by Unknown
‘But it wasn’t like that.’
‘Nevertheless, it’s what people will think,’ he assured her.
‘I don’t care what people think,’ said Igraine, sounding a great deal more confident than she felt.
‘Lucky you, darling,’ said Uther tartly. ‘I have to care. A politician lives or dies by what people think.’
‘Then why go into politics?’ ‘Because it’s what I want.’
Her voice was low and intense. ‘And I want my baby.’
‘You can have as many babies as you like, Igraine, but not this one. Not if you love me.’ And he stormed out, almost slamming the front door off its hinges.
Even in the depths of her misery, it occurred to Igraine that she could always start again. There had never been any problem finding men. The real problem was that she wasn’t interested in other men; it was this one she wanted. Having just lost her husband, and with a young family to bring up – seven year old Elaine, five year old Margot, and “baby” Morgan, only three – she felt achingly vulnerable. Poor mites, there had already been the most appalling upheaval in their little lives. Now they were just getting used to Uther. No, she concluded, any other man would be unthinkable.
Uther bided his time, flattering himself that Igraine loved him too much to defy him. Yet several days passed and still he had no word from her. At last he was compelled to accept that somehow or other the problem would have to be resolved. Nothing was more important to him than his high political ambitions. He would never be Prime Minister if he were involved in a scandal. There was something else that had preyed on his mind ever since that strange and disturbing meeting with Merlin – those ominous words of his.
It is written that he will overthrow you.
Are you suggesting I should be afraid of my own son? Is that so surprising? Many men are.
He phoned Igraine. ‘We need to talk.’ His voice softened. ‘I miss you.’
‘Me too,’ she whispered.
For the rest of the day she waited for the doorbell to ring. Finally at ten o’clock Uther arrived, and as he entered the hall, came straight to the point. ‘I was at fault, I confess it. Mea culpa. It would be wrong to . . . do what I suggested.’ He took her hand. ‘I love you, Igraine. I want to marry you. I couldn’t bear to lose you.’ Igraine’s eyes filled with tears. Could he possibly need her as much as she needed him? ‘I am going to suggest something, and I want you to consider it very carefully. Please don’t answer me right away. Think about it first. Promise me?’
Igraine nodded dumbly.
‘My proposal is this. You go down to the country as soon as possible. There’s a place I know where you will be very comfortable. Everything will be handled with the utmost discretion. You will have the best care money can buy, and all in a superb setting – a beautiful house in lovely countryside in the heart of Somerset.’
Was he about to pronounce the death sentence on her unborn child? She could not look at him.
‘A perfect place to have the baby.’
Her face lit up. Throwing her arms round his neck, she covered him with kisses. Gently he pulled away. ‘Let me finish.’ Her eyes searched his anxiously.
‘You will have the baby, and then . . . ’ – a moment of tense silence – ‘I shall arrange to have it adopted. You needn’t be involved. You may depend on me to find good and loving parents for the child.’
Igraine shrank from Uther, her body hunched, her fists held high, as if she were defending herself against a violent assault. ‘Go to hell, you bastard!’
‘I suggest we talk about this when you are calmer,’ he said coldly. ‘What I am proposing is a fair compromise. The child will have a good life, and you and I . . . we shall be happy again.’
Her voice grated in her throat. ‘I won’t let you take my son away from me.’
‘Think about it, Igraine, that’s all I ask.’ Suddenly he realised what she had said. ‘Your son? How do you know it’s a son?’
‘I had a scan. It’s a boy,’ she said, searching his face for the smallest hint of a change of heart.
‘I don’t want to hear any more,’ he said, turning his back and walking away from her.
She followed, pleading, ‘This is your son, your son and heir.
Doesn’t that mean anything to you?’
He looked at her with cold eyes. ‘Think about what I said.
I’ll phone you in the morning.’
‘Our own flesh and blood,’ she said sadly. ‘How can you ask me to give him away?’
‘Believe me, it’s for the best.’
She spat out the words. ‘Best for your bloody career you mean.’
‘Is it such a crime to want success?’
‘No. But it’s a crime to abandon your child.’
He shrugged. ‘Happens every day, duchess. It’s a funny old world. You’re angry now, but you’ll come round.’
How dare he patronise her? How dare he tell her how to think and feel? She was angry, angrier than she had ever been in her life, angry with him and angry with herself for being so mistaken in her judgement of him. She hated Uther for not being the man she had thought he was, and she hated him all the more because she knew he was going to get his way.
Three
January 1995
The waiting room was sparsely furnished: two grey polystyrene chairs, a white polystyrene table, its top burned by cigarettes. On the table was a metal ashtray and a copy of Country Life dated March 1992. The only decoration on the grey-painted walls was a photograph of a young Queen
Elizabeth taken on the day of her coronation.
Uther lowered himself gingerly onto one of the chairs, looked around the room and shuddered. Whilst he waited, his thoughts drifted back a couple of weeks. To give Igraine moral support he had driven down to Somerset and stayed at what the Travel Agents had described as a Hostelry, whatever that was; a synonym for a fleapit, presumably. On the afternoon of the 22nd the clinic had phoned to say the brat was on its way. Three days before Christmas – what a time to give birth. He had hung around the fleapit a few hours; no sense in rushing to the clinic, especially as he had not the slightest desire to watch the ‘proceedings’. Later, driving there, he had been caught in a storm; first a wild wind, then distant thunder rolling closer and closer, and then the storm itself breaking with such a banging and clattering it might have signalled the birth of the world, or the death. He had never known anything like it, the lightning had lit up the streets as if it were day, and then the rain, like a million tiny fists rapping on the car roof. The windscreen wipers had packed up, and he had been stranded in the middle of the village. Suddenly it was over – just before midnight – and everything was eerily calm. Apparently that was when the child was born.
Merlin entered briskly, shook hands with Uther, and sat at the table facing him. ‘Offer you something? Tea? Coffee?’
‘No thanks.’ Uther rested his hands on the table and examined his nails.
‘Any problem finding the place?’ asked Merlin politely.
Uther tried to concentrate his gaze on the Queen’s portrait slightly to the left of Merlin’s head. It was no good, the green orbs drew him back. ‘Your directions were perfect.’
‘Sorry about the red tape at the gate.’
‘They certainly quizzed me. You chaps must be doing something pretty special here.’
Merlin turned his luminous eyes on Uther and made no comment.
‘We met a few months ago,’ said Uther. Being nervous was a new experience for him, and he didn’t much care for it. ‘I don’t know if you remember me,’ he added diffidently.
Merlin blinked. ‘Indeed I do.’ ‘I expect it seems odd.’
Merlin directed a quick searching look at his visitor and waited for him to continue.
‘My coming to see you, I mean.’ Uther ruffled the pages of the tattered Country Life. ‘You do understand this is all . . . highly confidential.’
Merlin inclined his head, waiting for Uther to come to the point.
Uther did not really know why he was here. Why here? Why Merlin? There was no rational explanation, except perhaps that there was no other place to go. ‘This friend of mine I mentioned on the phone . . . ’ Was it worth persisting with the charade? On balance he thought it might be, though Merlin was obviously no fool, and very likely guessed that the ‘friend’ was sitting opposite him. The pretence at least allowed him to address Merlin as an equal, rather than as a supplicant. ‘I thought you might be able to help him. His wife wants to have the baby boy adopted, and he has agreed – reluctantly I may say.’
Merlin’s eyelids drooped in the subtlest of acknowledgements. ‘His main concern is to protect the lady’s good name. He intends to marry her.’ Uther shifted uncomfortably on the tiny chair. ‘Naturally.’
Merlin’s face remained impassive.
‘The child was not – um – conceived in wedlock.’ The archaic phrase somehow distanced Uther from the harsh realities of the situation, as indeed it was designed to. ‘Normally this would present no problem, not in this day and age. In this case though, there are . . . complications.’
‘What sort of complications?’ The green eyes were focused unwaveringly on Uther.
‘I prefer not to go into details, if you don’t mind. Take it from me, there would be a scandal, a scandal that would destroy both their lives. Though as I say, my friend is less concerned with his own reputation than with that of his lady friend.’
No response. Uther found the absence of reaction irritating, showing a lack of respect, perhaps even a touch of scepticism. Again he asked himself whether he was doing the right thing in approaching this strange man. Why should he be able to help? Even if he could, would he keep his mouth shut? Panic stirred, his heart fluttered in his chest, and he was tempted to make some excuse and walk out. But that would be foolhardy, he had said too much to turn back now.
‘Is this really your friend’s child?’ asked Merlin.
Uther was startled out of his reverie. ‘Why do you ask?’ ‘Because if it is,’ said Merlin, forcing the issue, ‘then I fear
there is nothing I can do.’
Uther was about to protest in the strongest terms, but Merlin’s green orbs were turned on him, and in their blinding light, it seemed, nothing but the truth was possible. ‘If you must know, the child is mine.’
Merlin nodded.
‘I’m not sure, but I seem to remember you and I making some kind of deal,’ said Uther, who remembered it all too clearly, ‘a deal I confess I never took seriously. And now here I am. A strange thing, life.’
‘Isn’t it.’
‘Full of coincidences.’ Uther was a proud man. It was humiliating to be sitting here, cap in hand – well, more like baby in hand. ‘As it happens, I might be looking for a good home for my, um . . . ’
‘For your son.’
Uther was looking intently at the table now. ‘Do you think you could . . . ?’
‘When was he born?’
‘The twenty-second of December, I think it was.’ ‘The winter solstice,’ said Merlin.
‘What does that have to do with anything?’ Uther snapped irritably.
Merlin responded mildly. ‘The winter solstice is about birth and rebirth.’
‘Really?’ said Uther indifferently.
‘The sun is at its lowest point. The winter solstice is the longest, darkest night of the year. In the moment of greatest despair, a seed begins to sprout.’
Despair? Seed? What on earth was the man talking about? ‘The storm had just died down?’ enquired Merlin.
‘There was a storm. Why all these questions?’
‘I just wanted to be sure. So the boy is now two weeks old.’ ‘I suppose.’
‘Wonderful.’ Merlin beamed.
Uther saw nothing wonderful about it. Wonderful it would be if Merlin could spirit the brat away. Didn’t he claim to be some kind of magician? That extraordinary business in the bar
– it was all coming back to him now.
‘Look here, can you help me or not?’ asked Uther impatiently, making it clear by his expression and tone of voice that he found the whole business frustrating, not to say demeaning.
‘There’s a couple I know who would be happy to have the child,’ said Merlin, unperturbed. ‘They have a son about a year old, but the lady can’t have any more children. They have been thinking of adopting for some time.’
‘What kind of people are they?’
‘She is a social worker. He is a schoolmaster.’
A social worker, a schoolmaster. My god, thought Uther, these are real people, a real man and a real woman with real jobs and a real son. And for all its strangeness, this was a real conversation he was having. Suddenly he understood the meaning of what he was doing; he was giving away his own son. Like the movement of some prehistoric creature in the depths of an uncharted lake, an unaccustomed and sombre emotion stirred the dark depths of his soul, and then was still. ‘Is it a good home? I have to be sure. Good background and all that? Are they capable of . . . I mean, you’re quite sure they’ll look after him properly?’
‘They are decent, unpretentious people,’ said Merlin, ‘moral, well educated and loving. Above all, loving.’
‘Where do they live?’
A slight hesitation. ‘In a small village in the Welsh countryside.’
Uther could scarcely conceal his distaste.
‘In my opinion they would make ideal parents for your son.’
Feeling the need to regain the moral high ground he had so clearly lost, Uther shook his head in sham sorrow. ‘Ideal? If only that were true. I fear the only ideal parents would be his own natural father and mother. You simply cannot imagine the pain this causes me. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. But then life isn’t fair, is it? Not on us, not on him. We are to be deprived of the joy of bringing up a son, and he, poor mite, will lose all those advantages I could have given him.’ An anguished look was followed by another gloomy shake of the head. ‘Ah well,’ he continued with resignation, ‘no sense in torturing oneself. The truth is, I’m too sensitive for my own good. It’s a curse, you know, being tender-hearted. But then that’s the way I am.’
Whatever he was thinking, Merlin’s face revealed nothing. ‘Do you want me to approach my friends?’
‘By all means. Naturally I shall have to meet them to approve them – or not, as the case may be.’
‘No.’ The monosyllabic response was surprisingly firm. ‘What do you mean, no?’
‘Meeting them would not be a good idea.’
‘My dear fellow,’ said Uther imperiously, ‘you surely don’t expect me to hand over my son to complete strangers?’
‘That is how it must be.’
Uther flushed with anger. Who the hell did this weirdo think he was, dictating terms to Uther Pendragon? He thumped the table with clenched fist. ‘Not acceptable.’
‘A normal condition of adoption,’ said Merlin calmly, ‘is that the adoptive parents and the birth parents do not meet.’
‘This is hardly a normal adoption.’
‘Would you like the other couple to know who you are?’ ‘None of their damn business.’ Uther was affronted to observe the mini-disturbance at the corners of Merlin’s mouth. This was no laughing matter. ‘You are not suggesting there is any comparison between my rights and theirs?’
Silence.
To hell with it, thought Uther, that did it; he was going to walk out. He laid his hands on the table, pushed back his chair and prepared to leave. And if he left, what then? Where would he go? To an adoption agency? He would never be able to rely on their discretion. It would only be a matter of time before a greedy employee sold the story to the editor of some sleazy tabloid. To whom then? To a friend? An acquaintance? A colleague? Was there a person in the world he could trust apart from Merlin? No. Aggravating though it was he really had no choice. Best get it over with. That disturbing exchange at Grey’s was in his head: Why do you want him? To save the world. Suddenly he had t
he odd feeling that the whole situation was out of his control, that it had all been decided a long time ago, long even before he met Merlin.
A few days later Uther drove to Merlin’s cottage and handed over the tiny baby, carefully wrapped against the winter’s cold. Uther glanced round Merlin’s kitchen, with its simple pine furniture and stone floor. A fire burned in the grate. Uther shuddered to think in what squalor a teacher and a social worker lived in some drab village in the Welsh countryside. Was he condemning his own flesh and blood to a lifetime of poverty? Noticing a crib in the far corner of the room, his heart sank. Dear god, not even a nursery?
‘Is there no room for the baby?’ he enquired loftily. Merlin spread his hands wide. ‘All the room in the world.’ Uther sniffed. ‘That is not what I mean.’
‘I know what you mean.’ ‘What about money?’
‘Money is not a problem,’ said Merlin.
Uther waved a dismissive hand. ‘I shall arrange something on a regular basis. A cheque or a bank transfer. No one need ever know where it comes from.’
‘That won’t be necessary.’
Uther seemed disappointed. ‘Well,’ he said, shifting his feet uncomfortably, ‘then it’s good-bye.’
Merlin nodded. ‘Goodbye.’
After Uther had gone, Merlin warmed a bottle of milk and fed the tiny baby, cradling it in his arms. ‘Welcome,’ he whispered in its ear, ‘welcome once again.’ When the baby was asleep, he laid it in its crib.
It was bitterly cold, a crisp, bright January night. Merlin opened the back door and stood for a few minutes looking up at the sky alive with stars. Somewhere in the woods a barn owl hooted. Closing the door again, Merlin smiled. He knew that sound. The fire chattered in the grate. For a few moments he gazed into the flames, stirring the embers with a poker. Crossing the room, he stood by the crib, eyes closed, the palms of his hands pressed together as though in prayer.