Sextet

by Sally Beauman

  Lindsay digested this information. She had her pride.

  ‘Markov,’ she said firmly. ‘I have no intention of going to this party.’

  ‘You’re intrigued; admit you’re intrigued. Lulu’s hooked you. I knew she would.’

  ‘The hell she has. Lulu? That has to be the silliest name I’ve heard in years…’

  ‘She used to be called Pandora…’

  ‘That doesn’t make it better, it makes it worse. Markov, I don’t go to this kind of party on principle. Life’s too short.’

  This remark, as Lindsay instantly realized, was a mistake. A smile curled around Markov’s lips. He finished his post-lunch coffee, then made his conversational pounce.

  ‘Do you want to change your life, or not?’ he began. ‘Because I seem to remember, honeychild, that last month, or like the month before that, you said—’

  ‘I can remember what I said.’

  Lindsay hastily rose to her feet. She edged across to the window and looked down at her familiar London street. Leaves whirled in an autumnal wind; the sun shone; the weather had an optimistic look. Backing away from the window, she thumped a cushion or two into place, tidied up the already tidy pile of Sunday newspapers, surveyed the detritus of the lunch table, fetched the coffee pot, and poured herself another cup of coffee she would not drink.

  She had hoped that one of these aimless activities might deflect Markov; none did. With buzz-saw determination, he stuck to the point.

  ‘Age was mentioned,’ he was continuing, still with that maddening smile on his face. ‘Career was mentioned. Domicile was mentioned. I suspect the term “empty-nest syndrome” came up…’

  Lindsay gave a groan. One of Markov’s least pleasant traits was his perfect recall of past conversations. Could she actually have used that trite phrase ‘empty nest’? Surely she had not sunk as low as ‘syndrome’?

  ‘I was drunk,’ she said. ‘If said that, which I doubt, I must have been drunk. It doesn’t count.’

  ‘Bad news, sweetheart. You were stone cold sober…’ Markov paused. ‘Angry, though. Fierce. You positively trembled with resolution. I was moved, Lindy. I was impressed…’

  ‘Will you stop this?’

  ‘“I am sick of being a fashion editor”—that’s what you said. “I am sick of the fashion world.” You were going to talk to that editor of yours. Have you talked to that editor of yours?’

  ‘What, Max? No, not yet.’

  ‘Fresh woods and pastures new—you quoted that.’

  Markov gave a sigh that was very nearly as theatrical as his usual mode of speech. ‘Darling, you were having lunch with some publisher man. A contract was being dangled. This publisher man—a very big wheel—wanted a book on Coco Chanel. You, Lindy, were going to write that book. It was going to be definitive. It was going to make you poor, but never mind that. Has this lunch with the big cheese of British publishing actually happened?’

  ‘No, I postponed it. I need time to think.’

  ‘And then there was the real-estate agent…’ The buzz-saw hit a higher pitch. ‘This guy had two firm potential buyers for this apartment. He was promising a bidding war. He pointed out that this is now a highly desirable area of London, so if you sold, you’d make a profit. Not a large profit, I admit, but just enough to buy, or rent, a small hovel somewhere outside London, in the sticks. In this hovel, you, Lindy, were going to commune with nature. A dog was mentioned, and a cat. Ducks featured, as, I’m afraid, did chickens…’

  ‘I never mentioned chickens.’

  ‘Oh yes, you did—at length. Lindy, I can see this hovel now; it had a wood fire, patchwork quilts. In it, serene, scholarly and alone, you wrote your book…’

  ‘So? It was just an idea.’

  ‘It was never-never land, Lindy. Face facts.’

  ‘I’ve had a few set-backs, that’s all. That estate agent was fired. I haven’t had time to look at any hovels yet, but I’m going to. I…’

  ‘And when you described this idyll, Lindy, was I unkind? No, I was not; I was encouraging, patient. And why? Because I knew the real reason behind this sudden desire to up sticks and change your life…’

  ‘Will you stop this? Markov, that’s enough…’

  Lindsay sank her head in her hands. She was beginning to regret, deeply regret, having asked Markov and his lover Jippy to Sunday lunch. She had done so partly because she was fond of them both, partly because they happened to be in London, and mainly because Sunday, that family day, was now the hardest, the loneliest, the most interminable day of the week.

  With a sigh, she raised her head and inspected her pleasant and familiar sitting-room. This apartment had been her home for eighteen years; formerly, it had been occupied by Lindsay, her son Tom, and her difficult mother, Louise. Now difficult Louise, astonishingly, had remarried and moved out; Tom was in his second year reading Modern History at Oxford. Thanks to their absence, the room was depressingly tidy. Markov and his friend Jippy, who was sitting beside him, but remaining silent as always, would soon be leaving; then the apartment would also be depressingly quiet. Lindsay feared this.

  Even that quietness, however, might be preferable to Markov’s present unrelenting assault, now moving in a most unwelcome direction. In a moment, Lindsay thought, a name—a forbidden name—would be mentioned. She embarked on a few more displacement activities, caught the glint of Markov’s pretentious dark glasses and sat down. She glared at the glasses, which Markov rarely removed; maybe he would be merciful, she thought. He was not.

  ‘Rowland,’ he said. ‘The name Rowland McGuire was mentioned; several times, sweetheart—which was progress. Which was honest, at least. Because let’s face facts, honeybunch—that man is at the back of this.’

  ‘I never mentioned Rowland,’ Lindsay cried, hearing a familiar defensive note enter her voice. ‘Well, maybe once or twice, in passing. Can we stop this conversation? All right, I said I intended to make some changes in my life. I’m making them, Markov. In my own way, at my own pace.’

  ‘Pace?’ Markov gave a snort of derision. He looked at his watch and rose to his feet. ‘Pace? Lindy, we are talking sluggish here. We are talking snail; we are talking limpet. We are talking chronic inertia and galloping indecision. We are talking one millimetre every other century…’

  ‘Give it a rest, Markov.’

  ‘And why? Because of a man. Because of that man. Lindy, you have to cure yourself of that man, and do it fast. As far as that man is concerned, you, Lindy, are invisible. You are less than a speck on the very distant horizon. When are you going to accept that?’

  ‘I have accepted it. I’ve nearly accepted it.’

  ‘Lindy, I’m now going to be brutally honest.’ Markov drew himself up. ‘You, Lindy, are not his type. Now, God knows what his type is, but it isn’t you. I think he’s a fool, Jippy thinks he’s a fool, but there you are. Three years ago, I thought we could bring him around, make him see sense. I put a lot of time and energy into that project, Lindy, if you remember…’

  ‘I do remember. Much good it did.’

  ‘Precisely. Nada. Zilch. So the time has come, Lindy, my love, to cut your losses. You have to hitch a ride, darling, to a different city on the highway of life…’

  ‘Markov, please. Give me a break.’

  ‘And you have to leave that son of a bitch behind in the parking lot. Am I right or am I right?’

  ‘You’re right, and he isn’t a son of a bitch; he’s good, he’s kind, he’s clever, he’s handsome, he’s nice.’

  ‘He’s blind.’ Markov became stern. ‘What you need, Lindy, is some McGuire antibiotic…’

  ‘I know that. I’m administering it. I’m in mid-cure right now…’

  ‘You are? And when does this cure cease?’

  ‘The end of the month. This month. I’ve set myself a deadline, Markov. Truly…’

  This reply, forced out of her, was another mistake—as Lindsay almost immediately realized. A crafty little smile curled about Markov’s lips. Nex
t to him, the silent and gentle Jippy gave a sigh. His eyes fell on the pink mirror-writing invitation card, abandoned on a table. Markov at once picked it up.

  ‘This party’, he said, with emphasis, ‘takes place on the last day of this month. All the more reason to go. You can celebrate your new-won freedom, for a start. You can meet new people, make new friends and kick-start your new improved McGuireless life.’

  ‘Thanks, but no thanks.’

  Lindsay took the proffered card and tucked it back in the pocket of Markov’s chartreuse-coloured jacket. Then, since she knew that beneath Markov’s affectations of speech and dress, his intentions were kindly, she patted the pocket and gave him an affectionate kiss on the cheek.

  ‘Really, Markov, I know you meant well, but I wouldn’t enjoy it. I wouldn’t know anyone there…’

  ‘That’s the entire point.’

  ‘You go, then you and Jippy can tell me all about it. It’s the day before you go off to Greece, isn’t it? You can tell me all about it when you get back. That gives you plenty of time to work out a good story—who was there, what I missed…’

  Markov, who rarely hesitated, hesitated then. He shifted from his right foot to his left.

  ‘Jippy thinks you ought to go,’ he announced. ‘In fact, this was all Jippy’s idea. You suggested it, didn’t you, Jippy?’

  It was Jippy’s main characteristic to speak only when it was unavoidable. As usual, he had that day entered Lindsay’s apartment without speaking, had tucked into lunch without speaking, and had sat at Markov’s side, a small benign shadow, without uttering once. Now, directly appealed to for confirmation, he rose to his feet. Jippy had a very bad stammer.

  ‘I d-d-did,’ he said.

  This unexpected endorsement made Lindsay pause. At the first meeting with Jippy, two years before, she had assumed that his reluctance to speak was caused by the stammer; further acquaintance with Jippy had taught her that the reason for those silences lay deeper.

  Jippy was a rare being: he spoke only when he had something of import to say; when he did so, his remarks, although sometimes difficult to interpret, were usually unequivocal, generally wise, and invariably brief. Lindsay looked at him with affection and with sudden doubt. Jippy was a small, squarely built man, with neat dark hair, gentle eyes and a childlike demeanour. Lindsay herself was not tall, but Jippy was shorter still, and could have been, she calculated, little over five feet. He was of indeterminate age; he might have been thirty-five, or much younger, but in certain lights he could look older, considerably older—as if he had been around for centuries, Markov said.

  Unlike Markov, who was flamboyant, Jippy cultivated anonymity of dress. Today, as usual, he was wearing clean, pressed blue jeans, a navy-blue sweater which a schoolboy might have worn, and a white shirt. His old-fashioned lace-up shoes were smartly polished, and, in a way Lindsay found heart-breakingly sad, he always looked spruced up, as if for a job interview—his expression, shy and somewhat hopeful, dogged but melancholy, suggesting it was a job Jippy was never going to get. He would have passed in a crowd without anyone’s giving him a second glance—indeed, Lindsay suspected that he preferred and intended this—but on closer inspection, he conveyed a powerful and disconcerting benevolence. Quite how he did this, Lindsay could not have said, since the benevolence seemed to radiate from him, without visible source, unless it be his eyes, the gaze of which was steady, as if expecting the best in others, and yet sorrowful—or so Lindsay thought.

  Jippy’s origins were in many ways obscure: Lindsay had never discovered his true name, where he lived or what he did before meeting Markov, or indeed how they had met. His ancestry, however, was for some reason elaborately exact. He was one half Belorussian, one quarter Armenian, one eighth British and one eighth Greek—on this issue, Jippy was emphatic, even pedantic. He was Markov’s photographic assistant as well as his lover, and according to Markov, he was a genius of the darkroom, indispensable to Markov’s latest experiments with silver and platinum prints. Lindsay knew virtually nothing else about him, except for one key piece of information, which, true, or untrue, Markov always stressed. He claimed that, from the Armenian grandmother, Jippy had inherited second sight.

  He was a gifted astrological interpreter, Markov said; he could read palms and sense auras, and was, at unexpected moments, afforded views of the future. This clairvoyance, whether a blessing or a curse, Jippy was said to treat with fortitude and circumspection, never discussing the ability himself. ‘Pay attention to Jippy,’ Markov liked to say. ‘He’s the seventh son of a seventh son, and believe me, you don’t argue with that.’

  Lindsay, who was more credulous and superstitious than she might have liked, was not disposed to argue in any case. From first meeting and first handshake, Jippy had impressed her. She liked his appearance, his reticence and his stammer; she liked him. Markov loved him, of course.

  When, therefore, she learned that it was Jippy who had suggested procuring the invitation to this ludicrous party, and that it was not one of Markov’s devious, hare-brained schemes, she began to see that mirror-writing invitation in a new light. Was it possible, could it be that…did Jippy see something fateful here, to which she was blind? She looked closely at Jippy, whose steady, liquid, brown-eyed gaze held hers. Perhaps she had been hasty; what harm could it do to go, after all? Was it not tempting to believe that, at last, she might be finding new purpose and direction to her life?

  At worst she risked being bored; escape would be easy; she would be free that night. Had she not, as Markov had just annoyingly reminded her, resolved to break out of the indecision and inertia that had comprised the last three years of her life? On the other hand, of course, Jippy was a social innocent; it was bound to be an appalling party, filled with people she neither knew, nor wished to know. Yes, it might have been intriguing to meet Tomas Court, whose movies she greatly admired, but a glimpse of the man, or one brief handshake, was the best she could expect, and that, she thought, she could well live without.

  And then there was the location: the party was to be held in some Dockland’s loft, in a part of London she knew well, having once worked for a newspaper whose grim and fortified offices lay very close to this venue in Wapping. It was miles from where she lived, in Notting Hill Gate; she was sure to get lost in those eerie ill-lit riverside streets. It would be dark; it would be Hallowe’en; she would almost certainly have to park miles away and then venture past gloomy wharves, threatening alleyways, at the end of which, by mud and slippery, weedy steps, the Thames sucked and washed…She gave a small involuntary shiver. ‘I know you both mean well,’ she began, ‘but I really don’t want to go. It’s a Friday; I have to go to Oxford to see Tom that weekend. It’s just before the New York collections, so I’ll be getting ready for New York and I’ll have a mountain of work…’

  Jippy made a gesture, a tiny, quick motion of the hand. He patted her arm and smiled, and began to lead Markov towards the door.

  ‘S-see how you feel,’ he said, ‘on the n-night.’

  ‘Oh, all right, I’ll think about it,’ Lindsay conceded, ‘if you both promise to go to it too. Markov, you might as well leave the invitation…’

  Jippy smiled broadly. Markov smiled broadly.

  ‘In your left pocket, I think you’ll find, Lindy,’ Markov said, opening her front door, exiting fast and shutting it with a smart click.

  Lindsay had forgotten Jippy’s other skills: his sleight of hand, his conjuring tricks, his ability to convey solid matter from that place of concealment to this. She put her hand disbelievingly into the pocket of her jacket. It closed over the pink, mirror-writing invitation to a party. She still had no intention of going, she told herself, and over the next two intervening weeks she constantly reminded herself of this.

  The two weeks were active ones. During them, she discovered something unpleasant: she began to realize just how much she missed her son, and how much she missed the daily tussle of wills provided in the past by the presence of her difficult moth
er. She missed Gini and her husband Pascal; other friends, and one in particular, were also away from London during this period, and Lindsay, returning to her familiar apartment after work, realized with a sense of panic that these much-loved rooms could feel lonely, not only on Sundays, but on weekday evenings as well.

  So, when it finally came to Hallowe’en, and the last day of her spiritual antibiotic course, Lindsay weakened. Invitations to Lulu’s parties, she had heard, were much in demand. Lulu was famous for her parties. Lindsay, a social cynic, placed little faith in such claims, or in parties. On the evening in question, however, she discovered she had decided to go after all; a mysterious process. In the shower, she was still undecided; wrapped in a towel five minutes later, her mind was made up.

  She threw on a red partyish dress, hated it, pulled it off, kicked it across the room and donned a black one. She screwed into place the prettiest ear-rings she possessed, which had been given to her by Gini as a parting gift: two teardrops of pale jade which seemed to have been imbued with an animation of their own, so that they shimmered or trembled before she made the least gesture or the slightest turn of her head.

  She ran up and down stairs in stockinged feet as darkness fell and her front doorbell kept ringing. She gave a bar of chocolate to a diminutive witch and her brother the hangman. She gave a tube of sweets to a werewolf, and some Turkish delight to a covey of skeletons from next door, escorted by a lugubrious father with an axe through his head. She was forestalled by a gorilla and a ghoul when finally leaving, and lacking sweets or small change, thrust a five pound note into the startled gorilla’s fur-paw. The gorilla and the ghoul she noted, fought a brief battle for possession of this prize in the middle of the street.

  Then, over an hour and a half late, and thoroughly rattled, she set off in her small car eastwards. Lindsay was a bad driver, and her sense of direction was dysfunctional. This fact had often been remarked upon, amiably and laconically, by Rowland McGuire. Even in his absence, Lindsay was determined to prove him wrong. She failed; as she had predicted, she lost herself in the dark streets of Docklands almost at once.