‘I wasn’t expecting visitors,’ I said, pushing a pair of pants under the bed with one foot. Not that I really minded about them. ‘I haven’t time for all that nonsense.’
‘Come on,’ said John, ‘let’s go.’
‘All right. But if anyone sees us, don’t try claiming any acquaintance with me.’
We got out unobserved, fortunately, and found Stephen’s car parked outside. I must confess that it was more the thought of the car that had lured me away from my books than the prospect of Louise’s company. I adore cars. And it really was a most gloriously sunny day: far too good for Hobbes and the college library.
I was hardly surprised at all to see Louise, although it was the first time she had ever visited me in Oxford since she herself went down two summers before. I knew exactly why she had come to see me. There is something about Oxford in the summer that is so entirely undergraduate and nostalgic and enclosed that a visitor feels compelled to establish some contact with the university world: it sucks people in. Uncles look up nephews they had never meant to visit, and passing girls look up long-forgotten men just for the sake of a ride in a punt or tea in a college garden. Having once arrived in Ox, Louise had inevitably come to see me, partly in order to display Stephen and John to me, and partly in order to display me to Stephen and John. For although I knew Louise wasn’t an admirer of mine, I wasn’t too humble to realize that to these three people from London I had the pure virtue of being the real thing, the real student with a real pile of books and a real gown and a real essay to write. It was my place, Oxford, and I was on my own ground, for the only time in the history of my acquaintance with those three.
It was nearly lunch-time and we drove out to eat somewhere out of Oxford. I wanted to go out of the town, as I so rarely had the chance. I thought we would probably go to a pub, but we ended up in rather an expensive hotel just off the road to Banbury. If there is anything that fills me with as much enthusiasm as cars, it is hotels, so I was transported with quiet and concealed joy. We drank a lot of Pimm’s at the bar, and then went and ate a lot of delicious food: Louise always eats an enormous amount and never puts on an ounce. So do I and neither do I. I noticed one curious thing while we were eating: Stephen never seemed to know what to order, and when his food arrived he messed about with it quite horribly, covering it with salt and pepper and French mustard and olive oil, and never more than half-finished anything. He didn’t drink, either: I remember thinking how dreary it must be, to be stone cold sober when everyone else is pleasantly mellow. The talk was quite pleasant: Louise and John talked about the theatre, Stephen and I talked about books and novelists, and so on. Stephen seemed to admire all the people I admired, except for Kingsley Amis. It annoyed me, as I was sure he liked them all for the wrong reasons. He talked about them so professionally, whereas these things were life and death to me. When he said, of a novel I particularly admired, ‘Of course, the whole thing would have been much more effective had he set it in a slightly lower social setting,’ I almost lost my temper, as I am apt to do.
‘What do you mean?’ I said. ‘He was writing about those people because those were the people he was writing about, and that’s the end of it.’
‘Oh no it isn’t,’ he said. ‘His ideas would have come across much more clearly had he allowed himself a wider field for contrast.’
‘But it isn’t about ideas, it’s about people,’ I said, crossly.
‘Not about individual people. Only about people as they illustrate a point.’
‘And you think the point could have been better illustrated in another way?’
‘That’s it’
‘But if he’d changed the social setting he’d have changed everything. The problems as well as the ideas, wouldn’t he?’
‘Why would he?’
This professional obtuseness baffled me, and I gave up and went back to my strawberries and cream.
At the end of the meal they asked us if we would have coffee in the garden. It was a lovely garden, with lawns and trees and roses: we sat around dozily in the sun. After a while I began to think it was time I left, as I had to meet someone for tea, so I hinted that I ought to be going.
Louise and I went to the Ladies while Stephen or John or both paid the bill: in the Ladies, as I combed my hair, I said to Louise, ‘Are you working at the moment?’
‘I’ve given up work’ said Louise. ‘It doesn’t get you anywhere. I have other things in hand.’
‘Such as what?’
‘Oh, this and that.’
‘What was your last job?’
‘Advertising.’
‘How deadly.’
‘There are worse things. What are you going to do when you come down?’
‘I haven’t thought.’ And I hadn’t, either. It didn’t seem to matter at the time.
‘It takes a lot of thinking,’ said Louise.
After a pause, I said, ‘It was a lovely meal. I love food.’
‘So do I.’
‘I feel wonderful,’ I said, and meant it. I was extremely happy, all that term, and particularly, that day.
‘You look it,’ said Louise, without looking at me. I was embarrassed by her tone.
‘I wish I could eat like that every day,’ I said. ‘Every day of my life.’
‘Oh, one can’t have everything,’ said Louise. ‘It’s either lovely food or lovely company.’
‘Of course one can have everything,’ I said. ‘Have one’s cake and eat it. I intend to.’
‘I daresay you do,’ she said. ‘So did I.’ She paused, and then said, in a different tone, a tone of intention rather than expectation, ‘and so do I. So do I.’
I didn’t see what she meant. Not for ages. Not until I learned myself how difficult it was to get anything, let alone the everything that is showered on one in garlands and blossoming armfuls until one faces the outside world.
So we drove back to Oxford. I was in the back of the car with John, who asked me some rather intelligent questions about Finals. Like Louise, he wasn’t as dumb as he ought to have been with those looks. Why is Life so unevenly distributed? I was full of envy for those two, or would have been if I hadn’t then been so perpetually full of envy for myself.
Times had certainly changed since then, I reflected, as the bus arrived at our village post-office. For her and for me. Now I was at a loose end and she was married. And moreover I didn’t know any rich men with cars to pass the time away by feeding me in restaurants and driving me round the countryside. I wondered at the skill with which Louise infallibly picked up wealth. I suppose I could have done it once if I had really tried. I used to know a very rich man whose father was something to do with Barclays Bank. But then he was even more boring than Stephen. One can’t have everything.
It was on that bus-ride that I realized that I really would have to get a job. Even Louise had gone into advertising. Although since that meeting in May I don’t think she had worked at all.
The next day I had a letter from Gill. She said that if I was thinking of going to live in London, why didn’t we look for a flat together.
The next day I broached the subject to my mother. Our discussion went along these well-oiled grooves.
ME: Mummy, I’ve been thinking, I think I might go to London at the end of the week.
MAMA: [Pause] Oh yes?
ME: Yes, a friend of mine wants someone to share a flat and I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to . . .
MAMA: Well, that sounds a very good idea. Where exactly is this flat?
ME: Well, we haven’t exactly got one, but I thought I might go and look—it’s easier if you’re on the spot.
MAMA: Oh yes, I’m sure it is. I hear it’s very difficult to find flats in London these days. me [my heart sinking as I think of adverts, agencies, Evening Standards, etcetera]: Oh no, it’s not at all difficult, people get themselves fixed up in no time.
MAMA: Oh well, I suppose you know better than me. What will you live on while you’re there?<
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ME: I’ll get a job. I’ll have to sometime, you know. I’ll write to the appointments board.
MAMA: Just any sort of job?
ME: Whatever there is.
MAMA: Don’t you want a proper career, Sarah? I mean to say, with a degree like yours . . .
ME: No, not really, I don’t know what I want to do.
MAMA: I’m not sure I like the idea of your going off all the way to London without a proper job and with nowhere to live . . . still, it’s your own life, I suppose. That’s what I say. No one can accuse me of trying to keep you at home, either of you . . . Who is this friend of yours?
ME: A girl called Gill Slater. She was at Oxford. She was here at the wedding, she knows Louise.
MAMA: Oh yes, the girl in grey with all the long hair . . . I thought she was married?
ME: Married? Oh no.
MAMA: I’m sure I addressed the invitation to a Mr and Mrs Antony Slater.
ME: Oh Antony. That’s her brother. Perhaps Louise put them on the list as Antony and Gill Slater, did she?
MAMA: Yes, that must have been it. How silly of me. They must have been surprised. And they did reply separately, I remember now—oh well, it’s too late to worry. And what does she do?
ME: Oh, she’s a—she’s a sort of research student.
MAMA: Oh yes? Well, it sounds like a very nice idea. After all, you won’t want to stay here all your life cooped up with your poor old mother, will you? I shall lose all my little ones at one fell swoop, shall I?
ME: Oh don’t be silly.
MAMA: What do you mean, don’t be silly? It seems to me you’re very eager to be off.
ME: You know that’s not it at all.
MAMA: Well, what is it then?
ME: Well, it’s just that I can’t stay here all my life, can I?
MAMA: No, of course you can’t, nobody ever suggested anything of the sort. When have I ever tried to keep you at home? Haven’t I just said that you must lead your own life? After all, that’s why we sent you off to Oxford, it was always me who said you two must go—I don’t know what I wouldn’t have given for the opportunities you’ve been given. And your father wasn’t any too keen, believe me. In my day education was kept for the boys, you know.
ME: Well, you hadn’t any boys to educate, had you? You had to make do with us.
MAMA: And what thanks do I get? And you can’t say that staying at home for a week just after you’ve got back from abroad is staying at home all your life, can you? I’ve hardly had a chance to see you yet, and you’re off. I sometimes wonder what you and Louise bother to come home for . . . Oh, it’s all very well when you want something, like a bed or a reception, but as for staying here for me, it never crosses your minds, does it?
ME: Honestly, Mama, you know you always used to get furious when Louise came home . . . and I have to start earning my living sometime, don’t I?
MAMA: I don’t see what all the hurry is about. No sooner do I get rid of one daughter than the other starts leaving home. You just use home as if it were a hotel, you two, you don’t seem to remember I’m your mother and have always been on your side whenever your—and then all you want to do is to get away to your horrible dirty friends and horrible poky little flats.
ME: Oh, Mum, you know Loulou’s flat isn’t a bit horrible, it’s a very smart little place in South Ken, all pastel painted and hand-woven curtains . . .
MAMA: All I am is a servant, that’s all I am, just a household drudge, and when I think how I respected my mother and carried things for her, and the years I’ve sat in for you two, all those nights when your father was away . . .
ME: Don’t say that, don’t say that, of course I’ll stay, it doesn’t matter to me at all . . .
MAMA [in floods of tears]: Oh, I know there’s nothing to keep you here, I know there’s no reason why you should stay here, there’s nothing to amuse you, you’ve outgrown it all, you always were too clever for me . . .
ME [weeping too, feeling myself saying her words, wounded by my own sharp, indifferent self]: Oh don’t, please don’t, Mummy, please don’t, I’ll stay with you as long as you like, you know I will . . .
MAMA [sniffing and reasserting her hairpins]: No, don’t be silly. Of course you can’t stay here, what on earth would you do with yourself here? You go off to London, you’ll be better off there, it’s your duty to get yourself a good job . . .
ME: No, I don’t want to go any more.
MAMA: Oh yes, you really ought to go. It would be much better for you to go. So let’s have no more nonsense, shall we?
And so I went to London at the end of the week. Once a point has been made openly my mother never retracts: she has a high sense of honour, at least theoretically, and occasionally I feel obliged to hold her to the letter of what she has said and not the spirit of it. This was one of those cases. I stayed at first in a flat at Earl’s Court with an old school-friend, a strange relic from my subdued past: at school we used to get out of bed at midnight and go down to sit in the moonlit classroom amongst the empty desks, where we would talk about John Donne, Camus and Comus. Now she was training to be a probation officer: the moral streak had come out on top, and although she still regarded it with a certain detached suspicion, I could see that she had settled down to live with it in close communion. I admired her perseverance: I envied her her acquaintance with Teds and shop girls: but I felt little impulse to go and do likewise. And I didn’t feel it was wholly my own love of luxury that was preventing me, either: I felt it was something slightly more positive. My moral streak was more ravenous and more demanding: I couldn’t satisfy it with a sacrifice.
In the end I got a job with the BBC. It seemed better than nothing, and it was work, with all the added charms of coffee-breaks, desks, lifts and catching the Tube home. Though I hadn’t as yet got a home. For some reason I didn’t get in touch with Tony, in his loathsome flat in the King’s Road, but I did ring Gill. She asked me out to visit her in the place in Highgate where she was living, and when I got there I saw at once why she was keen to get out. It was unspeakably sordid, and like Tony’s place it stank of paint: all the people in it were trying to be artists, though they completely lacked talent, and made Tony look like a young Picasso. They were all very young, younger even than Gill and me, and they all wore large men’s jerseys of shattering expense, and smoked all the time. I suppose such a place could have had charm if I had met it at the right moment: it could even have had glamour if I had gone there straight from leaving school: but as I was preoccupied with flats and jobs and being serious it utterly repelled me. I kept remembering my mother’s comments about dirt. It wasn’t just that they kept the bread loose on the windowsill among the ashtrays, without a suggestion of a breadboard, and cooked in unwashed pans, and left stale Martini in the only teapot: I could have thought these habits endearing, if it hadn’t been for the phoneyness of the whole setup. And these were such phoneys that I couldn’t even pride myself on detecting them. I felt as though I were watching them all through the civil pages of one of Stephen’s short stories about Bohemia. I hated the way they all felt it their duty to be rude, frank and blunt. I felt in relation to them as my probation officer friend doubtless felt in relation to me. Squalor has its degrees, like crime.
Gill and I didn’t have too bad a time flat-hunting. We kept drawing little circles on the map, indicating areas that we couldn’t bear to live outside, and in the end found somewhere in our third and largest circle, through an ad in a window, moreover, not through an agency. It was in Highbury, at the top of Highbury Hill, in a large decayed Victorian house. It was on the second floor, and the rooms were vast and gracious, with ceilings covered in moulded fruit and flowers. Gill borrowed a ladder from a neighbourly carpenter and painted all the moulding red and green and gold. It looked quite homely. The best thing was that we had enough room: I couldn’t have shared a bedroom, I don’t think. We settled down together there in a kind of suspended, interim tranquillity: Gill was working, quite pointless
ly, at Swan & Edgar’s, and I was busy filing things at the BBC. The days passed, which seemed the most I could expect of them, and the weather gathered its cold strength for the attack of winter.
After a while I began to wonder what had happened to Louise. Nobody had heard anything of her: she hadn’t even sent my parents a postcard to say she’d arrived in Rome. But I knew that she couldn’t have come home, as the news would surely have filtered through to me had she been in London. One October evening as I was walking home from the bus stop I passed a film poster of some epic with a large picture of the Coliseum, and I suddenly and insistently remembered her. I wondered why she was such a mystery, why she didn’t fit together, why she was so unpredictable. I simply could not imaginer what she and Stephen were doing together in Rome, if indeed they were still there: I could never picture one of their conversations together when nobody else was there. They just didn’t exist in relation to each other. And yet I suppose that I knew more facts about Louise than anyone else in the world, except perhaps our mother: but despite this I had a much better sense of what Gill, for example, would do under any given circumstances. I felt my powers of deduction were at fault: I ought to have been able to deduce from observed particulars, whereas I always trust to messy things like intuition, or to sheer voluntary information and confessions. I was just telling myself that it was time I had a little more data about Louise’s case when I arrived at our front door. I put my hand in the letter-box, and there, like a polite reply to my half-formulated thinkings, lay a letter from Simone, with a Rome postmark.
I went upstairs with it in a glow of contentment, feeling it solid and thick in my hand, a large white and expensive envelope covered in Simone’s black, twig-like script. A whole letter, and it felt quite a long one. It was so long since she had written to me: her letters used to arrive during vacations like manna in the wilderness. And I realized by my gratitude how near to a wilderness was the place I was now inhabiting. I made myself wait to open it until I had taken off my coat, hung it on the peg, lit the gas fire and sat down on the hearthrug: then I ran my finger through the thick, stiff paper and took out the neatly folded sheet. Her writing looked like some other language, hieroglyphic, neat and unearthly. Not for her the unaesthetic carelessness of dashes, scribbles, and postscripts.
A Summer Bird-Cage Page 6