by June Gadsby
“Megan?”
I hadn’t heard Greg come up, but there he was standing behind me as I gazed blindly at my naked body in the full-length wardrobe mirror. I blinked back at him through the glass and made to grab my night-dress, feeling ridiculously self-conscious.
“I thought you’d gone out,” I said a little breathlessly as I pulled over my head one the whisper-soft, lawn Edwardian garments I was so fond of. I felt a warm rush of blood to my cheeks as Greg laid his hands on my shoulders and pulled me back against him. “I’m tired. I thought I’d have an early night. Busy day tomorrow.”
He was nuzzling my left ear. I smelled stale sweat and cigarette smoke, the latter of which seemed to have settled in his shock of dark hair.
“Megan,” he murmured against my neck and I felt my teeth grit, knowing exactly what he had in mind.
“You need a hair-cut,” I said, moving out of his hands and sitting down at the dressing table, where I proceeded to smooth cream into my face and brush my hair. His eyes never left me.
“I’m sorry.”
His words came out so quietly, I could hardly make them out. I got up from the dressing table, tossed him a careless glance and pulled back the cover on the bed.
“I really am tired,” was all I could say as I slipped between mattress and duvet and reached for my book on the bedside table.
“You’re upset,” he said, not moving, but standing there, Neanderthal man personified.
“No, I’m not.”
“Angry, then.”
“Why should I be angry? I’ve just landed the job of a lifetime…well, my lifetime, anyway. You have no right to begrudge me that, Greg.”
“Okay. So, I have no right to do that. Do I still have the right to make love to my wife?”
“We had sex…” I wrinkled my forehead, unable to utter the word ‘love’ and tried to remember when the last time had been, and failed; “…not that long ago. Anyway, I thought you were busy with the book.”
He approached the bed and I tried to ignore him, giving my attention to the paperback in front of my nose. I felt the bed go down with his weight as he sat on the edge. Our eyes met over the book. Mine suspicious. His full of remorse. It looked so terribly genuine, I put the book aside with a sigh and held my arms out to him.
“You really do need a haircut, you know,” I muttered, wondering why I should feel so impatient to get the moment over. I wanted nothing but to turn out the light and go to sleep, shutting out everything. Greg, our marriage, my thoughts. My secret fears.
In the end, it was Greg who put out the light after an abortive love-making that he considered to be all my fault because, he said, I just wasn’t with him.
“I’m sorry, Greg.” Now it was my turn to apologise. I tried to make it sound sincere, though all I could feel was the relief that it was over. “I’ll try better next time. Goodnight.”
The only response I got was a heavy, brooding silence from the other side of the bed, where he had flung himself and was lying breathing fire and old gin fumes up to the ceiling. I wanted to scream at him that things might be different if he took more care with his personal hygiene, took a shower occasionally, changed his clothes more often, stopped smoking like a chimney as if his life depended on it. And all the other displeasing facets of his nature. Instead, I closed my eyes tightly, turned on my side away from him and tried desperately to go to sleep.
Chapter Ten
I awoke with a start, my heart thudding uncomfortably as I tried to figure out what was the cause of the terrible banging sound that had penetrated the dark recesses of my sleeping brain.
Raising myself on my elbows, I peered about me, quickly taking in the fact that I was alone in our dimly lit bedroom. Greg’s bedclothes were tossed back as if he had risen in a hurry. The duvet was mostly draping the floor. The clothes he had removed last night were still lying crushed where he had thrown them, strewn about haphazardly. The clock said half-past seven, which was more or less when I normally got up. It was a private routine I had fallen into over the years. I liked to get a good start to the day and not feel that I had wasted the best part of it in bed.
Greg had no such routine. Most of the time, he was running around like a headless, insomniac chicken, sometimes not coming to bed at all. Then there were the other times when he came home drunk after a liquid night out, either with the boys of the Press or alone. That was when he could sleep the clock around, dead to the world for anything between twelve and twenty-four hours. It didn’t seem to matter that the doctor had told him two years ago to make some sensible changes to his lifestyle. High levels in blood pressure and cholesterol notwithstanding, Greg continued a downward course without a parachute.
The sound of a car engine struggling to start and failing miserably cut through the otherwise silent morning. It sounded close, so I guessed the bang I had heard – I had decided there had really only been one, rather than a series of them – must have been Greg leaving the house. He couldn’t seem to do things quietly.
I got up and padded across the room to the window. The air was chilled, and I shivered as I pulled back the curtain and looked out at the new day. It was early yet, but it seemed grey and cheerless. And that’s how Greg’s face was when he stormed up the drive after slamming his car door. He had obviously left his car in the road last night. I opened the window and called down to him.
“What’s wrong?”
“Bloody battery’s dead! I’ll have to take yours.”
“Oh, Greg, you can’t!” I wailed, remembering my appointment with Callum Andrews.
“Sorry, but I’ve got some interviews lined up.”
“What interviews?”
“It’s to do with the Andrews’ biography. Important people.”
“I have an appointment with Callum Andrews himself,” I threw down at him and he simply gave a shrug. “What do you suggest I do? Walk?”
“There are such things as public transport,” he suggested flippantly.
“They’ve all been out on strike for a couple of days, as you well know,” I reminded him.
“Get a taxi, then. Better still, ring up Andrews and cancel.”
I closed the window and fumed behind the glass. My breath turned the window misty. Greg drove my car out of the garage and I watched helplessly as he bounced off the kerb and disappeared down the road in a carbon monoxide cloud as he stamped erratically down on all three pedals.
Always, when he got behind the wheel of my car, for some unknown reason, he drove like a novice on his first lesson. I think it had something to do with the fact that my car was rather small, and Greg was rather big, so his thighs tended to jamb themselves beneath the steering wheel. It never occurred to him to adjust the position of the driver’s seat. That would have taken up too much of his precious travelling time, I suppose.
I showered, breakfasted and tried to call for a taxi. There were none available, of course, as I expected. It was already getting late and I realised, with a gasp of horror that I didn’t even have Callum’s telephone number. The directory gave me no help. He was obviously ex-directory. I didn’t blame him for that, but right now I was cursing this system that allowed people to become so private they were anonymous and out of sight to all but the chosen few to whom they had deemed it necessary to give their number.
It was no good asking Ros for a lift. She didn’t even drive. And the only people I knew well enough to ask a favour of were already at work. Well, I was going to make a fine impression on Mister Bloody Andrews.
I had no idea why I should suddenly flair up in a cloud of dark anger directed at him, but anger was what I felt. Yes, it was. I’m sure it was. Wasn’t it?
Then I remembered Terry. I at least had his number and he would surely have the number for the Andrews’ household. I tapped in his digits with an over-hasty finger and had to re-dial when I got through to an erroneous correspondent.
When I finally heard Terry’s relaxed tones at the other end of the line, I heaved a sigh of relief
and blurted out my problem with an unstoppable flood of words.
“You couldn’t let me have Callum Andrews’ number, could you?” I concluded breathlessly. “Or give him a ring for me and explain what’s happened?”
“Whoah, Megan. Let me get a word in, there’s a love.”
“Sorry.”
“Right. Now, as I’ve been trying to explain to you, I also have an appointment with the great man himself at ten o’clock. How’s about I give you a lift and no harm done, eh? I’m just about ready to leave, so I’ll pick you up in a few minutes, okay?”
“Oh! Oh, yes, Terry. Okay.”
He must have taken me for some kind of prize fog-head the way I had babbled on to him. I didn’t know why I was like that just then. It wasn’t exactly characteristic of me. I had left the excitable, hyperactive adolescent behind me many years ago. Most of the time, I prided myself on my hard-learned, calm exterior. But one meeting with Callum Andrews and all that I’d learned over the years seemed to have gone down the proverbial S-bend.
It was actually twenty minutes before Terry pulled up in front of our gate and papped his horn. I half-stumbled out of the house, clutching my bag and portfolio and an umbrella in case I got caught in the rain on the homeward journey. I didn’t think for a moment that Terry would be staying until my session with Callum was finished. Editors of newspapers were busy people and Terry Carter was no exception, despite his laid-back-man-in-control attitude.
Strangely enough, Terry seemed a bit jittery that morning. He was unusually bright eyed and rosy-cheeked.
“Hi, Megan.” He bent to kiss my cheek, then, with my stuff piled on the back seat, we set off through the town that was oddly empty of buses, but nose to tail with cars and taxis. “God, what a mess! I hate the public transport system, just like everybody else, but when they’re on strike it causes even more mayhem.”
He was driving like a nervous old maid. I had never been in a car with him before, so I didn’t know that this was not his normal driving capability. When he jammed on the brake a fraction of a minute after I gasped and my own foot shot out at my non-existent pedal, he slowed down and shot me an apologetic look.
“Sorry, Megan. Are you all right?” he apologised and I forced a smile and a nod. I quickly returned my attentive gaze to the road ahead in the hope that I could again see the dangers before he drove us into the rear bumper of some unsuspecting commuter.
“It’s a bit of luck,” I said, swallowing my heart back into its usual niche, “you having a meeting with Callum this morning. Otherwise, I would have had to cancel and that wouldn’t have looked very good. Not at this early stage.”
“No, I don’t think you would have been very popular. One of the things Callum Andrews won’t tolerate is having his time wasted. Can’t say I blame him. Especially right now. He’s struggling to get this special piece composed and it’s not going right for him. Time, as they say, is of the essence.”
“In that case, I don’t know why he’s agreed to have me hanging around doing the art bit, when he could have had a photographer go clack-clack for a few minutes and it would all be over.”
Terry laughed. “As a matter of fact, I think he would prefer that, but we…the paper and his agent, that is…talked him into the artwork. And by the way, he tells me that he’s very impressed with you so far. Well done. Callum Andrews isn’t an easy man to please. Like most insular types, he doesn’t suffer fools gladly.”
I glowed with sudden self-conscious pride. “He seemed very nice, I thought.”
“Oh, he is! Don’t get me wrong, Megan…” at that he drew up sharply as we turned the corner and came up against a long tail-back of cars straggling as far as we could see. “Bloody hell! Get a move on, you idiots! Sorry, Megan. I’m a little nervous today, as you may have noticed.”
“Well, I did wonder…”
“It’s Christine….” Terry looked in the rear-view mirror, then frantically all around him searching for a side-road that might cut out some of the traffic. “You did know that she’s pregnant?”
“No, I didn’t. Congratulations.”
“You didn’t know? God doesn’t Greg tell you anything?”
“He doesn’t discuss his colleagues much…or his work,” I said hastily, though the pregnant wife of Greg’s boss was hardly work. “When’s the happy day?”
“That’s just it. It’s our first, you know, after ten years of marriage. Christine’s not so young anymore and it’s been a scary pregnancy. The thing is it could happen at any time and she wasn’t feeling too well this morning. That’s why I’m driving like an imbecile, I suppose.”
I smiled and tried to ignore the dull tug at my heart. Terry and Christine had been married the same length of time as Greg and me. The difference was, they were going to have a family. A son or a daughter to call their own, to love, to raise, to guide through life when necessary, to watch grow and mature. To laugh with or maybe even to cry over.
“You don’t have any kids, do you, Megan?” Terry continued, diving into a narrow alleyway and making his way cautiously along until we came to a parallel route that would allow us to miss the jams and get us to the Andrews’ house on time.
“Greg didn’t want any,” I replied shortly, then bit down on my lip, because that wasn’t what I had meant to say. It wasn’t very loyal, I supposed, even if it was the absolute truth.
“Oh, Lord! He’s quite something, is our Greg.” Terry shot me a look that had depth of meaning, though I wasn’t sure what that meaning was. “Pamela and I have been trying ever since we got married. We’d just about given up hope, then this happened, and we couldn’t be happier. It’s been a tough few months for both of us, I can tell you. I don’t know what we’d do if anything went wrong now.”
“Everything will be fine, I’m sure.” I was raw with pure jealousy and an all-pervading misery at my childless state, but I smiled brightly, hoping that my damp eyes did not show.
We arrived five minutes late and met Mrs. Andrews in the wide, sweeping drive. She was dressed up, a little like the Queen Mother, I thought, with her feathered hat, her velvet and her pearls, and was just about to step into a waiting taxi.
“Ah, there you are at last!” she exclaimed, all fuss and fur trim and a face made up in such a way that made her look clownish. That elderly, mother’s face simply did not lend itself to bright blue eye shadow, her eyes being a rather spaniel shade of brown. And her cheeks stood out feverishly with great dobs of fuchsia-coloured blusher and badly matched lipstick that looked as if it had been applied in a great hurry with the aid of a garden trowel. Poor woman, I thought. Somebody should take her in hand.
“Sorry, Mrs. Andrews,” Terry apologised, stopping to shake her hand and be charming. “The roads are chaos this morning.”
“Well, never mind that now. Himself is waiting for you. He’s no doubt champing at the bit by now. Don’t take any notice if he chews you off a bit. His bark is usually worse than his bite.” She turned to me for the first time and gave me a beaming scrutiny. “So nice to see you again, dear. Callum was most impressed with your work. I’m dying to see some of it, but right now I’m off to a literary luncheon in Durham. It’s that politician fellow who writes all those spy stories. Can’t remember his name. Not my type of book, you know, but it’s an excellent lunch they’re providing. Just go straight in. Callum won’t answer the bell in case it’s Jehovah’s Witnesses or some long-lost relative from up north. Goodbye!”
She left us standing there, looking after her and looking at each other with amused grins.
“She’s not for real!” Terry hissed out of the corner of his mouth and shook his head. “Priceless! Miss W.I. nineteen sixty. I wonder where ‘Himself’ found her?”
“Maybe it was the other way around,” I suggested, watching the bobbing purple feather on her felt hat wave to us cheekily as the taxi drove.
Chapter Eleven
We followed the sounds of the tinkling piano through to the back of the house and Callum’s hide
away conservatory. His door was open. Terry tapped sharply on it with his knuckles. There was no reply and the music, which I was surprised to recognise as one of my own favourites, Mozart’s twenty-first piano concerto, continued without a break. We stepped tentatively into the room.
Callum was lying back in a huge, soft old armchair covered in faded chintz. His long, muscular legs were stretched out before him. One elbow rested on the arm of the chair, his hand covering his closed eyes. His mouth was slightly open, and I guessed that he was snoozing and felt both embarrassed and honoured to witness our famous man in such a relaxed human state.
The music, of course, was coming from a CD player on the table by his elbow and it came to an end with a burst of live-audience applause as we stood there, shuffling our feet, not quite sure what to do for the best other than a little throat clearing.
“I’m not asleep!” Callum insisted loudly without moving a muscle. “Just trying to soak in a little inspiration from one of my greatest masters.”
We remained silent and watchful and waited for Callum to join us, so to speak. He did so almost immediately, dragging his hand away from his eyes and drawing back his feet before hauling himself out of the deep-cushioned chair.
“Come in, for goodness sake,” he said irritably as he bent over the CD player and extracted the disc. “And shut the door please. Are you familiar with Mozart?”
He straightened his back, turned and fixed me with an eagle eye. I hadn’t realised he was speaking to me. Immediately, I felt my cheeks grow ridiculously warm.
“Yes,” I told him. “And I’m particularly fond of that piece, but I prefer the second movement. The one they used for the film….?”
“Elvira Madigan…ah, yes. Everyone loves film music, yet not many of them know that most of it comes out of great classical composers from the past. So, how are you today, young woman?"
“Fine, thank you.” I glanced at Terry, who was looking vaguely uncomfortable and superfluous and I remembered the situation with his wife. “Er…how would you like to organise things, Mr. Andrews?”