by Patrick Gale
“Could have been worse,” the police constable said who took his statement. “He could have done for you, sir, on the phone like that with your back turned.”
“Oh no, I don’t think so,” John said but he thought about the possibility when they finally left him in the small hours and he promised never to leave the downstairs lavatory window open again.
The birds were already beginning to sing. He drew the bedroom curtains to block out the dawn but could not sleep. He lay on the bed, favoring Frances’s side as he always did when she was away, breathing the ghost of her scent from the pillows. He thanked God she and the boy were so far away and safe from harm and as he did so was unable to prevent terrible scenarios playing out in his mind. Their rape and torture, with him a powerless gagged witness, were all the more hideous for being enacted among familiar furnishings.
“Just give me the sow and piglets,” their American tormentor kept asking in reasonable tones, “and I’ll stop.”
BLUE HOUSE
John was not a concert-going animal. He liked music well enough, although a teacher in his nursery school had told him to mime rather than attempt to sing because he had no ear and he had taken her word for it. He preferred music with English words attached, like hymns, Dream of Gerontius or Judas Maccabeus; music with a story to give him something to follow and some idea of how near a piece was to finishing. He could not abide opera in any form, finding it dramatically inefficient. Ideally music should be domestic, as when Frances played the piano after dinner or found something on the radio. Then he could read a book or beaver at a crossword and be occasionally surprised and distracted by some passing beauty in what he was hearing. The enforced listening provided in concert halls could be like drip-fed torture.
Frances had chosen a lieder concert because she knew he preferred words, but the program was of Schubert and Wolf with only a thin, unpromising English-language filling of Britten folksong settings. The sketchy program, all too swiftly read, gave no translations. One had to rely on explanations from the girl at the piano, who was pretty but largely inaudible.
Will had been going to come—he was as passionate about music as his mother—but he dropped out unexpectedly, insisting on staying at home to babysit so Sandy could spend time alone with his in-laws. John could never think of much to say to Sandy once the initial family questioning was out of the way. The man was amiable enough but almost proud of his complete lack of culture; the most worrying kind of scientist, in John’s opinion. And Frances was having one of her bad days, after a sleepless night, so they were not a merry party and John keenly envied Will who was probably playing Cheat with the boys or enjoying a good book, having put them both to bed.
It was a long-standing music festival, performed and attended largely by outsiders who owned or rented holiday houses in the area. Despite the high reputation and ticket prices, a self-consciously informal air prevailed. Seats were unnumbered so had to be reserved with cushions beforehand, a process involving a heartily Dunkirk spirit in the queue outside and Byzantine ruthlessness in the barely restrained rush once the queue was admitted to the church. The idea, part of the fun apparently, was to fill the interval between pew-claiming and concert with a picnic. Will had thrown together delicious sandwiches, fruit salad and cake for them but they had forgotten in their rush to bring a rug so ate in the car, all facing the same way. With Frances in so flat a mood, one realized how great a contribution her chatter normally made. The atmosphere was strained, and made less comfortable still by thick, prickly weather heralding thunder. They talked exclusively of absent family.
John had queued alone for their seats, leaving the others to talk. As they filed inside for the concert, spirits improved by a bottle of buttery Chablis, Frances remarked on the changes to the building. She had been here before, apparently, before the bold decision was made to replace much of the old slate roof with glass. A tall, masculine creature in a peacock-blue tent dress that looked as old as herself, was handing out programs as they came in. She knew Frances, it seemed.
“Happy with your clacker, then?” she asked.
“Oh yes,” Frances said. “Although I’m a bit embarrassed to leave it going all the time as it’s been so noisy.”
“Look up when you get inside and take a look at what he used to do. Coffee in the rehearsal hall during the interval. You’ll see more art there.”
They dutifully looked up as they took their seats. The new glass roof was supported by a phalanx of carved wooden angels, replacements perhaps for old ones decayed past repair. Reminiscent of something by Epstein or Eric Gill, they were more muscular than spiritual and would not have looked out of place on some Olympic stadium of the thirties. Their faces were expressionless, their long hair streamed back and their robes were swept tight against their bodies to suggest a mighty wind bearing them up. They were not beautiful and John questioned their suitability for such a fine old building, albeit one already deconsecrated and buggered about, but there was no mistaking the skill and confidence in their execution.
“Bit of a comedown from those to rook-scarers,” he said.
“His wife died,” Frances told him. “He’s still a broken man, apparently.”
Sandy said nothing, his attention absorbed by the other concertgoers. He had that in his favor; when he had nothing to say, he kept his mouth shut. He was also, John supposed, a good husband and father in that he provided well for his family and they all appeared to love him. John was shocked however at how even the oldest child, who should at least be reading easy classics by now, spent all his free time playing games and surfing the Internet on Sandy’s laptop computer. It was a lapse emphasized by the child’s startling similarity to Will, who rarely had his nose out of a book at that age. When taken on walks or trips, neither boy asked questions unless they related to food or other things they wanted that would cost money. Flowers, birds, scenery, buildings—nothing seemed to stimulate their curiosity and he could tell from their reactions to things he said, about the Saxons or the tides or the lives of fishermen, that they knew nothing. Poppy and Sandy were raising two cultural blanks. Attractive, healthy, very good-natured and probably quite clever, but blank. John looked around the church at the other young couples and imagined them all producing similar offspring, then stopped because the idea frightened him. He did not like to be made to feel reactionary, even though he knew that within the family he was regarded as a social dinosaur; a man who still had a use for shoe trees, weekend ties and a Church of England prayer book.
There were three singers taking it in turns to rise from their chairs beside the piano; a woman and two men. The Schubert sequence was interminable, the smiley, inaudible explanations often lasting nearly as long as the brief songs that followed them. When the thunder finally sounded, one of the men threw off an impromptu performance of Der Erlkönig. When a burst of rain followed it, clattering on the glass overhead, the other man swelled a long program further with Die Forelle. John noticed Sandy stir impatiently at the sycophantic, cultured titters that followed the announcement of each addition and warmed to him with fellow-feeling.
Much as he could still recall reams of poetry learned by rote at school, he found himself remembering a trite, gallumphingly-accented English version of the song from the same hazy period in his life.
We see the merry TROUT as he swims alo-ong hi-is WAY.
We see his fishy TAIL and we wi-ish him good DAY!
Almost guiltily he craned his neck for a better view and began to enjoy himself, tapping a foot to the infectious rhythm.
Britten, in his experience, normally signified music to be borne with fortitude. It was either simply tuneless or tunefully creepy. In the course of Will’s time as a chorister, John had endured both the War Requiem and The Little Sweep. Will had landed the title role in the latter, leaving his father with chilling memories of his son being stripped half-naked in public in the cause of a thigh-slappingly grisly number called Sammy’s Bath.
There was some shifting a
round before the Britten sequence began and when one of their neighbors needed to leave to help the volunteer coffee-makers, John was tempted to escape with her, pleading that old man’s silencing standby, a troubled bladder. Frances patted his knee, however, and murmured, “Isn’t this a treat!” in a way that compelled him to stay and suffer.
The first item, The Little Ploughboy, confirmed his worst fears, managing to be not only tuneful and creepy but to induce little patronizing snorts of pleasure in the audience. Then came Salley Gardens, a tune John had always loved and which Britten had left well alone. It was with the unpromisingly titled O Waly Waly, however, sung by the bass, that he found himself transported. He realized he knew it, or a version of it, from a Kathleen Ferrier record he played sometimes when Frances was out. (The scratches on the record irritated her, she claimed, but he had reason to suspect she was jealous of his perceived attachment to the dead singer.) It contained the combination of despairing love and inexorability folksongs carried off so effectively and Britten had set it with admirable simplicity. The piano played nothing but chords in a rocking rhythm John could not have described technically but which put him in mind of water lapping round the landing stage at the end of the garden. For a young man, the bass had an amazingly mature voice, so that it was almost as though another, older man sang through a younger mouth. Where the words were saddest, he held back rather than letting rip, covering the brass in his tone as one might shade a candle.
“A ship there is, and she sails the sea,” he sang. “She’s loaded deep as deep can be, but not so deep as the love I’m in; I know not if I sink or swim.” And thinking suddenly not merely of Kathleen Ferrier but of the sitting-room at Wandsworth where he first heard the record and the old Governor’s House at Camp Hill and Frances young and careless in the garden, John was moved and it was his turn to reach out and touch her.
She sniffed and he saw she was crying. She had always been charmingly sentimental, crying easily at carols or songs that evoked a happy time. How sweet, he thought, squeezing her hand. She’s thinking about us. Then he realized the words sang of betrayal and of love as a long, hard slog of a journey. He glanced over again and saw to his dismay that she was crying in earnest, not just misty-eyed but with proper tears streaming down her face. He squeezed her hand again, uselessly, hoping she would manage to rein herself in, but she could not apparently and began to cry more openly until she was actually sobbing and having strouble breathing. A couple in front turned, first the husband then the wife, their faces angry until the sight of her tears turned them hastily back, alarm in their eyes. Other people were turning. Someone even shushed her.
“Ssh,” John murmured too. “It’ll soon be over,” which earned him a shush as well.
Frances struggled to her feet. She was like a woman gasping for air. “I’m sorry,” she said and spoke aloud.
John jumped up and helped her out, past the eyes boring into them. The song finished as they were leaving and he fancied the applause was the warmer to show disapproval of the rude interruption. Under cover of a change in singer, Sandy hurried up behind them, carrying the cushions. John guessed he had been suffering and was happy with an excuse to escape.
When they reached the graveyard Frances began to wail. John held her tight and she clung to him like a frightened child. “What?” he said. “What is it?”
Behind her Sandy signaled that he would go to the field across the way to fetch the car.
At first she could only mumble incoherently as John continued at once to hug her and steer her away from the church porch so she would disturb the music less.
Then she said what sounded like, “Chopsticks.”
“What?” he asked.
“It was a vision,” she said. “I had a vision.” And she gulped deeply, then bent over and was violently sick into the long grass beside the lych-gate.
John handed her his handkerchief and glanced behind them but the interval had not started yet. A handful of people who had not managed to capture seats were watching them from the porch with unfeigned curiosity.
Nobody spoke on the short drive home. John thought of many things to say but judged it better to remain silent. The boys were asleep. Will was sitting up reading. He was surprised to see them back so soon. Frances confirmed that something was wrong by saying, rather briskly, that bed was the best place for her and took herself off without greeting Will or looking in on the children. Will took the used picnic things off Sandy and, mind-reading, returned from the kitchen with the Scotch bottle and three glasses.
“I had no idea she had got so bad,” Sandy told Will as they sat on the veranda. “Poppy’s been making out she’s just a bit confused.”
“Poppy is in denial.”
“But she’s not so bad,” John insisted. “Not most of the time. She can’t concentrate the way she used to or read a book and she’s a bit forgetful. But she can talk quite cogently and plan excursions. Well, not plan exactly. But she enjoys them. And she still plays the piano, you know.” He heard how he was sounding and shut up.
“John,” Sandy said after a pause. “When we get back, you should let me book her in. For a scan.”
“Why?” Will asked. “How can that help?”
“So we can know the worst. See how it’s progressing.”
“You make it sound like a mold.”
Sandy pulled a face and dropped his voice so low that John had to lean forward to catch what he was saying. “Well, when you look at the photographs of the progressive damage it does … You don’t need to talk about this. Not yet.”
“Now who’s in denial?” John said. “Can I have another?”
“Sure.” Will splashed more Scotch into his tumbler. “Dad, are you OK?”
“It was a shock, that’s all,” John said. “I think it shocked her too. She was sick. I thought she’d had another stroke.” He drank, let the whisky scour him out. “It’s very kind of you to have us here, Will,” he said. “Not much fun for you.”
“Don’t be daft. It’s kind of you to come and keep me company.”
“No. This time next year … Well … Who knows …”
There was another pause filled by the sound of wave on sand. The sculpture thing was silent. By common consent, Sandy had tied it up until they got it home and could station it at the far end of the garden. Even there, John foresaw neighborly complaints. The boys had discovered it and kept untying the contraption and setting it clacking. Possibly Sandy could be persuaded to take it home with him.
“It’s so bloody unfair,” Sandy said.
“Farmer’s coming back,” John said suddenly. “Your friend Harriet rang to tell me and I clean forgot. It looks as though they’re going to extradite him and he’ll be standing trial at long last.”
“Good Lord,” Will said. “Are you glad?”
“After all these years it’s become completely meaningless. I’m retired. It’s not my problem.”
“So why did Hats ring?”
“To warn me. Sweet of her really. She thought journalists might start ringing up, raking it all over. Who knows? They might ring you.”
“I was a kid at the time. Why should they want to talk to me?”
“Oh. No reason really.”
“Did I know him?”
“He was quite a pal of yours for a bit. You don’t remember a thing, do you?”
Will smiled. “Not a sausage.”
“It was a long time ago,” John said. “Maybe it was one of the others who was your pal.”
How could he have acquired this innocence? And how could she lose great tracts of memory and be termed sick when Will could forget things and remain so blithe? Every parent strove for this. Especially now, John had noticed, when childhood had shrunk back to its eighteenth-century brevity and technology and fear were shrinking the years in which children could be kept in happy ignorance, parents craved the restoration of innocence. But innocence in one’s adult child was somehow insulting.
“I should have let her go year
s ago,” John said quietly. “Then I’d never have had to endure this slow absenting of herself. I should have divorced her.” Then, seeing naked hurt writ across his son’s kind face, he added, without thinking, “Not that she ever gave me cause.”
And Will smiled grimly, accepting what he was told.
So, John thought. That’s how it happens.
“Do the boys have any idea, do you think?” Will asked Sandy.
“No. They just think she’s ancient. You know how ageist kids are.”
“Oh, sure,” Will said. “Oz accused me of being fifty tonight. Have you got stronger sunblock for him, by the way? I couldn’t help noticing when he was in the bath, he got quite burned on his back today.”
“There’s another big tube in the car boot somewhere.”
John stood. “I’d better turn in,” he said. “Keep her company.”
The domestic tone between them, almost like that of a long-married couple, was exacerbating his desolate mood. He pressed Will’s shoulder to keep him where he sat, and moved inside as their voices continued softly behind him.