by Ruth Rendell
Marion waited expectantly. She had been waiting for over a week now. But Avice was still occupied with nomenclature. ‘If it had been me I’d have changed it to something more English. Carter perhaps or Carville.’
‘Will you go out for lunch or have it here?’
Avice hesitated for so long that Marion wondered if she meant to answer at all. Finally she said, ‘I don’t know, dear. He’ll have to come here even if we eat elsewhere. The trouble is Figaro doesn’t like him.’
‘I hope he’s never done anything unkind to him,’ said Marion in a suitably indignant tone. ‘Rabbits are like elephants. They never forget.’
‘He’s never had the chance,’ said Avice in the sort of tone that implied there was no knowing what outrages her solicitor would perpetrate if left to his own devices.
‘I could take Figaro into the dining room while he was here. I mean I’d have some of that cow parsley he likes all ready for him and then he’d come in very happily.’
‘That’s an idea.’
Her tone was neutral and unenthusiastic. Marion waited and then, suddenly, she understood. Avice was thinking. Avice put the piece of red ribbon which had come off a box of chocolates between the pages to mark her place, and pondered on her suggestion. Not the one about taking Figaro out of harm’s way but the other one, made after she received the news of Deirdre’s death. Marion could understand her hesitation. A large sum would have to be involved and she hadn’t known Marion long. But whom else could she ask? And how much should the large sum be? Asking Mr Karkashvili would be unwise, especially as he seemed to be an animal hater. Should she give Avice a prod? Not yet. If Mr Karkashvili was coming on Thursday she must make up her mind soon.
The restaurant in Pinner village was Italian and called La Mandritta. It didn’t seem very upmarket to Marion who had phoned the place and made the reservation. The man who answered the phone sounded as if he wasn’t used to people ringing up and booking tables. Especially for lunch, he said. ‘Most just come and take potluck.’
Marion didn’t like the sound of that but what was it to her? She wasn’t going to be eating there. She was going to be at home with those rabbits and meeting Mr Karkashvili when he came back with Avice to redraft her will. After Avice had gone off to meet him at La Mandritta, Marion did one of her little dances. She tripped around the living room in a kind of flamenco style, wishing she had some music. Her dancing frightened the rabbits who plunged through the flap into their hutch as soon as she waved her arms about.
The previous night she had gone off to bed despondently. It was more than a week since she had been back to Lithos Road, sticking close to Avice being the wisest thing to do. Avice had passed almost the entire evening immersed in what she called ‘the new Julie Myerson’ while Marion watched television, necessarily turned very low so as not to disturb Avice. They had both had some hot chocolate at ten and that was when Avice first mentioned the events scheduled for the following day. Marion, to use her own words, perked up a bit at that. But all Avice said was that she thought she and Mr Karkashvili would be back at the house by three at the latest and would Marion like to make tea when he came?
Half an hour later she was sitting up in bed, massaging her face with anti-ageing night serum, when Avice knocked at the door and came in. Marion eyed her warily. She had just come to a decision. She’d go home tomorrow and maybe not come back. Avice, who was holding the photographs of Figaro and Susanna Marion had fetched from the pharmacy that day, asked if she might sit down.
‘It’s your house,’ Marion said not very graciously.
‘Yes, but your room, dear.’
‘Was there something you wanted?’
‘Well, yes. Oh, dear, I find this quite embarrassing. I’m so afraid you’ll say no. That’s why I’ve been putting off asking for days – well, weeks.’
Marion knew now. ‘No need to be embarrassed with me.’
‘Well, you may not say that when you hear what I’ve got to ask.’
Oh, get on with it, Marion thought. Spit it out.
‘You must just say outright if you can’t take it on.’ A deep breath and Avice spat it out. ‘Do you remember when I heard about Deirdre’s dying you said she ought to have left money in her will to someone who’d look after her cat?’
‘Did I?’ said Marion.
‘Oh, yes, you certainly did, dear. Well, would you?’
Say how much, Marion prayed. How much? ‘Would I what, Avice?’
‘Take care of Figaro and Susanna when I – when I pass on? I thought fifty thousand. Would that be enough?’
Marion would have liked twice that but she dared not ask for more. The whole scheme might come to grief if she did. ‘I think that’s very generous, Avice,’ she said in a humble submissive voice, and then – this took more self-discipline than Marion had ever summoned up before – ‘May I give you my answer in the morning?’ She couldn’t resist adding, ‘Very first thing in the morning.’
Avice said in a tone anyone else would have found pathetic, ‘Rabbits seldom live beyond six years old, you know, and mine are nearly two now.’
Tea was ready when they came back from the restaurant. Marion poured it out and handed biscuits like a servant. Mr Karkashvili was a slender, not very tall man and, with his small pale face, resembled President Putin. He kept giving Marion the sort of looks that imply, go, go, leave us, get out. He never once smiled or said thank you. With great dignity, Marion passed him the last biscuit, said to Avice, ‘I’ll be in the dining room with Figaro if you need me,’ scooped up the struggling rabbit and departed, leaving those two to make the arrangements that would enrich her, for at seven thirty that morning she had said yes. ‘Yes, I will. Of course I will.’
And enrich her soon, Marion thought, remembering the morphine.
CHAPTER 15
It was the excitement of Mr Karkashvili’s visit, Marion said, that and eating La Mandritta’s spaghetti alle vongole, which had made Avice ill. The doctor, who came quickly because he was private, disagreed. Avice, he said, madly in Marion’s opinion, wasn’t as young as she used to be. As if he or anyone else was. Miss Conroy had been doing too much and her heart – he only slightly varied this favoured cliché of his – wasn’t what it used to be. The pain Avice said she had felt predominantly on her left side, caused him alarm. He wanted her to have an ECG even though she assured him the pain was gone now.
‘I can’t go into a hospital,’ Avice said. ‘I was in hospital once. I had my appendix out. The nurses were horrible, they called me by my Christian name. Besides, I have to think of Figaro and Susanna.’
‘I’m sure your cleaning lady will look after them,’ said the doctor.
Marion hadn’t been so incensed for years. To be taken for the cleaner! And Avice didn’t correct him. She didn’t say, this is my friend or this is my personal assistant. All she did was carry on refusing to go into, or even to, the hospital and the doctor finally gave up attempting persuasion and told her she must rest and take things easy. Once she got over his insult, Marion was pleased with the way things were going. It would make her task with the morphine easier if Avice had suffered a prior malaise. Of course, it also meant she, Marion, was virtually a prisoner in Pinner. Someone had to give Avice what she called her ‘heart medicine’, see she rested and feed the rabbits, and who else but Marion?
After a week of this, Joyce and Duncan Crosbie arrived. Apparently, they and Avice had a long-standing engagement to go together to the Chelsea Flower Show. Avice had completely forgotten this date, though Marion got the blame for forgetting it from all of them.
‘You could have told me she was ill,’ Joyce said, going out into the kitchen where Marion was making coffee for everyone. ‘I’d have been straight over.’
Marion said nothing. She was thinking it might be a good idea to send for Joyce as soon as Avice succumbed to the morphine, but not too soon in case she summoned help. When, after the coffee had been drunk and the biscuits eaten, Duncan said that they wouldn’t go t
o the flower show now but stay with Avice, Marion said, ‘In that case I’ll just nip out to see my poor old father. I haven’t been near him for a week and he does so rely on my visits.’
No one attempted to hinder her. She skipped down the road to the tube station, the first time she had been able to give vent to her feelings since the making of Avice’s will. She ran and danced and, on the corner of the street, executed a kind of pas de deux. People stared but there weren’t many of them about.
In spite of her resolve never to go near him again, she rang Mr Hussein’s doorbell. The door was answered by Khwaja, the tallest and largest of the Hussein sons, dressed this time in a very expensive-looking dark-grey silk suit. He recognised her at once and before she could speak, said with a twitching of his lips, ‘Ah, it’s the lady who gave my dad the unclean meat.’
He had a habit Marion particularly disliked, that of seeming to suppress, not altogether successfully, laughter at his own words and those of the person he was talking to. Ignoring his estimation of her while blushing at it, Marion asked, ‘How’s your father?’ feeling foolish when she did so as must anyone who utters this phrase with serious intent.
‘Gone on holiday to Marrakesh with Mrs Iqbal,’ said Khwaja, heaving a little with inward giggles. ‘I had a nice postcard of a camel.’
He shut the front door before Marion was halfway down the path. She got on the bus that goes to Swiss Cottage and ran the rest of the way to Chudleigh Hill. Irene had been in the living room making a necklace of carnelian and yellow amber beads and her first words were, ‘Oh, dear, I do so hate having to get up when I’m in the midst of stringing beads. I always feel I can see afterwards exactly where I reached. The next knot is never quite right.’
One must take the rough with the smooth, Marion told herself, and if today was particularly rough, well, too bad. ‘Avice Conroy is very ill,’ she said when Irene had made it clear she didn’t intend them to kiss. ‘Her heart has gone back on her.’
‘Goodness, what a ridiculous expression. Gone where, I should like to know. Is she in hospital?’
‘I’ve been nursing her at home,’ said Marion.
‘Avice always was a valetudinarian.’ Uncertain of the meaning of this word, Marion smiled vaguely. ‘People like me,’ Irene went on, ‘who suffer from chronic poor health, we can’t help resenting the Avices of this world. I mean, their way of inventing illness is insulting to us, don’t you think? We who would give anything to enjoy good health don’t have much patience with imaginary ailments.’
Marion couldn’t have that. Her plan depended on Avice’s heart trouble being taken seriously. On the other hand, she had no wish to alienate Irene. ‘The doctor seemed quite concerned,’ she said.
‘Oh, well, she pays him. What do you expect?’ The string of beads complete, Irene let it fall into her lap and pressed her right hand into her lumbar region. ‘I think my back is worse than it’s ever been. I’d get you a drink of something only I honestly don’t think I could get up.’
‘Can I get it?’
‘Oh, don’t bother. Not unless you absolutely can’t do without the stimulus of wine.’ Irene had begun accusing almost everyone she knew of alcoholism, Marion noted. ‘If my son and that wife of his hadn’t rushed off to the other side of London at the first opportunity, I’d have someone here to see to my needs. But, no, that wasn’t to madam’s taste. Luckily, my friend Barry Fenix will be here in a minute.’
Irene’s tone had softened when she spoke of this man and she sounded rather like someone half her age talking of her lover. Deciding that staying here any longer was profitless, Marion told Irene to take care of herself – ‘No one else will,’ was Irene’s reply – and left. She was looking forward to a few hours at home on her own. As she tripped down the front garden path she spotted through the privet the man next door strolling down his. Marion had caught a glimpse of him in the distance before but they had never spoken. She was surprised to see someone so handsome if you made allowances for age and liked moustaches.
They met on the pavement between his house and Irene’s. ‘You must be Mr Fenix,’ said Marion, holding out her hand. ‘Marion Melville.’
It was taken in a crushing grip. ‘Call me Barry. You’ve been seeing to the old lady, have you?’
If anything could have changed Marion’s rough day into a smooth one, Barry Fenix’s words would have done so. The old lady! ‘She really needs a full-time carer, Barry. And a housekeeper.’ Marion cast a glance in the direction of the front door he had come out of. ‘Her home is very big. I suppose yours is the same sort of size.’
‘A wee bit bigger, I think.’
‘Ah, but you have a devoted wife, no doubt.’
Barry looked down. ‘Once I did. I’m a widower,’ he said.
‘I’m so sorry. How awful of me. The minute I open my mouth I put my foot in it.’
‘A dainty little foot, if I may say so,’ said Barry gallantly. ‘Well, I’d best get on and see what’s to do next door.’
‘I’m not sure – actually, she’s asleep. It might be a good idea to leave it an hour or two. I hope you don’t think I’m being pushy but I do think your house is lovely. And the garden is beautiful.’
‘Since I’m not needed next door for a bit, would you like to come in and have a look around? Have a coffee or a drink or whatever.’
‘I’d love to,’ said Marion, her quiet time at home forgotten.
Eva got another phone call from the woman with the nice hair and the short fingernails. ‘I can’t just let this go, Eva. I want to say something quite important to you.’
‘I suppose you think all this is important, don’t you?’ Heather didn’t answer. ‘This is about you more than about Andrew and Ismay. You’re very young and I don’t think you know what Andrew’s like. Not yet. I hope you never will. You see, Ismay knows him. She knows how to be with him, how to make him happy and how to – well, survive while she’s with him. You don’t. He could destroy you.’
‘You know something, Heather. Andrew’s like my dad. A lot like him. And Mummy’s survived with him. She’s still with him after twenty-five years. I’d be the same.’
‘Couldn’t we meet and talk face-to-face?’ Heather asked her. ‘I don’t feel I’m getting anywhere on the phone.’
‘We did that already. It doesn’t make any difference. I’m not giving Andrew up. Why should I?’
‘I’ve told you why you should, Eva. It’s because Ismay loves him and you don’t. You just like him or you’re attracted to him.’
‘Look, Heather, if you could sort of prove to me that Andrew would go back to your sister if I split with him – well, then I might think seriously about it. But you can’t. Personally, I think he’d just go off and find some other girl. Isn’t that a lot more likely?’
‘Can’t we meet and talk this through?’
‘I don’t see the point.’
A listener who didn’t know these girls would by now have believed them friends. Both had an inkling of this but still Eva said, ‘I’m going to put the phone down now, Heather,’ and Heather said, ‘OK but we’ll talk again.’
They did so two days later. Heather went to be with her mother while Pamela was out and met Ismay there. Beatrix was calm, dosed up with chlorpromazine, chewing gum and silent, apart from once or twice telling Heather she would give her the key to the bottomless pit. Making tea for her mother and coffee for her sister and herself, Ismay turned dull eyes in a blank face to Heather and said in response to her enquiry that she was all right, she was just the same, she supposed she would get through it one day at a time.
‘If he came back now would you have him?’
‘Oh, yes. That doesn’t change.’
‘Even though you know – forgive me, Issy, I have to say this – even though you know he’d be unfaithful to you again. He’d take up with another Eva when he felt like it. Even though you know he’s completely self-absorbed and you’ll always love him more than he loves you.’
‘Even
though,’ said Ismay and her face was twisted with pain. ‘I’m the one who kisses and he’s the one who lets himself be kissed. That’s the way it is.’
So Heather said to Eva the next time she phoned her, ‘She’d take him back. She told me so. It wouldn’t matter what he’d done.’
Eva said hotly, ‘Well, he hasn’t done anything so very terrible, Heather. He’s only split up with his girlfriend and taken up with someone else. People do it all the time.’
‘Can we meet?’
‘I honestly don’t see what for. You haven’t proved anything. You’ve just told me what you say she’s said. I’ve thought a lot about all this. Actually, our families, I mean Andrew’s and mine, they’re very keen on our relationship. I mean, if it led to marriage Mummy and Daddy would be – well, actually delighted. His people would be. I’m not giving him up. I just couldn’t. I mean, I wouldn’t be able to say the words.’
‘I see.’
‘I may as well tell you, Heather, I don’t intend to go running in St James’s Park any more, so don’t think you can find me there, will you?’
‘I won’t think that. Goodbye, Eva.’
Walking along the King’s Road made Pamela feel uncomfortable. Out of place. The expression ‘a duck out of water’ came into her head and when she was here she knew fully what it meant. She said so to Ivan Roiter and when he only shrugged, explained. Everyone else was so young and they looked so free, as if they hadn’t a care in the world.
‘I don’t suppose they have,’ he said. ‘They’re all living on the benefit. And that means my taxes, your taxes.’
‘They can’t all be, Ivan. Some of them must have jobs. Anyway, that’s not really what I meant.’
She was always having to explain to Ivan what she meant. It wasn’t so much that he didn’t understand her – who could really understand somebody else? – or that he saw nothing from her point of view, though both were true, but that most of the time they seemed to be speaking different languages. Though they both worked with money, she wasn’t obsessed with it while he appeared to see everything in terms of finance. The young people they passed in this ever-lively, ever-youthful street were free, she thought, free in spirit, not constrained by time or duty or moral pressures or convention. She was always having to explain to Ivan but this time she didn’t explain – what would be the use?