That week the tight heat of the Washington summer was already closing in on them. Laura woke early under its weight, lying there in their bed with the covers pushed off, but she was already full of plans for the day, plans she had been laying all weekend. She could see herself, at the head of a table of relaxed guests, white flowers, clattering knives and forks, Edward smiling; and then Suzanne and Monica and Nick too would recognise that she was not just an appendage to Edward, that she could create something – an atmosphere, an evening … but there was so much to do.
When Laura went out to the fishmongers and the flower shop, she saw in the window of a drugstore how the humidity in the air was already making her hair curl out of its set; she longed to go into its air-conditioned cool and sip a limeade and read a magazine, but she had to struggle back with the bags. One bag caught on her stocking, and the ladder ran down her leg as she walked. Kathy was at home to receive a delivery; yes, there was the fruit – grapes, dusky purple, but over-ripe, already softening, while the pears on the other hand looked woody. Laura gave Kathy instructions and went into the dining room to put the flowers into vases. Monica had mentioned in passing recently that it was not done to interrupt the gaze across the table with flower arrangements, so over the weekend she had bought three greenish glass bowls, and she cut the flower stalks short and pushed them into the bowls. In her mind the arrangement looked charming, but the heaviness of the roses’ heads made them tumble out of the bowls onto the oak dining table, and she pricked her finger on their thorns pushing them back in. In the end she took them into the living room instead, putting them on the mantelpiece where the roses could lean against the wall.
That was how the day went; she went through the list of things to do, ticking things off, making things happen, but with a sense that she was rehearsing for a play where the director was missing. At last, at about six, she went up to change. She had thought she would wear a dark dress with a low back; it had gone down well the first time she had worn it, but now she noticed that there was a mark on the skirt that she had not seen before. She should have sent it to be cleaned. She was sitting on the bed, wetting her finger with her tongue and rubbing at the mark, when she saw that on the table next to Edward’s side of the bed was a letter. She picked it up, and even when she realised it was from his mother she went on reading it. ‘… Osborne has taken the land to add to his farm, but nobody seemed to want the house as a house – in the end it’s gone to this Bristol man, who intends to turn it into a hotel. Toby is taking some bits and pieces for their London house, and I’ll put a few of the paintings into the Lodge …’
At first the words meant little, and then they fell with force. Laura remembered the house’s austere beauty, the chilly setting for the early days of their love, the meadow where he had kissed her as though she were his dream and saviour. She thought of the rose garden, dug up for cabbages, and the avenue bordered by lime trees that led down to the village and the church. And the little boy who both loved and hated it; she felt him in the room, the man he became, tormented by his feelings for his privileged childhood. ‘To me, it’s the most beautiful place in the world,’ he had said at lunch one day. ‘But you can’t rely on this kind of beauty,’ he had said another time.
Why had he said nothing? Laura thought of how he had been that morning. His face had been set – one might have called it cold – but it had been no different to his face every morning recently. She moved to the telephone and was about to ring him at work, but just as she started dialling the number she thought of how strange her commiserations would sound on the telephone, and how she would have to say she had read a letter from his mother that was not addressed to her.
Instead, she slipped on her uncomfortable high-heeled pumps and went downstairs. Kathy was staying late to help with the meal, and in front of her Laura found herself putting on a show of confidence and chattering high spirits, insisting on whipping the cream and mixing the salad dressing. At half past seven Edward still hadn’t come home, and at a quarter to eight the doorbell went. Laura pulled off her apron, ran up the kitchen steps and opened the door to find Archie and Monica on the doorstep. ‘How funny!’ she said. Her voice was as bright as she could make it. ‘You’re the first! Even before the man of the house.’
‘Not really?’ Monica came in, laughing.
‘But I saw Edward leave his office an hour ago,’ Archie said, shaking his head.
‘He probably went to meet Nick,’ said Laura. ‘Have you met him?’
‘Well, I’ve heard about him – friend of mine worked with him at the Beeb before the war. Bit of a player, isn’t he?’
‘What on earth do you mean?’ Monica asked, but Laura started talking over them.
‘I shall have to do the drinks in the absence of Edward – so what would you like?’
To her embarrassment, Laura realised that she didn’t have ice put out in the living room, and she had to go down and get Kathy to bring some up. The doorbell rang again, but it was Joe and Suzanne. Again, Laura tried to laugh when she told them that Edward and the guest of honour hadn’t arrived yet. She noticed that Suzanne, like Monica, had dressed carefully; both of them were in black evening dresses, and Monica was wearing the big pearl earrings she only wore occasionally. That made her anxiety increase, as she imagined them getting ready, full of expectation, zipping up their best dresses and lipsticking their mouths, setting out with high hopes of a good evening. Thank God that Monica and Joe were so talkative, since they seemed happy to start swapping anecdotes and laughing at one another immediately. But as time wore on, even they seemed strained, without their host. ‘They must have completely lost track of the time – or maybe there was some emergency,’ Laura said after nine. ‘But, you know, the dinner will be ruined unless we eat now. Shall we go and sit down?’
The dinner was pretty much ruined, after having been in a low oven for an hour. Laura could hardly meet Kathy’s eyes as she served it. They ate the dry fish and the soft, sodden vegetables, and Laura asked Joe to pour the wine, which he did with a generous hand. As they munched their way through the under-sweetened dessert, a silence fell and finally Laura heard Edward’s step heavy in the hall. There he was in the doorway with Nick, but any relief Laura felt on seeing him was cancelled out by the state he was in. If he wasn’t actually swaying on his feet, he was only remaining upright by great effort of will, and he quickly slumped into one of the free seats.
‘Nick – everyone – this is Nick – this is everyone …’ he muttered and picked up an empty glass.
‘So glad to meet you all,’ said Nick, smiling, shrugging off his coat.
Laura stood up. ‘Let me take that, Nick. This is Joe – and Suzanne …’ She introduced everybody, took Nick’s coat out of the room and then came back to pile some cold food onto each of their plates.
‘We’ve really finished eating,’ she said. ‘But don’t let us stop you. How was your trip over, Nick?’
He was just as she remembered him: his clothes slightly wrinkled and even dirty, as though he had slept in them, but still with the invulnerable manner of the group, still entirely confident despite the discomfort of everyone else in the room.
‘Well, you know, the usual kind of boat experience; our dear Miss Austen had it so well – enough of rears and vices – isn’t it wonderful to think how the mind of the virgin of Hampshire would run on sodomy, and now I’ve come here to make amends. But we got sidetracked, you know – in a most amusing bar not far from here, where I think, I’m not sure but I think, we were the only white faces in the room.’
Laura felt all the listeners grappling with what he was saying. No one would really be shocked, she thought, but no one would be comfortable with Nick’s obvious desire to shock them – and nobody would know how to respond. Only Edward seemed oblivious to everything that Nick was saying, and was ignoring the food in favour of his glass of wine.
‘Well, if you don’t want to eat, shall we go into the living room for coffee? The rest of us have bee
n sitting here long enough.’
At least as they went through, the pattern of the guests reformed. Now Laura was sitting between Monica and Suzanne on the sofa, and she recognised their obvious wish to help salvage the evening, as Monica started telling Suzanne some pointless but amusing anecdote about her daughters. As conversation filled the room, Laura wondered if some pleasure, some little hope of civilised interaction, might now take over.
‘I never thanked you for those lovely pictures you sent over,’ Monica said at one point to Laura. ‘You know that Laura does such good photographs – do show them to Suzanne.’
‘I’m sure she won’t be—’
‘I’d love to see them,’ said Suzanne, as she had to, so that Laura felt it would be gauche of her to refuse. She went to get a big folder that lay on the table under the window, where she had put some of her favourite recent prints – oddly, they were all of mothers and daughters, of Ellen and Janet, and Monica and her girls. Suzanne looked at them with what seemed like more than the appearance of appreciation.
‘You are good, aren’t you? Look at the light in her hair. Not easy, capturing a child’s expression like that. Have you ever thought of doing it professionally?’
‘Laura just likes to photograph for fun,’ Edward said. ‘She likes watching people.’
Laura felt that there was some kind of antagonism in his voice, and yet what did he have to be antagonistic about? The feminine circle had become porous to the men again, and Nick started to tell another smutty anecdote in a voice so loud that the women had to listen too.
‘I’m off home,’ Monica said as it was finishing, standing up. ‘I am sorry but I have to be up early with the girls tomorrow.’ It was rare for Monica to break up a gathering – she was usually one of the last to leave. Laura felt the evening must have curdled beyond repair if she was going.
‘Do you just have girls?’ Nick asked her, with a look of innocence.
‘Yes, two daughters.’
‘But little boys must love you so much. You are just the kind of woman that we were all in love with at school, weren’t we, Edward?’
‘Am I?’ Laura could see that Monica was flattered. Maybe she would stay, maybe she would enjoy the charm that Nick could turn on if he wanted to please.
‘Yes, look, let me do you a sketch.’
Nick went stumbling over to the desk and picked up a pen and paper. As Suzanne went on talking to Laura about her photographs, he was drawing. Laura saw it just before he handed it to Monica: a caricature of Monica as a school matron, with her breasts hanging out of her dress, and a boy lying in bed holding a huge erection.
Monica and Archie were too English and, perhaps, too sorry for Laura, to be obviously angry when they saw what he had done. They simply went on moving out of the room, thanking her for a nice evening. Laura went into the hall with them, and as Monica went to the bathroom, Archie looked at her. She could not bear the pitying expression on his face. ‘You’ve a lot on your hands there, haven’t you?’ he said, and as Laura made a dismissive expression, he unexpectedly put his hand up and casually, almost as if he were brushing away a piece of dust, touched her cheek. It seemed an intolerable moment to make, as it seemed to Laura, a pass at her, and she stepped backwards, knocking a vase on the sideboard to the ground.
‘Let me help.’
‘No, please, do go.’ Laura was picking up the pieces, so was he, and she was the first to see the blood on his fingers. ‘You’ve—’
‘It’s nothing.’ He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wrapped it around the cut.
‘We should wash it.’
‘No, it’s fine.’
Laura could see how embarrassed he was, and when Monica came out of the bathroom she let them go – one offended, the other injured – and she went back into the living room. She caught Suzanne’s eye as she came in and Suzanne responded, getting up and saying, ‘Actually, we should be going too.’
‘Must we?’ Joe said, frowning. ‘But Nick, you must have realised that if you brought a negro to your hotel you would—’
To Laura’s relief, Suzanne prevailed and they left. Edward and Nick started having a blundering discussion about whether they were going to a nightclub.
‘No, we’re going to bed, I’m afraid, Nick,’ Laura said.
‘Must I go drinking alone? My first night in Washington?’
‘I’m sure you’ll be fine.’
As soon as the door shut behind him, Laura found her anger spilling out of her; it was uncontrollable. ‘This was your idea, this dinner, and couldn’t you even come back on time? Why were you so rude? Why didn’t you tell me about Sutton?’
At the mention of Sutton, she suddenly thought of the devils that might be driving Edward to behave as he had that evening, and she reached a hand towards him, but he shrugged her off so forcefully she staggered backwards.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, and pulled her back to him, and began to drag her dress off her shoulders, exposing her breasts. For the first time ever Laura pushed him away, reacting against the clumsy touch of his hands and the smell of alcohol on his breath.
‘Good God!’ he shouted and picked up the first thing that came to hand from the mantelpiece and threw it at the wall – it was only one of those small bowls of roses, but now it was broken, and the water was a puddle on the carpet, and then he walked out of the room and into the hall.
‘Where are you going?’
‘To find Nick.’
‘At this time?’
‘He said he was going to that club on U Street …’
‘You’re too drunk, stay here.’
‘You’re too drunk, you’re too drunk – that’s all I ever hear from you. So I spoilt your little party – why does that matter so much?’
‘It was for you – the whole evening!’ Laura said, but she wasn’t even sure if it was true; what had it all been for? But Edward went blundering out of the house and she went back into the living room. Despite all the drinking that everyone else had done, she felt clear-headed and cold. She sat down in an armchair and kicked off her high-heeled shoes. One heel knocked against something. That book, that Tchernavin book was still there, under the chair, she realised. She pulled it out and began to read. The minutes, the hours, passed as she did so.
5
The sky was as luminous as ever, that summer at Portstone. Despite their complaints, Tom and Ellen had rented the same house again for a fourth summer. Already memories were being built around the house and the people who came there every year; memories of the summer broken by Father’s death would dominate, but the following summer was the one when Janet cut her leg on a rock, the summer when Kit tried to teach Laura to play tennis, and last summer was the one when it rained for a week solidly.
This summer was as yet unmarked, stretching out ahead of them, the first summer of Ellen’s new son, and Laura wanted to feel hopeful that somewhere in the huge cleansing charge of the green water or in the high voices of children on the shore they could recapture a lightness that she wanted to be part of their lives again. A renewal. But on the first day, even though she struggled into the sea, Edward lay on the sand, a hand over his eyes.
‘You seem pretty tired.’ Kit was sitting next to them. He too seemed weary, strung out and expectant as they all were.
‘Washington is quite tough.’ Edward sat up and looked at the book Kit was reading. ‘Is he any good?’ It was a book by an American poet Laura had not heard of, and Kit passed it to him. Edward looked through it for a while.
‘I can’t make head or tail of it.’ There was resignation in his voice as he put it down.
‘I can’t read poetry myself,’ said Tom, ‘never saw the point of it.’
‘I used to,’ Edward said, lying back on the sand again, ‘but now it feels so hard – to get its secrets out. Reading all these reports, day in, day out …’
‘Do you spend your life in meetings?’
‘That’s it.’ Edward picked up a stone and sent it skimming
over the waves. ‘You need some silence in your head to read poetry.’
‘Maybe I have too much silence,’ Kit said, in a would-be light way, but Laura caught a complaining note in his voice. She knew that since his failure in Washington he had drifted rather, and was currently just teaching tennis in the locality. As time went on, the differences between the two brothers seemed to become exaggerated: Kit was more and more languid and diffident in his manner, while Tom seemed sturdier and more settled.
Laura felt a headache starting, and wandered back up the shore to the house, where Ellen was sitting in a rocking chair, nursing her baby. She was nervous around Laura, obviously wondering how the sight of her second child would affect her sister. But although Laura had held him a few times, the softness of the first hair on his skull and the curled balls of his fists did not touch her emotionally. The wall that she had built around herself, brick by careful brick, was much too high for that. As they sat and talked, Janet ran in with a ball in her hands.
‘Where’s Father?’ she demanded.
‘Say hello to your aunt,’ Ellen ordered.
‘Hello,’ Janet mumbled, looking at her shoes.
‘Father is probably busy now, why do you need him? You were going to stay with Ora till lunchtime.’
Janet started throwing the ball in her hands up and down, speaking in a singsong. ‘Daddy was going to play with me, he was going to teach me tennis,’ and just as she said ‘tennis’ she lost control of the ball, which bounced out of her hands and onto the baby’s head.
‘Oh, you stupid—’ Ellen’s voice was explosive, and her hand whipped out and slapped Janet hard, much harder than anyone would expect, on her cheek. Janet put her hands up to her face, and her eyes filled with tears. ‘And that,’ Ellen said, slapping her again, on her legs, where Laura saw now that the red mark joined existing bruises. Janet ran from the room, leaving a sick, horrible cloud of the consciousness of pain behind. As soon as she was gone, Ellen started complaining about her behaviour. Laura said nothing – she may even have nodded. But in her mind she was lost in their own childhood, lost in the realisation that patterns of violence she had hidden so deep, that she had never admitted, even to herself, ran like veins of coal through Ellen’s family life, and as soon as she could she excused herself and went upstairs. She knew that there was a bottle of bourbon in Edward’s closet.
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