Sextet

by Sally Beauman

  ‘Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,’ she said. ‘I told you. I’ll be here.’

  She replaced the receiver at once. Colin felt a soaring of the spirits. He pulled off his clothes, kicked the masterly dirty suit into a corner, kicked the shirt and the silk foulard tie and the handmade shoes and the socks and the boxer shorts after it. He turned the water full on. He glimpsed his own nakedness in the mirrors and stepped into the hail of the shower.

  Rowland McGuire’s call finally came through at 9.52. By then, those demons she fought so unsuccessfully had tormented Lindsay into a great state of nerves. Despite the fact that, of all the female characteristics with which she was richly endowed, a propensity to sit by a telephone and hope was the one she most loathed and despised, she had found herself trapped in that room at the Pierre. She was well acquainted with every inch of its carpet as she paced round and round. It was disconcerting, at exactly 9.45—the time she had convinced herself Rowland would call—to pick up the receiver and hear a man tell her he had to see her, when the voice telling her this was the wrong voice, and the man, much as she liked him, was the wrong man.

  At 9.46, having hung up on Colin, she had got herself as far as the door. By 9.47 she was back again at the bed, staring at the telephone with joy in her heart. She had just realized that if Rowland’s call the night before came through at eleven New York time, it must have been placed in London at four in the morning. For a brief instant, this fact filled her with hope. She imagined Rowland, in the dead of night, afflicted with torments similar to her own. Then she saw the obvious explanation: Rowland, who did not suffer torments, had called at 4 a.m. because he happened to have returned home then—and her swift and deadly imagination had no difficulty in seeing just why he might have returned so late, and why he had been detained.

  A brief sojourn in heaven; a swift and predictable descent to hell. Will I never be free of this bondage? Lindsay thought, feeling the familiar shackles lock into place. She turned back to the door, resolving on liberty; the telephone rang, and she found all desire for liberty had gone.

  She let it ring three times, out of pride, and in an attempt to calm herself. Sweet, womanly, dulcet, she reminded herself. She snatched up the receiver, heard Rowland’s voice, and experienced, as she always did, the same fatal joy. It was short-lived. Within sentences, she saw that this conversation was stilted and unusually awkward; this panicked her; she sensed an alteration in Rowland’s manner, and this panicked her more.

  He was not addressing her with his usual friendly warmth; if anything, his manner was cautious and guarded, even cold. He sounded as if he were feeling his way into this conversation with care, trusting neither himself nor her. He sounded, in short, like a stranger, and not like the man she had known for three years.

  Where was that usual fraternal ease, that relaxed willingness to discuss what each of them had been doing and where each had been? It was gone, utterly gone—the rules of their dialogue had changed. What could have happened in the space of just a week to effect such a change? Lindsay’s mind froze over. She felt like an actor whose script had just been torn from his hand; she was left with scraps and tatters of memorized speeches and an urgent need to improvise her way back into the scene.

  It might have been easier to do that, had Rowland been giving her clear and simple cues, but she found he was not doing that. She was stranded mid-stage, unable to hear the prompter, desperate to communicate with a fellow actor who sounded as stranded and uneasy as she. She stared at the wall. What was wrong? Had Rowland changed or had she?

  Concentrate, concentrate, she said to herself. How did this halting dialogue begin? Rowland had presaged his remarks by explaining, somewhat irritably, that he had been trying to get through since 8.55. Sounding agitated—and Rowland never sounded agitated—he had added that he had a meeting shortly and so could not talk for long.

  ‘I’d hoped,’ he had said, ‘to reach you last night. It would have been almost exactly a week since I last spoke to you—and we wouldn’t have been worrying about time…’

  Time! As soon as he used the word, Lindsay started gabbling inanities. She realized that Colin Lascelles would be arriving here soon. She could hear some inexorable clock ticking; she could see its pendulum swing. It was important, it was vital, to strike the right tone, to say the right thing.

  Then—what had happened then? Rowland had cut her inanities short. Had he done so in an irritable way? No. He had interrupted in a dry, even patient way, so for a second Lindsay glimpsed the man she knew.

  ‘I received that burst of Morse,’ he said, hesitating. ‘At least, I think I did. Lindsay—’

  Then he had stopped short. Whatever he had been about to say, he seemed to find it impossible to pronounce. He was as silent as Jippy, and Lindsay panicked again. Some idiot, she thought, some dolt has cut us off.

  ‘Rowland, are you there?’ she said, now very agitated.

  ‘Yes, I’m here.’

  ‘Oh, thank goodness. I thought…’

  ‘Can you hear me all right? You sound odd, Lindsay. You sound different. I—’

  ‘Yes, yes. I can hear you perfectly…’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  Why ever was he insisting on this point, Lindsay thought. It was wasting time; it was using up precious seconds.

  ‘Yes, I hear you as clear as a bell, as if you were in the same room and standing next to me. It’s just…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing. You have that meeting. I—I’m worrying about time…’

  ‘Then I’ll come to the point. Wasn’t I supposed to be testing that famous intuition of yours?’

  Rowland did not sound as if the prospect of doing so gave him amusement. He sounded oddly formal, Lindsay thought; and try as she would, she could not concentrate fully on what he was saying. She was beginning to worry that Colin, if unable to get through on the telephone from the desk, might come upstairs.

  Rowland had continued speaking, she now realized, for some while. He had been speaking throughout this flurried reappraisal of the beginning of their conversation, and he was still speaking now. He had said, after the mention of intuition, something about a visit to Oxford, something about some don, and something about Tom. But now her need to say the right thing, the vital thing, was growing stronger and stronger. She could feel this message rising up from her heart, and the urgency of these words made them take on physical shape; they loomed larger and larger in her mind; they were large, the size of a hoarding, as tall as the Hollywood sign.

  ‘…Tom’s opinion,’ she heard.

  ‘I have missed you, Rowland,’ said her tongue. Lindsay clamped her hand over her mouth. She realized that this blurted remark had gone unanswered. She was listening to silence, a silence that went on too long.

  ‘Lindsay—’

  He said her name with a sudden lift to his voice, and Lindsay, intent on retrieval, intent on glossing over that admission, an admission that had phrased itself in the wrong way, so that it sounded defensive, began babbling again.

  When she said missed, she continued, revving up into overdrive, what Rowland must remember was how dispiriting the collections could be, and how good it always was to have a friend to unwind with at the end of a hard day. Preferably someone with little interest in fashion, such as Rowland himself…or, for instance, his friend Colin Lascelles.

  Her eye fell on those photographs of Shute Farm, and she rushed on. Luckily for her, she continued, Colin had been a great help in this respect. They’d taken to meeting here in the bar after work…Oh, and last night, he’d taken her out for the most delicious dinner. Then he had shown her the Conrad, that extraordinary building, and introduced her to his aunt…

  This speech, a long one, was not interrupted once by Rowland; it was received in absolute silence, until the moment when she mentioned Colin’s aunt. Then he did interrupt, and his next question was not warmly asked.

  ‘Colin introduced you to Emily?’

  ‘Yes, yes, yes,’ Lindsa
y said, accelerating again, and finding that Rowland’s froideur, his inexplicable froideur, was making her more nervous. ‘Yes, yes,’ she said; then Colin had brought her back to the Pierre and had produced these photographs.

  This topic took Lindsay off on a very long explanation, involving her own future plans, her economic strategies, and finally the uncanny perfection of this house near Oxford called Shute Farm.

  ‘Could I just get something clear?’ Rowland said, his tone now arctic, interrupting this encomium as Lindsay began to rhapsodize about roses around doors. ‘You’re planning on moving out of London, is that correct?’

  ‘Yes, yes. Didn’t I mention that was my plan?’

  ‘No.’ There was a pause. ‘You did not.’

  This time his tone was so forbidding, Lindsay did not dare to speak, let alone babble.

  ‘Shute Farm. Twenty miles from Oxford. Well, well.’

  ‘It’s the location that makes it so perfect, Rowland,’ Lindsay said, confused and a little hurt that Rowland seemed displeased at her good fortune. ‘It will mean I can see Tom from time to time—but it’s not right on his doorstep, so he won’t feel cramped. And then, it’s so pretty, Rowland. It’s in the middle of fields, no neighbours…’

  ‘Are you sure about that?’

  ‘There’s no other cottages in the picture, Rowland, just fields. So there’ll be nothing and no-one to distract me…’

  ‘Possibly.’ He sounded unconvinced. ‘It’s certainly in a very beautiful part of the country.’

  ‘Oh, you mean you know it, Rowland? From when you were at Oxford?’

  ‘Yes, I used to drive out that way often. I know it well. And who did you say this place belongs to? Someone Colin’s father knows? I see. And it’s available? The rent is low?’

  ‘I think so. Colin’s coming over to explain all the details today. He’ll be here any minute, in fact—’

  ‘Ah. Well, don’t let me detain you.’

  ‘No, no. He’s coming up here—I know he’d love a word with you.’

  ‘Somehow I doubt that. And I don’t have time.’

  ‘It really is the most beautiful house, Rowland. It’s everything I dreamed about,’ Lindsay said, still puzzled by his critical tone. ‘If it does work out, will you come and see it? I’d like that. You could come over one day for a meal with Colin…’

  ‘With Colin? That should prove diverting, to say the least.’

  ‘Rowland, is something wrong? I don’t understand. You sound so—I expect I’m making you late for your meeting.’

  ‘Lateness is certainly on my mind.’

  ‘I don’t want you to miss it, Rowland—’

  ‘I have a feeling I’ve already missed it.’

  ‘Rowland, you could sound a bit more encouraging, you know.’ Lindsay hesitated, disappointment welling inside her. ‘I thought you’d be pleased. It was so kind of Colin to help. He’s obviously gone to a lot of trouble…’

  ‘Oh, I agree.’

  ‘He is your friend, Rowland. I was—well, I was a bit worried about the money side of things, and…’

  ‘With good cause.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’ Lindsay felt a sudden distress. ‘Rowland, don’t be disparaging. I know I haven’t planned all of this as well as I might have done—and that book contract isn’t marvellous, but I am trying to do my best…’

  ‘No, the contract isn’t marvellous, and any fool could have told you not to sign it. I suppose that one of these days you’ll learn to stand up for yourself on the money front. I certainly hope so, because that publisher has taken you for a ride.’

  ‘Rowland—’

  ‘You do realize, do you, that there’s no way you can live on that kind of advance? It’s going to take you two years, probably three, to write this damn book, and that advance won’t pay your electricity bills…’

  ‘Yes it will. Wait a moment, Rowland—’ Lindsay, feeling her temper begin to rise, struggled to control it. Dulcet she reminded herself. ‘I don’t think you can have been listening,’ she continued. ‘I told you—it will be a bit tight, but I can manage. I can rent my apartment in London for quite a lot, and somewhere in the country is bound to be cheaper. Colin says…’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake. When are you going to grow up, Lindsay? What kind of day-dream are you living in? All right, economics was never your strong point, but why don’t you check? What you can afford wouldn’t rent you a boathouse in the Orkney islands, let alone a desirable farmhouse in Oxfordshire. Why are you so naïve?’

  ‘I’m not naïve—and you’re wrong. I told you, I consulted Colin and Colin says that…’

  ‘Jesus Christ, will you stop parroting Colin’s name?’ Rowland’s voice rose. ‘No doubt you think Colin is giving you disinterested advice. You thought that shark of a publisher was doing just that. You’re impossible, Lindsay. Where’s your judgement here? You’ve known Colin for ten minutes. I’ve known him for twenty years and…’

  ‘Then you ought to be loyal to him,’ Lindsay snapped. ‘You shouldn’t suggest he’s a shark…’

  ‘I didn’t say that. Dear God, do you never listen? I’m just suggesting you look at this farmhouse proposal carefully and don’t rush into it without thinking, because as we all know, thinking before you act isn’t exactly your strong point…’

  ‘Goddamn it, Rowland, you can be insufferable, you know that?’ Lindsay said sharply. ‘Stop being so patronizing. I’m not fifteen. Can you stop talking down to me for five seconds? I’m not a child you know…’

  ‘Well, you can certainly behave like one,’ Rowland cut in, ‘in which respect, you and Colin make an excellent pair. As was evident when we all had lunch in Oxford, I now realize. I can’t think how it escaped my notice at the time…’

  ‘You pompous creep!’ Lindsay shouted, losing her temper completely. ‘What’s the matter with you? Oxford? I might have known you’d bring that up sooner or later. The one time in all the years you’ve known me when I happened to get a little bit drunk…’

  ‘A little bit? You couldn’t damn well stand up. You were falling over. You had to be propped up by me. It was one of the most…’ Rowland stopped abruptly. He hesitated.

  ‘Yes? Yes?’ Lindsay shouted, abandoning dulcet to the winds. ‘Go on, list my crimes! I don’t give a damn if I was drunk. That’s the effect you have on me. I could drink an entire bottle of Scotch right now…’

  ‘You kissed my sweater,’ Rowland said, in an altered tone.

  ‘So what?’ Lindsay yelled. ‘I don’t care if I did. I’ll kiss a hundred men’s sweaters, any time I feel like it. I don’t have to ask your permission before I breathe. You’re the most pompous, mean-spirited, narrow-minded, uptight man I’ve ever known…’

  ‘Would you like to answer my question?’ Rowland said, in a voice that sounded dangerously calm. ‘Pleasant though it is to be insulted by you on the transatlantic phone, I do have that meeting to attend. So answer the question, if you would, and then I can cease annoying you…’

  ‘What damn question?’ Lindsay shouted, now beside herself with rage. ‘You haven’t asked me anything—and I’m not insulting you…’

  ‘I asked you a question at the very beginning of this conversation,’ Rowland said, his voice becoming colder by the second. ‘If you’ve already forgotten it, it can’t have been worth asking. Never mind…’

  He paused, and for one second Lindsay thought he was about to ring off. Clearly he had second thoughts, because with effort, he continued.

  ‘I told you,’ he said, ‘that I have to go to Oxford soon, and while I’m there, I thought I should look in and see Tom. There’s something—well, there’s something I need to discuss with him…’

  ‘Something you need to discuss with Tom?’ Lindsay frowned. ‘Well, of course, I know he’d be delighted to see you. Katya would too.’

  ‘I’d rather Katya wasn’t there actually. I wanted to talk to Tom alone.’

  There was a silence; Rowland had spoken with emphasis. Lindsay felt a f
licker of unease.

  ‘You don’t want Katya to be there?’ She hesitated, feeling suddenly afraid. ‘I don’t understand. Rowland, does this concern Katya in some way?’

  ‘You could put it like that. I want to make Tom understand that—’

  ‘Tom loves Katya.’ Lindsay spoke in a flat voice, panic rising. ‘He adores her. They’ve been together nearly three years. She’s the fixed point of his life, Rowland…’

  ‘Precisely. I know that. Which is why—’

  ‘Oh God. She wrote to you, didn’t she? You told me and I thought no more about it.’ Lindsay’s voice became unsteady. ‘I can’t believe this. Rowland—wait…’

  In a second, a score of past incidents flashed before her eyes. She saw all those occasions when Katya glanced at Rowland as she made some provocative remark; all the occasions when Katya had tried to monopolize Rowland in argument; all the occasions when she had watched Katya mask attraction with antagonism, and had done nothing, assuming that Katya’s fascination with Rowland was harmless, that it would vanish eventually of its own accord.

  ‘So what’s happened?’ she heard herself say. ‘Has she written to you again? Have you seen her? Rowland—you haven’t encouraged her, surely? She’s nineteen years old. She’s young enough to be your daughter—’

  ‘I’m aware of Katya’s age.’ Rowland’s voice had become curt. ‘Lindsay, will you listen to me? For the whole of this past week I’ve—damn it, this is impossible on the telephone…’ Lindsay could hear the emotion in his voice then, and the urgency; it spoke volumes and it made her afraid.

  ‘Oh, I can’t believe this, I can’t,’ she burst out. ‘Rowland, how can you even consider such a thing? How far has this gone? You realize what this will do to Tom, do you? He admires you so much—he looks up to you. Rowland, if you’ve been anywhere near Katya, if you’ve flirted with her, I’ll never forgive you. For God’s sake, aren’t there enough obliging women in London? She’s Tom’s girlfriend. Don’t you dare go running to my son with that kind of problem…’

  ‘Have you finished?’

  ‘No, I damn well haven’t. What are you proposing to say to him, Rowland?’