Visitors

by Anita Brookner

  And in the meantime she was landed with Steve Best. This is the last thing I do for them, she thought incoherently, until she realised that it was also the first. Good sense, momentarily recaptured, told her that this was a routine favour, extended quite naturally by people of a more robust disposition. But she was not of a robust disposition, had never had anything more to cope with than a husband who had already been through one marriage, and who asked nothing more from her than a peaceful and secure setting for his future existence. Neither of them had had any contact with the young, whom she saw—common sense momentarily deserting her once again—as dangerously dynamic, like Puck, or Pan, with movements that would shatter the calm of her silent home. Why could Kitty not have had Steve, and sent Ann off to her? That would have been the considerate thing to do. Yet immediately she saw the futility of this reflection. Ann was the granddaughter who must be spoiled. Bullied too; certainly made privy to Kitty’s moods. Mrs May, remembering Kitty’s way with Ann as a child—ardent, but also dissatisfied, reproachful—did not think that these wedding preparations would proceed harmoniously. But that was Kitty’s problem, Kitty’s and the faithless Austin’s. If he had so much as volunteered a suggestion, which she was now inclined to doubt.

  And now she was to be invaded by this unknown Steve, with whom she hoped she would manage to be on polite terms, not showing him how deeply she resented his presence. Would he respect the atmosphere she had cultivated, even now with Henry in mind? She thought not. In the street young men on Rollerblades rushed past her like demons, or dropped nervelessly from the high cabs of articulated lorries, taking for granted an equilibrium which they had as yet no reason to distrust. She could hardly tell this Steve to go out all day, although a moment’s reflection told her that this was what he would choose to do. In herself she held no attractions for a young person. That was part of the humiliation of being overruled … She would be nervous, apologetic, regretting her lack of experience. She could at least make him comfortable, she decided. And then she would keep out of his way. She would convey, somehow, that she was not to be disturbed, regretting that she had no great work to occupy her. He was not to know this. ‘You’ll forgive me if I leave you to your own devices.’ she would say, pleasantly. ‘There is something I have to get on with. I suggest you make arrangements to see your friends, Ann, and, yes, David. I’m sure you have plenty to talk about. I’ll give you a key. But really, Steve, I expect we shall see very little of each other, don’t you?’

  There were three bedrooms in the flat, her own, the room in which Henry had died, and a small spare room in which he occasionally took a nap. The narrow divan bed seemed to retain the impress of his body, as if his ghost slept there. She stood in the doorway, reluctant to enter. It was a pleasant room, sunny and quiet, although it overlooked the street. In the daytime the street was silent, empty except for old people like herself. It was an elderly neighbourhood of quiet middle-class residents, most of whom she knew by sight, and with whom she exchanged greetings when she went out to do her morning shopping. This restraint occasionally made her sigh, although it was natural, if not entirely reassuring. She would have preferred evidence of a robust male presence, of someone who would take control in an emergency, but through the spare room window she could see only mute closed doors and undisturbed curtains. Many people were away, of course; it was still summer, although the first week in September, and exceptionally hot. Yet the houses looked closed against the street, which was itself deserted, without even the sound of a passing car to disturb this prolonged holiday trance.

  The room seemed abandoned, as all rarely entered rooms do, given over to the memory of Henry lying there on winter afternoons. He had always slept voluptuously, had had easy access to sleep, could sleep at any time. It was when he felt sleep gaining on him that he repaired to the spare room for an hour, to reappear, fully restored, when she prepared tea. Christmas day was his favourite time for sleep, so that she spent the lightless hours of that long silent afternoon on her own, reading, and reflecting that in essence nothing much had changed since her girlhood, when she had spent most of her leisure time reading on her bed. She did not mind the temporary solitude, to which she was after all accustomed; what she did mind was the winter, with its stealthy darkness, and the mortal quiet of the garden. For this reason, when it was time to make the tea, she clattered the cups a little more than was necessary, until Henry, his face still blank from the onslaught of his sleep, came to join her.

  Of that other unentered room she preferred not to think. It was empty now, empty of Henry and also of all evidence of his illness. When the last oxygen cylinder had been removed she had closed the door behind her as if the room had been condemned, as if it had been decreed that death had marked it forever. There was no question of anyone ever using the room again, and yet it was agreeable and overlooked the garden, as did her own. It was a sign of Henry’s elegance, of his desire to spare her, that made him move to what became his room when certain of his symptoms became noticeable. He had known what was in store for him. When the evidence could no longer be concealed they had entered into a conspiracy, the three of them, she and Henry and Monty Goldmark, to carry the whole thing off as best they could. It had been done, although it had left gaps in their conversation. At times a monstrous cheerfulness prevailed. She had been there throughout, had been there on the day he died, holding his hand, and yet it was with a savage relief that she had thrown away all his pills, stripped the bed, opened the windows, and, ten days later, after the funeral, had made up the bed again with clean linen, had closed the windows, and shut the door behind her forever.

  Nothing of Henry remained in that room except the knowledge of his disappearance from her life. Yet in the spare room, the room that was to be invaded, plundered, she could still see him as she had so often seen him when he woke from an afternoon nap, his hair wild, his gaze turned inward. She had not felt easy until he put himself to rights and drank his tea. When he was once more cheerfully back to normal, and as likely as not on the telephone, she would go in and straighten the coverlet on which he had lain, glancing out at the street in the hope of seeing lighted windows, signs of life. There had been none, only the pall of darkness and a fear that all might not be well, that the night would bring no comfort because sleep had become inimical, and because Henry’s sleep had held a warning that she had not fully understood. Later, sitting by his bed, in the course of one of those lengthy dozes which had become habitual in his last illness, she had understood her fearfulness. Consequently she had rather taken against the spare room in which he had slept so many times. She strove to be reasonable, and on the whole succeeded. She regretted anything nebulous, mysterious, immanent. She abhorred atmospheres, portents. Nevertheless she preferred to keep the door of the spare room permanently closed.

  Now, however, it was necessary to open it once again. In the sunlight, as opposed to the darkness of those distant winters, it looked reassuringly ordinary, if a little bare. Mrs May contemplated the Indian bedspread on which Henry had lain and decided to get rid of it. The room deserved something light, something new, without associations. She would go to one of the stores, John Lewis, she thought, and see what she could find. It was a point of honour that this Steve should find nothing amiss with her hospitality, even though the thought of him made her quail. It would be the same with any stranger, she told herself, even a woman. Revising her earlier estimate of the situation, she reflected that a woman would be worse. At least a man, and a young man at that, would want to keep out of her way, no doubt repelled by the very idea of sharing living space with a pensioner. Another woman would want to chat, wash her clothes, wash her hair, whereas a young man could be confined to his room, like a prisoner. She did not quite see how this was to be managed, but hoped that he would take his cue from her. She would prepare his breakfast and then make it clear that she did not expect to see him for the rest of the day.

  In the midst of these calculations, standing in the middle of the room,
the Indian bedspread in her hands, the irony of her position struck her anew. She was about to become a prisoner herself, at the behest of Kitty and her ruthless arrangements. And yet she could not blame Kitty for her own unpreparedness. What did she know of young men? There had been few in her own young years, which had been all duty, uncomplaining duty. She had thought that duty ruled everyone’s life, and in her heart of hearts still did. That was why she had acceded to Kitty’s request, seeing her own idleness as a refuge from the world and therefore of no value. She viewed herself as this young man might view her, as something worthless. He would be in favour of social justice, as all the young were, would think her an example of undeserving privilege. Therefore she must be prudent, less authoritative than she would like to be. She might, however distasteful the prospect, be required to win him over. Therefore a certain welcome must be prepared. She would meet him as she would wish to be met, smiling, composed. She opened the wardrobe, saw that there were plenty of hangers, then bundled up the Indian bedspread and took it through to the dustbin.

  Glancing once more at the impassive street, she decided that movement, activity, were what she needed. She was hungry for faces, crowds; she had been immured at home for far too long. She left the flat, locking the door impatiently behind her. But the street, which she knew so well, seemed unfamiliar, alien. She felt the first creeping inroads of anxiety and put a warning hand to her fluttering heart, slowing her pace. In her head she felt an impatience that her steps could not match. At some level it was clear to her that this excursion was unnecessary, that she could turn back at any moment, and probably should. Yet it was with something like eagerness that she took her place at the bus stop, gazing at passing cars as if any one of them might carry her off to a better life. She knew that for her there was no better life, was even on the whole contented, yet had she been able to see herself she would have been astonished at her ardent gaze and her unseeing stare. It was only after climbing onto the bus that she remembered her stiffness, her unhandiness. She composed her expression, embarrassed that she had entertained thoughts of flight.

  It was hot, very hot. In Oxford Street the crowds seemed to saunter luxuriously, as if they were on a promenade, an esplanade. They wore garish holiday clothes, walked three or four abreast, seemed, to her unaccustomed eye, overweight. She was carried along like a dry stick on a stream, wincing as she was struck by a gesticulating arm, apologising as she made her way through the loitering crowd. She began to think more kindly of home, understood what it was that kept her there. The shop was reached with some difficulty, and once inside the doors she felt that the crowds had followed her, were stepping on her heels. The same or similar fat women, absorbed in conversation with their companions, blocked the aisles, turned suddenly when least expected, and as far as she could see made no purchases. As she found her way to the bedding department her heart gave a premonitory lurch; she felt in her bag for her pills. They were not there. She could see them quite distinctly on her bedside table, where they were wont to remain. The small bottle in her bag was empty. She had meant to fill it, but now she remembered with alarm that she had put off this task for another day. The sight of so many duvets and pillows, wantonly plump and pale, made her feel faint, as if they had absorbed whatever air was still circulating. The potential urgency of the situation directed her to pick up a cream cotton bedspread and make her way, as if swimming through a heavy current, to the till. ‘Nice, aren’t they?’ said the assistant. ‘Portuguese.’ Haggard now, she paid with her credit card and was handed a large and pneumatic plastic bag, as inimical to her breathing as the pillows had been. There is no need to panic, she told herself. I shall walk out of here, find a taxi, and soon be home. It was foolish not to have eaten; she could not now remember why she had been in such a hurry to get out. It had been something to do with the sun, with the play of light on the windows across the street, with the sudden hatefulness of the untenanted room. With the grateful assumption of a duty, even one as negligible as this.

  Now, the plastic bag sticky against her leg, she was obliged once more to push her way through the implacable crowds, and as she did so she felt the familiar dread that signalled the beginning of an attack. She stood on the edge of the pavement, her head bent, willing a taxi to notice her plight and pull over. By the time that one did so she was already so breathless that she had difficulty in telling the driver her address. Breathing as best she could she extracted a ten pound note from her bag and held it in front of her like a talisman. The cotton bedspread tipped out of the plastic bag as the taxi swung round Hyde Park Corner, and it was only the prospect of familiar surroundings that gave her the strength to retrieve it.

  When the taxi stopped outside her building she climbed out gracelessly, her bag dangling open. She dropped her keys, bent to pick them up, intent only on reaching her pills. As she straightened, with some difficulty, she became aware of a young man coming forward to help her. ‘Hi,’ he said, as she turned her desperate eyes up to his face. ‘I’m Steve.’ No doctor, no attendant, no guardian angel could have been more welcome. Indeed he was rather better than any of these, being utterly unimpressed by her plight, or perhaps simply not aware of it. The gaze with which he favoured her was neutral, yet he helped her indoors, sat her down in her own drawing room, vanished, and came back with a glass of water. ‘My pills,’ she managed to say. ‘Room on the right, bedside table.’ He vanished and reappeared once more, then stood, watching her calmly. Within minutes, it seemed, she was looking at him with amazed gratitude, cautiously restored to something like health. It was only the heat, she told herself, and nerves: Monty was right. There is nothing to be alarmed about. Nevertheless she retained from the experience the sensation of falling that was becoming habitual. If this young man had not been there she might indeed have fallen, might have had to clamber to her feet in full view of any passer-by. ‘Your room is next door,’ she said. ‘I’ll show you.’ She got to her feet and preceded him down the corridor. ‘In a minute,’ she announced, ‘I shall make tea. There is a fruit cake. I’m sure you must be hungry.’

  Why she was sure of this was not explained. He did not look hungry. He looked careful, expressionless. But he had been kind, and there was no-one else, no friend, no neighbour at hand to succour her. He was neatly made, of middle height, with a patient abstracted air, as if he too would rather be elsewhere. ‘No hurry,’ he said. ‘I’ll get my bag.’ It was a pity that the pills had such a sedative effect; she was ready for a nap, in her own room, in silence, the curtains drawn. She knew that she should be asking him questions, making it clear that she expected him to be out all day, showing him the kitchen and the bathroom, feeling a tug of despair at the complications still to come. And the coverlet was not yet in place, was still in the plastic bag, which she was carrying like a visitor, a stranger in her own home. Yet he seemed unoffended, took off his linen jacket and hung it in the wardrobe, as of right. In his position she would have offered thanks and a mild compliment on the aspect of the room, with its view of the silent sunny street, but he continued to say nothing. Fortunately, or unfortunately, she was too becalmed by the pill to care about this. Tea, she thought; I must have tea. ‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ she said to the room generally; his back was towards her, and he was extracting clothes from a large nylon holdall. Turning to face him at the door, she saw his bright incurious eyes on her, his closed lips wearing a half smile.

  ‘The tea,’ she repeated. ‘Do join me when you’re ready.’

  ‘Right you are,’ he said. ‘Take your time.’

  ‘If you want to wash,’ she suggested.

  ‘I bathe in the morning,’ he told her. ‘If that’s okay with you.’

  Mrs May also bathed in the morning. Fortunately there were two bathrooms.

  ‘Or I can get a shower at the swimming pool, if there is one.’

  ‘I’m sure there is,’ she said. ‘But of course you must feel perfectly free.’

  ‘If I could just put a few things in your washing m
achine—you know what it’s like, travelling.’

  ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘But have your tea first.’ She felt extraordinarily tired. As long as she could endure him until she could decently go to bed, she did not much mind what he did.

  Tea restored her somewhat, permitted her to take stock. He seemed civilised, she thought, was quiet and contained, but with a patent lack of interest, of engagement, in his expression. One silent circular glance had apparently told him all he wanted to know about his surroundings.

  ‘I wasn’t expecting you until the weekend,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what you’ll have for supper—an omelette, perhaps. I myself don’t eat in the evenings.’

  ‘We came on an earlier flight,’ he explained. ‘There was no point in hanging about. Ann said her grandmother would put me up. Then when I got to her place I was told to come on here.’ He looked annoyed, as well he might. ‘Anyway, I’m going there for dinner tonight. That way I can bring the rest of my stuff back here.’ Mrs May felt anxiety return, but forced herself to remember his kindness.

  ‘How did you all meet?’ she asked. ‘Of course you must know Ann better than I do. I haven’t seen her since she was a little girl.’

  She remembered a stolid child, encountered one afternoon at Kitty’s when she and Henry had gone there to tea. The child’s thick body had been encased in a smocked Liberty print, a white ribbon in her flat dark hair. She had opposed a considerable will to Kitty’s rage and love, which had not prevented Kitty from endowing her with a wardrobe of unsuitable clothes. At least they would have been suitable for a baby. Mrs May had a vision of Kitty in shops that sold clothes for toddlers, although on that occasion Ann would have been about six. There was dissension in the air even then, an embryo battle of wills. And Kitty had not entirely managed to subdue the little girl; the grown woman would offer even greater resistance.