by Mary Wesley
Robert said, ‘Of course not, I am very glad to see you. I was going to call—’ (Well, easily might have.) ‘You were so kind when—’
‘Evelyn died.’
‘Yes.’
‘I was fond of him, Mr Copplestone. The war brought people together who were barely on nodding terms before. Your son’s basement was open house. I used to bring soup for him and his friends.’
‘He told me. Do call me Robert.’
‘Oh, shall I? Very well. He had a lot of friends.’
‘Please come up, we could light the fire. It’s chilly.’ Robert’s eye roved over the desolation of the hall, furniture askew, rugs rolled up, his hat looking ridiculous. ‘Let me lead the way.’
In the drawing-room he lit the fire, settled Mrs Hunt in an armchair. ‘I wondered whether you could help me,’ he said.
‘Of course, Robert, but how?’
‘I am looking to see whether there is anything I may have missed.’
‘Oh?’
‘About that last night.’
‘Those poor young things! Surely I told you at the time? He warned them, you know, but they so wanted to dance and off they went—’
‘Did you see the other girl?’
‘What other girl?’
‘A girl who did not go with the others?’
‘Oh! Goodness me, there was another girl, I had clean forgotten. She came in with Evelyn, she refused soup, so did he. They came up here, I suppose. She can’t have stayed long; he was alone when I found him.’
‘Did you know who she was? Was she a friend?’
‘Must have been.’
‘Was she here often?’
Mrs Hunt frowned. ‘No, I don’t think I had seen her before. I knew all the others, of course. Why? Is it important?’
‘Evelyn gave her a letter for me, suggested she should work—’
‘Oh, the dear fellow! So he found you a girl! He said how difficult it was for you to find anyone suitable, that all he could send you were impermanent pederasts—’
Robert laughed, ‘Anthony Smith?’
‘That’s the one, and he had a friend. But this girl, is she any good? Evelyn would be pleased.’
Robert said, ‘A very hard worker.’
‘Isn’t that splendid? Evelyn was such a good judge.’
‘I only wondered—’ Robert hesitated. He had wondered so much it was hard to know where to start or even, he eyed Mrs Hunt, whether to do so. Awkwardly he said, ‘I wondered how well he knew her?’
Mrs Hunt frowned. ‘I wouldn’t know that.’
‘Or how long?’ Robert forced himself on. This was worse than spying from the blotting paper.
‘I wouldn’t know that either. What does she say?’
‘Not much. Very little, in fact. Hardly anything.’
Mrs Hunt regarded Robert. ‘Are you wondering whether he was in love with her?’
‘I—’
‘And whether she was in love with him?’
‘It—’
‘Or whether they quarrelled and she walked out but, thinking better of it, came down to see you because she wanted the job? Or is my imagination taking a gallop?’
‘Mrs Hunt.’ Robert flushed.
Mrs Hunt chuckled, ‘I can assure you he wasn’t.’
‘Ah.’
‘Not in love, nor in the mood to take her to bed. I had learned to know your son, Robert.’
‘You had?’
‘He was very tired, dying as we now know. And, now I remember the girl, she looked knackered, too. She would be just someone he thought would suit you.’
‘He wrote something rather odd in his letter.’
‘What?’
‘That I would find her rewarding.’
‘Well, there you are,’ said Mrs Hunt. ‘What a good job you do.’
For a moment Robert felt like hitting her but resisted the temptation and, when she offered him a bed for the night, refused politely, saying that he had a bed waiting at his club and a dinner engagement with a friend.
From Evelyn’s house he walked to Jermyn Street to have his hair cut at Penhaligons, then on impulse caught a bus which took him west to the Brompton Road. Walking down it, he came to the square where Priscilla had told him Juno’s aunt lived.
Walking round the square, not even noting the numbers of the houses, he began to wonder whether he was quite right in the head. He had no wish to meet Juno’s aunt, would not know what to say or what question to ask if he did.
What on earth, if she could see him now, would Juno think? Flushing with embarrassment he quickened his pace, hurried back into the Brompton Road and through the swing doors into Harrods where, in the perfumery department, he bought a large bottle of Guerlain before going up in the lift to the toy department, where he bought two teddy bears.
Back at his club, he had tea and a boring conversation with a man he barely knew. Then he had a bath and changed, before telephoning a woman he had known for a number of years to invite her out to dinner, arranging to meet her at a restaurant of her choice. After an amiable meal he went back to her flat and went to bed with her, a perfectly pleasant, therapeutic but fairly dull experience which, if nothing else, proved, if he had had any doubts, that he was still in excellent working order.
Back at his club he asked the night porter to wake him early so that he could catch the fast train home, then lay sleepless all night worrying as to whether the pattern of the wallpaper in the bedroom of the bombed house opposite Evelyn’s was or was not a Morris print.
THIRTY-EIGHT
‘NOT LIKE THAT, DARLING, like this and this, then we are both comfortable.’
‘I was not exactly considering comfort.’ Jonty shifted his position. ‘That better?’ They were lying side by side on his parents’ sofa.
‘Much.’ Sheena relaxed in his arms, pleased with him, pleased with herself, ‘Love me?’
‘Why do you keep asking?’
‘A girl needs to be sure.’
‘So does a man.’
‘Well, then. But you are sure?’
‘Of course I am sure. D’you mind moving? I am getting cramp in my arm.’
‘Oh, Jonty.’
He rubbed his face against her cheek; she had lovely skin. Approvingly his mother had remarked, ‘That girl Sheena has the most wonderful complexion, it makes such a difference.’ He said, ‘Everybody has gone to bed.’
She said, ‘Goodness, you are scratchy. So they have.’
‘So we could—’
‘What?’
‘Move up to my room or yours.’
She said, ‘I don’t think we should.’
‘Are you not tempted?’ They had had this conversational exchange on previous occasions.
‘I want to discuss the best man.’ Sheena veered to another subject. ‘Who shall you have?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Darling, you must decide on somebody soon. The wedding is next week, after all.’
‘Ten days.’
‘Nearly next week. Choose somebody who looks nice. What about my brother?’
‘I have told you I don’t care.’ Jonty felt a choking anger. Abruptly he sat up. Why must Sheena keep boring on? With Francis dead, what did it matter? If Francis had not got himself killed, he naturally would have been best man, there would be no question. Come to that, it might have been Francis marrying Sheena and himself being best man; that scenario was as probable as either of them marrying anybody. Jonty began to laugh.
‘What’s the joke?’ She twined her arms round him; he could feel her breasts bubble against him.
He said, ‘All right. If that’s what you’d like, I’ll ask your brother.’ He chuckled again, and again she asked, ‘What’s the joke?’
This whole charade, it’s so improbable.’
‘Falling in love is always improbable.’ She laid her cheek against his, then risked sticking her tongue in his ear.
Jonty jumped. ‘Christ! Who taught you to do that?’
‘Just somebody—’
‘Come upstairs.’ Tiptoeing, they climbed the stairs to Sheena’s room. He unzipped her dress, she his trousers. As he shrugged out of his shirt, he thought, if my mother heard us and came in now, she would save me. Then he thought, even if she hears us she won’t come in, the wedding is in ten days.
As Sheena held back the bedclothes for him to join her in the bed, he said, ‘My mother thinks you are a very nice girl.’
Sheena replied, ‘I am.’
Had the somebody who had taught her to stick her tongue in his ear taught her all this? Did it matter? It was both exciting and agreeable. ‘Oh! Ah! Yes!’ he murmured, and, ‘We used Juno as a short cut.’
Sheena, prick-eared, enquired, ‘And who was Juno?’
He said vaguely, ‘Oh, just somebody we knew when we were children,’ then he said, ‘Go on, go on, this is most agreeable.’
But less agreeable when she turned away to fall sound asleep. This, he had been led to believe, was the male prerogative. Lying wakeful, he thought, oh, God, next week I am marrying this girl called Sheena, a nice and suitable girl and talented, but she is not Juno. A little later he thought, when we were with Juno I felt infinitely tender, but now I just feel a void.
Then presently, while Sheena slept, he slipped from the bed, gathered up his clothes and tiptoed downstairs, where in the morning his mother found him snoring on the sofa, having emptied his father’s whisky decanter.
THIRTY-NINE
CHANGING HIS MIND AS he lay wakeful in the night, Robert stayed on in London. He should see his solicitor, make a decision about Evelyn’s house; it was easier to sort things out while on the spot. He telephoned Ann telling her not to expect him, but eating a nauseating breakfast of dried scrambled egg in the club dining-room he regretted his decision and nearly changed his mind, for he was joined by an acquaintance who had been at school with him. The man was well known, he remembered, as the school bore, a reputation he proceeded to live up to by regaling Robert with a series of grouses: the state of London in the blackout, its dirty streets, messy bomb sites, broken glass, but worst of all the vandalous uprooting of the posts along Rotten Row; ‘They were of historic interest, cast from the guns captured at Waterloo, irreplaceable.’ He raised his voice. ‘Can you see how it can possibly help defeat Hitler?’
Robert said, ‘Not really,’ and laughed.
His acquaintance exclaimed, ‘It’s no laughing matter. The idea was Beaverbrook’s and he’s a foreigner.’
‘Canadian.’
‘Same thing. London is full of foreigners, you must have noticed. Dreadful.’
Robert said, ‘Oh, I enjoy them, and their jolly uniforms. I particularly like the French kepis, tremendously smart.’
‘And what will you say when we are overrun by Americans?’ The man leaned across the table. ‘I hear Churchill is extremely thick with the Roosevelt fellow, they say he is persuading him to come in to the war. God Almighty! D’you remember them in the last lot?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, then—’ The man leaned back in his chair.
Robert said, ‘It would certainly make a difference, alter the odds.’
‘Good God! Have you thought? Have you any idea? What will your honest Cornish landlords say when they surge into their pubs, black, white and khaki, and drink all the locals’ beer? Negroes! Red Indians too, I dare say.’
‘They will say, “They are all foreigners to us,” and joyfully relieve them of their dollars.’ The man was even more boring than he remembered. Robert swallowed the last of his coffee, put his napkin down and rose to go. ‘What brings you up to London?’ he enquired as he turned away, anxious to escape.
‘Our son is missing in the Western Desert, believed killed, but my wife insists that I come up and badger the War Office. What’s the bloody use?’ There was raw despair in the man’s voice.
Ashamed, Robert said, ‘Oh, Stephens, I am terribly sorry,’ suddenly remembering Stephens’s name and that he had been rather good at the long jump. ‘Please,’ he said, ‘remember me to your wife.’ (How could one be so crass?)
‘And you?’ Stephens was boring on. ‘What brings you up from the sticks?’
Evasively Robert said, ‘Oh, just some business I have to discuss with my lawyer.’ Escaping, he went to telephone and make an appointment. Then, afraid of running into Stephens again, he walked in the park until it was time, turning his situation and Stephens’s over in his mind.
Telling his solicitor, an old friend who had also been at school with Stephens, of this breakfast encounter, Robert said, ‘I suppose I should count myself lucky; at least I know Evelyn is dead. I am not in limbo. I can come to you for advice as to what to do with his house and possessions.’
Eyeing Robert, his solicitor wondered whether to stick strictly to business or whether to ask how he was bearing up. He had known Evelyn as a child and watched his slow inevitable dying. He said, ‘Yes. Do sit down, Robert, try that chair.’
Robert said, ‘I must not waste your time, Edwin. Here I come complaining about our school bore and his bother about the railings of Rotten Row, while I myself lay fussing all night as to what was the pattern on a bit of wallpaper I saw flapping in the bombed house opposite Evelyn’s. We are two of a kind. Now come on. Let’s to business, try a trace of sanity.’
Edwin said, ‘Right. Very well.’ He pulled a folder towards him. ‘I suppose you know Evelyn’s will? I wrote but you never answered.’
Robert said, ‘Sorry about that. His leaving everything back to me was, still is, a shock.’
Edwin said, ‘That’s what he wanted.’
‘I wonder why?’
‘Back to his roots? Something of that sort. He did not explain. I did not ask.’
‘You were ever discreet.’ Robert smiled at Edwin, remembering a long thin boy who had grown into this long thin man married to a long thin woman. ‘Alice well?’
‘Busy with war work. Fed up that the war has put a stop to hunting, but otherwise fine.’
‘I’d forgotten you hunted. Now, advice; what am I to do about Evelyn’s house?’
‘Hang on to it.’ Edwin leaned back in his chair and made a steeple of his fingers. ‘After the war houses will be at a premium; hang on to it now and sell it later. I take it you don’t want to live in it?’
‘God forbid.’
‘Then let me find you a tenant. When the war is over you can sell and buy yourself a small flat.’
‘I don’t want a flat.’
‘You come to London and dislike meeting Stephens at breakfast. A flat is a convenience.’
‘I’ll think about it.’
‘There will be death duties. When you do sell, you can recoup and still get a flat.’
‘Oh, Edwin, I hate all this.’
‘Yes, I know, but there’s another thing we should discuss. Your will.’
‘I’ve thought of that. I need to make a new one, but I’m not sure of the names yet. I shall have to let you know.’
‘Not sure of what names?’ Edwin unsteepled his fingers and sat up. ‘What names?’ he repeated.
Robert said, ‘The people in whose favour I am making a will have not been christened yet.’
FORTY
VIOLET MARLOWE FOLDED HER sister-in-law’s letter and replaced it in its envelope. ‘What to do?’
‘Trouble?’ John Barnes looked over the top of his newspaper, catching the eye of his fellow lodger. Their club had lately refused them breakfast on a regular basis, quoting the difficulties of wartime rationing. They now breakfasted with Violet, an arrangement which jarred on their nerves, for neither man cared for conversation before his bowels had worked, and Violet was given to chatting.
‘My sister-in-law has had her baby.’ Violet snorted and slapped the airmail envelope.
‘Everything all right?’ Bill Bailey spoke with his mouth full of toast.
‘Oh yes, she is rapturous.’
‘Boy or girl?’
‘Girl. You’d think she’d
be sorry, for there’s already Juno, but no, she appears delighted, says her husband is totally enchanted. I quote. You’d think he’d want a son but he has bought her pearls and a bracelet.’
‘I am happy with my girls.’ Bill Bailey folded his napkin.
‘And I with mine.’ John Baines rose, intending to reach the downstairs lavatory before his friend and finish reading The Times in peace.
‘Funny, she doesn’t mention Juno.’ Violet picked up the letter and began to reread it.
‘Does she know about Juno?’ Bill Bailey, seeing that John was one jump ahead, lingered. He would have to make do with the lavatory on the landing. ‘Have you heard from your delinquent niece?’ he asked. ‘Isn’t she about due to give birth to the Canadian infant’s nephew or niece?’ There had been jokes about the disparate Marlowe relationships when Violet had apprised them of Priscilla’s news. ‘Have you been in touch?’
‘Actually, no.’ Violet flushed. ‘I haven’t.’
‘Why not, Violet?’
‘It’s embarrassing. The girl isn’t married; the child will be illegitimate.’
‘We are in the nineteen forties, Violet, not the last gasps of Queen Victoria,’ Bill teased. ‘She is your niece. It will be your great-niece or nephew, will it not?’
‘Are you reproaching me?’ One did not like being put in the wrong. Violet started as John, leaving his friend to the fray, shut the kitchen door with a snap. She looked at Bill. ‘It’s not your niece,’ she said, ‘not your family.’
‘No telephoning? No letter? She thanked you for sending on her clothes, did she not? Minded her manners,’ Bill persisted.
‘I admit she did.’
‘So why don’t you have that little holiday you need so badly? Go and see her. You could visit your old friend who was so bad at hockey.’ Bill was relentless.
Violet did not answer.
Presently, pedalling up the incline towards Hyde Park Corner, Bill Bailey said to John Baines, ‘I have sown the seed.’