‘I will be. But it’s not a convertible, is it? Or should I say she? A great ship of a car like this one should surely be a female. Now my parents are out, or my mother would have thanked you for the dressing table.’
‘Nothing to do with me. What did she make of it?’
‘Oh, she loved it,’ said Jillie, ‘but it was too small.’
This was quite untrue; her mother hadn’t even seen the small dressing table shrouded in its dust sheet in the garage, next to the Mercedes. If she had, she would think Jillie had taken leave of her senses. Which, Jillie thought, half sadly, half amused, was exactly what she had done. She had looked at Julius and shaken his hand, and sense had just gone in one breath, leaving her senseless, stupid with – what? Not love, of course, she had learned her lesson on that one, on love at first sight. That was what she had felt for Ned, love had flown into the room and settled on her and him; and how foolish, when one knew nothing of a person – absolutely nothing of the most important things. She knew nothing of Julius either, and so clearly this was quite, quite different; she just thought he was very – interesting. And attractive. And had dark eyes like Ned’s and a sense of style like Ned and that was all it was about really, they were a type, her type. It had been a lovely drive; out onto the heath, towards Highgate, and they had a drink in a pub there, and thus on, further than they had realised for lunch at another pub, so engaged were they with one another, talking and laughing and enjoying the day. It wasn’t until it suddenly seemed to be growing dark that Julius said, ‘Oh, my goodness, I shall have to switch the lights on, and then I think we should be going back. And we haven’t had any lunch. I meant to buy us a splendid feast. I’m so sorry, you must be starving. Next week I’ll get Mrs W to make us a picnic, she’s awfully good at them.’
‘Who is Mrs W?’
‘My housekeeper.’
‘Ah.’
Clearly, she thought, a man of means: owning a car like this as a plaything was not usual in young men, and there wasn’t a great deal of money to be had from antiques, surely.
The next Sunday it was her turn, and she turned the Austin southwards, down to Richmond and the park; where they found the Pen Ponds, twin lakes housing an amazing assortment of birds and he leapt out of the car and said, ‘Right, here we are,’ and took out the picnic hamper he’d stowed in the boot. Such wonders it contained, almost Dickensian in its bounty, half a ham, a chicken pie, cold pickles, a freshly baked loaf (only just cool), some wonderful cheddar cheese and then for dessert, a peach tart.
‘My goodness, we could feed the five thousand with this,’ Jillie said.
‘I know, Mrs W takes the feeding of me very seriously. Now look, the sun is shining. We could carry the basket right down to the lake, and eat there, I see a seat. Would you risk the cold?’
‘I would risk anything,’ she almost said, but managed to say just ‘it’ instead, adding that it would give them an appetite, and they sat in the sunshine, tossing fine scraps at the swans and ducks, and then they went for a stroll and then again, before they knew it, it was growing dusk and they had to drive home. He stayed for supper and met her parents, who were clearly absolutely charmed by him, and when he had gone her mother said, ‘Darling, what a delightful young man.’
Jillie knew what she meant, which was ‘what a suitable young man’. She explained that actually Julius was engaged to somebody who was writing a book on Sundays and was just a friend, no more, whereupon her mother said, ‘Ah. I see. But – darling, don’t get hurt again …’
‘Mummy,’ said Jillie, ‘there’s no question of my getting hurt. He’s just a friend, I told you.’
‘Who clearly admires you very much,’ said Mrs Curtis briskly.
It was on the fourth Sunday that it happened. They had been in the Bentley, taking it for its own outing to Richmond, when Julius, having parked, suddenly said, ‘Look, the Sunday after next there’s a vintage car rally in the wilds of the Surrey-Hampshire border. Bit like the Old Crocks Run. I’ve got the Bentley’s name down, so to speak – would you like to come with me? I’ve asked Nell, but she’s too busy. I’d love to have some company – would you do me the great kindness of coming with me?’
‘Oh!’ said Jillie, and it was as if someone had handed her a priceless gift (which in a way they had). ‘Oh, Julius, I’d love to.’
‘I’ll pick you up. It starts quite early – seven in Richmond.’
‘Shall I dress up? Mummy’s still got the outfit she used to wear for the Old Crocks – I could borrow that. Hat and all.’
‘Wonderful.’
Was she mad? She was mad. Quite, quite, and very immorally mad.
She went up to her room and sat down at her dressing table, staring into the mirror: wondering if her wickedness showed on her face. It didn’t seem to. Her face didn’t seem to have gained any evil lines or twists; extraordinary that it should not have, but then the whole thing was extraordinary, this half-formed, half-acknowledged, totally impossible thing. What was Julius, newly engaged, thinking about? He could submit so cheerfully to banishment from his fiancée every Sunday and not only submit to it, but condone it? And what was she doing, acquiescing to it, allowing herself to enjoy it? When the one thing she knew, knew with certainty, was that she would not be instrumental in breaking up an engagement.
Chapter 46
Tom looked at Donald Herbert and tried to analyse what he felt. None of it nice: a bit sick, shocked, scared, and yes, disillusioned. That was almost the worst. Actually, he felt most of these things most of the time these days; his life, once so hopeful, so happy, so under control, had become a quagmire, where nothing was as he had thought, nothing as it had seemed.
He had believed so fervently in the beginning, in the early days, in the power of politics to right wrongs, rectify injustices, level inequalities; its practitioners, like-minded, idealistic people, using that power wisely and well. Gradually, he had come to see it was not like that at all, that the very people able to achieve the most for others wanted to achieve things also for themselves and were the best placed to do so: and that power did indeed tend to corrupt, and absolute power corrupted absolutely.
For the gist of what Donald had said was that the prospects of the party winning any new seats in the election, even one as promising as Purbridge, were remote, and that Tom stood almost no chance of getting in.
‘The party want you there on the back benches, and the National Agents told me they’re proposing to drop you into a dead cert. Trim-worth South, up near Leeds, Labour majority last time twenty-two thousand. Chap there desperate to retire and you’d stroll in, your profile being what it is now, and some other young hopeful can take over Purbridge.’
‘But—’
‘Tom, don’t turn this down. You need to get in, or it’s God knows how many more years in the wilderness. It means a bit of extra work of course, by-election almost straight away, new people to impress, but we’ve still got six weeks, it’ll be a doddle. No offence, old chap, but they’d vote Labour if the candidate was a donkey.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Now don’t get aerated, Tom. Just take the chance and be grateful. You’ll regret it if you don’t.’
Tom looked at him; thinking of all the friends he had made in Purbridge – his agent, all the local Labour councillors. All right, not exactly friends perhaps, but warm acquaintances, most of them. He thought how welcoming the people had always been, how he had come to know the head of the boys’ grammar school quite well, how he’d promised the staff of the secondary modern that he would work tirelessly to get it improved so that a place there would be an opportunity, not a mark of failure. And Alice, hoping to move there, spend the summers on the golden beach at Sandbanks, how she too had made a few friends, even in the short time she had spent there, including the matron of the local hospital. They trusted him, these people, trusted him to improve things for them, take up their causes, be on their side. Now they were to have some stranger dumped upon them, who they might like less, a
nd find less hard working.
‘I’ll have to think about it,’ he said to Herbert.
‘You’re allowed twenty-four hours. If you decide against this proposal, you’re a bigger fool than I ever expected. You finished with Diana Southcott yet?’
This came out so suddenly, so shockingly, that it was impossible to do anything but answer.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘And no.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean, for Christ’s sake?’
He had to tell him; he’d find out soon enough. ‘She – she said if I stayed away from her, she’d come and see Alice, tell her all about it. And that she’d go to the press.’
‘Christ Almighty. That’s all we need just now. You’re a bloody idiot. You should have listened to me the first time I warned you about her.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘So what are you going to do?’
‘I don’t know. I thought the only thing was to keep seeing her. She – she said once a fortnight would do.’
Donald Herbert laughed loudly.
‘She really has got you by the short and curlies, hasn’t she? Some woman, that one. Brains and beauty. You must have some pretty special qualities, Tom, I’ll give you that. Not much use in this situation, though. You’d better agree to my other proposal, or I really will give up on you.’
He walked out of the bar. Tom watched him, feeling, as he did most of the time these days, extremely sick.
It was Sunday again; they seemed to come round with gratifying speed, too fast really, Jillie thought, given their absolutely finite lifespan. They had taken the Morris out in the Sussex direction, along the Hog’s Back; had a sandwich at a pub, chatting about the rally the following week as they got into the Morris again.
‘What I loved best about the Old Crocks Day when I was a little girl,’ said Jillie, switching on her engine, ‘were all the people on the way watching by the road, waving and cheering. I used to pretend I was the Queen. Oh, I really am so excited!’
She looked at him and smiled, and he smiled his slow, careful smile back; and then, quite without warning, he said, ‘You are so very sweet, Jillie, I do love being with you,’ and he leaned forward and kissed her. On the mouth. And it started safely and innocently, and then it became dangerous, hugely so. She felt herself responding, fought against it, couldn’t, just couldn’t, kissed him on and on, hungry, greedy, unable to believe what was happening to her, to both of them. It was like an electric shock, her whole being was jolted by it; and then he drew back and said, ‘Oh, dear.’
No more was said by either of them, but she put her foot down and drove home as fast as she could, parked outside the house without even turning the engine off; and waited for him to get out. But he put his hand out onto hers and said, ‘That was my fault – incredibly stupid of me. I do hope you’ll forgive me.’
She said, her voice cool as she could manage, ‘I think it was both our faults, and I actually don’t think there’s anything to forgive. Goodbye, Julius. I hope you enjoy next Sunday.’
‘Thank you,’ he said, and there was clearly no question of his arguing about it, for which at least she was grateful.
She went indoors, and ran up to her room, and shut the door and cried. The pain was awful, dreadful, but even in the midst of it, she knew it was not as bad as it might have been, had they progressed further. There was no harm done, Nell had no idea, nobody knew. Really, she was lucky, it had just been fun, lovely charming fun, like Julius himself indeed, and now it was over.
What was the matter with her, she thought, starting on a new hanky, that she couldn’t find an ordinary, nice, unattached, attractive man who was attracted to her, a man who was free to love and to love her; did she have an unhappiness wish, as some people had a death wish? Whatever the reason, it was over; she must not, could not even consider, seeing Julius again. He was barred from her: as he should have been from the beginning, and for that she told herself, in a fresh wave of misery, drenching the clean handkerchief, she had only herself to blame.
She managed to arrange to be on duty the next Sunday, and was lucky to find herself extremely busy: three C-sections, a breech birth, and a hysterical midwife who had missed a clear case of pre-eclampsia, which Jillie spotted just in time. When she got home that night, weeping with exhaustion rather than sadness, her mother, having comforted her with the unbeatable combination of nursery food (fish pie) and a couple of glasses of rather grown-up wine, said, ‘Oh, your friend Julius Noble telephoned you. He asked if you could ring him back. At home.’
She nodded and said all she wanted to do was have a bath and she would ring him next day; which, exerting enormous self-control, she did.
‘Hello.’
‘Hello, Jillie.’
‘How was yesterday?’
‘I didn’t go.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry.’
‘Yes, me too. Look, Jillie – Jillie, I wonder – could you regard what happened as a bit of foolishness? We’re such good friends, and we do enjoy our Sundays – and it’s not as if we’ve fallen in love or anything. And I thought – well, I would so like us to stay friends. Go for the odd drive. It seems silly to throw all that pleasure away.’
Either he was extremely stupid, Jillie thought, or he was a fantasist. Or he really couldn’t face life without her. Whatever the reason, she knew what she must do.
‘I mean – it won’t happen again,’ he said. ‘The – the foolishness, I mean. So what do you think?’
‘I think,’ she said, trying to keep her voice calm, ‘that’s not a good idea. I really do. I’ve enjoyed our Sundays too, but – no, Julius. Goodbye.’
And she put the phone down. It had been quite horribly tempting. A reprieve at least from pain and loneliness and disappointment: but only a reprieve.
For a little while, she felt a glow of virtue and calm from knowing she had done the right thing. It didn’t last for very long.
‘Mr Welles! Glad I caught you. Wonder if you could spare me a minute of your very valuable time.’
It was the chairman of the board of governors of St Luke’s, Sir Neil Lawson, a gentle-voiced tyrant and professor of cardiology; it was said that he was the only living being who could make Matron feel nervous. Ned was certainly no exception.
‘Yes, of course, Sir Neil. Now?’
‘No time like the present. My office, five minutes?’
‘I’ll be there.’
Sir Neil’s office was large, overlooking the gardens of the hospital; every inch of wall space was taken up by framed certificates, telling of triumphs in examinations, honorary degrees of universities, international awards, and photographs of himself at what were clearly important ceremonies, or shaking hands with distinguished people from the Duke of Edinburgh downwards.
He was a tall, thin man with a shock of white hair and steely grey eyes, and wore, no matter what the season, a black worsted three-piece suit with a white shirt and a bow tie in a rather bilious green with white spots.
Ned knocked on the door, and on the imperious command of ‘Come’ went in. He knew at once he was for it; Sir Neil had his back to him, studying the gardens, and did not turn round for a full minute. When he did so, he greeted Ned with a charming smile.
‘Mr Welles, do please sit down.’
Ned sat on the chair on the other side of the desk, and waited.
It didn’t take long to begin.
‘Mr Welles, I understand you are doing the most splendid work in paediatrics; particularly in the area of premature infants and their incompetent lungs. We are fortunate to have you with us.’
Ned waited. This in no way accounted for the general aura of displeasure, conveyed by Sir Neil’s icy stare that had immediately followed the charming smile. He was right.
‘However,’ said Sir Neil, ‘I have received some – complaints would be too strong a word – criticism, about one aspect of your wards and your running of them.’
‘Really?’ said Ned.
‘Yes.
I speak of what appears to be almost a fixation about the children in those wards and their mothers. You will know, I imagine, to what I refer?’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Ned. ‘And if it appears a fixation, then that only reflects the depth of my concern.’
‘Which is?’
‘That the children are not just unhappy, but disturbed by the disappearance of their mothers for several days and at worst, weeks, at a time.’
‘Yet they respond to your treatment or surgery, they recover, they are reunited with their mothers and they go home healed.’
‘Apparently healed,’ said Ned. ‘Physically, yes, but I have come to believe, talking to the mothers when they bring their children for post-operative checks, that the trauma to the children of the separation is considerable. They have nightmares, they are anxious, clinging, they cry easily.’
‘Oh, please. All children cry.’
‘Not to the extent some of these children do.’
‘Could it be that they are the more difficult, over-sensitive children, hospitalised or not?’
‘It could,’ said Ned. ‘But I do not believe so. When I do my night rounds, I invariably find several of the children weeping silently, in a state of what I can only describe as despair. I try to comfort them, to reassure them, but—’
‘Yes, and it is this that various sisters have complained about.’
‘Complained? They haven’t done so to me.’
‘Well, that would be difficult for them, wouldn’t it? Your being their consultant. But I understand that other children wake, there is a general air of confusion, disarray, in the wards – and this isn’t a good thing in a hospital. Calm and quiet is what we look for in all our wards, Mr Welles. But particularly in the paediatric ones. Calm and quiet heal as much as good medicine and good nursing do.’
A Question of Trust Page 43