He turned away to pour the soup into a pan. ‘Since when did you start knocking, Mark?’
Behind him Francis Law said, ‘It’s not Mark, Bobby.’
Bobby spun round. ‘Mr Law – I’m sorry, I thought you were my brother.’
Law gazed at him. At last he said, ‘I heard you had a half-brother. Are you close to him?’
Bobby shifted uncomfortably under his intense gaze. ‘Fairly close.’
Law nodded. ‘That’s good.’ He looked around the kitchen as if seeing it for the first time. Catching sight of the photograph on the mantelpiece he looked away quickly. Bobby became aware of a change in him. Carefully he said, ‘Would you like to sit down?’
‘You’re about to have supper – I’m disturbing you.’
‘No, not at all.’
Law sat down. Bobby watched him curiously, reminded of his likeness to his father. He thought how ill Law looked, so pale he seemed afraid. As he was about to speak Bobby cut in, ‘I probably should know this but you’re not related to us, are you?’
Law opened his mouth to speak again only to stop. After a moment he said quickly, ‘When you were a baby … I loved you so much, I have no excuse for what I did. Every moment of my life since I’ve regretted it –’
Bobby sat down opposite him. He became aware of the clock ticking, of the other man’s laboured breathing. Seconds passed. He thought of how his grandfather talked about his father, always stopping himself short as if he’d said too much. He had always puzzled over the feeling that he was being deceived. He couldn’t explain it until now.
Feeling the kind of disconnected calm he’d felt when he’d witnessed Nick’s plane shot down, he said, ‘You’re Paul, aren’t you?’
‘Yes.’
Bobby shook his head in disbelief and Law sat forward, closing the gap between them. At once Bobby sat further back. Painfully Law said, ‘Bob, if I could have stayed with you and your mother I would have. You meant everything to me –’
‘Where did you go?’
‘What?’
‘If you weren’t dead, where did you go – if I meant so much, what stopped you coming back?’
Law looked down. ‘I was in prison. I was sent to prison.’
‘Why would they send you to prison – you were a war hero –’
Law laughed bleakly. ‘Did my father tell you that?’
‘What did you do? Steal, murder?’ Bobby heard his voice rising and struggled to keep calm. ‘Tell me what you did.’
‘I was caught with a man –’
‘Caught doing what?’
‘Bobby …’
‘Don’t call me that!’ He shouted so loudly that Law cringed. He found himself on his feet. Furiously he said, ‘You and this other man –’ He stopped, not needing to go on, the truth suddenly so obvious he felt like a fool for not understanding sooner. ‘You’re queer.’
‘Yes.’
‘Get out of my house.’
‘Bob, please –’
‘I don’t want you anywhere near me! Men like you – you’re disgusting! Filthy and disgusting –’ His heart was racing, a thread of spittle hanging from his mouth. He wiped it away; his mouth seemed full of the stuff, drowning any coherent words. He felt possessed by rage, a shrieking, infant devil that would have him stamp and scream. Horrified that he was crying he shouted, ‘Get out! I’ll kill you if you don’t get out!’
He began to weep, great, gasping sobs that felt as if all the air was being burnt from his lungs. He thought of Henry Vickers telling him how good he was as he raped him. He had been good. Somehow he had encouraged a man to have sex with him and he had been good.
He sank down on to the chair and covered his face with his hands. His face was wet with tears and snot; he imagined the work of the surgeons disintegrating, the face they had reconstructed melting on to the floor and he drew breath, afraid of crying like this. He lowered his hands. He wiped his eyes with his fingers and searched in his pockets for a hanky. He didn’t have one. Law stood up. Stepping towards him he held out his own, neatly folded handkerchief. ‘Here,’ he said gently. ‘Use this.’
The handkerchief smelt of his grandfather. The shock of smelling his scent again caused the crying to stop. He thought of Joan, how he would lift her from her cot and at once her screaming would become only hiccuping noises. He felt like a baby to be comforted by so little, as though his tears had been nothing.
Law said, ‘Your grandfather always made sure I had a clean handkerchief. He even used to send them in food parcels when I was in France.’
Bobby’s throat felt raw. He was trembling, too close to the onset of another bout of crying. To prevent it he cleared his throat and made himself say, ‘I want you to go.’
‘No, please Bob … let me talk to you.’
‘About? What could you have to say to me?’ He heard his voice rising hysterically but didn’t care any more. He just wanted him out of his sight. ‘Get out! Go now before I throw you out.’
‘Then throw me out. I won’t walk away from you again.’
Bobby stepped towards him, his fists clenched, but Law stood his ground as though he guessed that he wouldn’t be able to bring himself to touch him. The idea of touching Law was repellent. All he could do was stand there, puffed up and ridiculous with impotent rage, the atmosphere charged with it so that he wondered how long he could go on without breaking down again and making an even bigger fool of himself.
Gently Law said, ‘Bob, why don’t we sit down?’ He reached out and touched his arm.
Bobby stepped back. ‘Don’t touch me!’ He felt his lip curl in disgust and knew how ugly he must look. ‘You filthy bloody queer! I won’t have you touching me! Christ – when I think of what you are it makes me want to throw up! Do you have any idea how much I detest men like you? Even Hitler was right about what should be done with queers!’
Calmly Law said, ‘You don’t mean that.’
‘No? Why not? Why shouldn’t I mean it? What did you expect from me? Acceptance?’ He felt his anger like a surge of agitating power. He grabbed his father’s photograph from the mantelpiece and threw it at the wall so hard one of the frame’s metal corners made a tear in the wallpaper. It fell to the floor, its glass shattering. Bobby went to it and snatched the photograph up from the wreckage. He shoved it under Law’s nose. ‘You see this? This is the man I was meant to admire! This is the man my grandfather kept reminding me was so brave and clever and wonderful! No one could live up to you! Not me – certainly not me! My own grandfather could hardly bear to look at me! I must have reminded him too much of you – the lies he had to tell to cover up your disgusting behaviour! My God! No wonder they told me you were dead – the only pity is you weren’t!’
Law took the photograph from him. He was white and the picture trembled in his hand; he seemed to gasp for breath, stepping back, fumbling behind him for the chair. Bobby stood over him, his own breath coming in short bursts as though he’d just scrambled for immediate take off. His heart was pumping just as it did as he waited for the final clearance, only now there was no where to channel his fearful energy. There was only this frail, suddenly old-looking man. Bobby stepped back from him. Coldly he said, ‘You are dead to me. You always have been and nothing’s changed. I want you to go and I don’t ever want to see or hear from you again.’
Law seemed not to hear him. He closed his eyes as though concentrating on each breath he took; his face creased with pain. Bobby knew enough about pain to know this wasn’t just the shame of humiliation but real, physical agony. The photograph slipped from Law’s fingers to drift to the floor, the beautiful, familiar face lay at his foot, gazing up at him.
The room grew still, his own breathing returned to normal; Bobby felt some of his anger slip away, replaced by a creeping sense of shame that he quickly suppressed. He had nothing to be ashamed of. He had every right to be angry. All the same it seemed most of his anger had spent itself, burnt out quick as petrol on a fire. He could never sustain anger, never
rant and rave for hours as men like Mick Morgan could, as though it was more a show of force than any real emotion.
Stiffly he said, ‘Will you leave now?’
Law looked up at him. He seemed unable to speak. He closed his eyes again, his hands clenched together so tightly his knuckles were white. There was no colour in him. He reminded Bobby of corpses laid out on bombed airfields; the same shocked, agonised expression on his face had been on the faces of the dead, too.
Bobby shifted uncomfortably. He stooped to pick up the photograph and as he straightened up Law caught his eye and said painfully, ‘Could I have a drink?’
Bobby fetched him a glass of water. He thrust it at him.
Law sipped at the over-filled glass; his hand was still shaking and he slopped some of it on his lap. Eventually he managed to say, ‘I just need to catch my breath.’
‘And then you’ll go?’
Law closed his eyes as though he despaired of his heartlessness. ‘For pity’s sake. You don’t have to stand over me.’
‘I’ll stand where I want – this is my house.’
‘Is it? Perhaps you’ll find it’s mine.’
Bobby laughed, outraged. ‘Is that why you’re here? To claim your inheritance? Jesus Christ! Are you going to throw me on the street now? Well, I don’t want this bloody house! Do you imagine I was ever happy here? You have it! I’d rather have nothing than keep anything that was his!’
‘His?’ Law frowned at him. ‘You mean your grandfather’s? Hate me, by all means, but he loved you. Show him the respect his memory deserves.’
‘Deserves? He lied to me! Not only that he just stood by while my stepfather …’ He couldn’t bring himself to say that Redpath beat and humiliated him. Even the memory of it was enough to make him begin crying weak, disgusting tears. He had to do something, anything but show himself up again. He went to the cupboard under the sink. Taking out a dustpan and brush he began to sweep up the glass, so aware of Law’s eyes on him his flesh crawled. He dropped the bent metal picture frame into the dustpan.
As he stood up straight Law said, ‘Your grandfather was a good man. If he seemed weak to you it was because he’d had too much grief in his life, more grief than most. I won’t have you criticise him for my mistakes.’
‘Mistakes? Buggering another man and getting caught was a mistake was it? Not simply vile and filthy and degenerate, but a mistake?’
‘For God’s sake, Bobby!’ Law gazed at him, a little of the colour returning to his face. Angrily he said, ‘I’m queer – as you call it. I’m not much bothered what you think about that and I won’t apologise for it. Do you imagine this childish disgust hurts me? I’ve had your kind of contempt and bullying all my life, I’ve become immune. Hate me for abandoning you, by all means, but don’t demean yourself like this.’
‘I don’t need your reasons to hate you.’
‘No, I can see that.’ He took another sip of water, his face creasing in pain once more. After a moment he said, ‘I knew you’d hate me.’
‘So why are you here?’
‘You’re my son.’ He gazed at him steadily. ‘Every day of my life since my arrest I have wanted to see you.’
‘Why? To apologise? To explain? Yes, why don’t you explain?’ Bobby sat down. ‘Explain what made you do the filthy thing that got you arrested.’
‘I can’t. You’re my son. How could I talk about such a thing to my son?’
‘I’m a stranger. A grown man. So – man to man – tell me. What made you want to leave a young wife and baby to have sex with a man?’
‘Bobby, please. Are you always so relentless?’
‘Did you think this would be easy? That I’d just say never mind, I forgive you?’
‘No. I don’t know what I thought.’
‘I would have kept away if I were you. I would have been ashamed to show my face.’
‘Shame doesn’t matter as much as other things.’
‘Such as?’
‘Love. I never stopped loving you.’
‘Well you can stop now.’
‘Oh Bobby! Do you think I can just turn my feelings off like a tap?’
Bobby glanced away. ‘Stop calling me Bobby.’
‘It’s what I’ve always called you.’
Unable to sit still, Bobby stood up. He felt like pacing, the anger that was building inside him making him want to lash out. He turned on Law.
‘You should have been at your father’s funeral.’
‘Yes, I should have. I was too cowardly.’
‘Really? He used to tell me you were brave. He told me you faced up to losing your eye courageously. I used to wonder how you would have looked with only one eye. It’s hardly noticeable is it? Got off lightly really, didn’t you, compared to some of us?’
Law said, ‘Yes, I was lucky. I’m only half blind.’ He shook his head. ‘Bob, are we bickering? For goodness sake! Imagine what your grandfather would say if he could hear us! He was so proud of you – of everything you did.’
‘He wasn’t! All he ever did was compare me to you! I couldn’t do anything as well as you! There was one thing I could do though – fly, and he hated that, he did every thing to discourage me –’
‘He was terrified for you! Couldn’t you see that? God knows what losing you would have done to him, and to me. We just wanted you safe … not putting yourself up for danger, volunteering for it … and flying was so dangerous …’
‘Unlike sitting in a trench waiting to be blown up?’ Hating the sneer that had crept in to his voice he said, ‘I had an idea of you –’ He stopped himself from finishing what he was about to say, not wanting to admit to this man how much he’d missed his father. His anger subsided into self-pity. He began to cry again and it felt ridiculous and demeaning. He wanted to hide from him.
Law said gently, ‘Bob, please don’t cry. I’ve cried enough for both of us over the years.’
Bobby blew his nose. ‘I get it from you, then, all this bloody self pity?’
‘I’m afraid when I was your age I cried at the drop of a tin hat.’
‘You were shell-shocked.’
He smiled slightly. ‘Making an excuse for me? I was in an asylum for a while, after the war, it wasn’t shell shock – I’d seen shell-shocked men. I was just mad.’ After a moment he said, ‘When I heard you’d been hurt I wanted so badly to be with you. I would have sat at your bedside day and night if it had been possible.’
‘But it wasn’t possible, was it? You were dead. My mother had told me you were dead.’ He remembered his mother’s reluctance to answer his questions about Paul. Those childish queries about my real Daddy must have terrified her. She must have known that one day he would find her out. Her lies explained a lot about her relationship with him. It was all so understandable, in retrospect, it made him think that anyone with half a brain would have guessed her secret.
Thinking of Margot, that plump, unremarkable woman, he frowned at Law. ‘Why did you have anything to do with my mother? You must have known what you were.’
‘I loved her.’
‘How could you love her, imagine that you loved her? I know men like you, they never even look at women.’
For a while he said nothing and Bobby found himself looking at him thinking, ‘This is my father.’ It seemed surreal, and yet he was so recognisably his flesh and blood. He said, ‘I know I was a mistake, that she was pregnant when you married her. Were you experimenting? An experiment that went wrong – landed you with a baby.’
‘It wasn’t quite like that.’
‘Then what was it like?’
Law looked down at his hands.
Bobby said, ‘I had a child. I would have given up anything, everything, to keep her safe. In the end I couldn’t keep her safe enough. She died. I would have died in her place happily.’ He lit a cigarette. Exhaling he said, ‘My daughter was called Joan. No one could have taken her from me, least of all a man like my stepfather.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Is that what you came here to say? Do you feel better now? You know I didn’t cry when Joan died. And yet here I am, crying for myself. I feel ashamed. You’ve made me feel ashamed. I’d like you to go.’
‘Bob, please let me talk to you.’
Bobby looked at him. He thought how handsome Law was, his clothes well cut and expensive looking, his voice measured and gentle so that he sounded like his grandfather, making it so impossible to keep the tears in check. He tried to imagine what it would have been like to have been brought up by this man and if such an upbringing would have made him a better person.
He said, ‘When I was growing up I used to escape to this house and pretend that my grandfather was actually my father. But he wasn’t, and he kept reminding me he wasn’t – telling me about you, showing me your picture. He’d tell me how bright you were, what a good soldier you’d been. He made you into a saint. And then I’d go home and my stepfather would tell me how useless I was, that I would only ever go to the bad.’
He got up to fetch an ashtray. Sensing Law’s eyes on him he said, ‘You don’t want to explain or to apologise. You just want me to forgive you.’
‘I’d have to give you a reason to forgive.’
‘That you were young and stupid and let your dick rule your head?’
Law avoided his gaze. After a moment he said, ‘You’re right, I do want your forgiveness and I have no excuse other than those you’ve just given me which really are no excuses at all. In the trenches I surprised myself – I didn’t mind what other men seemed to mind so much. I don’t know where that courage – that madness it seems to me now – came from, but as soon as the war was over it melted away. Being a civilian was too hard for me. I tried, I tried for your sake, but as much as I loved you I felt my life had ended. Prison was almost a relief in some ways – I didn’t have to try any more.’
‘And when you were released? You could have come back, you could have claimed me.’
‘Yes, I could have. You were five years old. My father sent me a photograph of you. I couldn’t believe that you were so big, not the baby I’d left sleeping in his cot the day I was arrested. I couldn’t imagine what I’d say to you, couldn’t imagine that you would accept me. With the photograph Dad wrote to me saying it would be best if I kept away from you.’
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