The Wonder Worker

by Susan Howatch

  “Number two: the demons quite definitely came out of Francie when she stopped trying to kill Nicholas and passed out. Number three: they won’t come back so long as she receives the correct medical and spiritual care. Number four: she may not be normal when she recovers consciousness, but her prognosis, as I’ve explained, is good. Number five—wait a minute, I’ve lost track. Where have I got to?”

  “The sceptical doctors.”

  “Ah yes. Number five: Nicholas isn’t going to run around the hospital declaring that Francie’s been suffering from a demonic infestation and that he cured her, by the grace of God, through performing an emergency rite of deliverance. Val, of course, will understand what happened, and she’ll liaise with the doctors at the hospital when they eventually confess themselves amazed by Francie’s speedy recovery; the best doctors are always humble enough to be open-minded about the mysteries of illness, particularly mental illness—they’re not all reductionist robots. However in the end, to preserve the scientific proprieties, they’ll write her illness off as an acute psychotic episode resulting from a nervous breakdown and everyone will be happy. ‘Nervous breakdown’ is such a useful phrase and makes laymen feel they understand exactly what’s happened—and that answers your final question about Harry. I don’t think you need worry about him being baffled by esoteric explanations.”

  “Poor Harry.” I got up and chucked the empty ice cream tub into the swing-bin to join the fried banana sandwich.

  “Quite,” said Lewis dryly. “But I shouldn’t feel too sorry for him. He may not be a wife-beater but I doubt that Francie would have felt so unloved if he hadn’t been so lacking in sympathy and understanding. Emotionally speaking the man’s obviously as dumb as an ox.”

  I sat down again with my brandy. “The only good thing to come out of this mess,” I said, “is that no one will believe Francie now if she goes around saying Rosalind seduced Stacy, so we no longer have to worry about her spilling the beans at the inquest.”

  “There’s a silver lining to every cloud. Which reminds me … My dear, I want to tell you about the cloud I’ve been wrestling with and the silver lining which I’m only now beginning to recognise. Harry Parker hasn’t been the only man, I fear, who’s made a habit of behaving like a dumb ox in his dealings with the opposite sex.”

  With a sinking heart I finally remembered that he had had lunch with Venetia the Vamp. Stifling a sigh I took another swig of brandy and prepared to listen to the latest gory details of his infatuation.

  V

  “As usual I had the most stimulating meeting with Venetia,” said Lewis. “She’s made excellent progress and I’m sure now that she’ll go on to lead the rewarding life she so richly deserves. But—” He heaved a sigh and fell silent.

  “But?” I prompted patiently, expecting some moan about how far Cambridge was from London.

  “But I feel now,” said Lewis regretfully, “that she and I really must go our separate ways.”

  This was certainly a surprise. Clamping down on any expression of relief I enquired cautiously: “Why do you think that?”

  “She just met me today to be nice to me. I saw that at once. She was bothered because she knew I’d been upset last time and she wanted to try to put things right.”

  “Decent of her.”

  “Yes, wasn’t it? So … No, I’m sorry, I’m not being wholly honest here. The real truth—the unvarnished truth—and I hope I’m not such a coward that I can’t face up to it—” He stopped to summon the necessary courage.

  I was suddenly aware of a genuine interest forming. “Go on,” I said, trying to sound encouraging.

  “All right, here goes. The truth is that when she saw me last time on my crutches, an old crock who looked as if he had next to no mileage left, it must have seemed to her like a vision of things to come—a blinding insight into what a relationship with an old man was likely to mean in the long run. So having seen me in the light of this chilling reality, she decided I wasn’t right for her either now or later—yet at the same time she liked me enough to want to be kind, and that was why she staged this additional meeting which would enable us to part with grace and style. It was a splendid gesture and of course I was most grateful to her, but … there was no doubt I did feel a trifle sad afterwards.”

  “Lewis, did she actually spell this out to you or are you just guessing?”

  “It’s ESP,” he said outrageously, and had the nerve to give me his broadest smile.

  “ESP? It sounds more like absolute rubbish! Lewis, if Venetia really loves you she won’t care how much of an old crock you may or may not be in the dim and distant future!”

  “Quite so, but she obviously realises that two people past fifty should be prudent rather than romantic about their relationships. I’m certain she now feels that our friendship shouldn’t be taken further, but I don’t blame her because to my surprise I’ve come to believe she’s right.”

  “Honestly?”

  “Well, what else can I think when I’m apparently so old that the best of sirens just wants to be kind to me? Ye gods, if this is what it’s like to be sixty-seven I might as well book myself into the nearest nursing home and order a headstone!”

  “Oh, don’t be so idiotic!” I exclaimed exasperated. Lewis was becoming increasingly prone to drivel on about the horrors of old age. “You obviously need to be reminded that a man of sixty-seven is usually described as distinguished whereas a woman of sixty-seven is inevitably written off as an old bag! Why don’t you take time out to thank God you’re male instead of moaning away about nursing homes and headstones?”

  He laughed. “Very well,” he said, “I shall abstain from self-pity and merely say: so much for my romantic dreams about Venetia; I finally woke up. I’m sure I shall always find her alluring but I accept now she’s not for me. That’s the cloud I’ve been wrestling with.”

  “And the silver lining?”

  “This experience has made me realise that it’s no good perpetually searching for the ideal mistress and then kidding myself she’d be the ideal wife. And that in turn means I’ve finally got to admit that my spiritual director’s been right all along about my private life.”

  “He has?”

  “No question about it. He always said I ought to marry a nice middle-class girl who could put up with all my moods and cook me excellent meals and make old age heaven instead of hell.”

  “Super. Lewis, talking of nice middle-class women, can we go back to Francie for a moment? I was wondering if—”

  “Don’t interrupt. This is important. What I’m saying is this: I don’t need grand passion at my time of life. I need someone I can get on with—someone I find physically attractive, of course, but basically someone who can stand the strain when I start to go downhill—”

  “Oh, do shut up about your age! Listen, I was wondering if I ought to go and see Francie in hospital later—it might be therapeutic for me. Otherwise I’ll be stuck with this nightmarish memory of—”

  “—so bearing all that in mind,” interrupted Lewis, raising his voice to drown me out, “it seems obvious to me that there’s only one woman I know who’s remotely suitable for the job. How about it?”

  “How about what?” I was already fed up with this new fantasy of a middle-class nurse-cum-sex-slave who could provide him with gourmet cuisine.

  “How about you and I getting together? I could buy a little house in Westminster—I know that’s the area where you feel most at home—”

  “Hang on,” I said confused, finally forgetting Francie. “I’m not following this. Are you asking me to be your housekeeper?”

  “Good heavens, no! Nowadays two unrelated people can never live together without everyone assuming they share the same bed, and since I’m a priest—”

  “So do you mean—are you trying to say—”

  “I’m suggesting we should get married. It is, in fact, a most sensible and intelligent idea—”

  “Good God.”

  “—and I th
ink we’d do very well. You probably wouldn’t have to put up with me for more than ten years and then you’d be a rich widow. I know I was born in 1921—and don’t think I don’t realise how off-putting this must be for you—but I could offer you security, a nice home, and (with the new hip tamed) some very decent and respectable sexual intercourse every now and then—”

  “Lewis—”

  “Oh, you wouldn’t mind that at all, I promise you! I was always very good in bed, and besides there’s nothing like a bit of practice for brushing up one’s skills—”

  “Lewis—please—”

  “—and if you wanted children, well, that’s all right, I wouldn’t mind so long as it was accepted that I was a father of the old school and didn’t have anything to do with the child before it had learned to use a lavatory. So you see, all in all, even though I’m sixty-seven and currently on crutches, I do still have a considerable amount to offer—to the right woman. In fact, not to put too fine a point on it, I can offer you everything you’ve ever wanted, so—”

  “Not quite everything,” I said.

  We finally managed to look each other in the eyes.

  VI

  “All right,” said Lewis at last. “I see the practical approach hasn’t worked, although in marriage it’s the practical approach that counts in the long run. Let’s try this from another angle—”

  “Can I say something, please? Can I finally get a word in? Lewis, it’s very, very kind of you to propose, and of course I do realise you’re paying me the most wonderful compliment—”

  “You sound like the heroine of a Victorian novel. Spare me the Lily Dale style of rebuff!”

  “—and I know that the most sensible thing for me to do would be to say yes, but—”

  “Women really are impossible!” he growled, levering himself to his feet. “Impossible!” He shot a furious glance at his empty coffee-mug.

  “Oh God, I’m saying it all wrong, I’m sorry, but I’ve never been proposed to before and I’ve never even expected to be proposed to— if you could only understand how utterly pole-axed I am you wouldn’t think I’m trying to hurt you or insult you or—”

  “All right, all right, don’t panic!” He sat down again with a bump. “What I’m trying to get across to you,” he said, somehow managing to sound both calm and rational, “is that this—you and I—is a workable reality, while that—you and Nicholas—is a romantic dream which could destroy not only you but Nicholas as well.”

  Tears sprang to my eyes. “I haven’t forgotten what you said last night,” I said. “I haven’t forgotten how you said the Devil was using me too to get at Nicholas. And now you’re implying, aren’t you, that I’m like Francie, infested with demons who have embedded themselves in an obsession!”

  “If you’ve been listening to me carefully, you’ll know that’s nonsense. Of course you’re not obsessed or infested! Obviously you genuinely love him, and no demon can embed itself in a genuine love because all genuine love is from God. But the Devil can still try to take advantage of the situation and use it for his own ends.”

  I tried without success to reply.

  Once more Lewis hauled himself to his feet. I was aware of him moving to the dresser, opening a drawer and pulling out a box of Kleenex for me, but suddenly he became motionless. Dashing the tears from my eyes I saw he had come face to face with Nicholas’s bear, seated on the dresser in front of the best Delft plate.

  “Is this creature,” said Lewis slowly, “what I think it is?”

  “Nicholas rescued him this morning from Butterfold. He’s going to give him away at last—he’s going to put away childish things because …” I faltered but forced myself to go on. “He had a reconciliation with Rosalind. The marriage will move into a new phase. She won’t just be his childhood friend any more. She’ll be his wife—truly his wife—and they’ll have a mature relationship and all the childish side of the marriage will fade away and they’ll live happily ever after.” Tears were now rushing down my cheeks. “So you see, you don’t have to worry any more about me and Nicholas,” I heard myself say, scrubbing my eyes with the back of my hand as Lewis remained transfixed, the box of Kleenex forgotten in his hands. “He’s all right now, and even if he wasn’t I know he’d never feel physically attracted to me. I’m not slim and blonde like Rosalind.”

  Lewis said flatly: “Nicholas has never been attracted to slim blondes. He married Rosalind not because she was a slim blonde but in spite of it. And if he’s really moving on towards emotional maturity he won’t be having a reconciliation with a woman who merely replaced his teddy-bear in his affections.”

  Then as I stared at him through my tears, he moved back to the table, handed me the box of Kleenex and sat down not opposite me but at my side.

  VII

  At that point he asked me to tell him exactly what had happened in Surrey that morning, but I found I had the greatest difficulty in forcing my memory to focus on the scenes at the farmhouse. I saw now that I could have misunderstood what had happened, and I saw too why I had been tempted to believe in the reconciliation.

  “I’d recognised how jealous I was of Rosalind,” I said to Lewis, “but I suppose deep down I knew that the best I could hope for was that she and Nicholas would return to their old arrangement of being together just at weekends. If I couldn’t have him for myself—and I knew that was out of the question—then a wife who spent most of the time apart from him was for me the least painful scenario.”

  “Alice—”

  “The one thing I couldn’t stand,” I said rapidly, “would be Nicholas divorcing Rosalind and marrying someone else who lived at the Rectory full-time. I’d have to leave, even though that would be the last thing I’d want to do in so many ways. I’ve been happier here than I’ve ever been in my life.”

  Lewis said evenly: “There are times when one’s called to move on. St. Benet’s has been a very important staging-post for you on your journey, but who’s to say that you won’t be moving on to an even greater happiness elsewhere?”

  Fearful that he might propose again I abandoned the table and wandered to the dresser. The bear was looking at me with his mournful, knowing glass eyes. Picking him up I held him tightly and felt I knew something of the comfort which Nicholas had experienced long ago in his nursery. Then the moment of empathy with Nicholas coaxed my memory into action. As I recalled our conversation earlier I heard him say in describing his adult life: “There were a lot of things I didn’t find. Things I tried not to think about. Things I tried to believe weren’t as important as security.”

  “Nicholas never found a genuine companionship in that marriage, did he?” I said suddenly. “There would have been no meeting of the minds. He wouldn’t have found understanding—and he wouldn’t have found true peace either because he didn’t care about his home and always wanted to be somewhere else. All he and Rosalind really had in common were the children and the shared memories of their childhood.”

  “That’s all they’ll ever have in common. But nevertheless—”

  “They’ve outgrown each other,” I said, not listening, wholly absorbed in reinterpreting the scene at Butterfold and the significance of Bear. “He knows that now. It’ll be very, very hard to let her go but he knows it’s got to be done. He wants the best for her and he realises he can never provide the new life she needs and deserves …” I found I was hugging the bear tightly again. “I understand now,” I said, keeping my back to Lewis as I reseated Bear in front of the Delft plate. “I didn’t want to understand because I didn’t want to think of him getting divorced and marrying someone new who would make my life here unbearable, but it’s better to face the truth, isn’t it? When one’s grappling with the cutting edge of reality one can’t afford to start believing a lie.”

  I heard the chair scrape across the floor as Lewis yet again rose to his feet, but I remained staring at the bear. “Okay,” I said, “I accept that there’ll come a time when I have to move out of the Rectory and out of his lif
e. But that’s still a long way off, isn’t it? He’s a long way from being divorced and an even longer way from remarriage and meanwhile I can stay on here and everything will return to normal and we’ll be just as we were before all these terrible things started to happen—”

  “I think not,” said Lewis in his kindest voice, and began to destroy the last of my illusions.

  VIII

  “Predicting the future’s a risky business,” he said, “but let me start by repeating what I’ve said to you before: it’s by no means certain that Nicholas and Rosalind are capable of separating. They may think they are, but they could be mistaken.”

  “But I’m sure—”

  “You can’t be sure. We’re predicting the future, an activity not known for dealing in certainties. However, if they do stay together, the marriage will have to be completely restructured since the old split-level arrangement has broken down beyond repair. Alternatively, if they somehow manage to separate, I foresee that it will be very difficult for Nicholas to adjust to the break-up and it may take him a long time to reconstruct his private life. During that long time he’ll have to wrestle with the problem of living as a priest should when he has no wife and no gift for celibacy, and how likely, do you think, is it that he’ll solve such a difficult problem satisfactorily when he’s living in the same house as a woman who’s in love with him?”

  “But Nicholas would never—”

  “Never be tempted? Oh yes, he would! He may be a very gifted priest but he’s also a very ordinary man in some ways, and if he no longer has Rosalind to keep him on an even keel you’ll soon become an irresistible temptation to him.”

  “But Nicholas would never want me in that way!”