Nina followed him into the main room of the flat, a large, square space that always reminded her of a stage. Windows looked out on to plane trees growing close to the building, their half-bare branches like a painted backdrop. Centre-stage was Jason’s chaise-longue.
Davey said, ‘Look who’s here!’
‘Nina.’ Reclining on the couch, Jason struggled to sit up, the magazine he’d been reading tumbling to the floor, revealing a pre-war centre spread of Chanel evening dresses. He held his hand out to her. ‘Nina, my waif and stray.’
‘Sit down, Nina.’ Davey stood behind a chair, turning it a little more towards Jason. ‘Sit down here, nice and close so he can see you.’ More loudly he said, ‘Nina’s wearing dark blue today. A nice little two piece with a nipped waist. Not too utility.’ He smiled at her. ‘Now, you’ll have a cup of tea, won’t you?’
As Nina sat down Jason leaned towards her. Jerking his head at Davey’s retreating back he said, ‘I’m not blind, not yet.’ He gazed at her, searching her face. At last he said, ‘I can still see you, little waif.’
His skin had shrunk over his face, grey and thin as a workhouse blanket, revealing the outline of skull bones. It seemed, though, that he had made an effort for her. He had shaved and slicked back his hair, and there was a dark gold cravat tied at his throat and tucked beneath his navy silk dressing gown. He smelt of cologne, which masked a little the sour taint of his breath. Beside him on a low table was a vase of white lilies and he reached out, stroking a still closed bud.
‘Bobby sent them,’ he said. ‘Davey says they’re funeral flowers. He just stuck them in a vase – none of his usual fussing.’ Still looking at the flowers he said, ‘They are funereal. Bobby’s joke, I suspect.’ After a moment he looked at her. ‘There was a note with them, saying he was going home. Has he gone?’
‘A few days ago.’
Jason snorted. ‘He’ll come back – his home’s here, with his friends. That family of his!’ He shook his head in disgust. ‘They don’t care a flying fuck about him.’ Nina smiled and he caught her eye and laughed a little. There were tears in his eyes. ‘He won’t hide forever, not my Bobby.’
She remembered that Bobby had told her trees and high walls surrounded his grandfather’s house. ‘It’s like the Beast’s house,’ he’d said. ‘Secretive.’ They had been sitting in a café close to King’s Cross. Even in their shadowy corner people stared at him, the mixture of horror and pity on their faces barely disguising their curiosity. She’d found herself staring back until they looked away. Sensing her agitation, Bobby had reached out and covered her hand with his own, squeezing her fingers until she faced him again.
Jason slumped back on the couch. As though the effort of greeting her had exhausted him he said weakly, ‘You’re looking even thinner. I’m no one to talk, but all the same, I hope you’re not pining too much for him, I know how dreadful that can be.’
‘I’m not pining.’
‘No? That’s hard to believe. Although a little bird told me you’ve been seen with someone fabulous.’
Nina laughed, thinking of Hugh Morgan. ‘What else did your spies say about him?’
‘It’s true, then? They said he looked too straight. But then the information one gets largely depends on one’s sources. Anyway, it’s none of my business.’ Pointing to a photograph album on the floor between them he said, ‘I’ve been compiling a few memories.’
Nina picked the album up. It was heavy, bound in dark leather, its pages thick and serrated. Her heart began to pound as she wondered which photographs Jason had decided to commit to such an album. She glanced at him.
‘Go on,’ he said, ‘The first one is so beautiful. If it wasn’t for Davey I’d have it hanging above the fire-place.’
Her fingers hovered above the flimsy paper covering the first picture. She could just make out the white of the plaster Ionic columns from the studio on
Percy Street
. ‘Are they all of him?’ ‘There are some that were taken when he was very young, before you met. Some you haven’t seen.’
She closed the album and placed it on the floor again. ‘He is fabulous, the man your friends saw me with. He was an officer in the navy. He has a tattoo.’ She traced a circle on her arm. ‘An extraordinary tattoo, just here.’
‘He sounds like a natural. Could he get it up for the camera as well, do you think?’
Davey kicked the kitchen door open. He set down the tray he was carrying and turned to them. ‘There. Did I give you long enough to talk? Have you had time to look at all the lovely pictures, Nina?’ Picking the album up, he smiled too brightly and tapped the cover. ‘Some of his best work in here. The lighting effects are quite marvellous. Works of art, even if they are all of the same subject. But then, Monet had his water lilies, Turner his sunsets and Jason had that boy’s cock.’
Reaching out, Jason snatched the album from him. He looked down at it on his lap. ‘It’s right we should remember him as he was.’
Davey shook his head, exasperated. Turning to her he said, ‘You know he wouldn’t see him, don’t you? Told me to turn him away because he couldn’t bear to see his poor face all burnt away. He sent those flowers because I had to tell him Mr Sensitive here was too ill for visitors.’ To Jason he added, ‘Not that he seemed that upset. Hard to tell though, there’s not much expression left.’
Nina sighed. She sat forward and took Jason’s hand. ‘It’s not as bad as you imagine.’
Quietly Jason said, ‘I should’ve seen him. I should have faced up to it.’
Davey snorted. Taking the album from him he said, ‘I should burn this. It’s so hard to get enough coal, it could be put to some good use.’
Jason looked at her. ‘I’ve willed the photographs to you, Nina. When I’m dead they’re yours.’
‘And there are boxes and boxes, darling. Not just this album, not just the tasteful portraits, but all the arty pictures, too.’
Nina stood up. If she stayed she would be compelled to look through the album and each picture would be a reminder of what she’d lost. Forcing herself to smile she said, ‘You’re tired, I should go.’
As Davey showed her to the door, Jason called, ‘My solicitor will have the pictures delivered to you. Promise me you’ll keep them safe?’
Nina hesitated. She imagined the boxes of photographs piled up in her room. They should be burnt; it would be better for everyone. Turning to Jason she smiled. ‘You’ll keep them safe for a long time yet.’
CHAPTER THREE
HUGH MORGAN WAS STANDING outside Nina’s flat when she returned home. He was holding Cathy, her neighbour’s baby, jogging her up and down and singing Run Rabbit, Run, as her neighbour searched her handbag. They all turned to her as she reached the landing, Cathy wide-eyed and drooling on Hugh’s shoulder. Hugh smiled, shifting the baby from one arm to the other. ‘This lady can’t find her purse.’
Nina sighed. ‘How much do you need, Irene?’
The woman looked at her. Belligerently she said, ‘I’ve run out of milk.’
Nina took a half-crown from her own purse. ‘Here. You can pay me back next week.’
Without meeting Nina’s eye, the woman pocketed the money before taking the baby from Hugh’s arms and walking downstairs.
Nina took her keys from her bag. Her surprise at seeing him had turned to irritation, a feeling made worse by Irene’s fecklessness. She had wanted to be alone, to change out of her too dressy, putting-on-a-front suit and wash away the smell of Jason’s sickroom from her skin. Instead, here was this smiling, artless man, waiting expectantly. Behind the locked door of her flat, her room was neat and orderly; she wouldn’t have it disturbed. On impulse she dropped the keys discreetly back into her bag.
‘It’s such a lovely day,’ she said. ‘We could go for a walk.’
‘I thought a picnic, actually.’ He grinned, suddenly pulling a banana from each of his jacket pockets and pointing them at her in a gunslinger’s pose.
Astonished, she l
aughed. ‘Where on earth did you find them?’
He tapped the side of his nose with one of the fruits. ‘Ask no questions. Now, I saw a park along the road. We’ll go there.’
They sat on a bench overlooking the park duck pond where a pair of swans swam side by side. Nina smiled to herself, remembering a costume Bobby had made for her from lace and organza and soft white feathers saved from a moulting boa. They’d enacted their own version of SwanLake and the lovely, flighty costume hadn’t stayed on very long. She remembered the ticklish feel of the feathers against her skin, how one of them had caught in Bobby’s hair. Unseen by the camera she had brushed it away, moved by tenderness for him as she faked her cinematic climax.
Watching the seamless glide of the birds, she finished her banana, peeling back the skin monkey-fashion. From the corner of her eye she saw that Hugh Morgan was watching her. After a moment he said, ‘I never cared much for bananas as a child. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, I suppose.’
Thinking of Bobby she nodded, placing the yellow-black skin beside her on the bench. ‘Were they very expensive?’
‘Arm and a leg.’ He smiled at her. ‘And I had to queue for ages. Still, I had a sudden fancy that just had to be indulged.’
She looked at him properly for the first time since she’d seen him outside her flat. In daylight he looked younger than she remembered, less condescendingly arrogant. He wore dark wool slacks with a sailor’s flare and a white, roll-neck Arran sweater that complimented his square jaw. Earlier he’d taken off his short, double-breasted jacket and it lay folded beside him, its brass buttons glinting in the sunlight. His aura of wholesomeness was stronger than ever. She remembered the tattoo on his arm; it seemed incongruous now.
He said, ‘I’m sorry about the other night. I don’t usually fall asleep like that.’
‘What do you usually do?’
He laughed, as though shocked by her question. ‘Go back to my ship, I suppose – not that it happened often.’ Surprisingly he blushed. ‘It’s not true – that old lie about a girl in every port.’
‘That’s a pity.’
He met her gaze. ‘Is it? Who for?’
She stood up. ‘Your father’s reading this afternoon in a bookshop in Kensington. I’d like to hear him.’
He frowned incredulously. ‘You are joking?’
She began walking towards the park gates. Glancing back she saw him get up, tossing the limp banana skins into the bushes behind the bench, before picking up his jacket and following her.
The last time Hugh had attended one of his father’s readings a woman had cornered him, her face flushed, her eyes bright with what he could only think of now as sexual excitement. ‘Your father,’ she told him breathlessly, ‘is a genius. A true …’ She’d caught her breath, her hand fluttering at her throat as she sighed, ‘Genius.’ She had smelt of a heady, musk perfume; when she touched his arm some of her excitement transferred itself to him, even though he’d found the evening dull, his father as predictable as ever. It was the smell of her, he supposed, the passion in that breathless voice, that made him take her hand and lead her outside to Henry’s conveniently parked car. Only afterwards, as she rearranged her clothes, after he’d buttoned his flies and offered her the consolation of a cigarette, did he allow himself to acknowledge that it was his father, and not himself, who had inspired such passion. The knowledge depressed him but was only to be expected. All that adulation for the great poet had to be channelled somewhere.
Standing at the back of the crowded bookshop now, Hugh stole a sideways glance at Nina. Her heavy blonde hair was coiled in a net snood studded with black polka-dots. Her expression was intent as she concentrated on the poetry. From time to time she smiled slightly, or nodded as though at some profound understanding. He had an urge to heckle his father, to catcall and jeer. It would be the ultimate test of her loyalty, a test he felt sure she would fail.
He remembered her naked in his arms, her sweet, small breasts, the hollowness of her belly. She’d shaved her legs and beneath her arms, but between her legs, too, so that there was a definite shaping of her pubic hair that had shocked him. Later, alone, imagining that careful, deliberate shaving, he’d become as aroused as when he’d been with her. He’d been planning on never seeing her again, had marked her down as another of his father’s conquests by proxy, despising himself for his compliance. But the memory of that shocking triangle of dark blonde hair had him bathing and dressing carefully, had him standing in line for bananas: the only excuse he could think of to visit her again. Listening to the rhythmic rise and fall of his father’s voice, watching her hang on his every cadence, he silently cursed himself as a fool.
The last poem was read. There was a pause, a moment his father always timed perfectly before removing his glasses and closing his book and wheeling his chair ever so slightly backwards as though the resounding applause took him by surprise. Hugh stopped himself applauding – he could be one part Philistine, at least. Nina grinned at him, the most natural, spontaneous look she’d given him since they’d met. She didn’t seem to notice his churlishness. He exhaled, hating the edge in his voice as he said, ‘Do you want to speak to him?’
‘Don’t you?’ She laughed. ‘Were you just going to sneak away without even saying hello?’
He snorted, covering his irritation by lighting a cigarette. As he shook the match out he said, ‘I don’t want to get caught up here. I know how these affairs can drag on.’
‘We won’t stay long, I promise.’ She held his gaze and for a moment the noise and bustle around them receded. He imagined taking her hand and leading her out on to the street, hailing a taxi to take them back to her room. He couldn’t remember wanting anyone so badly and her reasons for wanting him had become totally irrelevant. Nothing mattered except the urgency to get her alone.
He took her hand tightly in his. ‘We’re going,’ he said. ‘Right now.’
She whispered, ‘Are you all right?’
Hugh stared into the blackout darkness of her room. Beneath him the bed sagged and his feet were hard against the metal frame so that he imagined deep indentations in his soles. From the anxiety in her voice he guessed that he’d been calling out from his nightmare and he wondered what she’d heard. The dream was still fresh; he could still see the slicks of oil burning on a millpond Atlantic. The men were still drowning: Jackson, Barker, Wilson with his face all black from the explosion. A slow motion newsreel with the sound distorted, it played in his head most nights lately. He closed his eyes, aware of her watching him.
‘I’m hungry,’ he said.
She got up and shrugged on a brightly printed dressing gown. ‘I’ll make you a sandwich.’
He watched her as she went to the sink and filled the kettle, as she lit the gas beneath it and took bread and what looked like a tin of sardines from a cupboard. She worked efficiently, rolling back the tin lid with its key, emptying the oily-smelling fish into a bowl and mashing the flesh before spreading it onto dry bread. The sandwich was sliced corner to corner and placed on a plate. The kettle boiled. Licking her fingers, she made tea, looking up to smile at him as she poured a tiny amount of tinned milk into two cups.
He frowned at her as she set a cup of tea on the bedside table and handed him the plate. ‘Aren’t you having anything to eat?’
Climbing back into bed she said, ‘Later.’
‘Share this with me.’
She hesitated a moment before tearing off a corner of sandwich and popping it into her mouth. Swallowing, she said, ‘I mashed up the bones. They’re good for you.’
‘So I hear.’
‘It’s all I have, I’m sorry.’
‘It’s all right – I’m used to weevil-infested ship biscuit.’
She smiled and he felt his heart soften towards her. Her hair had fallen around her shoulders and he reached out to hook a thick strand behind her ear. ‘Vinegar, that’s what we need. Sardines are always helped along by a splash of vinegar.’
He bit i
nto the sandwich, anticipating the disconcerting grittiness of bones, and reached for the tea to wash it down.
Nina lay back on the pillows and said, ‘I hope we didn’t offend your father, leaving like that.’
‘He didn’t even notice we were there.’
‘He smiled at me.’
‘He smiles at every pretty girl.’ He glanced at her. ‘We didn’t offend him.’
Looking up at him from the pillows, she seemed to be studying his face, frowning as though he was some particularly odd exhibit in a museum. Hugh sipped his tea, pretending to be unperturbed.
‘You don’t like your father, do you?’
‘Nooo …’
She propped her head up on her elbow. He noticed how her hair fell in a straight, shiny blonde curtain and resisted the urged to comb his fingers through it, aware suddenly that touching her had become a compulsion. At last she asked, ‘Why don’t you like him?’
‘I don’t know!’ He laughed uncomfortably. ‘He’s vain. It’s hard to like someone with such a gigantic opinion of himself.’
‘Do you love him?’
He closed his eyes, resting his head back against the bed frame. He didn’t want to think about Mick; in truth he hardly ever thought about him. Occasionally a too-well-read fellow officer would discover he was his son and ask idiotic questions as though he was an expert on poetry. He was usually rude to these men. Rudeness shut poetry lovers up, he’d found.
Nina was still watching him, allowing his silence to go on. Her coolness intrigued him – most women he knew couldn’t allow such gaps in conversation. He looked at her. ‘Do you love your parents?’
‘I don’t have any.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you’re alone in the world, I suppose.’
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