Tina Gallagher had no such qualms. ‘Don’t go soft on us now, you’re forgetting how bad it was.’
‘But, Tina, when you stand back and look at everything that has happened, when you think of what we’ve done…’
‘Think of what that woman has done to us,’ Tina retorted, ‘and you of all people should find that a cinch.’
I still tried to reason, ‘But there is a limit. Good grief, don’t you think the time has come when we could bend a little and wish them good luck? They have been our neighbours for over ten years…’
‘And have them change their minds? Not likely,’ sneered Tina, and I sensed that they were all watching me in case I betrayed them and gave Jennie a smile or asked the kids over to play. Oh yes, Jennie’s lie about Tina and Sam had been absolutely outrageous, but no harm had come of it, and it wasn’t her fault – she was sick, her illness had a name I’d forgotten, and instead of retribution my neighbour needed counselling.
For our behaviour there were no excuses.
And interestingly, that good Samaritan, Hilary Wainwright, with her meals on wheels and her Christian duties, was the meanest of all.
Look at the Blitz and the sense of togetherness, united against a common foe; then look at us – this little vendetta was so unhealthy, it sapped us and made fools of us all. I ached for the Gordons when they got in their car with their heads held high, eyes straight ahead, and I ached again when I noticed the kids only looked round when they’d left the Close.
Jesus, what had we done?
I couldn’t share in the pouring of scorn on Jennie’s work by those who had never seen it – particularly Sadie Harcourt, a self-proclaimed artist herself, just because of her art degree and her tacky animal earrings which she sold at the market on a Friday morning.
‘She must have something. She can’t have conned everyone.’
‘She conned everyone here for years,’ snapped Sadie, ‘especially you.’
‘You’re wrong, Sadie’ – I had to get this straight – ‘Jennie didn’t con me, she made her feelings clear from the start. I would rather not have known, but she told me anyway.’
‘But, Martha, the lengths to which she was willing to go in order to impress you! The way she ignored the rest of us, shouted her mouth off, caused so much trouble…’
‘Quite honestly, Sadie,’ I said, ‘your music can be annoying.’
‘Well, Martha, you could have mentioned it.’
‘What? Like Jennie? And have you slag me off ever after?’
‘That’s not fair,’ said Sadie.
Oh God, it was all so petty. And such old hat by now. Time is supposed to move on, but not here in Mulberry Close.
If we had to move out because of Sam’s business, then I wouldn’t give a damn.
My main concern wasn’t the money although that was catastrophic enough, it was the effect of failure on Sam’s macho image – he was provider, team leader, gifted designer and entrepreneur. And if work had given me an antidote to insanity and lack of self-esteem, then Sam’s need was imperative. What would he do? How would he face rejection time after time, competing with four hundred others for work in an industry that prefers the under-thirties, and cope with being humiliated before panels of judges who, according to his lights, would know fuck all about it?
The prognosis did not look good.
He’d been so scathing about unemployment: the underclasses should get off their arses, he’d say. I hadn’t bothered to contradict him because his attitude was so ingrained. His ghastly right-wing views were pathetic, but, more importantly, would he clean the bath while I went off to work, would he cook a meal, fetch the shopping, sort out the garden? No, he wouldn’t.
Sam would be all hell to live with.
I knew I would agree to go the minute the chief reporter gave me the office invite. ‘Jennie Gordon’s your neighbour, isn’t she? So take more of a human angle: hubby, kids, reactions to Mum’s success, that stuff… have they inherited her natural talent?’
I felt I was spying on my country. If Sam or any of my neighbours discovered I was going to Jennie’s exhibition, I would be stood against a wall and shot. No trial, nothing. I would certainly not insist on a byline for this little job.
I hadn’t a clue what to expect. The last time I had spoken to Jennie I had barred her from my house for ever, but I guessed that the sickening tie that had bound her to me over all these years would not have broken overnight. She would not ban me from the gallery as I had banned her from my life and I hoped a meeting might give us both a chance to end this ludicrous farce.
It was a shock – I hardly recognized her. She’d been out and bought something suitable from Ghost and she looked spectral in that gauzy grey with a string of silvery beads. Her hair was as it used to be, straight and loose to her shoulders. There was a quality of grace about her; she looked confident, almost demure, enjoying herself in this high society with a glass of champagne in her hand, chatting away as if nothing fazed her, as if she’d never known a life of scrubbing, cleaning and skulking about, peering at the world through cautious nets.
The publicity people. I accepted a drink from some purple-haired chick.
I recognized a fellow hack and we agreed how incredible it was that someone like Jennie could come from nowhere and take the art world by storm.
‘What’s she like, this nymph?’ he asked me, when I explained that I knew her. ‘That’s what everyone wants to know. She’s so enigmatic, without a past it seems, or none that she wants to lay claim to.’
‘What’s she like?’ I considered. ‘That’s hard to define. Quite ordinary, I would have said once. No-one could have imagined she had this kind of talent lying dormant inside her.’
I smiled at Graham. He glowered back and made no attempt to come over and speak. Fair enough. Why should he?
Poppy and Josh both noticed me, whispered something, and then Poppy went off. I guessed rightly that she’d gone to find Jennie.
Her smile was tense when she said, ‘Hello, Martha.’
‘All this.’ I gestured towards the impressive display – weird, wonderful, dominant and disturbing. It was easy to see how special her work was. ‘All this down to you. It’s amazing.’
‘You find it surprising?’ She was quiet, pale.
I was honest. ‘Where you are concerned, there are no surprises.’ These formal exchanges were uncomfortable. ‘How are you, Jennie?’
Her answer came without expression. ‘You’ve got one hell of a nerve to ask.’
‘I’m sorry you think that.’
Then her eyes turned cold. ‘No, you’re not sorry at all. So why come here and pretend that you are?’
The words almost stuck. ‘I hoped that we might…’
‘That we might what, Martha? Be friends again?’
‘I suppose…’
‘You and I were never friends.’
‘You make me sound like the guilty party.’
‘Guilty? Guilty of what?’
Confusion made me vulnerable. I was uneasy. People were looking. She was obviously still twisted up, still obstinate. I shouldn’t have come. I certainly should not have offered the hand of friendship so readily. ‘Guilty of lying…’
‘Go away, Martha. I’m tired of all this. Go back to the Close where you belong. Go back to Sam and the rest of them.’
Sam rattled the Observer hard before throwing it down beside him. He had only bought it for the jobs and found himself unexpectedly face to face with his despised next-door neighbour. Someone was doing well even if he wasn’t. He said, ‘I wonder if anyone would pay to know the sordid truth about Jennie Gordon?’
‘What truth? What do you mean?’ I gave him a hard look and moved away. He was after making some money, OK, but to involve his wife in a tabloid scandal was surely a step too far.
‘Jennie and Graham – how they met – I can see the headlines already.’
‘You denied that was true,’ I told him, incredulous. ‘You called that one of her
fantasies, you said I was mad to believe it.’
‘I said that at the time, you’re right, but all this has got me wondering.’
‘Don’t bother, Sam, it’s sick. I promised Jennie total discretion and I wish I’d never told you.’
‘But you did tell me and everyone knows. Somebody’s bound to jump on this bandwagon and why shouldn’t that person be me? Why shouldn’t I make something out of it? After all, that slag did lay my wife.’
I stiffened. So that was it. He had never got over that affront to his manhood. ‘How can you think of such a betrayal, let alone talk about it? Hell, we might be on our uppers right now, but we don’t have to act like scum. And anyway, if Jennie told the truth about her first meeting with Graham, what about you and Tina? Maybe there was more to that than you led me to believe.’
The words were out before I could stop them. Something about Jennie’s demeanour, the genuine hurt I saw in her eyes in the gallery where she reigned supreme and where there was no place for infantile games, had made me face some difficult questions. And now Sam had this grotesque idea in order to make a few quid… I hoped to hell he was joking, and I hoped to hell Jennie was lying.
I wished that life was only a dream so I’d have a chance to wake up.
THIRTY-THREE
Jennie
I WISHED THAT LIFE was only a dream so I’d have a chance to wake up.
We moved house.
I still can’t discuss it.
There is an illness – what it’s called doesn’t matter – when obsession is caused by a need to focus on one supreme being who can define the world for infantilized adults, in the way that a parent does for a toddler.
Infantilized? Was that really me?
And was Martha my supreme being?
And now, just when life was turning around, – giving us all new horizons, new hopes, I found myself staring at the studio wall, defeated and empty of all inspiration. This could only happen to me.
Dead from the inside out.
The princess who never spun straw into gold. The hidden magician had done it all for her.
‘This happens,’ Graham told me. ‘Too many high expectations, not just from Hogg but from you, too. It will pass. Relax, it’s just a block. Wait and see. If you do nothing else for a year it won’t matter. The school fees are paid, the new house is ours.’
How could he be so accepting of disaster? ‘But that’s not the point. I’ve lost it. Was all that energy just a fleeting gust which I’ve used up in one go?’
‘Stop it before you convince yourself. Sit down and read some of your write-ups. The experts know what they’re talking about, and no, it’s not just a flash in the pan – you’re going through a natural phase, that’s all. And moving house is meant to be the third most traumatic event—.’
‘That’s nonsense.’
Nothing Graham said could help me.
He was still disgusted by Martha’s effrontery in turning up at my exhibition: ‘Flamboyant, over-large, like some prima donna from Covent Garden.’ He called her a nosy, jealous old tart, ‘trying to soft-soap you now you’re famous’. But I knew Martha wasn’t like that. Poppy and Josh were all for throwing her out on the pavement, or telling the press about the campaign to evict us from Mulberry Close. ‘They’d be interested in that, wouldn’t they, Mum? The way we were treated? Go on, Mum, tell them.’
But Graham warned Poppy, ‘If we want to make a fresh start, what’s the point in hauling that old baggage with us or washing our dirty linen in public? You have to learn to rise above it. After next term it won’t matter anyway.’
We’d been a bit intimidated when we’d taken Poppy along for her interview at Birkdale House, what with its wood panelling and black and white tiles. I was scared she’d fail the entrance exam. While she sat in a daunting room full of strangers, head bent over the papers, we were shown round with the other parents, some in designer jeans and sweatshirts. Graham and I had dressed carefully in suits.
I prayed – my habit in times of stress, when me and God were in constant contact – and offered to do anything if he would just give Poppy this second chance. Oh, let her not be defeated by thinking the odds were stacked against her – as I would have been. Oh, please let my daughter, just this once, overcome her negative thoughts. If I could triumph, if only briefly, then so could Poppy, and apart from a massive boost to her ego, passing this exam would mean smaller classes, better results and a vast range of out-of-school activities. Birkdale House put the comp to shame.
Apart from that, she’d look great in the uniform.
Apart from that, I wanted to prove the Frazers and Mrs Forest were wrong.
She came out of the hall, pale and dejected. ‘Well, that’s it, I’ve had it, I couldn’t answer one question. And anyway I hate it here and the rules are stupid.’ Poppy stomped off ahead of us as if it was our fault, as if we had forced her to endure the ordeal for some demonic motive of our own.
We had heard on the grapevine that Sam had gone bust and I couldn’t prevent a mean stab of joy. If what we’d heard was right, then the Frazers would have to leave the Close, and this knowledge was such a relief it was hard to express it adequately. I’d have no need to look back and yearn once we’d gone. I wouldn’t be missing those marvellous times because they wouldn’t be happening. The Frazers were going. There’d be nothing there for me.
And they wouldn’t be buying a smart house like ours.
Ours was a Georgian house in the country, with a fairy-tale garden and a small field behind. Wisteria draped in clusters around the porch. The old barn next door was a ready-made studio: the previous owner had been a painter.
With my extra income we’d been able to buy a house that would normally have been way out of reach. How Martha would have loved it. It was probably more her style than mine and her furniture would have suited it better than our small, modern bits and pieces which we hadn’t changed since we got married. My obsession had blinded me to such trivia as interior design.
For the first time in my life I had stood up to Martha and the memory of that still made me tremble. I’d been on a high, flushed with success and strengthened by the sight of my work which had looked so impressive, magnificent even. To see her there in the gallery was startling; I’d been so sure she would ignore my invitation. If I had known I’d have spent weeks rehearsing exactly what I should say and it would have tainted the whole marvellous experience.
Damn her, damn her.
Why did she have to turn up like that? It had been so hard to live without her.
I refused to let those old wounds reopen.
The only way forward was to concentrate on more work – but I couldn’t work, my mind was a blank, all passion spent. Bewildered and vacant, I sat in my studio and blackness stared at me off the walls. Obliteration. Where had I gone? The dark feelings that nourished me had been unhealthy and horrible, they had deadened all normal emotions, they had demanded constant attention – but I needed them back to survive.
I was far more pathetic than Poppy. How could I pray for my daughter’s small triumph when I couldn’t rise to the challenge myself?
‘You’ve passed! You’re in! Poppy, you did it!’
I remembered to say a quick thank you to God as I rushed up the stairs with the precious letter, half blinded by tears.
Her sleepy face was a joy to behold.
‘Don’t kid me.’
‘I’m not, I’m not. Would I joke about something like this?’ I took her in my arms, kissed and hugged her, and I could hear her heart pounding away nineteen to the dozen while my own head was buzzing with thoughts sweet and good.
‘I don’t believe it.’ She read the letter. She reread it again and again. ‘But how could I have passed?’
‘Quite easily, it would seem. They say your results were excellent, so there we have it, on paper – if you have to do it alone, you can.’
‘Can I have that pony now?’ But I knew she didn’t really care; for the time being, this
success was enough.
I dabbed at my eyes. ‘We’ll see. We’ll see.’
I wouldn’t have seen the article if Demetrius Hogg hadn’t taken the Mirror because he had heard a rumour that something dastardly was afoot.
He didn’t call me, he waited until we arrived for the dinner his wife, Gloria, had organized at their enormous Cadogan Square flat.
‘Look at this – sensational!’ he boomed. He spread out the centre pages.
I reeled back with shock. It was libel. It was vicious.
And worst of all it was my lie.
I wanted to hide my face and weep. I glanced at the newspaper with utter revulsion; it could have been covered in maggots.
‘What’s this?’ asked Graham from over my shoulder.
‘Don’t look,’ I begged him, trying to cover the lie with my hands. ‘It’s vile.’
‘Don’t be an ass, let him see,’ commanded an excited Hogg. ‘The more folks see this, the better. You can’t be small-minded now, you’re a star.’
‘The children!’ I cried, appalled by his attitude. How could a man of such taste have such a warped view of the world? ‘How are they going to cope with this – their own mother was once a whore?’
‘It can’t be,’ said Graham, snatching the paper. ‘For God’s sake, let me see what they’ve done.’
‘Graham,’ I cried – this was worse than a nightmare – ‘what about your job? You might lose your job over this.’
‘That’s crap,’ said Hogg. How could he stay so calm?
Graham looked up, aghast. ‘But how can this be possible?’ he demanded, ashen-faced. ‘How can they print such blatant lies? Surely they’d know we’d sue? I mean, this says that Jennie was on the game. It says I was kerb crawling down Formby Road. This is mind-boggling. Listen – look – this says that’s how we met.’ His eyes were sunk in his head. They were hunted eyes, haunted. ‘We’ll get the law on this right away—’
‘Cool it, my friend,’ drawled Hogg, resting a calming hand on Graham’s shoulder. ‘If you really want a fight we’ll have one and we’ll win, I’d bet on that. But I’ve had two phone calls already from TV stations keen to do interviews, and it’s worth remembering they allege these happenings took place before you two got hitched – too long ago to count for anything. All this publicity means is that Jennie’s appeal is no longer confined to the narrow world of art but extends to the man in the street…’
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