The Missing World

by Margot Livesey

  “Does your husband look after them?”

  To this straightforward question, she responded like one of his clients when asked the exact date of the storm damage, fiddling with an earring, patting her ponytail. “My sister.”

  Aha, something here. Might be useful, he thought, getting to his feet.

  She followed his example. “You know, this is more like being a companion than a nurse. I’ll do my best, but a lot will depend on whether Hazel likes me.”

  “I’m ninety-nine percent certain she will. We have very similar tastes.”

  As Bernadette ducked her head and moved towards the door, he realised what he’d said. “If there’s any change of plan, Mr. Littleton,” she said, sounding very businesslike, “please get in touch as soon as possible.”

  Upstairs Hazel was awake after all; he found her reading. “Who was that?” she said.

  “Who was what?”

  A year ago his response would have upset her; six months ago she would’ve raised her voice; last month she would’ve slammed down the phone. Now she simply repeated her question. “The doorbell. Whoever you were talking to.”

  “Mrs. Craig. I was just telling her about the roofer. I didn’t want her to be startled when a man on a ladder appeared outside her house.”

  Why am I doing this? he wondered, sitting on the edge of the bed. The answer perfumed the air, sweet as violets: because I can.

  It had happened like this before, Charlotte thought. When only disaster lay ahead, when the horizon was dark in all directions, when she understood why people jumped from high buildings or into deep rivers, at that very moment some long-forgotten source of help, or at least distraction, would appear. She stumbled out of Cedric’s, back to the Marylebone Road. Not a single friendly face rose before her; home, never a refuge at the best of times, was out of the question. Then a bus bearing the legend ARCHWAY pulled up, and at once she had a destination. She clambered aboard, proffering one of Cedric’s pounds. She wished now she’d taken every penny and eaten the last biscuits too.

  She took a seat halfway between an elderly couple and a tired-looking woman in a suit. “Lovely upholstery,” the man of the couple was saying loudly. Charlotte spotted the pink knob of a hearing aid. “Fabric like that will see you into the next century. Goes with anything.”

  “Very easy on the eye,” his companion agreed.

  He’s not worth my little finger, Charlotte thought. Ginny and Luke had tried to warn her. Ten years younger, Ginny had argued. He’ll just take what he wants and throw you over. But Charlotte had told her she was being fuddy-duddy. Hadn’t Ginny heard younger men and older women were all the rage nowadays?

  The man had moved on to webbing: “the heart of a good chair.” Like it or not, Charlotte thought as they slid into the underpass, men did act their age. And how old was Donald Early? When he was her tutor at RADA, he already seemed middle-aged, which probably meant between twenty-six and thirty-nine. Since then, she’d run into him periodically at the theatre. And last year they had met at the Chelsea Flower Show. She’d been there with Bernie and Rory, still a couple in those days. They were arguing over a blue rose—“Unnatural,” Rory claimed—when a voice said, “Ms. Granger?”

  She and Bernie both looked up to see Mr. Early in a white linen suit, standing beside a white rose. Charlotte made the introductions. “Enchanted,” said Mr. Early. “This is magnificent, isn’t it? Sometimes I think it’s the single great sorrow of my life that I don’t have a green thumb.”

  Rory said he was the same. Charlotte, not to be left out, made a joke about nursing the inner green thumb. “I like that,” said Mr. Early. “Do come to tea sometime. I have open house on the first Sunday of each month.” And then—Rory said afterwards it was too camp for words, but she and Bernie had defended Mr. Early’s sense of style—he produced a silver case and handed her a card.

  A couple of months later, at loose ends one Sunday, Charlotte had knocked at his door and been welcomed to jasmine tea and cucumber sandwiches. She enjoyed the odd mix of Mr. Early’s neighbours, designer friends, and, thank god, only one other actor. An elderly opera singer made up a limerick in her honour, predictably rhyming Charlotte with harlot, and a hairdresser had lectured her about selenium, four brazil nuts contained all one’s daily needs; but what had stayed with her and now drew her back was a conversation with her host. They were in the kitchen, waiting for the kettle to boil, when he remarked, sotto voce, “I used to believe there were no criminals in love, but the older I get”—he dipped his glowing head—“the more certain I am that there are some people, not many but a few, who ought to be shipped off to a desert island where they can torment one another and leave the rest of us in peace. Earl Grey, or more jasmine?”

  “Jasmine,” Charlotte said. Walter, she thought.

  Now she couldn’t remember the house number or even the name of the street, though she knew it was off the Holloway Road with a garage on the corner. Once the bus passed the Nag’s Head, she went and stood beside the driver. Normally she would’ve joined in his rendition of “Brown-Eyed Girl.” Tonight she simply peered out of the window until a BP sign came into view. “Safe home,” he said, launching into “Yesterday.”

  As the bus pulled away, doubt washed over her. What on earth was she doing turning up on some acquaintance’s doorstep at eleven at night? Wasn’t Cedric a warning against surprise visits? But she had no choice. At whatever cost, she needed company. She set off down the right-hand pavement, studying the drawn curtains and shadowy front doors, certain it was on this side. Some of the houses were entirely dark, or lit only by the blue god. Others emitted thumping, raucous music, which seemed to rule out Mr. Early. Then she was at a side street and knew she’d gone too far.

  This time she examined both sides of the road and, halfway along, was rewarded by a wrought-iron gate on the left. Yes, that looked familiar, and the upstairs windows were reassuringly bright. Without hesitation she marched up the mosaic path and seized the dolphin knocker. Presently the hall light came on. “Who is it?” called Mr. Early.

  “Me. Charlotte Granger.” At her back a car grumbled. Everything hung in the balance. After her long days, long weeks, of rejection, here she was, her entire self, on this doorstep seeking admission. If Mr. Early sent her away, she could not imagine what she would do.

  “Ms. Granger. What a pleasant surprise.” He kissed her cheek and showed her upstairs to the room whose window she had seen from the street.

  Charlotte registered the clutter, nothing like hers, and that the room was even cosier than Cedric’s. Then Mr. Early was helping her out of her coat and offering Horlicks. “I’d rather have a drink,” she confessed.

  “Certainly. I have the usual wine, gin, Scotch, those Christmassy drinks like amaretto and Bailey’s. Name your poison.”

  “Scotch, please.”

  Alone, she sank into a wicker armchair and surveyed her surroundings. A few minutes before, she might have regarded the heads as part of that condemning chorus—you lazy freak, can’t act your way out of a paper bag—but now they seemed to be nodding approval of her many and generous talents. What was she going to say when Mr. Early asked why she was here? For once, nothing came to mind and it didn’t matter.

  He returned with a tray: a bottle of Scotch, two tumblers, a bowl of ice, a jug of water. “I forgot to ask how you like it,” he said.

  She settled for one ice cube and a splash so as not to seem like a lush. Mr. Early, unabashed, had his neat. “Bottoms up.”

  “Bottoms up.” To her horror, as the first sip slid down, her eyes grew watery. She stared fixedly at her host’s elegant ankles, trying to listen as he talked about the rush job he was doing. “Twenty heads in six weeks. I feel like a factory. I keep focussing on my Umbrian holiday. The church at Orvieto, I tell myself with the eyelashes. Todi, I say over the hair.”

  “I’ve never been to Italy,” she managed.

  “Oh, you should. It’s glorious. Whenever I come back, I’m struck all over ag
ain by what an ugly city London is, poor old thing. No wonder we’re not better people. Another?”

  Charlotte looked down in surprise. Her glass was empty. How had that happened? “Please,” she said. “Neat.”

  Mr. Early stood up, poured her a generous measure, and sat down again. As if the second whisky had been an invitation, Charlotte began to talk: about Mr. Aziz and the woman at British Telecom, about Bernadette’s stinginess and how cross Ginny was that she’d missed the audition, and her plan for renting out her flat. Mr. Early kept nodding and saying the right thing—how ghastly; oh, I am sorry; good for you—until, quite suddenly, she was telling him about Walter and not crying, not a tear, but yelping with high-pitched laughter.

  Then he was shaking her gently. “Stop. Take a deep breath and think of Queen Victoria.” Gradually she subsided into breathless hiccups. When she could once again speak, she explained she hadn’t eaten today, which was true, save for Cedric’s biscuits.

  Instantly Mr. Early was all sympathy and self-reproach. He hadn’t even asked if she was hungry. And then they were in the kitchen, Charlotte minding the toaster while Mr. Early beat eggs and sizzled butter in the pan. Suddenly she remembered Jason and his radio programme. “I recommended you as a guest. Can you pass the butter? I think you’d be brilliant. And Jason was very interested. I’m sure he’ll be calling soon, if he hasn’t already.”

  “How kind. Shall we have a dash of Parmesan in the eggs?”

  “Please,” said Charlotte, her mouth full of freshly buttered toast.

  At the table there was an awkward moment when she was about to set the plates down on the white cloth and Mr. Early quickly whisked mats into place. Who does he think I am, she thought, Eliza Doolittle? But when he spooned almost twice as many eggs onto her plate as his own, all was forgiven. Unlike everyone else in her life, here was someone who didn’t judge her, which in a way was even better than Jason’s admiration, with its fragile demands.

  Across the table Mr. Early balanced eggs on the back of his fork and talked about how much easier it had been for him to negotiate mad cow disease than the egg scare a few years ago. “Sometimes I think there’s nothing left on the planet that’s safe to eat. I mean,” he explicated neatly with his fork, “here we are, feasting on free-range eggs and organic bread, and I still worry that I’ll open the paper tomorrow and discover it was bad for us. I can’t get over the shame of living in a country where the water isn’t fit to drink.”

  Reaching for another slice of toast, Charlotte offered her own theory about maintaining a certain level of toxicity; keeping yourself too pure made you vulnerable to every chemical that came along.

  “You have a point,” said Mr. Early. “One doesn’t want to become too rarified.” His glance slipped over her shoulder. “This has been a treat, our midnight feast, but I’m afraid I must get back to work.” So, her rival was a clock. “I hope it won’t seem inhospitable if I call you a minicab.”

  “Oh.” She gazed at her empty plate, shining from a last vigorous pass with the toast. Why can’t I stay, she wanted to ask. You’ve got plenty of room. I’ll be no trouble. See how nicely I made the toast. How little space I take up.

  “A tot for the road?” he offered. “Another cup of tea? You must let me pay for the cab. It’s understood between us artists that whoever is in work picks up the check.”

  “More tea would be perfect.” Even as she spoke, Charlotte was rising gracefully, moving towards the kitchen. Lady Granger to the rescue. She would leave not a second sooner than she had to. She filled the kettle to the brim and was back in her seat, saying gaily, “Don’t you get tired of working alone? Head after head?”

  “Sometimes, but I do have a couple of assistants. One of them would be here now if she hadn’t caught a cold. Besides, I like having time to myself. Really, that was one of the trickiest aspects of theatre for me: all the socialising.”

  Charlotte was focussing on her character. Charm, she thought, not sex. Were all the buttons of her blouse secure? She held up her hand—hark, the kettle—and, following her gesture out to the kitchen, made tea meticulously. Back at the table she announced with a flourish, “I’ll be Mother.” A splash landed near the jam, a brown comma punctuating the snowy cloth; no reason to think he’d notice. “Milk? Sugar?”

  “Let me rinse the cups,” said Mr. Early hastily.

  When they were seated and poured, Charlotte raised her brimming cup. “Thanks for rescuing me.” She had meant to talk about Struan and the film; instead she found herself asking if she could help Mr. Early. “I was always good at crafts. I made a papier-mâché vase that my mother kept for years. And I don’t mind being a dogsbody. I can go to the shops, deal with the plumber, anything. You won’t have to pay me. Just food and the odd fiver.”

  Mr. Early hitched up his glasses, pushed his cup aside. “My dear Charlotte, you’re much too talented to be anybody’s dogsbody. I couldn’t possibly permit it, and to be frank, what I do, although not exactly complicated, does take a while to learn. You already have your skill, and thank goodness it’s not lollygagging around with dummies.

  “I know the last few months have been dreary, but that is the nature of the artistic life. We all have our periods of appreciation and depreciation. Let me tell you a story.”

  His voice was mellifluous, respectful, courteous, and, inside, Charlotte was screaming, Stop! But as he spoke, sentence by sentence, her grief and rage ebbed until she was able to hear his words.

  “So Orlando went mad,” said Mr. Early, “and his friend Astolfo made the first space journey on his behalf. He travelled to the moon and there, in the valley of lost things, he discovered everything that had gone missing on earth: umbrellas, gloves, tempers, dogs, reputations. He even came across some of his own wits, which he’d never noticed were gone. Deep in the valley he found the vial containing Orlando’s lost wits, and brought it back to earth. Thus Orlando was restored to sanity and able to woo his lady fair.”

  Before Charlotte grasped what was happening, Mr. Early had picked up the phone and was ordering a cab. Then he left the room and returned, her coat in one hand, the bottle of Scotch in the other. He handed her the former and poured a stiff measure from the latter. The door knocker sounded as Charlotte drained the glass; tears came again to her eyes.

  “Thanks,” she said, struggling into her coat.

  Heedless of the cold, Mr. Early showed her into the cab. “I have an account with them,” he said, and pressed something into her hand.

  Charlotte gave her address and, leaning back against the lumpy seat, asked the driver to turn up the radio. Wailing music engulfed her: Kurdish perhaps? With every yard they travelled, the Scotch grew more potent, until the streets and houses and other cars were rising up and flipping over and over. Doing cartwheels, thought Charlotte. Oops-a-daisy.

  On the fourth attempt, her key opened the door of her flat. Lurching across the threshold, she spotted a postcard of Trafalgar Square. One of her neighbours must have brought it upstairs. Charlie, where are you? I’ve been trying to phone. Please come to supper tomorrow. Bernie.

  chapter 8

  A stupid door, Freddie thought, eyeing the brass numbers screwed crooked above the letter box. Instead of the graceful Victorian doors of the rest of the street, two arched panes of glass set in neat panelling, number 41’s was a slab of meaty wood, with one of those little rectangles of wavy glass at face level. No knocker, of course, just a plastic bell that shrilled beneath his finger. He backed across the street.

  The roof was not among the swaybacks he had noticed on his nocturnal visit. In fact, considering the original Welsh slate, it was in remarkably good shape. And next door, number 39 wasn’t bad. He and Trevor had prolonged debates about artificial versus natural slate. Usually I’m with you, Freddie, Trevor said, but real slate is a hassle. It weighs a ton and breaks if you sneeze. Against such pragmatism Freddie offered aesthetics and durability. Now he felt vindicated by the two roofs, both bearing up gracefully, whereas the house
across the street, the victim of a particularly nasty fake slate, looked like a great-aunt wearing her niece’s hat.

  He was still tut-tutting when he realised the bell had produced results—a woman in blue pyjamas was peering up and down the street. “Hey,” Freddie called. Not pyjamas, he thought, walking towards the gate: sweats. She watched him approach with a secret, dreamy expression quite different from that with which most women greeted his appearance on their doorsteps. In the cloudy afternoon light her skin glimmered, like the abalone shells he used to come across on the beach near Stanford.

  “I’m Freddie Adams,” he said, feeling strangely breathless. “The roofer.”

  Her eyes, and he would not have thought it possible, widened still further. With one hand she held tight to the ugly door. “Are we expecting you?”

  “A Mr. Littleton phoned and said there was a problem with the roof at this address.”

  “I don’t know anything about that. At least”—she tilted slightly—“I don’t think I do. You’d better come in and wait. Jonathan’s on the phone.”

  “Will he be long?”

  “I don’t know.”

  A small movement of the head suggested she was just as annoyed by her ignorance as he might be. He could not help noticing that her hair needed washing. “Can you …” he started to say and, seeing her face, fell silent.

  “Please.” She let go of the door and stepped back into the hall.

  Many of the houses Freddie entered were in this state, half renovated, as if both owners and workmen, often the same, had pricked their fingers and forgotten even the possibility of finishing. Here the hall walls had been left stripped. That no immediate change was expected seemed indicated by the pictures hung on the scarred plaster. The kitchen, an immaculate yellow, was a pleasant surprise.

  The woman sat down at the table. “If you want to make tea, go ahead. Jonathan is upstairs.”