England's Lane

by Joseph Connolly

  He looked at me narrowly, the smile on his lips considerably kinder than the light in his eyes.

  “Frost …” he said with care, and very thoughtfully. “Frost … Anything by any chance to do with, um …?”

  “Indeed. He was my father.”

  “Ah. Your father, yes of course. My sincere condolences. He was much admired, your father. Fine man.”

  I nodded and lowered my head. “He was,” I said. “He was.”

  Later in the conversation—and by way of an unwontedly extravagant flourish of his arm, the gleam in his eyes now wholly determined—he invited Fiona and myself to dinner the following weekend, as I knew he was bound to. Not simply as a result of manners—the common courtesy extended to a newcomer with strong and respectable local connections: I just knew he was bound to. His house, The Grange, was well known in Henley, I soon was to discover: the grandest, the smartest—although, being early Georgian, by no means the oldest. During the interim before we dined there, I learned from several quarters that such an invitation was to be highly prized. For this is how people in a provincial town—no matter how ostensibly sophisticated—will habitually evaluate any given situation. Almost achingly parochial, but there it is—what can be done about it? A readily defined hierarchy is always required in England—others by whom to divine denominators, measure the necessary degree of distance and—quite paramount—make evident the wink of complicity, to subtly acknowledge the perception of parity, whether true or fantastical.

  In addition to the house, my dear father also bequeathed to me a smallish though still unexpected amount of assets. His current account, something in a building society, a modest portfolio of shares made up of shrinking, cheaply acquired oddments and too few gilts. There is also the Constable oil sketch in the drawing room of which he was inordinately fond, but that is worth hardly more than a hundred pounds. He had earlier alerted me to the existence of a brass-bound strongbox behind the sprung secret panel in that venerable green leather-topped pedestal desk whose rich mahogany is partially faded to ginger, due to the early morning sunlight that comes in shafts through the study’s big bay window: it would catch from the side his unlined forehead and the softness of his hair, rendering it then into a fine-spun and silvery floss. Within the box were my mother’s wedding and engagement rings in addition to a bracelet or so, pearl studs, a locket she habitually wore on a thin gold chain (and within which I was surprised though unmoved to find the tiniest oval and sepia photograph of myself as an infant) together with the platinum choker that so ill became her. And two rolled-up bundles of five-pound notes, tied in pink ribbon. Of which, rather fortunately, I had, by the time of my initial encounter with John Somerset, already invested a rather large proportion in much-needed clothing for Fiona and myself—for oh dear me, I simply cannot tell you: the state of our attire hitherto had been very shamingly little short of threadbare (we sometimes laughed about it, though often we did not). And so we had taken the train up to London by way of something of a rather joyous spree, staying for just the one night at The Strand Palace Hotel, and dining at Gennaro’s—an abiding ambition of Fiona’s, and one I was pleased to at last be in a position to satisfy. She acquired some very fetching costumes, blouses, gowns and tea frocks from Liberty and Harrods, while I had repaired with quite boyish excitement, I freely admit it, to Hilditch & Key in Jermyn Street to stock up on a goodly selection of shirts, ties, cravats, nightwear, hosiery, underthings, and so forth. I commissioned Anderson & Sheppard in Savile Row to kit me out with three day suits, a couple of decent tweed sportscoats, a flannel blazer, various pairs of bags, and of course black tie. This last, very happily, having been delivered just the very week before Fiona and I were to attend this much-vaunted dinner at The Grange, courtesy of Mr. John Somerset, and his lovely wife. Ah yes—his lovely wife … Anna, by name. Who soon, but naturally, was to be conspiratorially instrumental in the weaving together of yet another colored and intrinsic strand into what was destined to become—and really quite frighteningly quickly—a narrative tapestry of extraordinary scale, and very telling detail.

  The dinner itself, I should say, was no more than a something and a nothing. Or so, certainly, I appear to view the thing from well behind the battlements of hindsight. Though due to one factor and one factor only, this is not at all how it struck me at the time. Other than this single jeweled and glowing highlight, the evening ran its course more or less as one might have expected: seeds were sown, depths experimentally plumbed—ideas, opinions, prejudices, quips and a plethora of half-truths, all were let loose freely as a sequence of child-blown bubbles, or the barely there feathering of a new-born chick to flutter idly on the air above us, some then mysteriously melding to rise up as a halo and into the ether, while others would dissolve, or fall to earth. The dining hall … well what, now, do I recall of the dining hall? Paneled in oak so very dark, I should imagine, as to be artificially tinted, and in the Tudor style, linenfold—though I cannot say that it carried very well in a room of quite patently Queen Anne proportion. The fare relied upon the expense of its ingredients for whatever impression it may have made upon us, though it was gracefully served by a civil, dignified and suitably silent man whose name I later discovered to be Anton: clearly he knew his business well. Each of the wines—there must have been four—was, at that untried juncture of my life, the finest by far I had ever tasted. For still, you see, I was comparatively young—not maybe in terms of years on earth so much as the fact that I remained quite wholly inexperienced, as well as—yes, utterly innocent. How very odd to think it: that actually there existed a time when I was that. Fiona had been perfect, perfect of course. Always with exactly the correct gesture, a variety of scintillating bons mots, each dropped just so—the ideal degree of humorously arch coquetry, by way of flattering our host. Whereas the hostess, meanwhile … was regarding the scene with a degree of detachment, though also something approaching amusement. As if a floorshow such as this were a nightly occurrence (which, for all I then knew, it well might easily have been), though that this particular evening’s cabaret was thus far markedly more entertaining than the general run of the mill of the thing. And have I also said that Anna … that she was, oh—quite ravishingly beautiful …? I think I might have, without having had recourse to so stark and unpoetical an utterance—which now, prosaically, is out of my mouth. And would it be too foolishly fanciful to suggest that all those unearthly properties I had so zealously yearned to be thriving and vibrant within the body and soul of my mother (for her to be drenched in them) were present, and abundantly, in the form and being of Anna Somerset?

  Although I was too naïve at the time to be even aware, each of John’s conversational gambits was as a skirmish into unknown territory: he was scouting—not in order to discover any detail of what it was I did, nor indeed what, if anything, I wished for … but, crucially, that of which ultimately I was to be judged capable. It was only when the ladies had withdrawn and the two of us were still seated at the dining table with sweetmeats, the ruins of walnuts, bijou glasses of Benedictine—a liqueur quite new to me—and smoking exceptionally fine Hoyo de Monterreys of the type that nowadays it is perfectly impossible to obtain … only then did John seem able to relax into that which, in his measured appraisal, he apparently felt sure now to be me. What coded signals, I still do wonder, can he possibly have received, when I was conscious of having tapped out none? Well of course it has to be said that his extreme and often alarming intelligence has never been in any doubt: his perception is a foil of the finest steel—it can impale you with a sigh before even you are aware of its unsheathing, let alone the quite silent coldness of its entry. And if what we now were sharing might indeed be termed intimacy, then I grant that it excited me to be a part of it.

  The proprieties of course then were to be observed: we rejoined the ladies, and the talk was small. Fiona had been enjoying the port to a degree that had brought her just maybe to the very verge of over-refreshment, though still she remained quite properly
decorous. And soon we were seen to the door, whereupon John had insisted that Anton should now drive us home, despite my protestations that we had strolled across here at a leisurely pace in little more than minutes. John then gently steered me by the elbow into a corner by a window heavily curtained in a gold brocade, where he lowered his voice:

  “Jonathan … I cannot help but think that our meeting was a lucky one. Yes? I feel sure that we might be able to conduct a little business. Business, yes? Jointly, as it were. To our mutual advantage. Yes? And in the very near future, I do so hope. Yes?”

  I confess I had no idea as to what brand of business he might be—and I thought rather fancifully—alluding. There was no sort of business to which I aspired, nor was I skilled in any of the disciplines—and although I therefore was very acutely aware of my own incapacity, it thrilled me still that he appeared not to be.

  As yet I had not spoken. He added, while taking my hand:

  “I shall, if I may, be in touch. I know where to find you. We have, I am positive, much to discuss.”

  Then it was time for myself and Fiona to thank each of our hosts together and in turn no more than a dozen times in all, and for all sorts of aspects of the evening—though, as ever, not until the front door had been flung wide to the elements, and all of us there were shivering throughout. The cushioned ride home in the dark-blue Bentley I should like to have lasted forever. Fiona’s chatter I refused to allow to distract me: I was striving to retain—hard and blinding bright, like a diamond—the memory of Anna Somerset’s quite utterly startling face as then, in the doorway, she had for the very first time truly looked upon me … yes, and wholly into my eyes. The piercing that this had effected upon me rendered at once the rapier of her husband’s perspicacity as no more than an abrasion. And I took up with immediacy John’s subsequent offer of a working business partnership, the details of which I was barely even hearing, and was so far away from any comprehension … because how else? How else, yes? How else, I had reasoned—if reasoning may ever succeed in its struggle for breath within a man so very heated and wild-eyed—how else would I ever be able to maintain a proximity? To have liberty of access to his home and his life, and then be free and able to feast upon his wife …?

  Indeed, indeed … My, though: what a veritable deluge of memories. It affects you, you know: I am quite overwhelmed. But for now, while remaining ever aware of its predatory malice, its eternally lurking presence, I must for a time blind myself to threat. And so too, alas, must I wrenchingly relinquish the uplands, the sublimity of all that is Anna … in order to plummet, yes, to the inanity of one who is called Doreen. I go there now, so that she may quickly attend to me. Her mother is away from the flat, as I was chatteringly told is customary on a Thursday evening. At “bingo,” I gather, whatever more than detestable thing on earth this “bingo” might be. No matter—the child, she is alone, and therefore mine. I shall smoke a Black Russian, idly blowing rings, and she will be this close to swooning merely at witnessing such appalling sophistication on the part of a perfectly splendid and older moneyed man. She will coyly ask whether she might try one, whereupon I shall ease a second into my mouth and flourish again the Dunhill lighter. Then I shall with the most infinite care place the cigarette between her two plump and sticky lips. This will both frighten and excite her, she knows not why. Then she might cough—an apologetic splutter, after the pantomime of which she will laugh with hesitation as she recovers herself. She then very easily could wrinkle her eyes: she will hold aloft the cigarette and say that it is strong. Then I shall instruct her to remove her clothing and bend very sweetly across that chair there in order to receive just punishment, and without any further delay, please. She will close and then reopen her gorgeously caked and over-made-up eyes in a manner which she may genuinely imagine to be suggestive. Then she touches my arm, giggles quite irritatingly and tells me not to be in such a hurry. I say it is impolite to keep a gentleman waiting, although then I shall have to, I’m afraid, kiss her—which, since she will have been smoking, can only be distasteful—and after that wet and tedious little necessity is over and done with, I shall elect to wear the smile that devastates while producing as if by the most dextrous sleight of hand a one-pound box of Black Magic. The intake of breath will be audible. Her eyes, they then will melt. After the melt, they all of them, women, are yours for the taking: after the melt, there is nothing they will not be quite avid to do for you: this is known. How very wonderfully ridiculous. And what a deliciously contemptible and vulgar little slattern we have here in our young Doreen, to be sure.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  We All Need Help

  It really is, you know, so terribly pleasant to be out in the air and walking briskly. This is the thought that was idling contentedly in Milly’s happy mind as she girlishly was swinging to and fro a shopping basket in time with her purposeful steps, squinting up at the sun that alternately filtered softly, then suddenly was sparking silver through the overhanging lattice of thin and quivering quite black branches, so very high above her. On this cold and bright afternoon (and it really is freezing today—winter truly now is biting). But then on a Thursday, always on a Thursday, everything does seem to me so very … well what, actually? Heightened. My senses among them. It is the anticipation, I have long ago decided, that is so very largely a part of the thing. Seeing him, finally to be with him at the end of the day, that of course is quite wonderful … but the electric tingle that is just all over me throughout the afternoon—it makes me feel fizzy and it makes me smile irrepressibly: I imagine I appear like a perfect loony to any passer-by … but that terrific thrill, that I wouldn’t be without, no no, not for worlds. This is what an illicit sexual relationship will do for a woman, I suppose. Though the thing itself, the actual act of intercourse … and yes I quite see that it is essential to Jonathan, to his very being … for me really is just perfectly ordinary. I’m not saying ordinary in the sense of its being particularly dull—I just mean that it comes so very naturally to me. Which was surprising, at first. I thought I should be most awfully shy and embarrassed, not to say consumed by nerves and the most terrible guilt about, well—the whole of the affair, really. So I steeled myself as best I could and placidly awaited to be bombarded by all of this … and so it was actually mildly shocking when not a thing arrived. The fact that I remained unassaulted by so much as even a jot of it. Something of a bonus, really. And although I have taken to it all with considerable ease, I do not experience a physical hunger, as Jonathan seems to (my own appetite would appear to be for something more, well … spiritual, in a way—sort of that, for want of a better word), though still I do most wholeheartedly welcome all of his attentions. I do not believe Jonathan to be in any way unusual in his very tangible need for this thing—I am sure it is simply a male characteristic. A vital release, so to speak—an inbuilt genetic necessity. He is even so terribly accommodating on those unfortunate occasions when it just happens to be that time of the month and the curse is upon me—gently schooling me in a couple of techniques requiring a certain amount of deftness: tricky to begin with, though I think now I am mistress of both (though one of them had been so far beyond the boundaries of my imagination that at first I had assumed him to be joking) … whereby he might, at last, be contented. And I am quite delighted to be able to be his means of expression, as it were—to be so integral a part of the intimacy, such fusion as that: because it does so seem to please him. Or gratify. Certainly there is about him—when, so to speak, the hurly-burly’s done—an air of completion, of finality. Do I mean that …? I’m not actually sure that it is what I mean, you know … because it’s really so very hard, isn’t it? Attempting to articulate all this sort of thing. What I mean is that he will grunt just once, and then there is a sigh, I must presume of satisfaction.

  I think the part I truly most enjoy is just silently sitting there, and being undressed. He does it quite languorously—I like very much the feeling of being so very gradually taken apart. Each new release of ju
st some of me, until finally the lady is laid bare, and then he may feast upon the whole. Which is really a reasonably lascivious observation, and I am surprised, though pleased, to have made it. I love then afterward to be simply held by him … although it is true that often at this point he is eager to be up and away. And yes, I understand even that in a man, I think: certainly I don’t resent it. And it’s not, after all, as if we share the luxury of an actual bed, or anything—it’s only the Turkish rug in his office—that, a couple of cushions, and the rather beastly bolster that lives on the chaise. Then there is the matter of time, of course—always one has to be aware of the constraints of time: we each have our various responsibilities, and always in a street such as this the proprieties must be so very carefully considered. Alas, we no longer visit the Italian restaurant in Swiss Cottage: Jonathan decreed that it was a risk, an unnecessary danger to our continuing future together. I agree, really—though I do rather miss the spaghetti. But we are happy enough in his little back office. We drink red wine and Benedictine, and always I bring along a selection of sandwiches. I thought, having some measure of the man, that it would be ham and English mustard that he particularly would favor, though it turns out instead that he is inordinately partial to Wensleydale, in a bap. I get it in the Dairies. Jim, he noticed the wedge in the fridge last week: amazing in itself. Well, you can imagine: “What’s this here?” he goes. “Cheese, Jim. What does it look like? It’s cheese.” “I know it’s cheese—I’m not bloody stupid. I can see it’s bloody cheese, can’t I? But it ain’t Cheddar, is what I’m saying. It’s Cheddar what I like, you know that.” “Yes well it’s not for you. It’s not for you, Jim.” Rather brazen, I know. But I do seem to have become rather like that, just lately. If something is not pertinent, not relevant to all that I am now, and care about, then honestly I simply couldn’t give two hoots.