Dead Romantic

by Simon Brett

  ‘But no, Paul, the young are idealists. They must be. For example, I’m sure all of your friends are anti-war.’

  ‘Wouldn’t say so. Most of them got really excited when the Falklands thing was on. Couldn’t wait to get out there and bash a few Argies.’

  ‘Well, maybe, but nuclear war . . . I mean most of them must want the bomb banned.’

  Again he didn’t seem convinced. ‘No, I think most of them reckon there’s not a lot you can do about it. It’s going to happen. We’re all going to be blown to blazes in a few years, so you may as well get what you can out of life while you’re still around.’

  Madeleine began to feel that maybe she wasn’t getting her message across. ‘But what about Human Rights? I mean democracy. You mentioned the Falklands. Well, I didn’t actually approve of what went on then, but it could be seen as a blow for freedom against a repressive regime. Exactly the sort of thing Shelley was recommending in his ‘Ode to Liberty’. I mean, when he writes. . .’ She dropped into her recitation voice.

  ‘Oh, that the free would stamp the impious name

  Of KING into the dust! or write it there,

  So that this blot upon the page of fame

  Were as a serpent’s path, which the light air

  Erases, and the flat sands close behind!’

  She paused impressively, but Paul still didn’t look impressed, so she changed tack. ‘What about Shelley’s atheism then? Surely that’s something that strikes a chord with your generation?’

  ‘Not really,’ said Paul. ‘Not particularly. I mean, nobody I know believes in God anyway, so it’s not really a very big deal.’ He did not feel that he was being rude to Madeleine; he thought he was showing his character, fencing with her as an intellectual equal.

  ‘His belief in Free Love then? Now that really did put him ahead of his time. He had all the ideas of Open Marriage and what-have-you long before they were fashionable. Love was the dominant force for him. You get it stated in ‘Prometheus Unbound’. He writes “and yet I feel most vain all hopes but love.” Surely that must have some appeal to the young. I mean, the young are the love generation.’

  Paul looked at her in puzzlement, and even to Madeleine came an inkling that what she was saying might perhaps be out of date, that she was transferring her own youth on to his. ‘Well, maybe not,’ she conceded briskly, retreating.

  ‘I don’t think many of the people I know of my age are that hooked on love,’ Paul began slowly. Then, summoning courage, he said, ‘I think love’s very important. It’s important to me. In fact, it’s probably the most important thing in the world for me.’

  Madeleine smiled, unaware of the direction in which his remarks were leading. It was nice, she thought, to hear such a charming sentiment from him. His reactions to Shelley had sounded a bit negative and it was encouraging to know that he didn’t really share the depressing nihilism which seemed to have taken over young people in the years since she had been one of them.

  ‘What I really mean’, Paul picked his way gingerly onwards, ‘is that being with someone I love is the only thing that keeps me going. I really think I’d crack up if I didn’t go on seeing the person I love.’

  He hesitated, and, as had happened once before, his declaration was averted by the door’s opening.

  This time it was not Bernard who came in, but Julian Garrett’s secretary, Stella Franklin.

  ‘Oh, Madeleine, sorry to interrupt.’ She condescended a little smile to Paul and held out a letter. ‘It’s just that I wasn’t sure whether or not you’d be dropping into the office this morning and this was left for you. Didn’t want you to miss it.’

  Madeleine took the envelope and said in a politely dismissive tone, ‘Oh, thank you, Stella.’

  But Mrs Franklin lingered. ‘It’s from Bernard. He was hoping to hand it over, but Julian had to send him out to a group of Italians who were booked into one of the other schools and had their class cancelled.’

  ‘Ah.’ Madeleine managed to put the minimum of interest into the monosyllable, but still it didn’t seem enough to dismiss Mrs Franklin.

  ‘Always happy to be the messenger,’ the older woman said, with a hint of coquetry which didn’t suit her.

  ‘It’s a booklist on Tennyson that Bernard promised to look out for me,’ said Madeleine frostily.

  This had the desired effect. It even made Mrs Franklin look slightly discomfited, which was a rare sight. She also appeared to believe what Madeleine said and her face showed the dismantling of the cosy fantasy she had been building up.

  ‘Ah, yes. Yes, of course,’ she said, and left the room.

  ‘Now, where were we?’ asked Madeleine, her concentration broken.

  ‘We were talking about love,’ said Paul. Then, losing his nerve, ‘Shelley and love.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ she said, and then repeated the word more firmly. ‘Yes.’ But the distraction of the letter was too great. ‘Excuse me a moment,’ she said, as she ran her finger along the inside of the envelope.

  She half-pulled the contents out, then, seeing their nature, pushed them back into the envelope, which she shoved into her handbag, quickly. But not quickly enough. Paul had had time to see the colours of a reproduction of a painting. The envelope contained a greetings card. It seemed an unlikely way of presenting a booklist.

  ‘As I thought,’ Madeleine said, with a businesslike exhalation of air. ‘Now, Shelley . . . Shelley and love, that’s where we were, isn’t it?’

  Paul couldn’t answer. Depression had descended on him like a dark hood. He knew he had been fooling himself. He had entertained the pleasing fantasy of Madeleine and himself and had managed to shut out the fact of Bernard’s existence. But the card had removed that illusion. Madeleine’s reaction, her sudden decision not to read it left him in no doubt that it was a love-letter. Bernard Hopkins possessed Madeleine just as completely as Tony Ashton possessed Sharon. Once again Paul was the butt, aced out, a laughing stock. Thank God he hadn’t got further in his declaration, hadn’t made a complete fool of himself by exposing his love.

  Madeleine looked at him, and his face must have reflected the shift of his mood, because she asked, ‘What’s the matter?’

  He shook his head. He couldn’t tell her the truth. ‘I don’t know. Everything.’

  Her voice was gentle and, as he half-hoped, half-feared she might, she leant towards him. ‘Is it still girl trouble, Paul?’

  He gave his head a little shake and found, to his shame and despair, that he was crying. He looked away, but she had seen the tears.

  ‘Oh, Paul, Paul, you mustn’t take things so to heart.’ Once again Madeleine felt strong, filled with maternal power. She could help this boy. ‘What’s wrong? What has Sharon done to get you like this? Has she given you the brush-off?’

  ‘No, it’s not Sharon. It’s nothing to do with her.’ And yet it was, partly. Sharon’s going off with Tony, Sharon’s going to bed with Tony, was part of the confusion. But it was more than that, it was all the diverse moods and personalities inside him, the different people he could be at different times, the impossibility of reconciling them into one person, that seemed to be destroying him.

  ‘Then is there something wrong at home?’ asked Madeleine.

  That at least gave him a safe, acceptable answer. ‘It’s my mother,’ he said brokenly, although he knew it wasn’t really. ‘She’s in hospital. They’re doing tests. She’s been in for a week now.’

  ‘You poor boy.’ Once again, as he had feared she might, Madeleine took his hand. He turned slightly away. ‘She’ll be all right, Paul. I’m sure she’ll be all right. Do you know what the tests are for?’

  He shook his head, feeling hypocritical. She was giving him sympathy for his mother’s illness and it seemed to him that he hardly thought about his mother.

  ‘You mustn’t let yourself get depressed about it, Paul.’

  He snorted a bitter laugh. ‘Easy to say.’

  ‘Do you get very depressed?’

 
Still not looking at her, not trusting himself so close, he mumbled, ‘I suppose that’s a good word to describe it.’ But the word didn’t seem adequate for the violent seesawing moods that possessed him.

  ‘And what do you think when you’re depressed?’ Madeleine persisted.

  ‘I don’t know. Just that it all seems hopeless. That I don’t have any future. That there’s no point in going on.’

  ‘You mustn’t think that.’ Madeleine’s second hand came to enclose his. He turned even further away and, as he did so, his pullover rode up to show the end of the sheath-knife on his belt.

  ‘What’s that?’ asked Madeleine in alarm.

  He turned to look. ‘That? Oh. Just a knife.’

  ‘Why do you carry a knife?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘You must know.’

  ‘Well, yes, perhaps. I suppose I just carry it in case I need it.’

  ‘Why should you need it?’

  He shrugged and looked away again. Madeleine let go of his hands and sat upright in her seat. ‘Give it to me, Paul.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Give me the knife.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You’re in a disturbed state. I don’t think you should be carrying a knife. Besides,’ she continued, improvising, ‘it’s a rule in this school that none of the students should carry offensive weapons. Come on, give it to me.’

  Wordlessly, in a numb, almost hypnotic state, Paul unbuckled his belt, slipped the sheath-knife off it, and passed the weapon over to Madeleine.

  ‘Thank you.’ She rose to her feet. ‘I’m afraid I’m going to have to hand this over to Mr Garrett.’

  She left the room.

  ‘Just give it back to him,’ said Julian Garrett.

  ‘I can’t do that.’

  ‘Why not? It’s his.’

  ‘But, Julian, you can’t have students walking into the school with weapons like this.’

  ‘Who can be hurt? There are hardly any other students around at the moment.’

  ‘But it’s the principle.’

  ‘This isn’t a comprehensive. The boy’s eighteen. If he wants to carry a knife, and so long as he doesn’t stab anyone with it, I don’t see why we should bother to object.’

  ‘I’m not so worried about him stabbing someone else. I’m worried about him doing himself an injury.’

  ‘Why should he?’

  ‘He’s a very confused young man. Very depressed. He was virtually talking about suicide a few moments ago.’ Julian Garrett sighed, shook his head, and picked a hair off his elegantly pin-striped sleeve. ‘Madeleine, I don’t usually have to say this to you. Garrettway is not a full residential school. All we have to do is teach the students what they pay for. We’re not responsible for their personal problems. There’s no need for us to get involved.’

  ‘Sometimes you have to get involved, Julian.’

  ‘Not in my experience,’ said her employer, with a sardonic smile.

  Madeleine nodded sharply and went out of the room. The encounter had left them both feeling good. Madeleine had dramatised herself into a crusader, fighting nobly for the rights and welfare of her pupils against an unfeeling management. And Julian had got his customary satisfaction from another responsibility evaded.

  He thought idly of Madeleine after she had gone. She had been looking good that morning, the flush of annoyance heightening the colour of her cheeks, throwing into relief, as ever, the red-gold hair. Julian wondered, not for the first time, why he, with his strong appetite for women, had never fancied her. Partly, he knew, it was circumstance. She was too close to him, too ever-present, and he always took care that his exit-route should be clear before starting any relationship.

  But it wasn’t just that.

  For a full minute after Madeleine had left the room, Paul resisted the temptation, but he knew he would succumb sooner or later, and it would be safer to succumb sooner.

  He reached into her handbag and extracted the envelope. He slid the card out. The picture was a reproduction of Holman Hunt’s Claudio and Isabella, but Paul did not recognise it. He did not know that it illustrated the moment from Measure for Measure when Claudio tries to persuade his sister to sacrifice her virginity and save his life. Nor, to be fair, had the card’s sender thought of that particular significance when he chose it. So far as Bernard Hopkins was concerned, he knew that Madeleine liked the Pre- Raphaelites and he had thought the card romantic.

  The message inside, which Paul read, Bernard had also thought romantic.

  MADELEINE – YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED TO SPEND THE WEEKEND OF 2ND TO 4TH NOVEMBER AT WINTER JASMINE COTTAGE, SHORTON, NR PULBOROUGH, WEST SUSSEX. RSVP.

  Paul only opened the card long enough to read the words before he put it back into its envelope and returned it to Madeleine’s handbag.

  But he had had time to memorise the address.

  Madeleine did not want to give the knife back to Paul. She was mildly worried that he might do himself some injury with it, but, more than that, she didn’t want the drama of her confiscation to end in bathos. So she put it in the bottom of her brief-case which hung on a hook with her coat outside the office.

  Chapter 15

  ‘Oh, thank goodness it’s you.’

  Bernard recognised the voice at the other end as soon as he picked up the phone. ‘Madeleine. Why shouldn’t it be me?’

  ‘I was afraid your wife might answer. I suppose I’d just have rung off if she had.’

  ‘You needn’t worry. I always answer the phone.’

  ‘You’re more mobile, I suppose, than she is.’

  Bernard neither confirmed nor denied this. ‘Just assume that you’re safe to ring me.’

  ‘And she can’t hear your end of the conversation?’

  ‘The telephone’s in my study.’

  Madeleine sighed with relief. ‘It’s amazing how quickly one slips into the usages of duplicity. Secret phone-calls, secret messages.’

  ‘Yes.’ Bernard did not appear to wish to pursue this topic. He sounded expectant, waiting for something from her.

  ‘I rang,’ said Madeleine slowly, ‘in response to your invitation.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Being a nicely brought-up lady, I know that one should reply to invitations promptly. I know it should really be done by letter, but I wasn’t sure who picked up the post in your house.’

  ‘I do that too.’

  ‘I wasn’t to know that. So, anyway, the invitation. . .’ She let the silence spread for a moment before continuing. ‘Now, let me get the form of words right.’ She spoke as if quoting an official document. ‘Madeleine Severn has much pleasure in accepting Bernard Hopkins’ kind invitation to Winter Jasmine Cottage for the weekend of the 2nd to the 4th of November.’

  ‘Oh. Good.’ Bernard could not disguise the relief in his voice. ‘I’m very glad to hear that.’

  ‘No, I’ll look forward to it. Winter Jasmine Cottage – it sounds beautiful.’

  ‘It is. I’ve been to have a look.’

  ‘I have visions of a magic place, beams, thatched roof, surrounded by the yellow blooms of winter jasmine.’

  ‘I can do you the beams and the thatched roof all right, Madeleine. I’m afraid the winter jasmine isn’t out yet. Too early for it.’

  ‘Oh, well. Can’t have everything. I’m sure it’ll still be lovely.’

  ‘Yes. I hope so,’ he said gently, but with a note of seriousness.

  ‘Thank you for making all the arrangements, Bernard. Is there anything I can do to help?’

  ‘Well, I suppose we ought to think about food.’

  ‘Leave that to me. I’ll work out menus for the whole weekend.’

  ‘Thank you. I’ll organise some wine.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Oh, the owner said, um. . .’ Bernard was suddenly embarrassed, ‘there aren’t any sheets in the cottage.’

  ‘I’ll bring some.’

  ‘Well, I can if –’

  �
�I’ll do it.’

  Bernard let out a little, nervous laugh. ‘It was really quite easy. It’s amazing how easily things can be done if you set your mind to it.’

  ‘Yes.’ Then, with a hint of reproof, Madeleine said, ‘We must be discreet, Bernard.”

  ‘I know.’

  ‘I mean you shouldn’t really have given that card to Stella Franklin. You know what a gossip she is.’

  ‘Yes, I know. It was daft. It’s just that I was so convinced I’d see you at the Garrettway, I had the card all ready to slip to you discreetly, and then I was suddenly sent off to deal with these Italians. And I just wanted you to have it as soon as possible. I couldn’t wait. I didn’t give it to Stella, anyway. I just put it in your pigeon-hole.’

  ‘And she took it upon herself to make it a personal delivery.’

  ‘She must have done. Do you think she suspects what’s going on, Madeleine?’

  ‘I think I managed to put her off the scent this time. But we must be careful. I couldn’t bear the thought of this getting back to your wife.’

  ‘No. No.’ Bernard sounded subdued for the rest of the conversation, and after the call had ended he sat for some time in troubled contemplation. Madeleine’s mention of his wife had brought home to him the reality of what he was doing, and he felt guilt for his duplicity.

  Why, Madeleine wondered again as she looked at her niece over the health-food restaurant table, did Laura do her hair like that? Surely no one could imagine that the shaved nape and the flopping blonded forelock was attractive. It might be fashionable, but people ought to be able to recognise when a fashion was ugly.

  Madeleine smoothed down her shaggy loam-coloured pullover, her fingers lightly caressing the stomach into which a nut rissole and yoghurt with honey had just disappeared. ‘Laura,’ she said, ‘I’ve been thinking about what you asked me when we met last week.’

  ‘Yes?’ The girl’s voice was tense, very dependent on the reaction, so Madeleine did not hurry too much in replying.

  ‘I still don’t like the idea of deceiving Aggie. . .’

  Laura looked downcast and petulant.

  ‘On the other hand, as you know, I’ve always believed in the importance of love, and I think there are times when one must put love above other considerations.’