by P. D. James
Drysdale Laud took over. He said: “First we have to decide who to take on as tenants. We agreed that we could usefully find places for two more. It isn’t an easy choice.”
“Isn’t it? Come off it, Drysdale! Don’t tell me you haven’t reserved a place for Rupert Price-Maskell.”
Langton said: “He’s got an excellent reference from his pupil-master and he’s popular in Chambers. He’s academically outstanding, of course, Scholar of Eton, Scholar of King’s, First-Class Honours.”
Venetia said: “And he’s the nephew of a Law Lord, his great-grandfather was Head of these Chambers and his mother is the daughter of an earl.”
Langton frowned. “You aren’t suggesting that we’re being … we’re being … “ He paused, his face for a moment a mask of embarrassment. Then he said, “That we’re being over-influenced?”
“No. It’s as illogical and indefensible to discriminate against Etonians as it is to discriminate against any other group. It’s convenient that the candidate you want happens to be the one best qualified. You don’t have to persuade me to vote for Price-Maskell; I was going to do so anyway. He’ll be as pompous as his uncle in twenty years’ time, but if we take incipient pomposity into account we’d never appoint a member of your sex. I take it that Jonathan Skollard has the second place? He’s less obviously brilliant, but I’m not sure he won’t prove to have the better mind, more staying power.”
Laud walked over to the window. He said in a voice unemphatic and unworried: “We were thinking of Catherine Beddington.”
“Men in Chambers spend a great deal of time thinking of Catherine Beddington, but this isn’t a beauty contest. Skollard is the better lawyer.”
This, of course, was what it was all about. She had known from her first entry into Hubert’s room.
Langton intervened: “I don’t think Catherine’s pupil-master would necessarily agree. He’s given her a very satisfactory report. She’s got an excellent brain.”
“Of course she has. She wouldn’t have been given pupillage in these Chambers if she were stupid. Catherine Beddington will be a decorative and efficient member of the Bar, but she isn’t as good a lawyer as Jonathan Skollard. I am her sponsor, remember. I’ve taken an interest in her and I’ve seen some of her work. She isn’t as impressive as Simon makes out. For example, when I’m in conference discussing points of law in manslaughter I do rather expect a pupil to see the relevance of Dawson and Andrews. Those are cases she should have learned before she entered Chambers.”
Laud said lightly: “You terrify the child, Venetia. She’s perfectly competent with me.”
“If she’s terrified by me I pity her when she has to stand up before Mr. Justice Carter-Wright on a day his piles are giving him hell.”
How long, she thought, were they going to pussyfoot around the real issue? How they hated any argument in Chambers, any genuine dissent. And how typical that Hubert had needed Drysdale’s support, the two archbishops acting in concert, as always. And wasn’t it a way of letting her know that Drysdale was heir apparent, that she might as well give up hope of succeeding Hubert as Head of Chambers? But at least in this matter they knew that her voice would be influential—more than influential, it would probably carry the day.
She saw their quick glances at each other, then Drysdale said: “Isn’t it a question of balance? I thought we’d agreed—at a Chambers meeting in the spring of ‘94, wasn’t it?—that if we had two candidates for a Chambers vacancy, one male, one female, and they were equally qualified…”
Venetia broke in. “They never are equally qualified. People aren’t clones.”
Laud went on as if she hadn’t interrupted. “If we decided that there was nothing to choose between them, then in the interests of balance we’d take the woman.”
“When people say there’s nothing to choose, they mean that they want to avoid the responsibility of choosing.”
Langton’s voice held a note of obstinacy. “We agreed that we would take the woman.” He paused, then added: “Or the black, if we had a black pupil.”
This was too much. Venetia’s carefully controlled anger spilled out. “Woman? Black? How convenient to bracket us together. Pity we haven’t a black, lesbian, unmarried mother with a disability. That way you could satisfy four politically correct requirements at one go. And it’s bloody condescending to me. Do you think successful women want to be made to feel that we’ve got where we are because men were kind enough to give us an unfair advantage? Jonathan Skollard is the better lawyer, and you know it. So does he. Do you think it will help Catherine Beddington’s career if he’s able to go about saying he was cheated out of a place here because we wanted it for a less able woman? What does that do for the cause of equal opportunity?”
Langton glanced at his colleague, then went on: “I’m not sure that it does the reputation of Chambers any good if we are seen to be a coterie of misogynists out of touch with changes in society and in the profession.”
“Our reputation is founded on professional excellence. These are small Chambers but we haven’t a dud. On the contrary, we’ve got some of the best people in their fields in London. And what are you frightened of? Has someone been getting at you?”
There was a pause. Langton said: “Informal representations have been made.”
“Oh have they! Might I ask from whom? Anyway, it won’t be that female pressure group, Redress. It’s the women they go after, the ones they judge aren’t doing enough to give their sex a chance. Bankers, businesswomen, lawyers, publishers, top consultants. They’re compiling a list of women who don’t do enough to help the sisterhood. Not surprisingly, I’m on it. I suppose someone sent you a copy of their rag, Redress. There’s a mention of me in the latest issue. It could be libellous. I’m taking advice from Henry Makins. If he advises that it’s actionable, I’ll sue.”
Laud said: “Is that wise? You’ll get nothing unless they’re insured. Are they worth the time or the trouble?”
“Probably not, but with the press as mean-minded and vicious as some of it is today it’s unwise to let the idea get around that you can’t be bothered to sue. You know as well as I that the litigious generally get left alone. Look at Robert Maxwell. And I can afford Henry Makins, Redress can’t. If you are worried about the reputation of the law, why don’t you apply your minds to that inequality? What is it that you currently charge for an hour of your time, Drysdale? Four hundred pounds, isn’t it? Five hundred? That effectively puts justice out of the reach of most people. Doing something about that is rather more difficult than pushing a few women into jobs for which they are under-qualified, in the interests of balance. …”
She paused. Neither of the men spoke. Then she said: “So what’s your other problem? You said there were two. It’s Harry Naughton’s retirement, I suppose.”
Langton said: “Harry’s sixty-five at the end of the month. His contract ends then but he’d very much like another three years. His boy, Stephen, has got a place at university—Reading. He’s just started on his first year. It’s a big thing for them. But it means, of course, that the boy won’t be earning and naturally they’re worried. They can manage but it would be easier if Harry could carry on here for a year or two.”
Laud added: “He’s good for another three years at least. Sixty-five is young for a healthy man to be pensioned off if he wants to go on working. We could give him an extension, renewed annually, and see how it goes.”
Venetia said: “He’s a perfectly competent Senior Clerk. He’s conscientious, methodical, accurate and he gets the money in on time. I have no complaint about Harry, but things have changed since he succeeded his father here. He’s made no attempt to come to terms with the new technology. All right, so the junior clerks, Terry and Scott, have. It comes easily to their generation. We haven’t lost out. And I sympathize with Harry. I rather like his wall chart and personal files and his little flags showing where we’re appearing. But he should go when he’s due to go. We all should. You know my views
. What we need is a Chambers manager. If we’re going to expand—and we are expanding—the office and services need modernizing.”
“He’ll take it very hard. He’s given thirty-nine years to these Chambers and his father was Senior Clerk before him.”
Venetia cried: “For God’s sake, Hubert, you’re not sacking the man! He’s had thirty-nine good years and he’s reached retirement age. He’ll get his pension and no doubt a little present to go with it. Of course you want him to stay on. That way you can postpone another difficult decision. You won’t have to decide for another three years what Chambers really needs and set about putting it in place. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got work to do. You’ve had your answers. If I’ve any influence in Chambers then Jonathan Skollard will get the second vacancy and Harry won’t get an extension. And for God’s sake, both of you, show some guts! Why not make a decision on its merits for a change?”
They watched her without speaking as she went to the door. God, she thought, what an awful day. What a horrible day. And now she had to tackle Simon Costello. That, of course, could wait but she was in no mood to let it wait, no mood to show mercy to any man. But there was one thing more to be said to the archbishops. She turned at the door and looked at Laud.
“And if you’re worried that Chambers may be getting a reputation for misogyny, relax. I’m the senior member after Hubert. Having a woman as next Head of Chambers should put that right.”
7
He had said that he would be with her at Pelham Place by six-thirty, and by six Octavia was ready and waiting, moving restlessly from her small galley kitchen to the left of the door into the sitting-room, where she could gaze from the window up through the basement railings. It would be the first meal she had cooked for him, the first time he had entered the flat. Until now he had called for her, but when she had invited him in, he had said mysteriously, “Not yet.” She wondered what he had been waiting for. Some greater certainty, some more positive commitment, the right moment to make a symbolic entrance into her life? But she couldn’t be more committed to him than she was now. She loved him. He was her man, her person, her lover. They had never made love, but that would come. There would be a right time for that too. Now it was sufficient for her that she could rejoice in the assurance that she was loved. She wanted the whole of the world to know. She wanted to take him back with her to the convent, to show him off, to let those despised and arrogant girls know that she, too, could get a man. She wanted the conventional things: a ring on her engagement finger, a wedding to be planned, a home to make for him. He needed looking after, he needed love.
And he had another power over her, and one she only half-acknowledged. He was dangerous. She didn’t know how dangerous or in what way, but he wasn’t of her world. He wasn’t of any world that she had ever known or expected to know. With him there was not only the urge and excitement of growing desire, there was a frisson of danger which satisfied the rebel in her, made her feel for the first time in her life fully alive. This wasn’t just a love affair, it was a comradeship-in-arms, an alliance, offensive and defensive, against the conforming world of home, against her mother and all her mother stood for. The motorcycle was part of that Ashe. Her arms round his waist, she would feel the rush of cold night air, see the road spinning like a grey ribbon under their wheels, want to shout with exhilaration and triumph.
She had never known anyone like him. His behaviour to her was punctilious, almost formal. He would bend and kiss her cheek when they met, or lift her hand to his lips. Otherwise he never touched her, and she was beginning to want him with a need which increasingly she found it hard to hide. She knew that he didn’t like to be touched but she could barely keep her hands from him.
He never told her where he was taking her, and she had been content not to know. Invariably it was to a country pub; he seemed to dislike London pubs and they went to them seldom. But he despised the smart country pubs with rows of Porsches and BMWs carefully parked outside, the hanging baskets, the bar with its open fire and artfully arranged objects to provide a synthetic rusticity, the separate restaurant serving predictable food, the sound of confident, braying upper-class voices. He stopped always at the quieter, less fashionable places where the country people drank, and he would settle her in a corner seat, fetch the medium sherry or half-pint of lager for which she asked, and his own half-pint of beer. They would eat bar food, usually cheese or pâté and French bread, and she would talk while he listened. He told her little about himself. She sensed that he was both willing that she should know how awful those early years had been, and yet unable to tolerate her pity. If she questioned he would reply but briefly, sometimes with a single word. The impression he gave was of someone in control, who had always been in control, staying with each foster parent for as long as he had decided to stay and no longer. She learned to know when she was treading on dangerous ground. After the meal they would walk for half an hour in the country, he striding ahead, she scurrying to keep up with him, before setting back for London.
Sometimes they went on to the coast. He liked Brighton and they would roar out on the Rottingdean road with its wide view of the Channel, find a small café, eat, then drive on over the Downs. Although he disliked fashionable places, he was fussy about his food. A roll which wasn’t fresh, cheese which was dry, rancid-tasting butter would be pushed aside.
He would say: “Don’t eat this muck, Octavia.”
“It’s not too bad, darling.”
“Don’t eat it. We’ll buy some chips on the way home.”
She liked that best of all, sitting on the verge while the traffic swished past, the smell of chips and warm greaseproof paper, the excitement of being free and untrammelled, on the move, and yet of being secure in their private world. The purple Kawasaki was both the means of their freedom and its symbol.
But today she was to cook for him for the first time. She had decided on steak. Surely all men like steak. She had bought filet at the butcher’s suggestion, and now the two thick lumps of red flesh lay on a plate, ready to be put under the grill at the last minute. She had been to Marks and Spencer and bought ready-washed and prepared vegetables—peas, small carrots, new potatoes. They were to have a lemon tart as a pudding. The table was laid. She had bought candles and borrowed two silver candlesticks from the drawing-room. She carried them with her into the ground-floor kitchen, where her mother’s housekeeper, Mrs. Buckley, was scraping potatoes, and said without preamble: “If my mother wants to know where her candlesticks are, I’ve borrowed them.”
Without waiting for a response she went over to the drinks cupboard and took out the first bottle of claret to hand, outstaring Mrs. Buckley’s disapproving gaze. The woman opened her mouth to protest, thought better of it and bent again to her task.
Octavia thought: “Silly old cow, what’s it to do with her? She’ll probably be peering through the curtains to watch who arrives. Then she’ll sneak to Venetia. Well, let her. It can’t matter now.”
Standing at the door with the candlesticks in one hand, the bottle of wine in the other, she said: “Perhaps you’d open the door for me. Can’t you see I’ve got my hands full?”
Without a word Mrs. Buckley came over and held open the door. Octavia swept out and heard the door close behind her.
Downstairs, in her own sitting-room, she surveyed the table with satisfaction. The candles made all the difference. And she had even remembered to buy flowers, a bunch of bronze chrysanthemums.
The sitting-room, which she had never liked, looked festive and welcoming. Maybe this evening they would make love.
But when he arrived, on time, unsmiling as always, and she opened the door, he still didn’t come in.
He said: “Get into your bike things. There’s something I want to show you.”
“But, darling, I said I’d cook supper for you. I’ve got steak.”
“It’ll wait. We’ll have it when we get back. I’ll cook it.”
When she returned a few minutes
later, carrying her helmet and zipping up her leather jacket, she said: “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
“You make it sound important.”
“It is important.”
She asked no more questions. Fifteen minutes later they were at the Holland Park roundabout and turning onto Westway. Another five minutes and he drew up outside of one of the houses and she knew where they were.
It was a scene of utter desolation, made more unreal and bizarre by the glare of the overhead lights. On either side of them the houses stretched, boarded up with what looked like sheets of rust-coloured metal. They were identical, semi-detached with side entrances and recessed porches. There were three-paned bay windows on the ground and upper floors and a triangular gable crossed with dark wooded slats. The windows and doors were barred. The fences of the front gardens had been wrenched away and the small patches of scrub, some with the torn and broken branches of rosebushes and shrubs, were open to the pavement.
He wheeled the bike down the side entrance of Number 397 and she followed. He said, “Wait here,” and, pulling himself up onto the wall with one easy swing, climbed over the gate. A second later she heard the bolt drawn back. She held the gate open while he wheeled the bike into the back garden.
She said: “Who lived next door?”
“A woman called Scully. She’s gone now. This is the last house to be cleared.”
“Does it belong to you?”
“No.”
“But you live here?”
“I do for now. Not much longer.”
“Is there electricity on?”
“There is at present.”
She could see little of the garden. There was the outline of a small shed. Perhaps, she thought, this was where he kept the bike. She thought she could see a round white plastic table, overturned, and the spiky outline of garden chairs broken and on their sides. There had been some kind of tree, but now there was only a splintered black trunk, its jagged spears sharp against the lurid blue and crimson of the evening sky. The air was dusty, clogging her nostrils, and smelt strongly of brick dust, rubble and charred wood.