‘Of course,’ Mickey answered, a little too sharply. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘Oh don’t be like that, please. It’s just that the night I was with Dan Lovell we went to an Indian restaurant and saw David but not you, obviously not you or you’d know, if you see what I mean.’
‘Just because two people are married doesn’t mean they have to spend every waking hour together,’ Mickey said.
‘I’m sorry, forget I mentioned it,’ Josephine said hastily, but she wasn’t finished.
Silence fell between them. Josephine chewed on a fingernail.
‘Mickey.’
‘Yes?’
‘When the two people are you and David they do spend Saturday nights together unless something’s wrong.’
‘I don’t see how it’s possible for us to spend every Saturday night together. More often than not David’s miles away at some other clubhouse.’
‘You could go with him.’
‘It’s not always possible.’
‘You mean it never is!’
It seemed that Josephine had observed more than she’d initially let on.
‘Mickey, he’s drinking too much. Surely you’ve seen it. He’s probably out somewhere throwing them back right now.’
‘No, he’s gone to a meeting,’ Mickey told her, but what had been said was a stark revelation, a jolter.
‘You didn’t know, did you?’ Josephine said, with unbearable insight. She then went on to retell the story of her mother’s decline via the bottle until Mickey felt in need of a drink herself.
She left very late, her forebodings about David further affirmed by his not having returned. Mickey went to bed and for the first time in her logical life indulged in superstitious placatory thinking, making pacts with fate.
If Josephine’s wrong this time I’ll never see Arthur again, she bargained and in doing so realized the degree of Arthur’s tyranny, that much as part of her now wanted to be free of him, there would have to be an outside force in order to make the break. She was, in fact, frightened of finishing with him; frightened of what he might do and of the gap there would be without him. She was ‘hooked’ on him but in the way of a drug addict unwilling to face the traumas of withdrawal.
And if Josephine was right . . . what then?
*
In the days and nights leading up to David’s departure for South Africa, Mickey watched his level of drinking and by the time he left felt easier in her mind. He was nowhere near being an alcoholic she decided. She’d heard a radio programme about the nation’s drinking problem one Sunday morning after The Archers. ‘Drink is a problem when it costs you more than money,’ the expert had said, with gratifying simplicity. David seemed fit enough. How could he not be when he played so many games.
She went with him to Heathrow and as he kissed her perfunctorily on the mouth just before going into the departures lounge she wished with all her heart that things were different; that Arthur did not exist, or rather, that she had never needed him to. She had spoken to him once since the night Josephine called. She telephoned the shop to put off seeing him the coming weekend and as was so often the case, he confounded her. He could not manage that weekend himself. He was engaged elsewhere, those were his words. And Mickey, being sensitive and possessive to a degree that was more than she realized, experienced a sensation of pique she found both unexpected and appalling.
That Sunday, seemingly the first since the week of their marriage David was not playing, they had lunch with Molly and the Walrus. Laura and baby Lucien were out for the day with Laura’s new boyfriend, a pop musician, and as Mickey sat down to lunch with her parents and David it struck her that this was the only time she could remember eating a Molly meal without Laura being present.
‘Well, this is an occasion!’ Molly declared as she brought in the vegetables.
‘Yes,’ Mickey concurred, her line of thought unchanged, then realizing that it sounded more like a veiled indictment of David. She had, despite her almost schizophrenic achievement in splitting herself in two, become hypersensitive to injustice and her own sense of guilt. This now spread in a number of directions and with sudden and alarming clarity: David whom she deceived (there was no other word for it) and yet allowed to remain guilty by dint of his particular obsession; her parents, who unwittingly and undeservedly, produced a prickling resentment within her; sweet Laura of whom she had always been jealous; and Arthur, who perhaps she had, after all, used initially as revenge. She sat at the table watching her father aggressively carving the beef then placing on her plate the crisp outside bit she was known to like best. She watched Molly spoon out the vegetables as if they were fragile and precious, and David pour wine into her glass. She sat still, almost frozen with regret and felt an utter fraud.
‘Are you alright, darling?’ Molly was enquiring concernedly. ‘You’re not off your food?’
‘No,’ Mickey snapped, hearing expectancy in the question. ‘Nothing like that.’
‘No need to jump down your mother’s throat,’ the Walrus barked, hypocritically.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said.
‘Are you sure you’re alright?’ Molly persisted. ‘She’s not off colour, is she, David? She’s not doing too much?’
Mickey and David exchanged glances and in that brief moment Mickey thought he knew.
‘She’s alright,’ he said but there had been the slight pause.
After that the Walrus got going about the traitor Gordon and the latest piece of gimmickry he’d launched upon the toy market in calculated competition against his father’s own new range of pump-up cartoon characters. Molly, who had evidently heard it all before and long ago given up listening, assumed such business talk to be directed at David and therefore engaged Mickey in a discussion about arrangements for Christmas.
‘I’m inviting Gordon and the family here this year,’ she was saying as Mickey heard her father describing her brother as ‘that Northern weasel’. ‘If you and David could come as well it would be a real family Christmas,’ she continued, obliviously.
It was both irritating and endearing the way her mother managed to ignore those nasty things in life which did not suit her purpose, and relating this to her own situation, Mickey could imagine a scene in which she might tell her about Arthur. Molly would dismiss it, saying she should stop being silly and immediately go on to talk about the escalating cost of fresh vegetables. Molly’s was an oddly effective form of defence, developed over years of having to cope with the rigours of marriage to a would-be bully. Dear Molly, the closest she had come to showing uncluttered emotion had been only when nothing else would do – when Laura’s baby had been so nearly rejected by the Walrus and then life. It had been a heavy, undiluted dose of trauma for all of them and would probably suffice in that particular household for years to come. Subconsciously still jealous, Mickey self-pityingly imagined them diminishing her situation, treating it as inconsequential.
God, I’m a dreadful person to think in that way, she thought, feeling her face colour. What’s the matter with me?
Further into the afternoon, Molly took her upstairs on the pretext of obtaining her opinion of a new bedcover. Mickey surmised as soon as the door closed behind her that she was lined up for something else.
‘It’s none of my business of course,’ Molly began.
Mickey’s conscience immediately led her to Arthur.
‘The cover’s very nice,’ she said, touching the green quilting, not looking at her mother.
‘Mickey. Listen dear. I don’t want to interfere, but you are approaching thirty,’ Molly persevered, stickily.
‘That’s true, Mother,’ Mickey said evenly, the warning bell receding, another taking its place.
‘If you want a family, that’s what I’m saying. Don’t leave it too long. You want to be able to enjoy them while you’re still young.’
‘Oh, Mother,’ Mickey said, with a mixture of relief and irritation and an odd twinge in her groin. ‘I haven’t even thought about it.
’
‘It’s a lovely time, you know, when you’re carrying. Everyone makes a fuss of you. It’s about the only time they do, I might add, and once you get over the sicky bit at the beginning you feel marvellous.’ She was speaking now as if Mickey was already in this state of grace, assuming by her lack of protest that the thing was settled. Mickey felt as if an attempt was being made to bring her to the faith and her ill-preparedness for conversion created an uncomfortable sensation of fraudulence.
In the evening, after she had driven David home and he’d sobered up from the afternoon of scotch and cigars with the Walrus, they sat together in their half-decorated drawing room. It was the first time in months they had done so and all the while Mickey expected any moment David to stir and announce his intention of going to the club. At last she could bear it no longer and asked him if he was going.
‘Not tonight. To be honest I don’t feel too good,’ he answered her. ‘Anyway, it’s about time we spent a Sunday evening at home together.’
‘Father’s scotch. He does force it on people.’
‘Yes, it’s probably that,’ David said, shifting a little, as if his limbs were stiff. ‘You and Molly were ensconced upstairs a long time,’ he went on, changing the subject.
‘Yes, she thinks I ought to have a baby,’ Mickey said, as if the idea was preposterous.
‘So do I,’ David said. He was looking at her with serious intent.
‘But . . .’ Mickey began, heart palpitating.
‘But?’ David interjected. ‘But nothing. Why not?’
‘For one thing, we hardly see each other.’
‘I’m sure we could fit it in,’ he remarked, sardonically.
‘David,’ she was searching for the right words, the excuses.
‘I’ve always assumed that we would have children,’ he continued more seriously. ‘Haven’t you?’
‘Yes, I mean no. I don’t know,’ she felt thoroughly confused. The strange twinge had recurred in the area of her pelvis.
‘Well I certainly won’t force you,’ he said, standing up in what seemed a slightly menacing attitude.
Mickey stood up as well.
‘It’s just that I don’t want to be alone,’ she cried, with sudden truth. ‘I don’t want to spend my life waiting for you to come home from the club.’ She realized then that she was actually wringing her hands.
‘Ah that,’ David said, quietly.
‘Yes, that!’
‘Mickey, I think it might be different if we had a child,’ he said, moving towards her.
‘No it wouldn’t! And that’s a terrible thing to say,’ she went on, insistently. ‘You’re saying that you’d come home for a baby but not for me!’ Her voice had become vigorously petulant with so ugly and demeaning an accusation.
David was now close enough to put his arms round her which he did.
‘Poor darling,’ he said, soothingly. ‘I’m sorry if I’ve made you unhappy.’
The tenor of his words was too much for her then, plus their having been prompted by the wretchedness of her own. She wept into his shoulder and longed greatly to be able to tell him about the miserable entanglement with Arthur.
That night they made love with conviction and agreed that when David returned from South Africa they would do it for real. Mickey felt cleansed and purposeful, as if her being had changed; but there was more of Molly in her than she’d ever realized.
‘Why deceive yourself?’ Arthur would have said.
‘Why not!’ Molly and Mickey might reply, if they heard at all.
Chapter Thirteen
The easier course for Mickey at this juncture would have been simply not to see Arthur again; but she had never been the sort of person to opt for the easy route. Arthur’s insidious hold over her had to be expunged and this meant seeing him and working it through; convincing him, and herself.
Accordingly, she went to the shop a few hours after watching David board the plane. It was quite late in the evening but Arthur was still downstairs, working on repairs to his stock.
She was decidedly apprehensive and as he undid the bolts on the shop door to let her in she was experiencing a combination of pity, revulsion and fear. He was so very unprepossessing and yet this had been the very thing that had led her into the situation, initially because he had posed no threat, and the sort of barriers that self-consciousness would have created with a sexually attractive man had never been there. She had felt generous in going to bed with him because for someone of her sheltered upbringing it was difficult to recognize and admit perverse attraction. And now he stood in the doorway, looking at her as if he knew why she had come this time and challenging her to go through with it.
‘You look, if I may say so, troubled,’ he said. ‘I do believe it is your conscience that is causing the problem.’
She stepped past him and he closed and rebolted the door.
‘Arthur, I can’t stay long,’ she said, realizing that she was shaking.
‘I haven’t asked you to,’ he said in defensive tone. ‘I take it though, you have time for a drink?’
‘Yes, of course,’ she agreed, rather too hastily, seizing upon this small placatory concession.
She followed him up the steep narrow staircase to the surprising, familiar room.
‘I expected you sooner.’ he said, fetching wine.
The usual slight odour of Rentokil fluid seemed much stronger Mickey noticed. It made her feel a little sick.
Arthur handed her a glass.
‘You will sit down?’ he enquired, with an edge of his unpleasant sarcasm.
Obediently, Mickey dropped to the chaise longue, then took a deep breath and began: ‘I’ve come to tell you that I can’t see you again after tonight,’ she said, her heart beating wildly.
There was a pause.
Arthur took a sip from his wine glass.
‘A good year,’ he remarked, peering at the clarity of the remaining liquid.
‘Did you hear what I said?’ Mickey asked shakily.
‘Yes. I didn’t realize you expected an answer,’ Arthur said, still studying the wine.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, lamely.
‘Are you?’
‘I’m sorry if I’ve upset you.’
‘You haven’t. Only yourself,’ he observed, coldly. ‘I would say that you are in a state of indecision.’
‘I don’t think I am,’ she said quietly, too full of a sense of being in the wrong to want to argue.
‘Oh, but you are. Now that your husband has gone away the game of deception has lost its thrill. I dare say over the next three weeks you will be indulging the notion of a “fresh start” as if by some easy miracle the man who returns to you will be the ideal you choose to imagine, with none of the shortcomings that have led you, poor Mickey, to the uncomfortable situation in which you find yourself at this moment.’
‘Oh please don’t be eloquent,’ Mickey pleaded.
‘If I was good-looking would you be asking me to rearrange my features simply to ease your task?’
She didn’t answer.
Arthur stood up and moved away. His back turned to her he said: ‘I can’t let you do this, Mickey. I can’t let you.’
In her state of nervousness, if not indecision, Mickey missed this first small warning. Pity and guilt were huge in her, especially now that she foresaw a changed and happy future for herself.
‘I would like us to have a little holiday together, just a few days, no more than a week. I think you owe it to us, to yourself. You can think of it as a farewell. You won’t deny me this, will you? After all, you’ve got three weeks of freedom.’
Relief and gratitude weakened her in that moment and in the next Arthur was talking like a travel agent, turning back to face her, his expression suddenly boyish with victory.
Mickey listened to the sound of his enthusiasm and bowed to his cunning, knowing as well as he did how cleverly he had played on her remorse. The thought of a holiday with him was far from attractive. It
filled her with a sense of dread which her conscience decreed to be selfish and immature. She wanted to make it clear to him that the holiday would have to be platonic but to say so seemed near impossible. Just to mention that side of their relationship, which had only ever been incidental, would sound mean and small-minded and somehow it still mattered to have his good opinion as to the quality of her mind.
She made arrangements for the days she would be away from the office and a week later she and Arthur flew from Gatwick to the Channel Islands. Mickey was glad they had not had to leave from Heathrow.
The time was to be spent on Sark, one of the smallest of the islands and to which Arthur had been taken as a child by his mother. Mickey had not questioned why he had chosen this place, so isolated and devoid of things to do. She had not felt in a strong enough position to question it all, not now that it was so nearly over.
Throughout the journey Arthur was carefully polite to her and she to him, although all the while she was aware of tightness and restraint in him as if she were no longer to be trusted. It was a sort of self-righteous defensiveness for which she couldn’t blame him although it was going to make the days away heavy going.
From St Peter Port on Guernsey they caught the hydrofoil out to Sark and were the only passengers. The season was over and even the sky seemed to indicate closure, a blanket of low cloud spreading down across the small landing stage among the grey rocks that accentuated the bleakness of the place.
They had to walk with their cases up a steep pathway that eventually flattened out and led to a small hotel. Assuming this was where they were staying, Mickey remarked hopefully, that it didn’t look too bad, but Arthur, who had said nothing during the climb, now informed her that he had arranged for them to stay in the same island bungalow he and his mother had been to twenty years earlier.
They walked on, the wind lifting Mickey’s thick hair and biting her ears. There were few houses and those there were had an appearance of insubstantiality as if their owners had considered habitation of the island only temporary. They passed along a narrow street with a cluster of small-scale buildings, a makeshift-looking Post Office and general stores with a rack of curling picture postcards flapping in the wind.
Not Playing the Game Page 14