) But the bookseller had said, “I’d have sworn I hadn’t seen one of these in years!” and even after that I hadn’t understood. Dear Lord. I was tempted not merely to throw back my head and laugh out loud upon the pavement, amongst those absorbed and frowning shoppers, but even to go down on my knees in front of them, inadequately to express my thanks and to appeal for God’s forgiveness.
What’s more he was just as I’d expected—with strong clean-shaven features and a faint smile which was already captivating but, yes, would surely grow to be far more so; and with a proud determined chin, broad shoulders and the look of height.
His portrait had obviously been painted when he was in his late twenties or early thirties.
And it was just as Miss Eversley had said: superficially quite sombre—a fact which would make it all the more exciting when those vital grey-green eyes looked straight out at you whichever way you moved—or, at any rate, whichever way I moved—as though, almost as though, now that the pair of us had finally come together he had no intention whatsoever of allowing me to get away again.
(“Again”? Why had that word so naturally presented itself? Was my subconscious trying to tell me something? Was he trying to tell me something? And, anyway, hadn’t I already guessed? Besides... How would I have known —known even from the pavement and even in spite of the sombreness—that his eyes were grey-green?)
I rushed into the shop.
I saw a man standing by the counter. He was portly, with a drooping moustache.
“That picture in the window,” I gasped. It was just as if I had run there all the way from home. “How much is it?” Irrelevant, unnecessary question.
“Madam, I don’t work here. You’ll have to ask the proprietor.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
Just then Mr. Lipton himself came through a door at the back. He was small, thin and worried-looking, and wore a brown overall. I repeated my question.
His eyes screwed up in a smile that seemed oddly at variance with his tired expression. “The unknown cavalier?” he asked.
“Oh dear, is that what you call him?” Unknown indeed! But on the other hand I liked the thought of “cavalier” with its suggestion of laughter and of gallantry. “Yes, yes,” I cried.
“Eight pounds to you, madam.”
“Oh— thank you!” I said.
I paid by cheque, not because I hadn’t got the money on me, and not that I could ever have forgotten such a momentous date as this but because I wanted to have it actually inscribed there on the counterfoil—a monument in black and white—today I met Horatio!
Today I met my destiny.
Met him again!
“What’s your initial, Mr. Lipton?”
“Oh, just make it out to Lipton’s,” he said. “ My name is Guthrie. I work here part-time.”
While I wrote the cheque Mr. Guthrie took the painting from the window.
“Well, I can see he’s going to a good home,” he remarked.
“I think you must be psychic.”
“How so, madam?”
“Just your talking in that way about home. Because you’re right, you know. Today’s the day he’s coming home!”
Yet I left it at that. He didn’t look the gossipy kind but even so it was better not to say too much. People could still be amazingly judgmental.
“We’re really going to miss him.” After Mr. Guthrie had looked quickly at the cheque and also written on the back he spoke directly to the portrait. “This place, old man, won’t ever be the same without you!”
I was torn between slightly resenting this easy familiarity (but after all, I supposed, eighteen months did undoubtedly confer on you a position of some privilege) and feeling amused and rather proud that such a display of bonhomie could only have been evoked by a natural propensity on the part of its recipient to inspire friendship.
But, again, the sheet of brown paper which wasn’t even new—and the length of hairy string which had been picked up off the floor—seemed wholly out of keeping with the significance of the occasion.
“No, no,” I exclaimed, sharply. “Don’t shut him in! Only imagine! What a feeling of imprisonment and claustrophobia!”
“Madam?”
“I saw a film once. A woman was buried alive. They finally got to her in time, but—”
“I’d say then, madam, she must definitely have been one of the luckier ones.” Mr. Guthrie’s tone sounded puzzled as well as amused— amused!—yet then he gave his crinkled, kindly smile. “You’re really quite sure you wish to take this with you? We could deliver it tomorrow morning before ten.”
This? It?
And as though I could now bear to be separated from him for twenty-four minutes, let alone twenty-four hours!
I turned to the customer with the droopy moustache who was now sifting through bric-a-brac at a nearby table. “I wonder if you’d be kind enough to hail me a taxi?”
I had asked it with considerable charm and he didn’t seem to mind—in any case he had something of the air of a doorman—but Mr. Guthrie made me feel I might have taken a liberty; he himself hurried outside. I apologized to the customer and made some humorous remark about gentlemen vying for a damsel’s favour. “Do you think I ought to offer him a tip? I would certainly have given you one.”
We agreed not, however, and even when Mr. Guthrie had to come back and phone for a cab I received a further small shake of the head—the customer was very nice. They both were.
And less than fifteen minutes later I was back home. In the taxi I’d briefly wondered about putting Mr. Gavin (I should have to decide not only on how to address him but even on how to refer to him) in a spot where we should see each other
last thing at night and as soon as I awoke in the morning. But I think I already knew what had to be his rightful position—indeed, what he practically demanded as such. Over the mantelpiece, of course, in the sitting room. And, yes, the very moment he’d been hung there by the eventually cheerful cabby—who by then had most definitely received a tip and a pretty large one at that (and who now advised me on the best new place for the mirror and hammered in the picture hook and accomplished the whole cumbersome transfer)—Horatio truly did seem to have come home.
* * *
Besides I couldn’t help thinking that the bedroom, although appealing in many ways, somehow wouldn’t have been quite the thing. Not really.
* * *
That morning by second post I received a polite though frosty letter from the bank. I was overdrawn by £15—would I please make good this deficiency as soon as possible? It came as a complete surprise. Two or three days earlier it might well have been a shock, might well have tipped me hard against the bosom of the glooms. (But not once in this kind house had I ever yet encountered them.) Today, though, my reaction to the news was more surprising than the news itself. I simply couldn’t have cared less. Anyway, I told myself, I had a few shares left to sell—what was all the fuss about? I felt positively gay. Defiant. I was ready to take on the world; and the world, one supposed, included bank managers. I knew that the handsome, strong-faced, utterly dependable man who had been watching thoughtfully as I read the letter would henceforth, without question, make it his job to look after me.
I laughed. My merriment was uncontainable. I had moved my chair even closer to the hearth; now I lifted my feet off the ground and hugged my knees. My eyes never wavered from his lovely face.
“But how does it feel...to return home after two centuries?”
My question, though, released something unexpected. Along with my exuberance—guilt! I wrung my hands. I remembered how in my heart I had criticized poor Mr. Guthrie for not recognizing the supreme importance of such a homecoming—that dear little man with his sheet of crumpled paper and his piece of grubby string.
But Mr. Guthrie’s failing was nothing as compared to mine! How had I reacted to this wonderful event? By dashing off to ring church bells? Fire a cannon? Buy a round of drinks in every pub across the city? No! It was unbelievable. I hadn’t even bought a bottle of champagne.
“But at least I can now put that right!” I cried. “No matter how lacking in forethought or how woefully, woefully inadequate!”
I had already leapt to my feet.
“Oh, a fig for Mr. Fitzroy and his fifteen pounds! Thank you so much for coming back to me! Thank you so much for coming home!”
I dashed out of the room, just to fetch my hat. Briefly returned to collect my handbag—and to tell him that I shouldn’t be long.
“Oh, it’s so good to have a man about the house!”
23
He was born after a difficult pregnancy and a long and painful labour to a woman who was then approaching forty—virtually old for those times—but who, despite twenty years or more of fearing she would never be able to conceive, had still been so determined she was going to do so. After the child’s delivery the midwife had gone down on her knees, thanking her Maker, and his, over and over, with hot tears coursing down her cheeks, good honest woman that she was; while Horatio’s father, elderly and sensitive, was also much affected.
He said to his wife:
“‘My dear, we nearly lost you. Dr. Smollett says... that this young fellow here... our very last attempt... ’
“‘Mr. Gavin,’ she answered, ‘the good Lord has harkened to our prayer; and what a miracle he has vouchsafed us! So great a blessing as this would make me appear greedy indeed, were I even to think about desiring such another.’
“And she smiled up at him with so much simple goodness on her adored and loving features that he swiftly had to turn away, for fear of causing her soft heart a moment’s consternation... ”
* * *
By five o’clock that afternoon, even though I hadn’t properly started until two, I had covered over fourteen sides of my rough pad! And by nine o’clock, when I had copied them up neatly—with not one single crossing out!—I had filled nearly eight pages of the book itself.
(But, oh, how I had hesitated before inscribing my fateful first word upon that awesome snowbound territory: a land which—as the April thaws advanced—might burgeon into richness, a timeless enchantment for both the writer and the reader... As a reader, indeed, I still never embarked on any serious novel without half hoping to find in it the solution to all of life’s most pressing queries: all of its problems, mysteries and ills: a story so self-contained and comprehensive it would finally render superfluous the reading of every other. Yes. My first word, apart from “Chapter One”—as yet I had no title—was “On.”)
When I at last laid down my pen I made a playful feint of collapsing—and how my hand and fingers really did ache! But I felt wonderfully elated by the act of creation; I hesitate to say “re-creation” since it was of course a novel, although “recreation” is what it really was. The details might be wrong, for the Reverend Mr. Wallace had in truth mentioned nothing of Horatio’s birth, nor had he given me the names and ages of Horatio’s parents, nor even once referred to either the absence or superabundance of siblings, but I knew the spirit was entirely right.
And even those troublesome details... well, from the word go I had the strongest feeling I was being guided, led on and inspired in the same way (I am aware this sounds presumptuous; but why, when you truly pause to think about it?) that the Gospel writers must have been led on and inspired; my hand, my brain—my Biro—being the media through which some higher agency was seeking to communicate. Oh, yes, I can assure you! It was a grand and glorious feeling.
And how the hours had flown! I hadn’t stopped for supper; and even my afternoon cup of tea, would you believe, had been just that, a cup of tea, poured in the kitchen and carried upstairs with two ginger snaps balanced on the saucer! I laughed self-reproachfully and declared that never again must art be allowed to get in the way of civilization—but that for this first afternoon (and for this first afternoon only!) I had a special dispensation. And I knew just what Mr. Wallace meant: in appreciation of my gentle joke Horatio’s smile really did seem to grow a little wider.
At first I had intended to go out for my evening meal; I rather fancied something light and delicate in a stylish Thai restaurant lately opened. In fact I had already put on my coat and was standing before the mirror in the hall adjusting my—rakish, rather saucy—new hat when a further idea occurred to me: how unfair, if there were indeed going to be celebrations (I mean, over and above that very thoughtless, very tardy bottle of champagne), how excessively selfish to be thinking of holding them away from home! I took my things off discreetly, as if by acting so stealthily I might avoid having my earlier intentions guessed (what a nincompoop!) and went to look in the refrigerator. I found a little cold chicken and some potato salad and I could open my one small tin of asparagus spears. There was even the last of the Dom Perignon. What luxury! And this time, atoning for my lapse, I should try to be particularly considerate, right down to the second flute set across the table from me and the white damask napkin made into a tricorn: things which collectively, I hoped, would be viewed as a nice forgiveness-seeking gesture. Even the yoghurt looked extra pretty when poured into a stemmed syllabub glass and sprinkled with cinnamon—and of course I had given the silverware a quick polish.
I had recently renewed my makeup but I tidied my hair again, now that I had taken off my hat, and as I went back into the sitting room, bearing the supper tray with humility yet perhaps a touch of bashful pride, I felt in the proper festive mood: glowing, expectant, even a little nervous, just as if this were indeed going to be a party. And from now on, I thought, any true celebration would always be held right here at home.
This was a promise that I made to him.
24
I hadn�
�t been to church since childhood. What prompted me on this particular Sunday I don’t know. It might have been simply to say “Thank you!” but I usually said my thank-yous all over the place and in the main quite unselfconsciously.
Besides, I felt embarrassed as I went in. Was I late? Where to sit? There were already masses of people and I knew that every eye must have swivelled in my direction.
Holidaymaker? Resident? And could it have been in Bristol she had bought that stunning hat?
Yes, yes, I wanted to say: the answer to each of those questions is yes. Yes, unbelievably, my hat was indeed bought in Bristol! And, yes, I’m both a resident and on holiday. The whole of life should be a holiday.
I chose a place near the front. That was a mistake. Without turning round I couldn’t see most of the congregation.
On the other hand maybe it wasn’t a mistake. Most of the congregation—if it strained—could probably see me. I was wearing a very dashing sky-blue skirt and jacket. Summer -sky-blue, nothing wishy-washy. White blouse and scarf. To get ready had taken me two hours.
But I tried to be self-effacing. I followed through my notion about holidays. Life ought to be a holiday. There had been a film with Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn which said precisely that. Money shouldn’t be allowed to dominate. The one essential was having the right attitude. And I agreed with this entirely. Why, only look at myself: how I had felt about things in London and how I felt about them now!
Confusingly it was in London that I’d seen the film yet it was in Bristol that Cary Grant had been born and raised. But I reflected that I should come to church more often. I had been here merely a few minutes and already I was having deep thoughts.
Wish Her Safe At Home Page 9