The Rules of Engagement

by Anita Brookner

  There was a dreadful pathos in all this. I thought of the boy and his toy boat, giving him parity with the other children watched over by mothers in the peaceful afternoons. Simply put, it had taken him a lifetime to recover from childhood and he had not managed the process, had in fact abandoned it, had perhaps had a moment of lucidity and known himself to be inadequate to the task. Whereas Betsy had not accepted that her circumstances had been unfavourable, and had only revealed her longing for love and friendship in a sometimes misplaced enthusiasm. That eagerness had now gone, replaced by something that was not yet maturity, was perhaps merely the dawning realization that all her efforts, her acceptance, and even the happiness she had known in the early days of her love affair, were all aspects of a reality, a complexity with which she had not reckoned, simply because it was not in her nature to look beyond the truth she sought, and had so far managed to find. That truth had revealed itself as unpalatable, and this constituted a moral problem. There was evidence of this in the way she had rubbed her forehead, as philosophers do in the statues of old. Enlightenment would not be altogether welcome. But then it so rarely is.

  My situation was not greatly different. I too had given my trust to an unreliable partner. Digby, an entirely honourable man, had merely prepared the way. I thought, or thought I knew, that it was the intensity of one’s feelings rather than any idea of merit that determined one’s choice. Therefore love is a matter of pure solipsism. If that solipsism is in a sense exchanged with that of another the results are conclusive. Sentiment hardly enters into it, may not even be regretted. I had found myself entirely at home with this knowledge, and now barely thought to question it.

  When Betsy returned from the bathroom she looked composed and refreshed, as if the mere fact of being in someone else’s home were reassuring. Some people can deal with solitude—I could myself—but not, I saw, Betsy. What she wanted was to be cherished. Ideally she would have liked to be integrated into a family, someone else’s if necessary, where she would have various roles and would do her best to perfect them. On her own, in a small flat, she would not do so well. She seemed relieved to have delivered an account of herself, persuaded that she need not offer it again, that it had been dealt with, that I had evidently not believed that she had made Daniel unhappy. How could she? It takes a certain skill, a certain determination to make a man unhappy if one is frustratingly in love with him, and Betsy lacked that skill, though she was capable of determination, as her history to date had proved.

  ‘The main thing now,’ I said firmly, ‘is the flat. Tell me about it.’

  ‘Well, it’s small, though bigger than the rue Cler. Oh, I don’t like it. I don’t suppose I ever shall.’

  ‘You can move again when you want to. Find something more substantial.’

  She smiled again, again faintly. That occluded smile was the only sign that she had survived a major misfortune. Her original smile, the one I remembered, had been open, undisguised, in tune with her candid nature.

  ‘I don’t see myself in anything more substantial, as you put it.’

  ‘You’ll have the money,’ I reminded her, but it was clear that the money did not interest her. ‘And you’ll find something to do, make new friends.’ This, at the moment, seemed beyond her. ‘If I can help,’ I repeated.

  ‘Well, yes, I’d be grateful for some advice.’ She glanced appreciatively at my pale green walls, a mistake, I frequently thought, but pleasant enough. ‘You’ve made it so nice here.’

  ‘You’ll have enough furniture, I take it. Though you can get rid of it if it’s not suitable.’

  The smile faded. ‘Yes, all that stuff. Father’s desk—I never got rid of that. Mary didn’t want anything changed.’

  ‘Change it now,’ I instructed her. ‘You’ll feel better with new things around you.’

  The sound of Digby’s key in the door brought us both to our feet. ‘Home!’ he called, as he always did, and I went out into the hall to greet him. ‘Tired?’ I queried. That too was habitual. ‘I have a friend with me,’ I told him. Obediently he straightened his shoulders and summoned a smile. ‘You remember Betsy,’ I told him. ‘She was at our wedding.’

  Betsy held out her hand. ‘Betsy de Saint-Jorre,’ she said. She had appropriated both the aristocratic name and the married style. It was her one act of dissimulation, and I thought it entirely permissible.

  7

  EDMUND’S VOICE ON THE TELEPHONE SOUNDED DISTANT, patriarchal, as a voice does after an absence. I had not seen him for six weeks, and at times it had seemed to me that he had gone away, perhaps on a longer holiday than I had anticipated, or, worse, that he had gone away of his own accord, leaving me without an explanation, or rather with an explanation I was free to divine for myself. The agreement, or rather the agreement that had been imposed on me, was that we were two strangers who met from time to time for a specified purpose, but who did not otherwise intrude into each other’s lives. In order to sustain my part in this bargain I had needed all my hard-won pragmatism, and this, so far, had not deserted me. What intimacy we shared was rigorously controlled, confined to the flat in Britten Street, and never referred to in a wider context. This tacit collusion had excited me from the start. Now, with the changes in the year becoming advanced, and consequently the alteration in my habits dictated by the colder weather, the darker evenings, I began to see the advantages conferred by a companionship that could be taken for granted, a middle ground in which references could be understood without explanation. This carefully contrived neutrality was something one observed with strangers, beyond the comfort conferred by true knowledge.

  ‘Are you all right?’ I asked, aware that my voice had betrayed an unwanted eagerness.

  ‘My mother died. We had to go up to Scotland for the funeral.’

  ‘Oh, I’m so sorry.’ Again, this was too heartfelt. But surely the death of one’s mother was a tragedy? I felt that it might be a tragedy for others, although the warring tendencies of my own parents had made their absence a blessing rather than something to be regretted, as I rather suspected their eventual deaths would do. Parenting responsibilities had long since passed to my husband, in whose care I remained safe. But I assumed that for a man who had had the confidence to establish a family of his own, while continuing to live as freely as he chose, such ties would inevitably be stronger. In fact it pleased me to view Edmund as a member not exactly of a class but of a caste, a man in possession of all the certainties that had come to him at birth and had never had to be relinquished. His assurance derived not simply from his untroubled physical expectations but rather from the conviction that he had obeyed all of life’s norms, that he measured up to some ideal standard which he had never thought to doubt. His behaviour would remain unquestioned by those whom it affected, simply because there were no questions to ask, or perhaps because it was a matter of form not to ask them.

  Privately it had occurred to me that such behaviour might cause anguish, bitterness, but from these dilemmas Edmund seemed inviolate. It was perhaps part of his natural endowment, this ability to please himself. He had given himself permission to do so by virtue of the fact that he had observed and paid the dues he owed to society, that he had acquired all those attributes that mark out the finished man: a fine house, fine children, honourable and amply rewarded work, considerable affluence, and the sort of health rarely achieved by those whose lives were plagued by anxiety or unhappiness. His ability to maintain an even body temperature in all weathers seemed to me to be part of this endowment: I myself began to shiver as soon as summer was over, and could, if I let myself, lapse into depression. Edmund, however, seemed untouched by such vagaries, untouched too by the melancholy which comes with the turn of the year and the approach of Christmas. He seemed, quite simply, impervious to any messages his nerves and susceptibilities might prompt, and thus gained an equilibrium that would no doubt be the envy of those not similarly favoured, myself included.

  ‘I’m sorry for your trouble,’ I said awkwardly
, aware that this sounded quaint. ‘I expect you’ll miss her.’

  ‘Well, she was very old, and she died in her sleep. The best thing that could have happened, really. We shall all go up again to look over the house, see what needs to be sold. We’ll probably keep it, though.’ There was a pause. ‘The children were very fond of her.’

  ‘And you? How are you?’

  ‘What? I’m fine.’ Another pause. ‘Are you free?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ But this sounded wrong too. I was being too simple, whereas I knew, from appreciative comments in the past, that what he preferred was a certain trickiness, a certain savoir-faire . I suspected that he preferred women who were as appropriately situated as he was himself, and from whom he need expect no sarcasm, no criticism, certainly no recriminations. It was all part of the bargain, a bargain which separated the initiated from the uninitiated. How one passed this particular test I was unsure, for I had thought ardour a worthy substitute for experience. Now I realized once again that my own experience was limited. What partners I had had in Paris were remembered with a certain discomfort, or indeed not remembered at all. That was why, like Emma Bovary, whose story does indeed seem to touch the lives of most women, I had been moved to exclaim, ‘J’ai un amant! J’ai un amant!’ when undergoing the rite of passage that distinguishes true joy from mere acquiescence. That such pleasure had to be paid for was a notion that belonged to the Dark Ages. Or did it? Women of my generation were at last profiting from the freedoms of the 1960s and had not yet been punished for so doing. One likes to think in terms of rewards and deserts, or at least I did. I was aware that my conduct was reprehensible, and yet I had only to remember the loneliness I had endured in Paris (and indeed since then) to reassure myself that certain indulgences were permitted. And that even if they were not (here doubt persisted) I was willing to pay the price. That there was a price to be paid I had read too much, and had been too indoctrinated to ignore. But part of Edmund’s gift to me had been to make me seem so fortunate that I might escape the penalties altogether. In short he had lent me some of his own glamorous freedom from the pangs of conscience, and I took this as further proof that I had matured in a way that had not hitherto been possible.

  If I regretted anything it was that our time together was too brief, that there was too little conversation. I should have liked to ask questions, not only about his wife, his children, but about his antecedents, his childhood, his loyalties. While enslaved by the outward man it was only the inner man who would have satisfied my curiosity. The death of his mother might have furnished a pretext for such an enquiry, might have provided the answer to many questions, but I knew that I was duty bound to observe my rightful place in the gallery of his acquaintances. This would have been a slight torment if I had allowed it to develop into something like a grudge. Being obliged to keep my place I was aware of the inequalities of the relationship. This was one of the many unfairnesses visited on women by men, particularly resented by women of my generation whose anger had at last been given free rein. I had no desire to indulge in accusations, or even suggestions; instinct, or was it fear, had prompted me to apply only the lightest of touches. But a light touch can be a heavy burden. Only the satisfaction of desire, the confidence of shared pleasure, can mitigate the inevitable suspicions and dissatisfactions that come to the surface between opportunities for meeting. And sometimes those opportunities seemed too slender. I had managed my own domestic responsibilities as if by magic in my eagerness to make the greater part of my time available. Now I was prompted by a wish that Edmund would do the same, while conscious of the need not to voice this. So far he had managed to please himself without any hint of remorse. It was his lack of remorse that was his most perversely attractive feature.

  Our meeting was perhaps more brief than usual. As I watched him dressing, with a rediscovered briskness, I thought he seemed preoccupied. Questions of the nature of ‘Are you all right?’ were, I had the wit to know, both clumsy and fussy, like the ardent ‘How are you?’ offered to mere acquaintances. ‘Are you very busy?’ I ventured, suddenly regretting that I had no job other than that of looking after Digby. I longed for an office, an enterprise that would absorb me and my daytime thoughts; I had observed, with respect, the girls on their way to work, briefcase in hand, one arm flung up to hail a taxi. I could see myself as a humble typist, a loyal secretary, anything so long as it gave a structure to my day and obliterated the long hours of waiting. Indeed I should have been more balanced, more reasonable, if I had had to compile an annual report, or— an even greater temptation, this—take part in meetings. Such activities would have palliated my isolation, and the loneliness which had survived my marriage and now threatened to disturb my love affair.

  ‘Yes, very busy,’ he said, in answer to my question. ‘And we may be going to move.’

  ‘From that lovely house?’

  ‘What? Oh, yes, you came there once or twice, didn’t you? Well, it’s too big now that all the children are away. And there’s a surprising amount of noise from the traffic. My wife finds it exasperating.’

  My wife. Not Constance. A major error.

  ‘Where will you go?’ I said lightly.

  ‘I’ve got a man looking out for me. We’ll stay in the neighbourhood, I think. Probably move further inland, nearer Sloane Square. I really don’t know at the moment. Look, I must go. I’ll see you soon. Or at least I’ll give you a ring. All right?’

  ‘Of course,’ I said, smiling. I was too imbued with the joy of seeing him again to be conscious of a desolation which had more to do with the threatened disappearance of cherished landmarks than with a sense of change. A feeling of displacement on my own behalf might increase not only any potential difficulties but also my ability to deal with them. I depended on a wholly artificial stasis: I liked to know, or to think I knew, where Edmund was, even if this were pure delusion. I did not care to think of him acting without reference to myself, enjoying a freedom that was somehow denied me. Even the fact that he had ‘a man looking out’ for him contributed to an air of suzerainty that was in his gift, as if it were entirely normal that he should have agents to do his bidding. I felt poor in comparison, quite literally so, as if my own naturally careful habits compared unfavourably with his largesse. I had genuinely admired my husband’s departure from his usual thrift in his attempt to divert me with expensive holidays, and it had been with a sense of gratitude that I repaid him with my household management and the skills I had perfected in my erstwhile career. Now I felt as though these skills merely established me as ineluctably middle class, not dashing enough to ensure the continued interest of a man surely accustomed to grander associations. I determined to buy some new clothes, and wondered why I had not done so during the long summer break. I did not normally pay much attention to such matters. If I had any appeal it was because my entirely neutral appearance gave rise to a certain curiosity. Now I began to wonder whether I should not have been more calculating. But to bring such considerations into a love affair seemed to me to be so unworthy that I abandoned the thought almost as soon as it had formed. In truth it had half formed and thus qualified for further examination. This I determined to postpone until I felt less doubtful, less divided. For that was the way of it with another’s obvious entitlements. They were genuinely envied, admired, even, but at the same time they left one feeling diminished. It was as if one’s own entitlements were being depleted in order to make room for those other, more natural, demands. But no, demands were consciously formed. These were assumptions, all the more compelling in that they were entirely instinctive, almost a gift of nature. Or of the gods.

  I was no longer anxious to linger in the flat, and yet it was too early to go home. I decided to pay a visit to Betsy, to see how she had settled into her new home. I found her surrounded by the overweening furniture that was de rigueur in the 1930s: a large glass-fronted bookcase, a nest of tables, and a standard lamp with a dull parchment shade. In the bedroom I knew I should find, and indeed did fi
nd, a bed with a sculpted walnut headboard and a dressing-table with a tilting mirror. The kitchen at least seemed to be free of influences, but her shopping—apples, cheese, coffee beans—proclaimed that here was a woman with little appetite and only a faint desire to go through the motions. A street light glowered through the window, which was as yet uncurtained. It was, as she had said, so obviously a unit rather than a home, a unit designed for a single person, and one that gave out messages of loneliness, determination, and suitability.

  ‘You’ll have to get rid of this stuff,’ I said stoutly, with a conviction I did not altogether feel. My slight paranoia had diminished in the light of how Betsy now appeared to me: an orphan, surrounded by an orphan’s furniture. She gave out an unmistakable message of loss. One advertises oneself in all sorts of unconscious ways: others are alert to the signals. A ruminative aspect, a hesitant walk, a less than responsive smile, all betoken facts about oneself that one would not necessarily wish to be known. Any assumption of busyness is immediately seen to be fallacious by those who know how to look. And Betsy’s large eyes were so obviously turned to the past that her ugly surroundings seemed almost appropriate. How would she live? And in this new context how would she see her recent history? It seemed more than unfair to me that she should be cast adrift in this manner. A woman in our time is far from helpless; she can work, earn her own money, surround herself with like-minded friends, join protests, even constitute a one-woman protest in her own right. But if there is no love in her life she will know herself to be an exception, an anomaly.