He nodded but said nothing and for a moment we were silent. I was surprised by how comforting the silence was. It was as if my mind was being stroked—but that reminded me of all the times I had stroked Orlando’s golden fur and I had no desire to start crying again. Chucking the sodden tissue in the wastepaper basket I rammed my glasses back on my nose. “I must go now,” I said, “but it was very nice of you to see me. Thanks.”
“Would you consider visiting St. Benet’s regularly for a while? It might be useful to have a weekly slot when you could update me on your new journey as it unfolds.”
“That’s very kind of you,” I said, “but no.”
“I hope you’re not refusing because you feel you’d be a nuisance, taking up my time.”
“It’s more complicated than that.” I hesitated, aware that I was now skating on thin ice. Finally I said: “I don’t want to get involved with the people here. I don’t want to get involved with anyone anywhere while I’m so fat because being fat means one’s always in an unequal position and no real relationship’s possible. Take Francie, for instance. She’s been wonderfully kind to me, but despite the fact that she’s always behaved exactly as a Christian should I know that deep down she thinks I’m just a sad case, someone to be pitied rather than liked. When I’m thin, of course, everything will be quite different and I’ll be able to meet Francie on equal terms, but right now … well, never mind, forget all that, it doesn’t matter.”
“I think it matters very much,” he said. “I think you matter, Alice. I’d be undervaluing you as a person if I tried to override a decision you’re fully entitled to take, but remember—the door’s always open if you want to return.”
That was the moment when I nearly lost control altogether and told him that if I returned I’d never rest until I could see him every day from Monday to Friday (although I did realise I’d have to cede him to Rosalind at weekends). A horrific monologue zipped through my mind. “Of course I know you’ll never love me, but that’s all right because I don’t expect love, I’m not worthy of such a thing, the people I hope will love me always go away—which means it’s less painful not to get involved—but even so I would like to keep seeing you, I would, because you’re the first man who’s ever treated me as a real person and I’m just so grateful—and yes, okay, I’ll admit it, I do love you, but it’s not a pathetic infatuation, I love you because I sense that at some deep level we connect, it’s as if the bedrock of our personalities is made of the same stuff, it’s as if—” I broke off this unspoken torrent of romantic nonsense when I suddenly realised Nicholas was speaking again.
“Let me just add,” he said, not looking at me as he rose to his feet, “that I do understand what you’re implying. You feel, don’t you, in some way difficult to put into words, that the kind of relationship I’m now offering wouldn’t make you feel at ease, and that therefore, if you came here as a client, the relationship would always contain an element that didn’t ring true. If you do feel that, then you’re right to refuse to see me in future. It’s all to do with honesty, isn’t it?”
We stood facing each other. His grey eyes were almost blue, reflecting the colour of his shirt. I looked away.
“There’d be no equal ground,” I heard my voice say. “Here I’m so vulnerable and you’re so powerful. There’d be illusions … difficulties … I couldn’t cope.”
“Fair enough. I accept that. But I’m sorry.”
I was too emotionally pulverised to reply. Escaping from his office at top speed I left the Healing Centre and fled back to my collection of ice-cream tubs in Belgravia.
VII
Ten lunch-parties, three cocktail-parties and five dinner-parties later in the height of summer, when the English strawberries were glowing in the Food Hall at Harrods, the flowers were blooming in the lush gardens of Eaton Square and the Wimbledon tennis was fizzing (at intervals—the weather was dreadful) on television, Lady Cynthia summoned me to the private den she called her boudoir to discuss her future plans for hospitality.
By this time I was familiar with the pattern of Lady Cynthia’s life. She certainly kept herself busy; no one could have accused her of being one of the idle rich. She took an active part in the affairs of her local church. She was involved with more than one charity concerned with mental health. She sat on committees, organised fund-raising events and cultivated a network of people who were in a position to help her with her good causes. This meant her entertaining was primarily inspired not by a self-centred need to stave off boredom but by a desire to be of use to others less fortunate than herself. I admired this very much, especially as I now felt sure she must often be lonely. She spoke little of her relations except for her younger son, hundreds of miles away in Scotland, and although she had many friends there was no person who visited the house more frequently than anyone else; my assumption that a rich, still beautiful woman would have at least one doting admirer had proved to be quite mistaken.
“Distrusts men, she does,” said Mrs. Simcock darkly. “And after having an alcoholic for a husband, who can blame her?”
However during that summer, shortly before the Wimbledon tennis began to dominate the television, Lady Cynthia had attracted the attention of a VIP while attending a reception at the American Embassy, and when I arrived in her boudoir that morning with my notebook I found her in unusually buoyant spirits.
“I want to invite some people to a Sunday lunch,” she announced as I sat down. “A traditional Sunday lunch, the kind of lunch which will make an American go home to Boston and swear that English food, properly cooked, is divine.”
“Roast beef,” I said automatically. “Yorkshire pudding. Roast potatoes—” My mouth was already watering. I decided I had cooked too many French dishes lately and was keen for a respite. “Horseradish sauce, gravy, three kinds of mustard—”
“Exactly!”
“Peas, creamed carrots, greens—and new potatoes to contrast with the roast potatoes—”
“Perfect!”
I sighed at the thought of what fun I was going to have. “Anything to start, Lady Cynthia, or do you want to plunge straight into the roast?”
“Let me see. No soup, certainly. Perhaps something cool and light—”
“Asparagus with hollandaise sauce? Dressed Cornish crab? Smoked eel terrine?”
Lady Cynthia dithered. “Asparagus would be heavenly, but since we’re having so many vegetables with the main course … Dressed crab would be heavenly too, but everyone serves dressed crab nowadays so perhaps we should try to be more original … Did you say smoked eel?”
“British eel! It’s delicious. You serve it with finely diced green capsicums—or blanched button mushrooms—or I could make a salad with—”
“Salad,” said Lady Cynthia, fastening on the word with relief. “Americans love salads.”
“Fine. And the pudding? Apple crumble, treacle tart—”
“I don’t think we want anything hot. And strawberries at this time of year are such a cliché—”
“Syllabub, gooseberry fool, junket, summer pudding—”
“Summer pudding! Yes—with a choice of custard or cream!” Lady Cynthia, who was so careful with her calories, was certainly succumbing to the urge to splurge. I wondered if this was all part of her new buoyant mood.
“The lunch will be for six,” she was saying with animation. “Five guests and me. The chief guest will be the American whom I want to convert to the glories of English cooking, and his name is Walter P. Woodbridge the Third. (You write ‘third’ as the Roman numeral three on the place-card.) He flew to Europe with President Reagan earlier this month and stayed on in England after the President had briefed Mrs. Thatcher about the Moscow summit. He’s now checking up on NATO or something terribly vital, but it’s all secret so I don’t ask questions.”
“How interesting, but I’ve just had an awful thought: might he be on a diet? Americans so often are.”
“Walter doesn’t need to diet,” said Lady Cynthia happ
ily. “He’s very slim and fit.” That was when I knew she was tempted to fall in love but trying to keep a cool head. I myself might have described Nicholas in exactly that tone of voice to a sympathetic third party.
I had a stimulating time planning the details of this feast, but on the Friday which preceded it the details changed when Lady Cynthia arrived back from the Wimbledon championships in a state of agitation. Rain had suspended play again and she hadn’t waited for the Becker-Lendl semi-final. As soon as she arrived home she hurried to join me in the kitchen where I was preparing her low-cal dinner (stuffed peppers, green salad, stewed apple with no sugar added).
“I’ve done something I know I’m going to regret,” she confessed, sinking down into the nearest chair, Mortimer clasped to her bosom for comfort. “In fact I regret it already. We’re going to have an extra guest on Sunday.”
“Fine, no problem—”
“It’s the biggest problem imaginable—really, I can’t think how I could have been so stupid! There I was, sipping champagne with Walter in one of those rather frightful hospitality tents, when someone shrieked behind me: ‘Cynthia darling!’ and to my horror I found it was someone whom I’ve been trying to avoid because, to be absolutely frank, she’s become a bit much. We used to belong to the same set in the sixties and she was a great friend of my husband’s eldest brother, but she made a disastrous marriage and went to seed and—well anyway, when I’d recovered from the shock of seeing her I said: ‘Darling, what a surprise!’ and in fact it was surprising because she was almost presentable, only the tiniest bit tight, and when she said how splendidly original it was of Richard to have married a Scot I actually felt quite warm towards her because such a lot of people were stuffy about the wedding and made snide remarks about kilts. So on an impulse I said: ‘Darling, do drop in for a drink sometime!’ and she said: ‘Lovely—when?’ which really put me on the spot, but I thought she might be all right if she had to eat at the same time as she was drinking, so I invited her to lunch on Sunday. However, when she cried: ‘Whooppee!’ and drank a glass of champagne straight off, my heart sank to my boots. The other guests will think I’ve taken leave of my senses.”
“They know her?”
“All too well—with the exception of Walter, of course, who met her today for the first time. God, what am I going to do? Walter says don’t worry, he’ll take care of her, but he has no idea of the size of the problem. If she goes over the top she might well try to tear his clothes off.”
“Gosh!” Up till now I had only experienced dramas of this kind on television.
“I think my only hope,” said Lady Cynthia, too worried to be aware of my vicarious thrill, “is to invite yet another guest, someone who’ll be able to whisk her away if she soars beyond the pale … Nick Darrow would be ideal, but he’s never in town on weekends.”
Immediately, as if to distract myself from all thought of Nicholas, I suggested: “What about Mr. Hall?”
“Lewis—of course!” Lady Cynthia was so struck by this idea that she almost dropped Mortimer. But then she hesitated. “He may not want to come,” she said uncertainly at last. “We don’t usually socialise, but perhaps in this case he’d make an exception to our rule.” And seeing my baffled expression she added in an abrupt voice: “I have a special relationship with Lewis and go to St. Benet’s every month to talk to him. He’s my spiritual director.”
I didn’t like to say: “What’s that?” so instead I murmured encouragingly: “I’m sure he’d want to come to your rescue.” As I spoke I was realising I had finally uncovered Lady Cynthia’s principal connection with the Healing Centre.
“Well, he certainly knows all about trying to cope with a society woman who drinks too much,” said Lady Cynthia dryly. “He was married to one.”
“I didn’t realise he was a widower.”
“He’s not. He’s divorced. But that was all a long time ago and he’s never remarried. The great thing about Lewis,” said Lady Cynthia, relaxing at last as she warmed to her subject, “is that he’s thoroughly sophisticated so no decadent behaviour would surprise him, and he’s thoroughly au fait with this woman’s social background so he won’t be inhibited about muzzling her if she becomes impossible. His father was at Eton with my father,” she added casually, as if producing the trump card which proved Lewis could be trusted to triumph over anyone remotely louche, “and his mother’s family owned that wonderful house in Sussex called Hampton Darcy which now belongs to the National Trust.” And having delivered this little snippet from Debrett she dismissed me in order to make the crucial phone call. It was only later that I had the opportunity to ask: “Lady Cynthia, what’s the name of this tricky old acquaintance of yours?”
“Venetia Hoffenberg. And may I just say, my dear, that I consider the word ‘tricky’ to be a masterpiece of English understatement.”
I thought: this is going to be a real fun-lunch.
It never occurred to me that the inevitable drama would pave the way for the third miracle.
4
We suggest you do not just focus on the issue of food intake. Rather, try to unravel the difficulties and deprivations that have led to compulsive eating … Are you using food to suppress uncomfortable feelings? Are you, literally, stuffing them down?… Or is food a way of filling up the emptiness within you?
GARETH TUCKWELL AND DAVID FLAGG
A Question of Healing
I
I went to Harrods for the beef and eel, Marks and Spencer for the vegetables and fruit and Sainsbury’s for the more mundane ingredients. This tour exercised the Polo and gave me some interesting experiences in parking.
Back at Eaton Terrace I planned the approaching meal as if I were a general plotting a military campaign. The golden rule of English cooking is: never overcook the vegetables. But this is a hard rule to keep when several vegetables are on the menu, and on Sunday morning I was so absorbed in the challenges the lunch presented that I almost forgot to set my video to record the men’s final from Wimbledon. (I had a mild crush on Edberg.) However, as things turned out I needn’t have bothered. The weather was so foul that the entire match was postponed, but in the kitchen I was certainly grateful for the cool temperature. By the time I’d finished nursing each item to the pinnacle of eatability I still looked as if I’d been roasting in the oven alongside the beef, but at least the sweat wasn’t actually sizzling on my forehead.
Since I’d set out the smoked eel terrine with the sweet red capsicum salad while everyone was drinking champagne in the drawing-room, I didn’t get the chance to inspect the guests until Lady Cynthia buzzed me to remove the plates some time later. Mr. Walter P. Wood-bridge III, I discovered, was tall and handsome with melancholy brown eyes which reminded me of Mortimer. Unlike Mortimer he had iron-grey hair, beautifully cut, and the usual American teeth, flawless and well flossed. When he smiled at me and said a courteous “thank you” as I presented him with the first platter of vegetables, I even decided he was good enough for Lady Cynthia—good enough, at least, to be her escort. Naturally I didn’t want him to marry her and leave me homeless, but as Lady Cynthia was so cautious about men I decided my future was probably secure.
One of the other male guests had been elected to carve the roast beef, as Lady Cynthia had been nervous of entrusting this supremely British task to Walter P.W.III. Mr. Robert Welbeck, an old friend of hers, was the son of a knight, not a baronet, a misfortune which meant he had no title. (Lady Cynthia was always keen to tell me these details to ensure I got the place-cards right at the first attempt.) The untitled Mr. Welbeck was bald and portly, probably in his fifties. Despite the fact that he was a churchwarden of St. Mary’s Mayfair and, presumably, a Christian, he didn’t treat me as if I had any value whatsoever, and neither did his wife, a pencil-thin teetotaller who refused the potatoes. (I hate people who are strong-minded enough to do this.)
The next two guests I assessed were Lord Todd-Marshall (Conservative life-peer, no inheritable title, born middle-class, profe
ssion “something in the City,” hobby sitting on quangos) and Lady Todd-Marshall (title acquired by marriage, also born middle-class, unpaid profession magistrate, hobby organising everything in sight). Lady T-M was better behaved than Mrs. Welbeck and gave a little grunt of acknowledgement when she had finished helping herself to all the vegetables including both varieties of potato. I decided she and her husband were standard Tory Party fodder, Lord T-M bulky in grey, Lady T-M stout in navy-blue, neither of them about to win a prize for unconventional behaviour.
Having passed judgement on the Todd-Marshalls I turned my critical gaze on the last two guests: Lewis Hall (no title but born upper-class, marital status divorced, profession clergyman, hobby directing spirits—or whatever it was he did with Lady Cynthia once a month) and the Shady Lady (born the daughter of a baron, title The Honourable, marital status widow, profession unprintable, hobby creating havoc).
Lewis was austerely and traditionally dressed in one of his tailor-made clerical suits, but still created the impression of a demagogue who preached hellfire and damnation in the pulpit and flirted with both behind the scenes. By now I was sure that this impression was deeply misleading, but I remained intrigued by his indestructible air of raciness. Of course he behaved beautifully. When our glances met he exclaimed: “Hullo, Alice! What a magnificent banquet you’ve prepared for us!” and he smiled, treating me as a real person instead of a robotic slave, before I moved on towards the Shady Lady.
The Honourable Mrs. Venetia Hoffenberg was tall, with fantastic hair, dyed jet-black and arranged to soar skywards into a knobbly hump which was nailed eccentrically into position by a couple of diamond hatpins. She had green eyes, false eyelashes, scarlet lips and a husky voice made huskier by a smoker’s cough. She looked as if she could seduce six men before breakfast and still be capable of downing a bottle of champagne with a seventh. Appearing to be wearing pyjamas, she was also flaunting enough gold bangles to win instant admittance to Fort Knox.
The Wonder Worker Page 9