Falling Slowly

by Anita Brookner

  Even Beatrice’s early beauty was a little dimmed, she saw. Her face had lost some of its attractive pallor; her mouth was a rueful and incongruous indicator of her unreformed childishness. For surely it was childish to believe in heroes? Childish, but inevitable, if one were on uneasy terms with reality. Miriam’s heart contracted when she saw the look of wistful concentration on her sister’s face as she immersed herself in her beguiling reading matter. Each time she made a vow never to look like that. At the piano Beatrice was all smiling indulgence for the performer, her usual partner, a woman singer whom she did not like. There was a certain grimness behind that indulgence. ‘One more Mainacht and I shall brain her,’ she had said. ‘And she had the audacity to ask me not to wear so much scent.’ In that context grimness was appropriate. Whereas left to herself, when not practising, she sought refuge, as if growing up, becoming an adult, was something she had not truly desired.

  Exasperated and alarmed at these partial confessions, Miriam shut a cupboard door more noisily than was necessary.

  ‘Do you want a hot drink?’ she called out. What else could she provide but minor indulgences, which made her uncomfortable, as if her own regard for truth were being forced aside?

  ‘I hate these long spring evenings,’ she said, as she carried a glass of hot lemon and honey into Beatrice’s bedroom, larger and more profusely decorated than her own. ‘I hate it when it gets dark so slowly, and yet stays cold. Light sky and cold wind: an irritating combination. Are you all right? You seemed a bit down earlier. We shouldn’t go on about the past. It’s bound to be upsetting.’

  But Beatrice, lying in bed, seemed to have recovered herself. This was due to her consciousness of looking her best, of appearing to her advantage, her hair released, her nightdress scarcely whiter than the opaque skin of her white throat and shoulders. So would she arrange herself for her ideal lover, even if he never came.

  ‘I do get tired, Miriam, though I try not to show it. My life isn’t altogether straightforward, you know. There are professional worries. I only get second-rate singers these days.’

  ‘They ask for you.’

  ‘I know that, but a really good agent would do something about the situation. I’ve complained enough. Of course, Max is not what he was.’

  ‘Can’t you change?’

  ‘Not really. He’s on the verge of retirement, and then I suppose someone else will pick up the list. Arrangements have probably been made that I don’t know about. That’s one more uncertainty to add to all the others. And the truth is my fingers aren’t as supple as they once were. And my arms ache. I’m bored, Miriam.’

  ‘You’re downhearted. It will pass.’

  ‘We don’t know enough people,’ said Beatrice fretfully. ‘Why is that?’

  ‘Oh, people. I lost all hope of people when friends married and didn’t bother to keep in touch.’

  ‘Disappointing that, yes. But you should make more of an effort, get out more.’

  ‘I go to the London Library.’

  ‘That doesn’t count.’

  And yet it was reassuring to work in the Reading Room, and to see all those heads bent over their books. Virtue, it seemed, resided in the text; application was the key to a higher form of life.

  ‘We could invite a few people, I suppose. We know enough for that kind of function.’

  Beatrice sighed. ‘Don’t you get tired of making an effort? I know I do. I don’t want to rely on myself all the time.’

  ‘You want the fatal encounter, eyes meeting by chance …’

  ‘It would be preferable.’

  They sat in silence, listening to the sad sound of birds in the fading light. Buses, at the end of the street, were now infrequent; few footsteps could be heard. Yet somewhere people were drinking, dining, entertaining each other, on an ordinary weekday evening, released from work, eager for pleasure. Only in the flat was life becalmed, and somehow it was right, on this particular evening, after this particular exchange, that it should be so.

  ‘Goodnight, then.’

  ‘Goodnight. Will you sleep?’

  ‘I doubt it. Will you?’

  ‘Oh, I’ll read for a bit,’ said Beatrice, stretching out a hand for her book, her features softer now that no blame was forthcoming. Frequently her sister urged stronger reading matter on her, with varying degrees of success. Something in her rejected the promise of those attractive covers. Yet Beatrice, who was, as she thought, so beautifully attuned to men, in a way denied to Miriam, read only books about women, written by women. It hardly mattered if the subject were well-bred adultery in a rural setting, or a feisty investigation by a female detective living with her cats in San Francisco. Nodding slightly she sympathized with these women, always presented as heroines, savoured their satisfactions, their triumphs. She acquiesced in their relationships, knowing that she would do the same, would always succumb, seeing little harm in doing so. There was no calculation in this. Disarmed by fantasy, she became disarming. It was not conviction, thought Miriam; it was not even confidence. It was faith, Beatrice’s substitute for invocation, less a diversion than a plea to a problematic fate, as others might make a solemn wish.

  The one exception to this light, even invalid diet was Jane Eyre, which Beatrice read frequently, thrilling to Mr Rochester as most women did, disdaining St John Rivers, as no woman should.

  ‘Of course it’s a romantic novel,’ said Miriam. ‘That’s you like it.’

  ‘That’s why I’m meant to,’ Beatrice would reply. And Miriam, who secretly felt the same, allowed for once that Beatrice had got it right, was in fact Charlotte Brontë’s ideal reader, even wished that she too could still feel the rightness of the conclusion. But then she was not a romantic, and never failed to point this out.

  ‘What you miss!’ Beatrice would remark. ‘My poor girl, what you miss!’

  3

  Strange how those conversations stayed with her, while those she had initially enjoyed with her husband had entirely vanished, as he had. Beatrice, dead, had more of a life even now than her insouciant husband, who had removed himself to Canada as lightheartedly as though this could not possibly affect her. Deeply offended – but in fact more annoyed than offended – she had suggested a divorce, to which he had readily acquiesced, with a deprecating charm which no longer pleased her. He was a biochemist; his work meant much to him. They had known each other since childhood, maybe too long; each had registered the other’s eccentricities, in the days before these had become weighty, too weighty to bear. She had loved him as a brother, or as an old friend, and had therefore been unprepared for his continuing childishness, his eternal restless depthless curiosity.

  His conversation had been wearisome, full of unanswerable questions. What do you think of Freud? he would ask her, or indeed any of their friends. What do you think of Picasso? Of Napoleon? Like anyone barely educated beyond his specialization he was always slightly behind the times, a writer of letters to newspapers on subjects no longer being discussed, not much put out by a look of boredom, hastily masked, on a hitherto friendly face, because in the split second in which he was aware of a lack of interest, he would become conscious of more questions to which he was sure that someone had the answer. Hence the elusive yet insistent nature of his presence which had made her marriage tedious. His appointment in Canada had seemed a sign that they should part; she had no intention of joining him, knowing him to be too volatile to be faithful. He was no longer attractive to her, although as a boy with undisciplined hair he had awoken proprietory feelings. The trouble was that although by all accounts brilliant she could never see him as grown-up. Even after what had after all been a fairly momentous discussion of their future, or rather lack of it, even when both had discovered unacknowledged reserves of hostility, even then, after turning on his heel and leaving her, shocked, in the kitchen, he had returned after five minutes, no longer put out, sunny-tempered even, and as loquacious as ever. What did she think of Stephen Hawking? Of Jesus?

  Battered by hi
s questions, by his strange insubstantiality she had been quite relieved to see him go. Besides, there was Beatrice, in Wilbraham Place, who needed her attention. Beatrice had never liked him. Jonathan, she called him, though he was Jon to everyone else. Miriam had sold the flat in Bramham Gardens and moved back to Wilbraham Place. Just as she had been pleased to get out of it once, she was almost pleased to get back. No, Beatrice had never liked him, although she had resented the engagement, had looked round sharply for signs of intimacy when she came home in the evenings, precipitating the alternative partnership which she had never been able to claim for herself. She had despised Jon, his elfin swagger, his apparent lack of experience, not perceiving a solipsism which could make him quite ruthless. She had rarely visited them as a married couple, so that it was up to Miriam to call in to Wilbraham Place, increasingly so, as Beatrice had become so inexplicably tired. Jonathan Eldon, who had now vanished from her life, as if his residence had only been temporary after all, as if she should have known that. Her marriage had lasted a mere five years, and now she thought of it with shame, with irritation. Back in Wilbraham Place nothing had changed, although the flat was now untidy, and her old room no longer seemed her own. A Mrs Kinsella came in to clean: she cleaned round Miriam, as if in contempt for her loss of status. Nor did Beatrice seem all that gracious, airily assigning Miriam tasks, punishing her for that initial departure. This now looked almost permanent an awkward cohabitation, which might become a very real necessity, borne awkwardly by them both, in the absence of any cogent reason to separate.

  In time Miriam had come to see her husband as insane, or at the very least emotionally illiterate. His great advantage was that he had known her parents, had not, if he gave the matter any thought, considered them crazier than his own mother, a widow, who was in love with him. It was vaguely thought a good thing that they should marry, since neither of them objected to the other, a basis for lifelong harmony, or at least adjudged so by their disaffected families. It was Beatrice who had viewed him with disfavour. On the one hand he was harmless, would not use her sister, to whom she was still close, badly; on the other hand he was inferior to her own cherished ideas of what a man should be and could therefore be relinquished without a murmur. What residual jealousy there had been had subsided. It was the state of marriage that Beatrice coveted; hence her few visits to the flat in Bramham Gardens, where the sight of a set of new saucepans, a suit laid aside ready to go to the dry-cleaners, hinted at an intimacy from which she was debarred. After their mother’s death she had come more to rely on Miriam. Besides, that death had brought them closer, as if they were now free to commune with each other over their memories. In time those memories became as tenuous as Miriam’s marriage was seen to be. In time Beatrice came to see herself as having the better part of the bargain: freedom, the flat in Wilbraham Place, the attention of her faithful acolytes, the not very fervent applause of the recital platform. She thought of herself as delicate, sensitive, vulnerable, identified her fatigue as evidence of her temperament, and rested in the knowledge that in one way or another Miriam would always be there – somewhere – to see to her needs.

  Such symbiosis as existed was not between Miriam and her husband, of whom she was only wryly aware, as between the two sisters, who understood each other without the need to ask questions. It was the lack of questions, of everything conceived in an interrogative mode, that Miriam still found acceptable in Wilbraham Place, preferable, in fact, to all those enquiries, which were in truth entirely one-sided. Her husband always seemed genuinely disappointed when she failed to respond to his eager and somehow ill-judged curiosity. It was not that she was indifferent to the substance of his conversation; it was more serious than that. She wanted to be in receipt of information, rather than in the harassed position of giving tired résumés about the world historical figures in whom he was so interested. She did not know enough, she felt, to be educating somebody else. Unworldly, she had thought that knowledge would be revealed to her; instead she was driven back to her books, to her work, which she could do without assistance. With Beatrice she could let herself appear sombre, as if marriage were tricky, adult, not to be compared with the airy compliments that bolstered Beatrice’s emotional life. She did not allude to their intimate exchanges, which were surprisingly satisfactory; a sense of decency bound her to silence. If Beatrice thought that she detected disappointment Miriam was generous enough to allow her that, for she considered herself older and wiser than her sister, matured by the sort of marriage judged adequate by those who had never known the fatal passion, and who assumed that others need not know it, since they had, apparently, no views on the matter. Beatrice considered her sister dull, conventional, but also secretive, and occasionally disliked her for just those qualities, particularly the latter, whereas Miriam, who had adopted a responsibility in addition to those which had been laid down for her, for her husband seemed no more and no less than that, merely murmured, ‘I can’t explain.’ Unmarried, Beatrice was an expert on marriage. Miriam’s ‘I can’t explain’ spoke volumes to her, although in fact Miriam was simply tired of answering questions.

  They were proud of Jon’s reputed brilliance, although privately they saw no evidence of it, and in any event it was not of a nature to benefit either of them. What he did in a white coat in a laboratory remained a mystery; he himself regarded it as a mystery, shared only with those possessed of the same arcane knowledge. Beatrice even went so far as to deplore his ignorance of the arts, but this proved unpopular: it was reluctantly allowed that he was too brilliant for either of them, for if he were not too brilliant then they must be too stupid to understand. ‘My brother-in-law the mad scientist,’ Beatrice might laugh, but in one sense they were in agreement: he was theirs. He was the man of the family, even if he did not know it, even if he was useless at tax forms and contracts and bills, which they were used to taking care of for themselves. They regarded him as a child of nature, even a luxury, to be indulged as he had been indulged by his mother. He was the male made harmless. Until his surprise announcement that he had accepted a post in Canada they had seen no premonitory signs of initiative on his part. The marriage ended in a fit of temper uncharacteristic of either of them. Yet Miriam had to admit, but only to herself, that anger, or as near as he could get to showing it, became him. It was only his sunny relapse into normality a moment afterwards that made her grit her teeth. ‘Go, then, if that’s what you want,’ she had said. ‘I’m staying here. We might as well divorce. That way we could meet someone else, someone more suitable.’ That was when he had surprised her. ‘I already have,’ he said. ‘She’s coming with me. My lab assistant.’ ‘Congratulations,’ she had said, still through gritted teeth.

  I’m still fond of you, but I don’t think you’re fond of me, are you?’

  This was more character than she had bargained for. At once she felt ashamed. She had turned away, too confused to reply. There had been a moment’s silence before he left the room. She went on slowly drying the breakfast dishes. But he was soon back, and eager to solicit her views on Christianity. As ever, she had no response ready, even though for once she would have given the matter some consideration, if only as a parting gift.

  Those afternoons spent with Beatrice in Wilbraham Place, before Jon left for Canada, had been curative. Conversation was peaceful, inconsequential. ‘Have you still got that cream jacket?’ she might say, feeling only a mild interest. ‘You used to wear it with that daisy print skirt. I always liked you in that.’

  ‘I’ve still got it somewhere. I must go through my things soon. Mrs Kinsella might like it for Anne Marie.’

  ‘Oh, don’t get rid of it.’

  For, on the edge of an upheaval in her own life, she wanted everything to stay the same, the way it had always been. Yet there were changes, which she pretended not to see. The flat was untidy; in the bedroom clothes were laid out on the bed, as if in preparation for a holiday, an excursion.

  ‘Are you going away?’ she had enquired, alar
med, after her first sighting of these arrangements.

  ‘Me? I never go away.’

  It was true; Beatrice rarely left London unless she had to, claiming that she would not know what she would do with herself, alone, in a foreign resort. There was something immovable about Beatrice, which was why she was so reassuring to return to. But now she was forced to concede that there was an intimation of change. Beatrice was slightly altered. The feet in the high-heeled shoes looked swollen, as did the ankles; her colour was somehow no longer transparent. They were getting older, must make provision for themselves while there was still time. She did not see that there was any urgency in this, but after Jon’s departure, and before she had sold the flat in Bramham Gardens, she felt it. On the one hand it was comforting to sink into that companionable female sub-world, to watch Beatrice filing her nails, to drink tea and ruminatively smoke a cigarette, trying not to notice that the ashtray had not been emptied, for all the world as if they were two actresses on tour, marooned in some out-of-season provincial hotel, whiling away the afternoon before the evening performance, no one knowing they were there. After she had moved back (for there was no reason not to, and Beatrice’s now suffused complexion, an unattractive pink under the refurbished golden hair, must have delivered a subliminal warning) she found it disconcerting to be living with a woman again, to hear her in the bathroom, to witness her briefly alarming appearance before the face she normally presented to the day was in place. With a man there was no transition: the naked face and body were quickly transformed into the clothed adult human being, with nothing to hint at frailty, at disguise, at vigilance. Men were more viable; that was why it was advisable to live with one. In the early mornings, bathed, shaved, dressed, Jon seemed normal, like any routine husband; in any event he was usually quiet until he had eaten his breakfast and scanned The Times. It was only afterwards that his curiosity came to life and his quite unremarkable features took on a look of boyish eagerness as he prepared to launch himself into another day of fact-seeking and opinion-sounding. His questions never concerned his wife; he never, for example, asked her what she was going to do with her day. He thought he knew the answer to that; besides, what she did was her business. She had found this very disappointing, longing to have her life taken into account.