The Late Breakfasters and Other Strange Stories

by Robert Aickman

  In the end, a decision being urgently necessary, she settled upon a small rectangular residence in a block of flats built for young, and presumably underpaid, office workers of her own sex, by a semi-­charitable organization, The New Vista Apartments Trust. Situated just off the western side of that great dividing thoroughfare, the Edgware Road, Greenwood Tree House purported to improve upon such commercial lodgings as could be obtained for a like rental. Under the rules, tenants had to move out upon reaching the age of thirty; and were expected, though not compelled, to interest themselves in the work of the Y.W.C.A. or in some cognate organization approved by the Management Committee. The block was not an unreservedly first-­class piece of construction, owing to shortage of funds; but it had been designed (for less than the rightful fee) by an eminent cathedral architect, and therefore reflected the very best in contemporary design.

  In addition to her depression about Louise, Griselda now began to suffer from positive loneliness. Although Mr. Tamburlane’s mysterious paper was stated to be issued weekly, he soon made it clear that nothing was likely to come of the quest for Louise for several months. Combined with the obscurity about how the paper in any way forwarded the quest, and Mr. Tam­bur­lane’s incommunicativeness upon matters of detail, this announcement confirmed Griselda’s view that the whole episode was a dismal exercise in whimsicality, conducted at her expense, or possibly a patch of moonshine from the minds of two near-­lunatics. Miss Otter visited Mr. Tamburlane regularly each Friday, but rarely remained closeted with him for so long as on that first occasion. Upon entering and leaving, she continued to favour Griselda with cryptic and prophetic observations: “Next time a title comes your way, Miss de Reptonville, I think you would be most unwise to lose your chance”; or simply “More friends are what you need most at the moment, my dear.”

  In three months of inner misery, Griselda made only a single friend, apart from Mr. Tamburlane, who continued as punctiliously complimentary as on the day she met him. The new friend was Peggy Potter, her neighbour in Greenwood Tree House. Peggy was a broad, well-­built girl with a large bust; a little taller than Griselda, and with a quantity of more or less fair hair hanging to her shoulders. She wore woollen dresses, of which Griselda felt that Louise would have strongly disapproved; and had a reserved air derived, as Griselda soon discovered, from a conviction that she had little in common with her fellow inmates. This circumstance, combined with the fact that, before coming to London, she had passed her entire existence in Bodmin, where she had graduated at University College, made her as a friend for Griselda something of a cul-­de-­sac. None the less, Griselda found her very much better than nobody. Ultimately Griselda realized that inner misery was a positive handicap when seeking to extend a social circle.

  It was the pipes in the passage which brought Peggy and Griselda together. Each apartment was equipped with an electric radiator dependant upon a shilling meter; but outside in the passages were occasional steam coils, installed to guard the cocoanut matting and other decorations from injury by damp. The flow of electricity was so costly that the tenants formed the habit of drying their stockings and underclothes on these pipes, which were kept hardly more than lukewarm. The practice was specifically forbidden in the Rules: but as the Rules in most cases failed to provide for sanctions (the Management Committee felt that small fines, for example, were anachronistic and reminiscent of the evil days before the Truck Act), this particular Rule was obeyed only by those who wore no stockings. The practice was to steal out after eleven o’clock and drape the coils: realistically, the difficulty was the insufficient number of the installations. Often there were grave friction and persisting feuds. Griselda and Peggy became friends upon Peggy suggesting that they sidetrack the general run of inmates by sharing the use and the cost of a single electric heater. This arrangement involved them in constant use of one another’s rooms.

  They began to drink tea together, and Griselda lent Peggy a packet of “Lux.” In less than a week, Peggy suggested that Griselda accompany her to hear some music. It proved to be a recital of songs by Duparc, given by a rather elderly Belgian woman, retired some years previously from the provincial operatic stage of her country. The Wigmore Hall was almost empty, and Griselda was slightly scared by the unaccountable permanent decorations behind the platform; nor were the seats which Peggy and Griselda occupied, either very cosy or very close to the centre of interest: none the less Griselda enjoyed the evening because she was so glad to have a friend to share her enjoyment. During the interval, which was rather long, she gave expression to this feeling by offering to stand Peggy a cup of coffee: but the Wigmore Hall proved not to offer refreshments. Outside, at the end of the recital, a group of excitingly dressed women with collecting boxes and very little English beset the small audience for contributions to some continental charity. Griselda gathered that the charity had been founded to commemorate the recitalist’s wonderful work for the Allies during the World War.

  One thing followed another, and soon Griselda was accompanying Peggy to other entertainments: a production by students at the Rudolf Steiner Hall of a seldom performed Elizabethan tragedy; and a recital at Friends House of works by lesser members of the Bach family, the performers being partly professional and partly amateur. One Sunday afternoon they ambled round the Tate Gallery, where Peggy was much addicted to Mr. Graham Robertson’s Blakes.

  “Have you read that book of his? His reminiscences?”

  “I found him an exhibitionist. He’s not my period, of course.”

  “Shall we go and see the surrealists some time? At the Zwemmer? I’d like to.”

  “Once is enough for surrealism; just like Madame Tussaud. You go, Griselda, and you’ll see what I mean.”

  “But the critics say that the surrealists are the modern equivalent of Blake, and you say you like Blake?”

  “Blake had belief. The surrealists have no belief. Surely that is fundamental?”

  “Have you belief, Peggy?”

  “Not yet. But I am prepared to have.”

  They passed on to some water colours in the basement, with which Peggy was clearly well acquainted, as she discoursed upon them most convincingly and exhaustively, though water colour landscapes were not Griselda’s favourite kind of picture.

  Peggy seemed to live in a general condition of contingency: her prevailing attitude was the provisional. Thus although a permanent civil servant, and apparently well advanced in the service for her years (though remarkably ill paid, Griselda thought, considering her Honours Degree and years of youth devoted to passing difficult examinations), yet Peggy’s attitude to her job was merely, as she put it, “marking time”. Where she aimed to go when her march was resumed, was, however, indefinite. Equally her sojourn at Greenwood Tree House was described by her as a “passage through”; while even her health she referred to, upon Griselda once enquiring about it, as “under observation.” She accumulated almost no possessions, and seemed content to have Griselda as her only friend. There were times when Griselda wondered whether Peggy was not in a state verging upon suspended animation.

  One evening towards the end of June, they were seated in Hyde Park. Peggy was reading “The Listener”; Griselda a book from Mr. Tamburlane’s stock. Peggy suddenly spoke.

  “I’m taking some leave in August.” It was the first time Griselda had heard the military term applied to civil life. “I’m going to Italy. Not the big towns and tourist centres, of course; just some of the smaller places in the south. Right off the beaten track. I try to visit a new country each year. I suppose you wouldn’t come with me?”

  “I can’t afford a holiday yet. Nor am I entitled to one, I think.” It was difficult to imagine Mr. Tamburlane raising an objection; but, oddly enough, it was equally difficult to imagine the job being still there, or even the shop upon return from a holiday. “I’m terribly sorry. Of course I’d have loved to come.” Griselda’s regret was tempered inwardly by a distinct reservation in favour of the big towns and tourist centres;
particularly, she felt, in Italy.

  “I could find the money for both of us, if that’s what it is. You could repay me later. Or not at all, if you couldn’t.”

  “That’s terribly generous. Thank you, Peggy.” Griselda touched her hand, which Peggy slightly withdrew. “But as things are with me, I don’t see how I could ever repay you.”

  “You needn’t. I said that. Only if and when you can.”

  “I couldn’t agree to that.” Griselda knew that she could agree quite easily had she wanted to visit tiny poverty-­stricken Italian villages with Peggy. “But thank you again. It is a very kind idea.”

  “Not particularly. I want you to come with me, Griselda. Do think it over. Believe me I’m quite good at digging out just the places no one else ever gets to.”

  “There are many better people than I am for that sort of holiday.” But Griselda thought with guilt of her fondness for long walks, of how difficult she was to tire, her prima facie suitability for the undertaking. “What about the people you’ve gone with before?”

  “I’ve usually gone alone. But I’d like you to come.”

  Griselda glanced at her: at her big bust, her rather dull hair, her indifferent clothes, her face already drawing on its iron mask of frustration, only to be removed by death.

  “I’d like to come, Peggy. But I mustn’t. I really mustn’t. Please don’t tempt me.”

  “I thought we could have a good time.”

  It occurred to Griselda as possible that Peggy, despite appearances, really cared for her: not in the least as Louise cared for her, and she cared for Louise, but in some other way, not necessarily the less authentic because probably approved by society or because completely unaccompanied by any display of feeling. Griselda was incapable of feeling very much without showing that she felt something; without tendering her affection. It seemed a simpler way than Peggy’s.

  “Next year, perhaps. Where do you plan to go next year?”

  “Finland. I don’t think you’d care for that.”

  Peggy resumed “The Listener”. In the end they went to the Marble Arch Pavilion together, as if nothing had happened.

  Later, while washing stockings in Peggy’s room, Griselda said: “Would you like to borrow ‘Old Calabria’ before you go? Doesn’t it deal with just the part you’re visiting? It’s a book Mr. Tamburlane always has in stock, and I could easily lend it to you for a week or two.”

  “Thank you, Griselda, but I think I’d rather form my own impressions. I don’t know that I’d care to see things through Norman Douglas’s eyes.”

  Griselda began to squeeze out a wet stocking. “Peggy,” she said. “What do you want most in the world?”

  Peggy looked faintly hostile, as in the Park.

  “I don’t think the question has much significance for me,” she replied. “I don’t think I see life in quite those terms.” Then she added, obviously trying to please: “What do you want most in the world?”

  But, contrary to Peggy’s notion, Griselda had neither expected nor desired that the question should be thus lobbed back at her. She was merely trying to enter into a corner of Peggy’s mind; fractionally to explore an outlook which she believed to be as habitual among her neighbours as it was alien to herself. “I want to know about you.”

  “Really I’m remarkably content as I am.”

  “I’m not content as I am.”

  “I know you’re not. And of course I know why you’re not.”

  “Why am I not?”

  “Griselda, we’re not schoolgirls. We don’t have to go into all that at this hour of the night.”

  Her attitude was so impossibly aloof, that Griselda became momentarily filled with a younger than schoolgirlish urge to shock. “What I want from life is ecstasy.”

  “What will you do when you’ve got it?” Peggy had taken off her dress and stood in her knickers and brassière. “I mean after you’ve got it?”

  “I shall reconsider the whole subject,” said Griselda.

  Peggy smiled slightly, relieved that the conversation was apparently being dropped. By way of farewell gesture she said: “If you really want to know, Griselda, I’m not the marrying kind.”

  “I’m not. I rather thought you were.”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “I see.” Not that she did. “Anyway you don’t want to borrow ‘Old Calabria’.”

  “Afterwards, perhaps. If I may?”

  “Of course. If I’m still at the shop.” Griselda gathered together four wet stockings, like bits of ghosts which had been out in the rain. “Good night, Peggy.”

  Peggy’s preparations for bed had advanced no further. She jerked into speech. “Tell me something, Griselda.”

  “Yes.”

  “Is my bust too large?”

  “Of course it isn’t. It’s much better than having too small a bust like me.”

  “Then it is too large?”

  Peggy’s face was white. She was very near tears.

  “It’s larger than most people’s. I wish mine was. It’s a good thing.”

  Peggy was visibly making a great effort. “I sometimes feel self-conscious about it. Not often.”

  Griselda kissed Peggy gently on each breast. Suddenly she felt a hundred years older than Peggy; and oddly enough, glad to be so. “Attractiveness is mainly a matter of thoughts.”

  Peggy had removed her last garments and was putting on her nightdress. “It’s easy for someone as attractive as you to say that. Most men never get as far as a woman’s mind.”

  Griselda recalled Louise’s words about fellow feeling. “I expect not,” she said sadly.

  “I’ve decided to do without them. You can if you try. At least I can. It’s not even very difficult.” Peggy began to brush her teeth.

  “I need someone to love me.”

  “I’m glad to say I don’t. It’s extraordinary how well I do on my own.”

  “I can see there are advantages.”

  “Not that I’m bigoted about it. It’s just what suits me.”

  “I think you’re very wise to do what suits you. But I still think you have a particularly attractive figure. Shall I turn out the light for you?”

  “You’re kind to me, Griselda.” She was climbing into the divan bed.

  “You’re kind to me. Shall I open the window?”

  “Please. Quite wide.”

  “The sky is full of stars.”

  “More rain, I’m afraid. July is often a wet month, though not so wet as August.”

  “Surely it would mean rain if there were no stars?”

  “It depends. Often it means rain either way.”

  “What a pity! Good night, Peggy dear.”

  “Good night, Griselda.”

  Griselda returned to her own room, and, switching on the electric heater, began to dry the two pairs of stockings, to eat chocolate wafers, and to conclude her interesting book.

  During the small hours she was awakened by screams and groans from the next room, and deduced that Peggy must be having a nightmare. She reflected that, as a friend, she should intervene; but before thought had turned to action, she was once more dreamlessly sleeping.

  CHAPTER XIX

  Griselda preferred a light luncheon at Fullers, comparatively dear at the price, to a cheaper and more substantial meal at Lyons or the Express Dairy. Some time after Peggy had invited her to Italy, she was making for Fullers’ shop in Regent Street when she encountered Geoffrey Kynaston. After several days of rain, it had suddenly become humidly hot, and Kynaston was wearing a white shirt, open at the neck, and grey flannel trousers, neither garment being noticeably new, clean, or appealing.

  “Hullo, you,” he said in the most casual manner.

  “Hullo.”

  “Still alive and kicking after the bust-­up?”

  “As you see.”

  “Got some new clothes too. A great improvement, if I may say so.”

  Indeed it could not be said that Griselda was saving any money at all. She wa
s not even attempting to do so.

  “Thank you.”

  “I didn’t grasp that you were that way?”

  “What way?”

  “That way.”

  “I’m not. Or not entirely.”

  “I see. Thank you for clearing my mind. I’m not that way at all. I think I told you.”

  “You did.”

  “In the light of your explanation, I’m glad to see you. More glad, I mean, than had it been, as I supposed, otherwise.”

  “I’m glad.”

  “Perhaps we could start something up?”

  “What?”

  “Light refreshments first, I suppose. To judge by your air of purpose. Can you pay for two?”

  “With difficulty.”

  “If you can do it all, you’re better placed than I am. Let’s go.” There was a second’s pause, and he added: “You don’t mind do you? I did feed you at Hodley.”

  “It’s quite all right,” said Griselda. “Come on.” They advanced up the hot busy pavement.

  “You don’t work, if I remember? I suppose you have an allowance?”

  “No.”

  “Not a job after all?”

  “Why not?”

  “How grimly disillusioning.”

  “I’m sorry. How’s dancing?”

  “Packed up. What did you suppose?”

  “It never occurred to me.”

  “It was on its last legs when you arrived. You could see the state of business for yourself.”

  “I’m sorry. What about poetry?”

  “Same as before.”

  “That was better than nothing.”

  “Very little.”

  They reached and entered Fullers. Kynaston’s costume was not precisely what the management was used to at that particular branch.

  “What’ll you have?” enquired Griselda, putting forward the menu.

  “Just a large fruit salad,” said Kynaston, without looking at it. “And a cup of Ovaltine or something like that.” Seated opposite him, Griselda observed that he seemed really emaciated.

  “Wouldn’t you care for something more solid?”

  “Not in this heat.”