by Jane Gardam
‘We—I—we haven’t got a spare bed.’ He leapt after her. ‘Just the two bedrooms. The other is my study. You’ll have to—er—lie—on Binkie’s.’
Opening Binkie’s door, however, her bed was seen to be covered and stacked with great neat heaps of clothing, books and trays of jam awaiting collection.
‘Oh, Lord, the bazaar! Oh, Ellie—there’s a church bazaar. Next Saturday . . . ’
‘For goodness sake, Charles!’ Ellie flew past him and burst into the next-door bedroom—his own—and flung herself headlong on his bed. ‘Am I here for bazaars?’ She began to weep noisily into the folk-weave bedcover.
Her outline was large and loose and soft and she sank down, denting the bed, and looked, in spite of the desperate way she rubbed her face about in the pillow, very much settled there.
‘Ellie,’ he said standing near. The sobs increased and he touched her shoulder. ‘I’ll get some brandy.’
‘We never drink it. It isn’t permitted.’
‘Are you at boarding school?’
‘Yes.’ She sobbed harder. ‘Yes, yes, yes. Or a mad house. I don’t know. Oh, Charles!’
‘But you’ve been married to him twelve years.’
‘Yes.’
‘And had two children.’
‘Yes.’
‘But you go . . . go in for it all, don’t you? You must have believed in it—all the sin and so forth. Somewhere in you you must have believed in it? It can’t have been just because of . . . ’
She sobbed. ‘Of what?’ she said at last.
‘Well—well—because of me.’
‘How dare you. How dare you! What did you think you meant to me? Conceit—utter, utter conceit. The whole family the same . . . ’
‘I’m sorry, Ellie. I just thought—all that sin . . . I couldn’t see you thinking . . . It was out of character, Ellie.’
‘I don’t know. How should I know?’
‘I’ll get the brandy.’
He brought two huge brandies and she sat up and drank hers in one swallow. He took the glass from her and walked across the room with his own to the window. Looking out over the municipal park with its prominent litter bins and carefully spaced dahlias he thought, ‘Brandy in the bedroom. With Ellie. In the afternoon.’
‘Did you mind meeting me again, Ellie? The other day?’
‘I wouldn’t have invited myself to tea if I had.’
‘You looked so very . . . cool.’ He turned round to the flushed plump creature in this bed. At fourteen it had floated like a wisp on his windowsill, so slight and fragile that she might perhaps only be some sort of trick of the light, or a ghost in the old house, her huge soft eyes turning to him but seeing things elsewhere in a less physical world. Ellie the dustman’s ethereal daughter. Now however he saw with consternation that she was taking off her clothes.
‘Ellie! Binkie will be back in a minute!’
‘Binkie!’ She wrenched off her blouse and dropped it on the floor.
‘She’s at confession.’
‘Confession!’
‘She doesn’t take very long usually. She’ll be back any minute. She never takes long, even when she’s doing the flowers.’
‘Flowers!’ Ellie had turned back the bedcover and was taking off her stockings. ‘Whatever’s Bink to do with flowers? They’d drop dead soon as look at her.’
‘You’ve become very abrasive,’ he said with interest—but not with commendation. Ellie had been—and it had been her charm—unswervingly adoring of the Fraylings.
‘And confession! I ask you. How typical.’
‘You are more analytical than I remember.’
She began to laugh helplessly. ‘Good Lord—Good Lord! What a thing to say. More analyt . . . I wonder just what you do remember?’
‘A peaceful person,’ he said, ‘gentle. Loving. You know what I remember, Ellie.’
‘Ha!’ She was now undoing an enormous camisole.
‘Ellie . . . look. Could you stop? I think you’re not very well.’
‘Quite right.’
‘What happened?’
‘I’ve had a revelation.’ She got herself out of her skirt. ‘If I were Margaret I would quote you chapter and verse, but at least I missed the Sunday School so I’m not trained to that. I only had your mother and Miss Pannell.’ She dragged up his sheets, slid deep down into his bed and turned her face to the wall. ‘I’ve been in a mad house, Charles. A mad house. I didn’t know it till this afternoon when I . . . walked past an open door. If you knew—if you and Bink knew. If you had ever known what passion is all about. What madness is all about. It would be very good for you to know—the pair of you. You never will. Madness will never get near you. Leave me alone. I must have some sleep.’
‘We do know,’ he said, ‘about mad people. People who live in mad houses seldom . . . throw stones.’
After a while during which she looked at the wall and he turned and stared out of the window again, she said, ‘I’m sorry,’ and began once more to cry.
Charles watched a car draw up at the gate. Out of it stepped Father Carter who opened a door for Binkie who emerged heavily, followed by the shambling figure of Bezeer-Iremonger, and the trio moved up the path. Charles said, ‘Hell. Oh, Hell. Whatever next!’
‘What?’ she sobbed.
‘Look, Ellie—could you stop crying? Er . . . darling! Binkie’s here.’
‘Well, I don’t care. I don’t want to talk to her now.’
‘She’s got a priest with her.’
‘Well, maybe that’ll be a good thing.’
‘Ellie—whatever’s the matter with you? I’ve never known you like this in your life. It may be over twelve years, but . . . you’re histrionic. A child would be more rational. Bezeer-Iremonger is with the priest.’
‘Christ!’ she said, sitting up and staring.
There was a booming and clattering in the hall below. ‘No—Bezeer-Iremonger,’ he said, and steadily they held the look between them. Elinor said, ‘I am not laughing,’ and began to. ‘Charles!’ cried Binkie, thumping up the stairs.
‘Shut me in. Quick!’ said Ellie. ‘Go away.’
‘I love you,’ he said.
‘Shut me in. I love you. Go away.’
He thought, she has authority—she’s as certain of herself as Binkie. More so. She is changed. And there is something else—something Binkie hasn’t got—yet something familiar. A simplicity he had met recently and loved, though not in her. Yet it was Ellie—it was the Ellie he had always known with something much better as well. She had confidence. It had been the lack of confidence in her that had troubled him. She had been a heavy, introverted child, a heavy-going girl-friend, easily forgotten behind the grille of the village post office when he had gone to Cambridge. And there had been the inexcusable touch of deference. Of . . . well, almost obsequiousness behind her shyness and self-conscious skipping walk. ‘Shut the door and go away,’ she cried now, half-naked, pulling his sheets over her head and turning her face to the wall. Around his bed her clothes were scattered in a preposterous heap.
‘Coming!’ he cried out to his sister, and nearly cannoned into her on the landing.
‘Father Carter has kindly said,’ announced Binkie, ‘that he will take the things to the bazaar. We picked up Mr Bezeer outside the vicarage and he says he’ll help. It’s a good chance. They are all on my bed.’
Bezeer-Iremonger was roaming up the stairs and making for Charles’s door. ‘No—this way, Mr Beezer. Charles—go down and talk to Father Carter.’
‘Er—no. I’ll help. You go down. He might like a brandy.’
‘A brandy!’ Binkie’s big face grew huge. ‘At this time in the evening?’
‘Perhaps Mr Bezeer would like a brandy?’ Bezeer-Iremonger who had been looking hard at Charles’s door brightened up. Charles said. ‘Though you don’t drink, Mr Bezeer, do you? Aren’t you a Primitive?’
‘Nonsense,’ shouted Binkie heartily. ‘Mr B is nothing of the sort, I’ve just followed
on from him at confession. Give him the jam to carry. You take the books. Perhaps Father C might follow and kindly take a few clothes? Then perhaps we could all have another sherry.’
‘Another . . . ?’
‘Well, we had some at the Vicarage.’
‘I see,’ said Charles surprised.
‘I didn’t,’ said Bezeer-Iremonger, ‘and I haven’t got long.’
‘Oh dear,’ said Charles.
‘You two go ahead.’
The three trooped down the stairs with the armfuls of lumber. ‘Might I help?’ asked Father Carter in the hall.
‘Yes. There’s a lot more,’ Binkie said, ‘just on my bed.’
‘Hold on—I’ll show you,’ Charles shouted. He began to run with the jam at full speed to the car. ‘Hold on,’ and made it back in time to find Father Carter safely approaching the right bedroom. ‘Oh, sorry,’ he said slowing down, ‘just thought you might get the wrong room.’
‘The door was open,’ said the priest.
‘Just thought you might have got to my study by mistake. Gathered up the wrong stuff.’
‘I don’t suppose you keep heaps of clothes in your study,’ Father Carter said politely. ‘By the way, Frayling, I wonder if I could have a word with you some time?’
‘I’m afraid . . . I’m afraid . . . ’ Charles looked wildly around, ‘I can’t take anything on just at present. A book nearing completion . . . er . . . writing up an old thesis.’
‘No, no. Nothing to do with the parish. I know you are not . . . convinced. It is about your sister. She is in some difficulty. A spiritual difficulty.’
‘Hello there?’ called Binkie’s restored and rolling voice from below. ‘Can you manage?’
‘Yes, yes,’ said Charles.
‘She’s . . . I’m afraid, quite deeply disturbed.’
‘Charles!’ roared Binkie. ‘Whatever are you doing? The jam is sliding all over the seat. Ridiculous place. You practically threw it.’
‘Hatred,’ said the priest, ‘is so very close to love.’ There was a scuffly noise behind him from the closed door and Charles shouted loudly, ‘It’ll be all right. You’ll just have to hold the tray when you go round the corners.’
‘As,’ said Father Carter, ‘sanity is so close to madness. Is that a dog?’
‘We haven’t got a dog. It must be the wind.’
‘Wind—ah,’ said Carter mopping his head in the boiling, airless house. ‘As of course we all know. I often think, Frayling, someone who consciously, fiercely strives after sanity, after an image of sanity—a person with perhaps not quite enough to do, someone with a real sense of being an example to the rest of us—such a person is at terrible risk.’
‘I’m sending up Bezeer,’ called Binkie threateningly.
‘No. No. We’re on our way.’ Charles tried to urge Carter down the stairs ahead of him. ‘Can you see your way?’ Carter feeling for the top step hidden by the tall pile of white elephants swung a foot about in mid-air for a while and there was another vibration from behind Charles’s door. Carter turned to it. ‘Just as someone who is immensely loving,’ he said, ‘I always feel is capable of equal hatred—don’t you? And we all need objects of love—except of course the saints. That does sound like a dog?’
‘We haven’t got one.’
‘Ah.’
‘Shall we go down?’ Charles gave the priest a shove, for Bezeer-Iremonger was coming up. They crossed with him on the stairs. At the car, alone with Carter for a moment again, they stacked things and steadied the jam. ‘Of course she’s at a difficult age. She needs a lot of love,’ Carter murmured.
‘Of course. Precisely,’ said Charles and saw with relief that Binkie, unloved, was sailing down the path to join them followed by Bezeer-Iremonger, who had the last few bits and pieces of clothing trailing about him. ‘A drink?’ he urged half-heartedly. Bezeer-Iremonger blinked with hope.
‘No. No. We won’t trouble you, Frayling. (She’s had a sherry or two already.) Better get this stuff safely stowed. Bezeer will be responsible for the jam. Bezeer—get in,’ and Bezeer got lugubriously in, one arm embracing the toppling jars, the other still clutching the last small heap of garments which Charles saw with a queer sudden dizziness. Binkie settled herself beside the driver, a stack of old books balanced on her knee up to and past eye-level.
‘How unattractive these things always look until they are displayed,’ said Carter. ‘I never cease to wonder how we make money at these parish beanos.’
‘Yes.’
‘Remember what I said.’ He shook hands meaningfully. ‘Can we discuss this further? She is most insecure.’ He turned his head away from Binkie’s ears. ‘Needs a family. Women need someone to command.’
‘Father, we must be moving,’ Binkie boomed, ‘Mr Beezer is meant to be singing in five minutes on the sands.’
‘But splendid woman, of course. Vale!’ he added, lifting a thumb.
‘Non mecum,’ said Charles, getting out a handkerchief and mopping hands and face. ‘Gratias.’
He staggered back to the house thinking what a tatty old mystery Bezeer was.
But then maybe no more than anyone else.
Sanity, insanity, he thought. Love, hate. Sense, nonsense. And where shall wisdom be found?
Even the things Bezeer touched seemed to turn rubbishy, he thought, and wondered why the last armful of clothing had seemed so familiar. He couldn’t remember. He couldn’t connect. And this was the second time today that he couldn’t connect.
The first had been when he had looked at Ellie’s shining face, clear and young and courageous in his bed. And now, these clothes.
He locked the front door behind him and picking up the brandy bottle on the way, returned to his room.
On opening the door he remembered both things at once. For Ellie, wrapped up in the folk-weave, glared at him with the wide blue eyes of the child Margaret. It was Margaret I saw, he thought—Ellie is just one part of Margaret. The other thing he remembered as he looked at the floor.
‘That awful old man,’ said Ellie, above the counterpane, ‘came in and took away my clothes.’
17.
A troop of dogs was rushing around the sands, four chasing one, and all very excited with their tongues hanging out. Margaret watched them tearing about. There was a great big black one with matted sandy hair, a hot red one with hot red eyes and a tail in a curl, and a white midget with legs like trotters. The dog they chased was a nondescript-looking, slightly mangy Airedale and it seemed distressed. As Margaret watched, the big black dog leapt on its back and began to push it vigorously along in jerks. She did not feel that she dare rescue it herself—the black dog seemed so fierce—but she couldn’t think why nobody else tried. There were still quite a lot of people on the beach for the tide was far out.
Children were just beginning to be called in. Mothers were packing up beach–bags or finishing a last cigarette. Several men were there, too. But most people were not even watching the dogs and some had quite turned away. They wriggled about in strange attitudes beneath towels, getting out of their bathing clothes, feeling about modestly for underclothing. The other dogs—the ones who had not leapt on the Airedale’s back—sat down in a semi-circle and watched and waited, panting. Margaret said to a small boy bashing a sandcastle with the flat of a spade, ‘Look at the poor dog.’ He looked and turned to his father and yelled, ‘Dad!’
‘Eh?’ The man was lying on the sand with his heels and shoulders pressed into it and the rest of him heaved into an arc under a towel. He flung off a rag of bathing trunks with his foot and turned a tortured face to the dogs and went on squirming.
‘The dogs,’ cried the boy.
‘Shurrup,’ said the man.
‘What are they doing?’ Margaret asked. The man had now stood up and was tucking a long old shirt into flannel bags. His wife, picking up rugs, her cigarette dropping long ash, sniggered. ‘Git on,’ said the man. ‘Nowt.’
The boy had already lost interest and gone back t
o the keep of his castle. ‘It might get hurt,’ said Margaret. Nobody said a word. Instead of words they all seemed to be breathing out something which Margaret felt disturbing and familiar and she turned away.
She walked on out towards the sea which was only a line in the distance beyond the rocks. Even the end of the pier was bare today, its poor thin chicken’s legs stuck in big cement humps with rusty marks trickling over them. She walked on until she reached the place where the sand was hard with sahara ripples, and pressed her shoes into every ridge to spoil it. There were heaps of sand worms. Worm casts, her mother called them, but Margaret knew better. They were little bundles of live worms created from sand as God had created Adam out of spit and dust. They looked like chestnut purée.
Now there were pools as clear as glass and she waded through them until they got more frequent and deeper and were able to soak through her shoes and socks. The tops of her ankle socks were dark worm-chestnut brown, fawn purée. Fawn, worm-shaped and sopped. Sand collected inside them and it grew uncomfortable. The rocks began, long and black, ridged crocodiles, covered with barnacles. If you pounced quickly enough upon a barnacle you could just feel it move. Just the faintest looseness and then—clamp! Rock to rock. Dust to dust. How old are barnacles? How old do they grow? What becomes of dead barnacles? Where do old barnacles go to die? Rock of ages cleft for me. How tightly stuck to the rock was the barnacle? How tightly stuck had been the big black dog? Why had the woman sniggered?
Two white hands on Lydia’s back. Lydia’s wide tight back. White back beneath the big pink corset. White, tight hands over the hidden, ridged corset. White beneath.
And God said Thou shalt love one another. That is my Commandment.
And so why do I feel . . .
The pools were not pools now, they were lakes. She had walked a very long way. When she turned there were rocks and pools behind her and the huge beach shining like a steel sheet, then the pale line of the dry sandcastles with the crackling seaweed, the sweet-papers and the litter. Behind this again the promenade and the railings—though she was too far out now to see the railings. She could not even see Seaview Villas from here, only the small crinkled gables in a little low rick-rack line. She was way beyond the pier’s end.