Sunday Best

by Bernice Rubens

  ‘But how?’

  ‘Well you give them a description of the person who’s gone, and then they hold something belonging to them. A piece of clothing or a watch or something. They can at least tell you if he’s alive or not.’

  Joy shuddered.

  ‘Well, it’s better to know the worst, that’s what I think.’ Mrs Whitely’s tardy re-marriage to the church, and the grand issue she was making of it, seemed to absolve her of all feelings. Dogma would take care of everything. Joy wondered what kind of man was Mr Whitely, and whether he too was totally accounted for in the creed. She found this diviner mumbo-jumbo hard to reconcile with the altar phraseology that dripped from her mother-in-law’s lips, and she ventured to suggest that such a pursuit was faintly pagan. ‘The police use them, you know,’ Mrs Whitely was quick to defend herself. The fact that the Law availed itself of such a facility, made it slightly more kosher. There used to be a Mr Wentworth. Lived in Stamford Hill. He’d be in the phone book if he’s still alive. Clive Wentworth, that’s it. George’s father, God rest his soul, used to know him. He used to be quite famous. We could ring him up for an appointment.’

  ‘No, not the phone,’ Joy interrupted her, and she explained why her telephone was unusable. So it was arranged that Mrs Whitely should go to the Post Office and phone him from there, if he was still alive. But before she left, she asked to see her room so that she could unpack a few things, which, as Joy watched her, turned out to be very little clothing, but an abundance of church gear. She had even brought her own hammer and nail for her crucifix, which she proceeded to hang on the wall above her bed. Next came a do-it-yourself altar, plastic and painted by numbers. This she set up on the bedside table.

  She was obviously relieved to have thus unburdened herself. A holdall was no place for instant religion. She looked around her room and sighed with satisfaction. Now she was ready to face whatever vicissitudes her wayward son had landed her in.

  When she had gone, Joy went back into the front room and sprayed it with Fresh-air. Mrs Whitely had brought the mustiness of the church with her, both on her person and in her holdall. Joy Verrey Smith wondered how long she was going to stay.

  She heard a car draw up outside, and from the raising of curtains opposite, she knew that something was afoot in the street. It was probably the Superintendent again with questions pertaining to the confession letter. She did not care any more about the Superintendent. Since the phone call from the little boy, George had, in her mind, been acquitted of one murder at least. The other was possibly a figment of his mother’s imagination.

  She went over to the window to investigate. It was a large van, and the Superintendent’s car was parked behind. It was a feast for the neighbours. She opened the door to the Superintendent and the men and their equipment followed him inside.

  ‘This won’t take very long,’ the Superintendent was saying. ‘Shall we do it here?’ he said, pointing to the front room. ‘Now you just relax, Mrs Verrey Smith. We can discuss what you’ll say, while they’re getting everything ready.’ The Superintendent had taken over the role of director. ‘I thought perhaps you would prefer to talk to a reporter, rather than straight to the camera.’ He himself was itching for a part in the production, but there was no valid role for him to play. So he busied himself in seating Mrs Verrey Smith and the reporter, checking with the director from time to time as to their positions. After some discussion and much shifting of lights, it seemed that they were ready. The camera-man suggested a little powder on Mrs Verrey Smith’s chin to take off the shine, and the director, who had once, many years ago, made a ‘B’ feature and, apart from the odd day, had been out of work ever since, readily agreed with him, for there was no reason why the interview, though a straightforward piece of reporting, should not be of artistic value. All this set him off on repositioning the lights, so that Mrs Verrey Smith in profile would look rather fetching. ‘After all,’ he explained to the Superintendent, who by now was getting rather restless, ‘here is a woman in distress, appealing to her husband to come home.’ Once again, he saw himself in the studios, under the great arc lights, the sound and camera crews hanging on his every word. ‘She should rest her chin on her hand, I think,’ he said. ‘Let me see that position, Mrs Verrey Smith.’ He looked through the eye-piece, and found his star satisfactory.

  The Superintendent thought the director was overstepping himself. ‘It’s only an appeal,’ he said. ‘We’re not making a Hollywood spectacular.’

  The director ignored him. As far as he was concerned, the Superintendent was a mere clapper-boy and only served to reinforce the atmosphere of crew versus director tension, which, after all, obtains on any production. He motioned the Superintendent to stand behind the camera, or otherwise cast his shadow over the whole proceedings. He then relit the whole scene as for a feature, and after much rearrangement of mikes, lights and camera-positions, he announced himself ready to shoot.

  Then the doorbell rang. The Superintendent, knowing his cue, crossed over the set, and in doing so, tripped over one of the cables, bringing a lamp crashing down, and narrowly missing the camera.

  ‘You’re fired,’ the director shouted, still reigning down in Elstree.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ the Superintendent said. ‘But nothing is broken. You film people always make such a fuss.’ He was out of the room before the director could reply. The crash had brought him sadly back to a parlour in suburban London, to a set that was barely documentary. His job was a mere piece of reportage, that needed only to be in focus, and required no direction whatsoever.

  The Superintendent returned with Mrs Whitely. ‘You didn’t tell me about your mother-in-law,’ he said accusingly.

  ‘But she’s only just arrived,’ Joy said. ‘There’s no particular significance in her coming. She is anxious for her son. Her arrival, Superintendent, is not information.’

  The director was quick to catch the antagonism between these two, and it heartened him a little to feel that he was dealing with a temperamental leading lady.

  The Superintendent ignored her. ‘I think perhaps I would like Mrs Whitely in the interview,’ he said.

  The director sat down, overcome by the vicissitudes of his craft. He sighed with the burden of his creativity. ‘Perhaps you would like to reposition them, Inspector. Kill the lights,’ he ordered. ‘We’re back to square one.’

  And so it started all over again. Mrs Whitely sat next to her daughter-in-law. ‘I found him,’ she whispered. ‘I made an appointment for tomorrow. We must take some of his clothing.’

  ‘Relax, relax,’ the director directed his increased cast. He studied Mrs Whitely to see what he could make of her. She had taken off her hat and he decided that she looked more worried with it on. In his book, an anxious mother was hatted, and he asked her to replace it.

  ‘You don’t wear a hat in the house,’ the Superintendent objected.

  ‘Worried mothers,’ the director said with authority, ‘wear hats wherever they are.’

  ‘But this is not a – er – movie.’

  ‘Even a straight piece of reporting must carry its own inbuilt appeal, Inspector. Relax, this will take a little while.’

  The Superintendent placed himself in the set between Mrs Whitely and Mrs Verrey Smith.

  ‘I can’t light the set if you’re in it, Inspector. D’you mind sitting just here? Behind the camera.’

  The Superintendent moved obediently and, squatting on his haunches, he indulged in a wild fantasy of arresting the whole film-director profession on a charge of mass murder and hanging each one personally. This one, he decided, would drop twice.

  It took the rest of the morning to light the set and to prepare for shooting. Then after a hot-dinner break, insisted on by the sound crew, quoting Article 17b of the Union Rules, the cameras started to roll. It was six o’clock before the ‘Wrap’ order came. The director had enough film in the can for three hours’ viewing. The Superintendent had booked television time for five minutes.

 
As the crew were leaving, the Superintendent lagged behind. ‘I don’t suppose, Mrs Whitely,’ he said, ‘that you have any extra information about where your son would be hiding?’

  ‘We can only pray for guidance,’ Mrs Whitely said. ‘I pray that we will find him in the bosom of the church. He has much business to do there,’ she said, looking at Joy.

  The Superintendent shrugged. In his mind he recapped Mrs Whitely’s sermon before the cameras, and he wondered whether he could make an extra bob or two by selling the off-cuts to religious broadcasting. It wasn’t a bad business, film-making. As he drove off in his car, he thought he might suggest a possible career for his son.

  When he got back to the station, the night-shift had already taken over. He thought he would take a train down to Brighton. There’d been no news from there, but he was restless sitting around in London, when he knew, though now with less conviction, that Brighton was a more promising hunting-ground.

  He crossed over the foyer to his office. A coloured woman was standing at the reception desk. Her head was pressed on her hand. Her body was shaking; she was obviously in deep distress. The policeman behind the counter was trying to get her particulars, but she was obviously so overwrought, that only a few unintelligible words could escape her. ‘I’ll handle this, Officer,’ the Superintendent said, and he helped the woman into his office. He sat her down, gave her some water and tried to calm her.

  ‘Now what can we do for you?’ he said.

  ‘It’s my son,’ she stammered. ‘He’s lost. He hasn’t come home from school.’ She gathered momentum as the information flooded out. ‘He’s never late. Always back from school at half-past four. He’s a good boy. Wouldn’t go anywhere without telling me first. He’s ten, and he had on a green pullover. His name’s Washington. He’s my youngest. You’ve got to find him.’

  ‘Washington,’ the Superintendent said. ‘Washington what?’ He was prepared for an equally exotic surname.

  ‘Jones,’ she said flatly, starting to cry again.

  The Superintendent could see the last train for Brighton leaving without him. He rang for the senior officer, and instructed him to see to the woman, and if necessary to start a search for the boy. He tapped her shoulder as he left. ‘Probably playing football somewhere, Mrs Jones. Nothing to worry about. We’ll find him.’

  She broke into a new burst of sobbing. He looked at the senior officer and nodded to the jug of water on the desk. When in doubt, or playing for time, use water. He wondered why the film director hadn’t used a glass on the set. And that reminded him. He must ring up home to check that his sons were back from school. He decided to do it from the railway station. He was anxious to get away from his office. There was something about this woman that disturbed him deeply. It was always painful when a child was lost, but this woman was sobbing as if already bereaved. He called the senior officer over and whispered to him, ‘Get an all-out search for that boy. For some reason or other, I don’t like it. Keep me informed. I want him found, and quickly.’

  Chapter Nine

  The Superintendent’s trusted lieutenant had ferreted Brighton for a week, and had come up with nothing. He’d covered all the large hotels, and most of the boarding-houses. There were far too many to cover them all. In any case, Mrs Price was far more likely to be staying as a lodger somewhere, or with friends. ‘They’ve gone underground’ was his phrase to cover his failure, and it was his greeting to his chief when he arrived from London. ‘Gone underground’ was less final than ‘totally disappeared’. It held hope for eventual discovery.

  The Superintendent was not impressed whatever the phrasing. ‘Have you scoured the beaches?’ he said. ‘They could have taken a boat. Did you make all inquiries?’

  The trusted lieutenant, now feeling himself slightly less trusted, nodded. The boat possibility hadn’t occurred to him, but he dared not confess to it. He would do it quietly and on his own, in the morning.

  ‘Brighton’s not such a big place,’ the Superintendent was saying. ‘The woman’s bound to come out to do her shopping. Are there men in the markets? Have you no leads at all?’

  The lieutenant was bound in truth to shake his head.

  ‘I’ll patrol myself tomorrow,’ the Superintendent said. ‘Though they’ve had a week to slip out of our hands. I should have come here immediately,’ he said, almost to himself. ‘We’ve got to find Emily Price,’ he said aloud. Now that he felt her slipping from his grasp, he became more and more convinced that she was harbouring a murderer. ‘There’s a television appeal going out tomorrow,’ he said. ‘There’s bound to be a response,’ he almost shouted. He was very tired, and he knew that if he talked much longer he would lose his temper. He went back to his hotel, and early in the morning he was sniffing the streets, his confidence partially returned.

  But Emily Price was firmly indoors, or in-tent, as it were, for she had returned to Mrs Jumble’s. Sitting in that Worthing cave almost a week ago, shivering, and trying to dismiss the sea’s ham-fisted symbolism, she had decided that she wanted to live. In what guise, and where, was secondary and preferable to dying from cold and exposure on the English coastline. So she had taken the last bus back to Brighton and offered some excuse to Mrs Jumble for being so very late. But time meant nothing to Mrs Jumble and she had welcomed her. The week had passed smoothly. Emily enjoyed the simple cooking, and tending to the in-tent plants. Privacy was available whenever she wanted, and sometimes, when Mrs Jumble was asleep, she would wear George Verrey Smith for a while. It was always a relief after her woman-day to feel the rough tweed on her skin, and the solid safety of her lace-up shoes. She wondered whether Mrs Jumble was cheating too in her blue chiffon nightie underneath the donkey blankets. They were both, after all, entitled to their fumbling uncertainties. Sometimes Emily was depressed, especially at night, and then, in her tweeds, she counted her blessings of three meals a day and a roof over her head. Mrs Jumble always did the shopping, so she was safe, but eventually, when she received her wages, she would have to go out and buy another dress. She felt she was beginning to smell and she dreaded each morning on waking that, during the course of the day, Mrs Jumble might refer to it. And the following day, while the Superintendent was prowling Brighton for Emily Price, and the senior officer was scouring London for Washington Jones, and Clive Wentworth, in Stamford Hill, was divining George Verrey Smith, Mrs Jumble noted Emily’s sparse wardrobe and offered some clothes of her own until Emily’s mythical boxes arrived from London. ‘We’re practically the same size,’ she said. ‘You can try them on after supper.’

  They were sitting in the tent round a makeshift table, their plates on their knees. Mrs Jumble had put the television on for the news, and it spouted a warming-up hum. Emily worried less about the television. The news of her disappearance was stale, and obviously they had uncovered nothing more. Yet whenever the set was turned on, she tried to mask it or drown it in conversation. But as Mrs Jumble could neither read nor write, it was unfair to cut her off from one of her only means of communication.

  ‘I like to know what’s going on in the world,’ she would say, turning the switch prior to every news bulletin. She had shown no special interest in the disappearance of George Verrey Smith when it had been announced at the beginning of the week. Even a picture of the man had elicited no comment, though Emily had watched her for the slightest reaction. For herself, she had to grip the arm of her chair. When it appeared on a second bulletin, Emily even ventured to comment on the man’s very ordinary appearance. Her vanity prompted her. She could not let her face fill the television frame and remain wholly unnoticed. Mrs Jumble had said that she was quite right. There were a million people who looked like that one, and they’d never find him, an observation that Emily found both a relief and an insult. A later bulletin had suggested Brighton as the man’s whereabouts and Mrs Jumble had shown only slightly more interest, to the effect that they should both be careful when they went out. Emily had decided, in any case, to lie low until her disappearance had
blown over, and now with the promise of Mrs Jumble’s clothes, there was even less reason for her to risk the streets. She began to look forward to trying them on, and hoped fervently that Mrs Jumble would leave her alone as she did so. She would have to pretend to be shy and change alone, and then model each garment in front of her. She trembled in anticipation of this new pursuit. Emily Price as a model. She flushed with excitement. She went on eating her salad, though now more daintily. The person of Emily had come much closer to her in the last few days, as the risk of Verrey Smith had worn away. She took more care with her manners and her voice, for being Emily was once more, as in the beginning, enjoyable. She sliced a tomato thinly, and held it daintily on her fork. And as she raised it to her mouth, she heard a familiar voice. It did not belong to Mrs Jumble. She looked at her and that good lady was stuffing her lettuce into her mouth with her hands. She listened intently, and though she could not immediately pinpoint the voice, she felt Emily turning sour inside her once again, and all the joyful anticipation of her after-dinner modelling evaporated. Then she knew the voice as Joy’s, but the shock of recognition was too sickening for her to assimilate at the same time the matter of her words. So she had to look squarely at the screen to understand it at all, to see her wife in synchronization before it could mean anything to her. And there Joy was, filling the screen in her indispensable little black, in prepared mourning as it were, talking right at her, begging her to come home. Emily’s first reaction was to spit fair and square into her wife’s face. She looked at Mrs Jumble out of the corner of her eye, and that lady had stopped lettuce-stuffing and was staring at Joy Verrey Smith. ‘Poor woman,’ she said, taking advantage of one of the very few pauses that Joy allowed herself in her plea. ‘She must be suffering, poor thing.’

  ‘Yes, she is indeed,’ Emily agreed, and suddenly felt so too. She could hardly bear to look at her wife’s face and its puckered pain. So she listened to what she was saying and tried not to believe that it was she to whom she spoke.