The Bay of Angels

by Anita Brookner

  In the salon I found a man and a woman sitting in chairs whose positions they had altered and nursing large tumblers of whisky filled with clinking ice cubes. The man sprang to his feet as I came in and held out a large damp hand.

  ‘Hi,’ he said. ‘Tony Spedding. This is my wife, Tina.’

  Tony and Tina. Names from a television game show. Like most contestants for large prizes they had the insistent smiles that would assure them victory, and behind the smiles the naked gaze of acquisitiveness.

  ‘You must be . . . ?’

  ‘Cunningham. Zoë Cunningham. You’ve taken possession, then?’

  ‘Well, you can’t leave a house like this empty, can you?’ said Tina. ‘Anyone could get in.’

  Tina was already dressed for the Riviera, in white trousers, a white shirt, gold necklaces, two gold bracelets, and a great deal of asphyxiating scent. She also wore full make-up, such as is usually seen on television presenters, blue eye-shadow, and exceptionally long nails. ‘Is there a decent hairdresser around here?’ she asked. I was vaguely frightened of her.

  Tony too had dressed the part: officious navy blazer, and tan-coloured trousers. They seemed to be entirely at their ease. Tina had not stood up when I appeared.

  ‘I shall have to stay here for the time being,’ I said. ‘My mother is ill in hospital . . . ’

  ‘Not our affair, is it? The house is mine, always has been mine.’

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t understand how you come to be here.’

  ‘She doesn’t understand,’ said Tina, rolling her eyes.

  ‘If the house was always yours, which I doubt . . . ’

  ‘Oh, there’s no doubt about it. I’ve tried to take possession in the nicest possible way. I felt sorry for the old man, though I never much liked him. So I wrote, suggesting that he leave the premises.’

  ‘Where did you write to?’

  ‘Here, of course. He never answered my letters. I had to break into his desk to see if he’d kept them. No dice. And I wrote to his place in Onslow Square. No answer from there, either. I was about to put my people on to it, which could have been nasty, I can tell you, when I saw the notice of his death in The Times. Pure chance, I might say. I usually read The Telegraph. If I hadn’t had a lot on my plate all this would have been taken care of a long time ago.’

  ‘We found the place in a terrible state,’ said Tina. ‘Conchita had to clean it from top to bottom.’

  They both frowned, their faces darkening. I was filled with shame, not for myself, but for my mother, and above all for Simon.

  ‘Simon had a fall that killed him,’ I said. ‘You must understand that I have been too anxious about my mother, who is quite ill . . . ’

  ‘Nothing to do with me,’ said Tony, whose smile was no longer in evidence. ‘Don’t drink any more,’ he told his wife sharply. ‘I want this settled now.’

  He was a slightly menacing figure, despite his short stature. Round his expanding waist he wore a lizard-skin belt. The smile, I felt, would not be resumed until he judged it necessary. He had nothing in the way of ordinary politeness, which he probably thought redundant. He was clearly angry, as was Tina, who, despite her husband’s warning, had poured herself another drink. Simon’s bottle of Glenlivet, half empty, was smeared with their fingerprints. They seemed an uneasy couple, who left traces everywhere. The scent that rose from Tina was mingled with a faint smell of sweat. Tony too was slightly damp about the forehead; a large silk handkerchief was applied from time to time throughout this interview. Tina flicked back her hair, peered down into the depths of her shirt. Their anger was habitual. Mine was of the once in a lifetime variety, building up to an explosion which would destroy us all.

  ‘So, if you’d like to collect your things,’ said Tony.

  ‘That will not be necessary. I shall have to stay here until I can make other arrangements.’

  He took a couple of steps towards me, and smiled pleasantly. ‘You’ve got fifteen minutes,’ he said.

  I was tempted to strike him, to kill them both. Instead I turned on my heel and went up to my mother’s bedroom, which they had now made their own. Her clothes had been removed from the wardrobes and dumped in the corridor, together with two large suitcases. In the offending bathroom, in which the aroma of Tina’s scent was strong, there was an array of pungent and expensive cosmetics. My mother’s modest effects had been either hidden or thrown away, probably the latter. Of Simon there was no trace.

  I filled the two suitcases as best I could, though I knew I should have to leave behind most of our clothes. I remembered, even in my anger, to pack a couple of nightdresses, a thin silk dressing-gown, two trouser suits, and the dresses we usually wore when dining with the Thibaudets. Two pairs of shoes, which should have gone in the bottom, went on the top. I could not find my mother’s hairbrushes, her nail scissors, or her slippers. These I should have to buy in town. In the bureau which had been hers and was now Tina’s, to judge by the smell, I found tights and some underwear. One suitcase was now full. Into the other I crammed a light coat, a jacket, three sweaters, a tweed skirt, and two silk shirts.

  Tina appeared in the doorway. ‘Taking all that, are you?’

  I ignored her. ‘You can send on the rest,’ I said. ‘I’ll give you my address in London.’ This I took time to do, sitting at my mother’s desk. ‘And if you’d be good enough to telephone for a taxi . . . ’

  ‘I dare say Miguel could take you in the car, if you’d like to hang on until he’s off duty.’

  ‘I would not like to hang on, and I have no intention of doing so. I have to find somewhere to stay.’

  ‘Yes, well . . . ’

  ‘So, if you would be kind enough to make sure that your man is available . . . ’

  ‘No need to take that tone.’

  ‘I’m afraid there’s every need. I perhaps expected more in the way of tact . . . ’

  She laughed harshly. ‘We’re practical people. Tony hasn’t got where he is today by being tactful.’

  ‘And I dare say you won’t even live here.’

  ‘We’ll use the house. Don’t think you can come back. Conchita and Miguel will be here all the time.’

  ‘Have no fear,’ I said. ‘And now if you’ll excuse me? Perhaps you could help me with that other suitcase.’

  I knew that if she had been alone she would have opened it to see what I was taking. As it was she clattered down the stairs in front of me, empty-handed.

  Tony was standing guard by the front entrance, which we rarely used. In the wide semi-circle of gravel that served as a drive stood a man lazily polishing an unfamiliar car. ‘Miguel,’ said Tony. ‘Take the lady to the railway station. You can find a cheap hotel there,’ he told me. He held out his hand. ‘All the best,’ he said cheerily. ‘No hard feelings, I hope. After all, what’s mine is mine, no doubt about that.’

  ‘You’ll be hearing from my solicitor,’ I said. ‘You have taken many of our possessions.’

  He laughed coarsely. ‘That fool, Redman? I can deal with him, no bother. I think you’ll find, Miss Cunningham, that I know what I’m doing.’ He shot his cuff and consulted a large and expensive watch. ‘I think we’ve spent enough time on this, don’t you? I’ll leave you with Miguel. He’ll know where to take you. You needn’t tip him,’ he added gallantly. ‘This is on the house.’ He waved, as if to go back inside, then thought better of it. He was still there when the car moved off, taking me safely away from his domain.

  My simmering rage came to some sort of climax on the journey back into Nice. It was the sort of anger that inspires the rare creative act. Therefore when I saw a sign above a souvenir shop selling postcards and sunglasses in the rue de France stating, ‘Chambre à louer’, I unhesitatingly dragged my bags from the car and without a backward glance at Miguel, who had done me no harm, entered the shop with as much force as I could command. Behind the counter stood an elderly man wearing a short-sleeved shirt and a beret. I told him I should like to see the room. He took a key from a
drawer, and led me up a flight of stairs somewhere at the back of the shop. Opening off a dusky landing was a room containing a bed, a table, and a chair. ‘Cottin,’ said the man. ‘Aristide.’ ‘Cunningham,’ I said. ‘Zoë.’ ‘Ah, Zoé.’ He pulled aside a curtain and revealed a wash-basin and a gas-ring, with Gaz de France emblazoned on its side. The room was bathed in darkness, a darkness which seemed symbolic. M. Cottin opened the shutters. This made the room seem darker rather than lighter. Fine, I said. Perfect. My one desire was to put down the suitcases. My hands were so sore that I could hardly get the money out of my bag to pay a month’s rent in advance. You are a student? I was asked. Yes, I was a student. When I felt the tears rising I urged him out of the room. No one, not even M. Cottin, a complete stranger, should witness my collapse.

  The rue de France is a commercial artery of no scenic significance. The end occupied by M. Cottin abounds in shops exactly like his own, catering for the kind of tourists who do not frequent the major hotels. From my window I could see crowds of them ambling by, on their way to cafés or restaurants. I rather enjoyed this spectacle, or would have done had I not needed to buy the sort of commodities crowded out of my mother’s bathroom by Tina, for whom I reserved my entire hatred. This hatred was useful; it gave me the impetus to go out and find a chemist. I bought soap, toothpaste, washcloths, talcum powder. I added a bottle of cologne, regretting that I had not thought to do so earlier. It was too late to go to the clinic, but I went anyway, in order to give them my new address. I had not noticed a telephone but reckoned there must be one in the shop. This could be sorted out on the following day, when I should ask to see Dr Balbi. I was now very tired, and not a little confused, in no condition to see my mother, who might be awake. I stole past her room on tiptoe, then, ashamed of my hesitation, knocked and entered. A different nurse, Marie-Ange presumably, sprang to her feet, prepared to usher me out again: this was a day when I was not wanted anywhere. On the bed my mother seemed to have changed her position, or had it changed for her. I explained in a whisper that I would not stop, would return in the morning. Marie-Ange, who was older than Marie-Caroline and had a gold incisor on the right side of her mouth, made hushing noises and gestures. I left my bag of toiletries, went downstairs to the desk, told the receptionist of my new address, and managed to get away before bursting into tears.

  I was still in tears in the rue de France, although my room seemed almost acceptable, or would have done had it not been encumbered by two large suitcases which took up most of the floor space. Outside the window I could hear the footsteps of a strolling populace. Night time here would be noisy, and I might be glad of it: I lacked company as never before. But tonight I must sleep, for on the following day I must telephone Mr Redman, and consult Dr Balbi, and assume a confident air with which to console my mother. My tears started again. There was a knock on the door. I wondered whether I had been sobbing out loud, whether my sobs had disturbed anyone. On the landing stood M. Cottin, still in his short-sleeved shirt and beret. He was holding a cup of coffee which he presented to me.

  ‘Je me suis dit, cette petite dame va tomber dans les pommes.’

  I thanked him, no longer conscious of the tears running down my face. It was the first kindness I had received since leaving London. I drank the coffee gratefully. It was bitter and only lukewarm, but it was the best I had ever tasted. Then I removed the harsh brown coverlet from the bed, took off my clothes, and fell into the deepest sleep I thought I had ever known. Like the coffee the night lacked certain refinements, but when I awoke it was with a sense of renewed purpose which I hoped would see me through the day, and through the days after that.

  I took the cup and saucer down to M. Cottin and offered him my truly grateful thanks. He nodded briefly and went back to trundling his stands of postcards onto the pavement. The air was fresh, clear; it would be a fine day. I found a café where, presumably, I should eat all my meals, and had breakfast. As soon as the post office opened I should telephone Mr Redman. Dr Blackburn I dismissed as a lost cause; my work would speak for me, if anything could, but was not to be contemplated at the moment. When this appalling adventure was concluded I would make a reasoned attempt to minimize it, for his benefit, and indeed for my own, and persuade him that I was employable once again. As always, when I was in Nice, London seemed remote, a place of dull skies and inferior weather. I lingered as long as I could, then, with a sigh, set off on my errands. I noticed that the sun was already hot, and once again realized that I was not entitled to enjoy it. This was the mood that had greeted me at Nice airport. It was infinitely seductive, an invitation to forget my obligations, or rather to lay them aside onto somebody else, somebody older, wiser, stronger, richer. Above all, richer. The money in my bag had been sufficient for my rent and would probably take care of my mother’s costs for the time being. The telephone call to Mr Redman was therefore my first priority.

  At some point I should have to open another bank account to receive the shower of gold from Switzerland. The same dilemma presented itself: Nice or London? Nice, if I had to pay my mother’s charges, and also my own. At some further point I would have to go back to London to collect some more clothes, and also minimal household effects. It seemed as if I were destined to stay in the rue de France for at least a month, probably longer. Now that I had found somewhere to eat I did not dislike my room. The bed was narrow and hard, but the table and chair were of fairly good quality, and there was a shelf on which I could stack books, if I had any. It seemed to me a decent enough place in which to work, until I remembered that I had no work. The ‘student’ who had had the room before me had stuck a few pictures on the walls, stills from Hollywood films cut out from magazines, all of women, sultry temptresses with enigmatic expressions and copious hair. This unknown person, a man, surely, with a young man’s tastes, had been formed by the cinema, but evidently preferred the sexual promise of earlier icons to anything he might have seen in the rue de France. I was comforted by this unknown presence, with its reassuring idealism. I had slept well; I was in some way reconciled to spending time here. I decided to telephone Mr Redman every day, to give him up-to-date news of my affairs, and to learn from him if there were any new developments in the way of Simon’s legacy. At some point money would be produced; at some point I should have to find somewhere for us to live. And, sooner rather than later, I should have to deal with my mother’s state of mind, which would be one of dispossession, of shipwreck, perhaps worse.

  The weather was so beguiling that I was tempted to sit down and drink more coffee, but I felt that I had no right to do so. After the brilliant sunshine the clinic seemed relatively dim, for blinds were kept lowered at all times. I found my mother propped up with pillows, sipping orange juice through a glass straw. I hardly recognized this emaciated woman, with huge eyes, and the air of questing for approbation. She smiled cautiously when I approached the bed, intent on holding her glass of orange juice, a little of which had spilled on to the sheet.

  ‘I knew you’d come,’ she said. Her voice was low, hoarse, unused. ‘Have I been ill?’

  ‘A little, yes.’

  ‘Is that why I’m in hospital?’

  ‘Dr Thibaudet thought it best.’

  ‘Dear Maurice. Did they get off all right?’

  I assured her that they had. I was immensely relieved that she had remembered the name.

  ‘Is someone looking after Simon?’

  ‘Mama, Simon is . . . ’

  But at that point she closed her eyes and sank back on to the pillows. Marie-Caroline rescued the glass before it fell. Once again my mother’s face was drained, blanched, the face of one who had come back too fast, from too far, from a place where I could not join her.

  Marie-Caroline told me that she might be confused for a day or two, but that I could of course visit at any time. It might help if I were to prompt her memory very gently, but not to deluge her with information which would merely bewilder her. Marie-Caroline herself seemed less cheerful than usual, and it w
as clear that she wanted me out of the way. I asked her if my mother had been seen by Dr Balbi, and was told that he would be in on the following day, when I could talk to him myself.

  ‘If there is any change we will of course get in touch with you.’

  I gave her my new address, and asked her if she expected any change.

  ‘No, no,’ she said, with something of her old briskness. This all looked more serious than it was. But then she asked if I had a telephone number at which she could call me, and I knew that recovery would be by no means straightforward, might contain unknown risks, might not be assured. She sensed my alarm and smiled a tired smile. She had been on duty every day without a break; the work was tedious, and she was young enough to find the enforced vigilance oppressive. And she had been excellent from all points of view. It was just that now that the prolonged sleep was drawing to a close she was permitted to weigh up the risks of the rest of the procedure, the encouragement to eat, to walk, to wash, to make the sort of recovery set out in all the textbooks. Once again I thought that it would have been better for my mother to have suffered the shock of bereavement straight away rather than be unconscious of it altogether, leaving it to others to instruct her. Those others, and their judgement, or misjudgement, would determine the future of her mental health. It now seemed that this would be precarious. And how could I, so firmly entrenched in this world, make proper contact with one whose senses had been put to sleep, and who might prefer to stay in limbo rather than rejoin me, with my easy unthinking movements, my physicality, and my eagerness, in calculations for a future in which she could not believe, and would not understand?

  I stole another look at the figure on the bed, then leaned towards it, as if determined to unlock its secrets. For more than a few moments, maybe for longer, I wondered whether it might be preferable for her to die now, like this, in the care of kindly supervisors who would know how to dispose of her, whether that return to life were not too much to expect of her, indeed of anyone. For to resurrect a fallen life, one which had been all but destroyed, is an almost impossible task, or so it seemed to me, bending over my mother’s sleeping figure, hearing her laggard breath. I even wondered whether there were any way of making my fears—or were they wishes?—known to those in charge, and whether they would regard me as an unnatural daughter, or simply as one who recognized the necessity of solutions. For my mother’s death would be a solution of sorts. It seemed to me so near that I lost all fear of it. This did not in any way diminish my love for her, which had never wavered. But her life now seemed mired in a pathos which I found unacceptable. She had sunk so gratefully back to sleep. Was it the mention of Simon’s name, the beginning of my warning sentence—‘Simon is . . . ’—that had closed down her faculties once again? For somehow she must know what had happened, and for a little while was allowed not to know, preferring this half-life in a hospital bed to a full life in the world.