by Bill James
‘You’ve always had impulses, Syb. They made you wonderfully unpredictable and exciting.’
‘Yes, well . . . history. What’s going on, Manse?’ Decorators were preparing to paper the stairwell walls, and the stair carpet had been removed.
‘I thought the place could do with some freshening up,’ Shale said. They went into the drawing room.
‘Ah, the Arthur Hughes and the Edward Prentises,’ she said. ‘You’re very faithful.’
‘They deserve it,’ he said.
‘Yes, they do, they do,’ she replied. ‘But you could sell and restock on the profits. If you’re into freshening up the house.’
‘I’d miss them. These particular ones.’ Syb did not understand about collectors, their love for certain special items. She thought deals. ‘Tea or a drink?’ he asked.
‘A drink.’
‘Good.’ He mixed a couple of gin and tonics and went into the kitchen for ice and sliced a lemon.. ‘Our home.’ He’d noticed that. And then the jealousy and suspicion about the locks. It all meant something? She wanted to come back permanently to the rectory and him, did she? This visit was her way of testing how she might feel if that happened. She had boldness, or call it cheek. What if her key had worked and he was here with Carmel or Lowri or Patricia? Lowri would do it anywhere. They might of been on the rug in front of the Arthur Hughes. That had happened with her occasionally. Manse did not regard it as disrespect to art. This was a totally natural act and many great paintings focused on Nature. Think of Van Gogh and the cornfield.
Manse still could not be sure how he would feel if she proposed coming back for keeps. Would he like to settle for someone permanent again? Did he still love her enough? Definitely it hit him very, very bad when she left. He would say wounded. Plus it had to be wrong for a rectory wife to go scampering off with another man to a place like Wales. Perhaps he owed it to the children to give them a returned mother, who would bring a more settled flow to their lives. Yes, he did owe it. Any of them marriage counsellors etcetera would tell him that. Her nice words about the paintings seemed meant to woo him. She didn’t call the girl models his ‘wank women’ no longer and stand in front of the pictures and look like she was going to spit. Manse enjoyed getting wooed, and enjoyed feeling the Pre-Raphaelites had won her over, even if it was only a bloody ploy. She said ‘damn’ a lot but that would be show.
He returned with the ice. Sybil had remained standing near the bigger Edward Prentis, though not looking at it but staring around the room. ‘I don’t know where to sit,’ she said.
‘You mean for the best view of the pictures? It is a dilemma,’ Manse replied considerately.
‘No, I don’t damn well want to sit where one of them has sat.’
Manse thought this rectory was like full of people from the past. He himself wondered about how it would of been when clergymen lived here, mulling over the Old Testament and making a list of church wardens. And, not so far back in the past, he remembered that body on the stairs. Now, Sybil could imagine Lowri or Patricia or Carmel in one of the drawing-room chairs and wanted to shun that, whichever it might be. This would not be a hygiene thing. A pride thing, a wife thing. She had to be different from them, even if she did live with someone else now.
Probably she guessed that if she sat in the big armchair near the Hughes, for example, Manse would be eyeing her and thinking, Last time I looked over at that big armchair when a woman was in it, it was Patricia, or Carmel or Lowri. Today, it’s Syb. Well, swings and roundabouts. Maybe she’d wonder if he was comparing her legs with Lowri’s or Patricia’s or Carmel’s, or all three’s. Women had their worries. Often they did not add up to much at all, but Manse tried to regard them seriously.
‘Here’s one I always sit in,’ he said, pointing to another of the chairs. ‘Take that, will you, Syb?’ On the whole, Manse considered this not a bad solution to a pretty tough problem. Tact – he always felt he had quite a bucketful of that. Offering this chair was like putting her in the main seat, the master seat. Although she came back unexpected and cool out of nowhere from closeness with some other man she still got this spot. Quite a few these days supported equality of the sexes, yes, but he’d bet not many men would be willing to listen without no violence at all to a woman bleating on about not putting her damn arse on some cushion because another woman’s, or other women’s, damn arse or arses had been there, and then offer her instead the room’s best perch, his own. He spooned ice and a lemon slice gently into her drink. She sat in his chair. He did not mind. For some men it would be like having their balls cut off to see a woman in the chief place. But Manse would regard that as ignorant. Women certainly had a right to a reasonable chair, this being the new millennium, for God’s sake.
‘The stair carpet wasn’t old, was it?’ she said.
‘It had become very 1990s, I thought.’
‘What’s that mean?’
‘Yes, very 1990s,’ he said, the new millennium being in his mind and probably good, although, of course, 9/11 was in the new millennium, so you never knew what might come.
‘Where is it?’
‘The stuff that was taken up?’ he said.
‘Yes, what did you do with it?’
‘Burned.’
‘Oh, Manse! Many people would be glad of a carpet of that quality, even a bit worn. Hotel standard.’
‘I don’t like the idea.’
‘What?’ Sybil replied.
‘Other people walking over carpet that used to be in my family’s home. Does that sound sentimental? I’m sorry.’
‘And the new carpet – have you chosen it?’
‘Oh, yes, to be put down when the decorating’s finished.’
‘Who helped?’
‘Helped what?’
‘Who helped you choose?’
He felt like saying that Chandor or Chandor’s people didn’t exactly help him choose but made damn sure he did choose, and fucking fast. ‘I picked it myself.’
‘No advice from Carmel or Lowri or Patricia?’
‘I decided something not too vivid, yet with a colour theme that impressed,’ Shale replied. ‘The same sort of . . . well . . . mood as the Pre-Raphaelites.’
‘Do you know what I thought, Manse, when I failed to get in?’
‘It would be confusing, I can see that,’ he replied.
‘I thought, he’s changed the bloody locks so I can’t just roll up and catch him screwing one of those cohabit dames on the rug in front of the splendid Arthur Hughes,’ Sybil said, ‘or more than one.’ It angered him that she could add those last few words. His rule about one woman at a time in his home had always been totally firm. He felt insulted. Manse tried to remember whether he’d ever screwed Sybil on the rug in front of the splendid Arthur Hughes. If not, she must be second-sighted to some extent, though he’d never noticed that before. He had for definite bought the Hughes before she left him, or she would not of referred to his ‘wank women’. Shale thought it was the kind of generous thing he might of done at some time – screwed Sybil on the rug in front of the Arthur Hughes – so as to show her that regardless of the glorious Pre-Raphaelite models he still wanted her. But, if he had took the trouble to bang her there, it did not do the trick, did it, because she still left him for that greengrocer or psychiatrist, whatshisname?
‘It would of been an even more lovely surprise, to meet you inside the rectory, Syb – like suppose your key still worked and you’d come in and found me in my den,’ Manse said. ‘Just the way things used to be.’
‘I wonder if you really want that, Mansel.’
Well, yes, he did wonder himself, and felt ashamed. There was quite an area of Manse that believed a husband should want to see his wife around the house, even a wife who bolted, and particularly in a rectory where the family should surely be a true solid example. He considered the behaviour by Chandor and his people had been a one-off – or a two-off, if you counted bringing the art back, taking the body and trying to spruce up the place – ye
s, a one-off or a two-off, so a wife in this house probably wouldn’t never come across anything shocking like that in the future. Probably, Carmel or Lowri or Patricia wouldn’t, either, if he resumed them, instead of Syb, but it seemed more important for a wife not to have to put up with that sort of trouble, he didn’t know why. When women took part in their wedding ceremony and made the promises, they would not expect their home to get a deado left on the stairs and all the art cleared.
Shale thought she looked excellent today and at Severalponds, no greying yet – or terrific dye – her skin youngish, eyes dark, full of fight, yet also friendly, her legs as good as Carmel’s and better than Lowri’s and Patricia’s. He didn’t think she seemed content, but he would not expect that, being over there in Wales with someone. Well, she would not of turned up now if she was content there, would she? Did him over there know she’d come?
Manse regarded as definitely possible a rug screw in front of the Hughes today, although decorators worked on the stairwell and now and then went into the kitchen to make tea. They had no need to come into the drawing room. Manse did not want dungarees and that sort of thing in the drawing room, anyway, regardless of whether he was screwing Syb on the rug. Shale would never regard himself as snobby, but he believed in decorum. Obviously an artist, when he worked on a picture, might wear dungarees, because of the splatter. But art hanging in the drawing room of an ex-rectory needed respect.
‘Which one wouldn’t leave, Manse?’
‘They all get attached to the place, you know. It’s understandable, maybe – the conservatory and high ceilings.’
‘I damn well don’t like it.’
‘No. Awkward. Unpleasant.’
‘Proprietorial. A woman who carries on like that shows she believes she has entitlements.’
Manse said: ‘I hate being forced into measures. The locks. Against the grain. And yet what else?’
‘Her clothes and so on – did you have to put them outside?’
‘Unpleasant.’
‘And the children?’
‘What, Syb?’
‘Do they become fond of these people or, say, of one of them more than the others? These are still my damn children, you know. Oh, yes. These women, if they’ve captured the children by cleverness, subtlety, deviousness, well, they’ve captured you as well, haven’t they?’
Increasingly it seemed to Manse that only by making love to her in here could he hope to ease her bad anxieties and jealousies and help her cut down on the ‘damns’. Women lived for these glowing little signs. If a woman drove here from Wales, this showed a true itch. And Mansel felt the start of a throb come on as he watched Syb there, very solemn and bullyboy in his personal chair. No, that was wrong – ‘bullyboy’ – not just because it should be bully girl, but because he could tell that, really, she looked for love and longed to give love. Ivor didn’t rate no longer? He found he could think the name now because he must be a failure instead of a menace. Kidology – that’s all the dim bits of anger in Syb added up to. Her pride would not let her act sweet, not yet. ‘It’s a sort of “welcome home” message,’ he said.
‘What is?’
‘The redecoration and new stair carpet.’
‘Who for – this welcome home?’ she said.
‘Have a guess, Syb.’
‘Well, which is due on rotation here – Patricia, Lowri or Carmel? But you’ve kicked one of them out and I imagine won’t let her back in. So, you’re down to two, or have you recruited a damn replacement?’
Manse could see, of course, that she knew he did not mean one of them girls. He would not be redecorating and getting new stair carpet for a sleep-with lodger. And if it was for one of them he would never say so to Syb because he’d realize it must hurt. He could feel the hope and satisfaction in her now as he smiled to show he did not swallow her bluff – the way she pretended that she thought the only women he cared for were Lowri, Carmel and Patricia, or two of them because one had turned difficult. Oh, yes, she had undoubted picked up he meant her, Syb, when he spoke about them refurbishments and who they was in honour of.
Naturally, she could not pick up they was not really to do with any woman – not Sybil, nor Lowri nor Patricia nor Carmel – but only with Chandor and his sodding staff, and the disgusting mess they made of an historical rectory. Manse knew that rectories had never been blessed, the way a church building was, but rectories required decent behaviour all the same. He thought he would ask the kids not to mention the sauce story and especially not their blood story about the staining. They would probably agree to play along with that, and he’d give them a couple of twenties to make sure, with a promise of another each if they stuck to it.
‘Oh, Mansel, you’re saying the new look on the stairs is for me?’ Sybil said. ‘For me?’
‘They’re only at the scraping-off stage, but I can show you the wallpaper sample. And I do think you’ll like the carpet.’ In fact, as he watched her, he decided her legs were better than Carmel’s, and so better than all the girls’ legs. But what did it mean, good legs in a woman? Manse faced up very square to this poser now, and thought the legs should be rounded but slim, if possible long, and clearly very ready to move apart for the right man at the right time, disclosing that fine invitation-only treat and worthy of it. This was the chief point, in Manse’s opinion – the legs should be worthy of it. Where legs became thighs, they began to reach their full duty, in his opinion. Thighs should have some bulk, yes, but not too much, just so they could offer a frame and protection. Women’s thighs was tricky. If they was too fat you wondered if you would ever find anything, through overhang. If they was skinny, they made you feel coarse and brutal getting between them. Sometimes, he wished he didn’t have this need to ponder matters but instead could just go ahead like so many men probably did.
Sybil said: ‘A welcome home – how could it be a welcome home when you don’t know whether . . . what I mean, Manse, is I live somewhere else? A welcome? It doesn’t make sense. You could not even know I’d ever be inside the rectory again.’
‘ “Make sense”? I think it made sense because . . . well, because I could sense something, Syb.’
‘Sense what?’
‘At Severalponds. I could spot a wish. I could spot regret. This is not boasting.’
‘It’s a settled, adequate thing I’ve got with Ivor.’
So, Manse crossed the room and bent down alongside what would usually of been his own chair by tradition. She turned her head away, which he reckoned was part of that game she had to go on with, because of dignity. He put a hand gently on her cheek and pushed her head around towards him. He kissed her on the lips. She was ready for that, keen for that, Manse could tell. He did not mind the rigmarole, the suggestion that she had not arrived here for this. That was a delicacy thing, and he approved of some delicacy in women. For instance, Manse hated to hear a woman belch although some did these days as a sign of equality and heartiness, and thoroughly enjoying their grub in a healthy style. Without taking her lips from his, she stood, so she could put her arms around him properly and get her body hard against his. When the kiss ended he said: ‘That was such an idea of yours, Syb.’
‘What?’
‘On the rug in front of the Hughes.’ He wondered if he should say ‘On the rug again in front of the Hughes,’ in case they had done it there before, but decided this would be dangerous, because if they had not done it there before, Sybil would think he was mixing her up with one of the girls, or more than one, and this would be deadly injurious. Holding each other they stepped over towards the rug. It had black, silver and yellow leaf-like patterns. Afghan. He sat down first and then she lowered herself beside him. He considered it important to be first so that she could see his excitement and would not have to blame herself for being pushy when she set up the idea of having it off beneath the Hughes, or thinking she set up the idea of having it off beneath the Hughes.
And he really was excited and eager. That throb stuck with him, the way a throb
ought to, and she let the back of her hand brush sort of accidentally across his zip to check it was there and had not gone into malfunction because of her and Ivor. ‘You could give it more,’ he said.
‘More what?’
‘Knuckles.’
‘Oh, that,’ she said, and made the sweep with the back of her hand again, then turned it the other way so she could take a proper, meaningful hold on him through his trousers and pants. One of his own hands was up her skirt, giving a happy rub to those spot-on thighs and dawdling over the triangle of thong pouch. Manse did not care about the laid-down procedures of foreplay, starting high and progressing down, like through an agenda. He believed in priorities and today’s priority was that tufted, tucked-away area, but not tucked away from him. He eased the bit of silken cloth to the side and tenderly slipped two fingers into her enthusiasm. She smiled, and her eyes had no fight in them now, only hormone response. Could women turn that on, or was it just Nature, like the juice? In other words, would Ivor get it sometimes in Wales? Often?
The screech sounds of the wall work on the stairs did not bother Manse, nor the occasional talk between the men and some whistling – quite old tunes, mostly, like ‘It’s Not Unusual’ and ‘Yellow Submarine’. These noises let him know things went ahead all right and they would not be coming to him with queries. Luckily, he’d got the locksmith to take care of internal security and when he stood to take his clothes off he went to the end of the drawing room and turned the new key. Vertical slat blinds covered the windows and prevented any spying from outside.
Sybil did not undress. That was normal. Always when they used to make love somewhere other than in bed she liked Manse to strip her. He had found quite often that tough, domineering women wanted things to go this way during rough sex. They seemed to like switching off all the control and trouble-making they usually went for and become offerings to be unwrapped, like weak and past resistance. Patricia was the same and Cordelia Matin-Domo, who had a lot of personality and drive and often went on street protest marches, sometimes with her husband, the famous ITV man, sometimes not, depending which cause. She liked blouse buttons not just to be undone by Manse but made to pop off through clawing. God knows how she explained the wrecked garment when she got home.