The Birdcage

by Marcia Willett

  He realized that he was staring up at the birdcage and looked away, took another drink.

  ‘The birdcage was theirs?’ Piers’ voice was unexpectedly gentle.

  ‘Yes.’ Felix blinked away a threatening sting of tears. ‘Angel got it from somewhere – a prop room, I suspect – and the chick was added later. It was supposed to represent the three of them. Pidge’s name triggered it off. She was Charlotte Pidgeon but nobody ever called her Charlotte. When Angel died she asked Pidge to give it to me as a keepsake. I hadn’t heard from them for more than twenty years and it was a terrific shock. Angel can’t have been much more than sixty when she died and Lizzie was married and living in London. I went to Bristol to collect it.’

  ‘But why did she want you to have it? After all, it must have meant a great deal to Pidge too.’ His voice was calm now, interested.

  ‘The end of the affair was a very bitter one. Angel couldn’t see why we shouldn’t continue in the same way, and we parted badly. I think the birdcage was her way of showing that she’d forgiven me.’

  ‘So why then, after all those years? What happened that broke it up?’

  ‘Marina gave me an ultimatum. I’d tried before then to stop seeing them, after Angel very foolishly brought Lizzie here for a holiday and Marina saw them both. She’d met Angel twice, backstage and at a party, and it took a matter of seconds, I imagine, for her to guess the situation. It was at that time that Angel’s contract had finished at the Old Vic in Bristol and she was going to be working in the north for a season. I thought it would do no harm to go on seeing Pidge and Lizzie but then Angel turned up one weekend and it all started up again, but very spasmodically. Someone saw us together at the cinema in Bristol, mentioned it to Marina and that was that. She told me that she would divorce me and that I wouldn’t be able to see you and so, in the end, there was no contest.’

  The shrill sound of the telephone bell startled Felix into spilling his drink and he reached for the receiver, striving to keep his voice calm, praying that it wasn’t Lizzie.

  ‘Tilda.’ He let out a breath of relief. ‘Hello . . . Sorry? . . . Oh, yes, he’s still with me. Would you like a word?’

  He passed the phone to Piers and, wiping his fingers and the base of the tumbler on his handkerchief, went to stand by the window, staring out, wondering where Lizzie was and what she was thinking, imagining what a shock it must have been for her when Piers introduced himself. The touch on his shoulder made him jump.

  ‘I’d quite forgotten about Teresa staying to supper.’ Piers smiled a little. ‘Not terribly surprising, I suppose, under the circumstances. I think it might be a good idea if I went home now, don’t you? There’s rather a lot to think about and I feel that we both need a bit of a break.’

  Felix nodded, wondering how he should behave, his normal instincts hampered by a lack of confidence. He had no idea what Piers might be thinking and felt that it was his son’s right to dictate the next move.

  ‘That sounds very reasonable. I hope . . . I am so sorry, my dear boy . . .’

  His voice faltered, suddenly he was exhausted, and Piers assisted him into his chair.

  ‘Thank you for being so open,’ he said. ‘It can’t have been easy. Rest now and I’ll phone you in the morning.’

  He kissed him lightly on the brow, as he always did, and went quietly away. Felix sat for some moments in silence, too tired to do more than think over all that had just been said, trying to remember Piers’ reactions, hoping that he hadn’t made a mess of it all. Quite suddenly – with a little stab of guilt – he thought again of Lizzie, remembering their dinner date, and, picking up the telephone, he dialled the number of the Luttrell Arms.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Back in her bedroom, Lizzie sat down shakily in the armchair by the window, placing her drink on the small nearby table. She couldn’t concentrate – couldn’t remember exactly what she’d said or how she’d reacted – she only knew that the whole scene had bombed: her timing had been rubbish, her gestures wildly under-rehearsed.

  ‘A perfectly bloody performance,’ she announced, using her old trick of making something seem less frightening – less important – if spoken aloud. ‘In fact, I may have to shoot you. Bounding in there, grinning like some third-rate hooker the minute he looked at you . . .’

  Her stomach contracted as she thought about the way she’d responded to his open, friendly look across the bar, recalling that sudden impact which had startled her into such an unguarded smile. And later, when he’d approached her, his unstudied opening remark had bounced her into dropping her careful defences, beaming madly at him like some demented schoolgirl . . .

  Lizzie groaned aloud in humiliation, hot with shame, as she leaned forward to rest her head on her up-drawn knees as though to hide herself, but the scene continued to replay itself relentlessly before her inner eye. If only she’d kept her mouth shut, heard him out, but no, but no – she groaned again – she’d had to interrupt him, saying that she’d recognized him too. If only she’d had more sense she might have guessed that his reaction was all bound up in that wretched television advertisement and that he hadn’t spoken to Felix after all.

  Thinking of Felix had the effect of bringing her upright again, wondering how he was coping with Piers and what he might be saying to him. She picked up her glass and swallowed some of the now-warm vodka, trying to decide at what point she might risk telephoning him. She began to feel nervous and unconfident, fearing that her arrival in Dunster might be as divisive as Angel’s was forty years before. She wondered what Angel had hoped to achieve or if it had simply been an impulsive moment of madness. Sipping her drink, Lizzie tried to imagine how Angel had viewed Felix’s family; whether her need of him had outweighed any feelings of guilt. It occurred to her that, as a child, she’d assumed that it was perfectly reasonable for Felix to share himself between the two households – although two or three days once a month was hardly a fair distribution of his company – and although she’d longed for him to be her father she’d never resented the boy with the odd name who lived ‘in the country’ with his mother, rather, she’d been fascinated about him, longed to meet him. How odd that she should have done so, here in the shop in Dunster, without realizing at the time who he and the grim-faced woman were! That meeting had signalled the end of the affair.

  It must have been almost as difficult for Pidge to adapt to the separation as it had been for Angel. It was clear that although Pidge had disapproved of that holiday in Dunster – . . . you’ll be relieved to know! – not a sign of F . . . – nevertheless she’d always been pleased to see Felix at the Birdcage, welcoming him, joking with him, preparing a special supper. Certainly there had been no disapproving faces or making herself scarce: they’d been a little family together. It struck Lizzie that Angel must have been possessed of a great generosity in being so ready to share her lover with her friend and child: she’d been so full of warmth and ready laughter. It was so sad to recall that, later, she’d begun to drink heavily, to become unreliable and so get offered fewer and fewer parts. Perhaps, Lizzie thought, her mother had missed Felix more than either she or Pidge had guessed. She pictured her as she’d been in her late thirties.

  In the early sixties she is no longer offered the parts of Rosalind or Lydia Languish but she assumes the roles of Mistress Quickly and Lady Sneerwell with enthusiasm – and discovers a talent for the meatier roles in Restoration comedy. Although she’s beginning to lose her shapely suppleness, the extra weight suits her, lending her a statuesque beauty, the creamy skin still smooth and eminently touchable. As the decade draws to an end, however, Angel’s career has begun to decline. It manifests itself slowly, that lack of self-discipline, the desperate need for another drink. Perhaps it is nothing to do with Felix’s defection: perhaps she fails to get an important part she auditions for, or perhaps a play folds but, at some point during the sixties, Angel loses her confidence and becomes unstable, swinging between extravagant high spirits and a kind of bitchy in
difference; between affectionate maternalism and maudlin depression.

  She makes her way to the café in King Street, which they call Hell’s Kitchen, or to the Duke for a drink with her actor friends, sometimes persuading them to come back home with her for a ‘jolly’, but as the months wear on and still no work is forthcoming she becomes more withdrawn, finding it increasingly difficult to wear a cheerful expression or shrug an indifferent shoulder.

  It isn’t easy for Angel when she hears that her daughter has been offered the part of Nellie Forbush in a production of South Pacific. Angel pretends disdain, which she sees is hurtful but she simply cannot help herself.

  ‘Musical comedy?’ Her shocked expression is almost ludicrous.

  ‘It’s the lead . . .’ mutters Lizzie defensively.

  ‘And a first-class touring company.’ Pidge’s voice is warm and proud. ‘Isn’t it wonderful? All those singing lessons have paid off. I’m so thrilled, Lizzie.’

  ‘We can’t all be Shakespeareans.’ It is a hurt response to Angel’s reaction but Lizzie smiles gratefully at Pidge.

  ‘Clearly . . .’ Angel shrugs; her voice tails away, indicating that such a thing is beyond speech.

  Pidge’s arm tightens round Lizzies’s shoulder as if to ward off Angel’s marked lack of enthusiasm.

  ‘You’re such a snob, Angel,’ she says lightly. ‘Or it couldn’t be that you’re just the least bit jealous, could it?’

  ‘Oh, shut up, Pidge.’ The reluctant grin wrinkles her still charming nose. ‘It is a bit of a shock when your child lands her first major part, especially when no-one is exactly falling over themselves to offer you a job.’ She opens her arms to Lizzie. ‘Give me a kiss, sweetie, and forgive your old mother for being a bitch.’

  It is so typical of Angel during those later years, that switch from sharp-tongued contempt to affectionate gaiety; her smile – self-deprecating but with a twinkle – is a special blend of penitence and joyfulness that demands forgiveness. On this occasion they make it up very quickly, opening a bottle to drink to Lizzie’s success; Angel holding up her glass, her eyes sliding carefully away until the glass is brimming, ‘Goodness, that’s plenty! Here’s to you, sweetie . . .’ and Lizzie is always ready to accept the olive branch after these outbursts.

  Nevertheless, it is almost a relief when the time comes to leave Angel and Pidge in the Birdcage, to spread her wings at last. Yet she always returns; after success or failure it is still home.

  The telephone disturbed Lizzie’s thoughts, jolting her back to her horror of the meeting with Piers.

  ‘We’ve had it out.’ Felix sounded exhausted. ‘It’s been very tricky but I think we’re still friends. I hope that the worst is over but I have to say that I simply can’t face the dining-room at the hotel, Lizzie. Would you like to come over and see me after you’ve eaten?’

  ‘I’m not hungry, Felix,’ she told him, concerned by the ragged timbre of his voice. ‘I’d love to see you but I don’t want to tire you out any more than you are already.’

  ‘Oh, please come over,’ he said at once. ‘I’d so like to see you. We can have some cheese and biscuits or a sandwich. I am tired but I feel terribly restless . . .’

  ‘I’ll be right there,’ she answered. ‘I know exactly how you feel. The adrenalin’s still racing but there’s nowhere for it to go. I can’t wait to tell you what a prat I was. But I expect that Piers has done that already.’ She heard his chuckle and felt a great uplift of spirits. ‘Five minutes,’ she told him – and, replacing the receiver, stood for a moment, her hands clasped together in relief and gratitude.

  Driving back to Michaelgarth, Piers was surprised at his principal reaction to his father’s disclosures: the relief was overwhelming. Now he could fit the missing pieces together and make sense of the puzzle, remembering that moment years ago when he’d stood outside the drawing-room door listening to his mother’s accusations.

  From that moment forward, he fears that somewhere in the world, waiting to appear, is a half-sister: his father’s child. His mother’s voice is full of distaste, the words clear, although it isn’t until much later that he understands them fully. He doesn’t know what a mistress is but the words ‘She had a child with her. I suppose she isn’t yours, by any chance?’ fill him with a nameless anxiety. Hearing his father’s exclamation, his footsteps approaching the slightly open door, he flees away but, even as he hides out on the hill with Monty, he thinks about the meeting earlier that day in Parhams: his mother’s cold hand gripping his own as she stared at the woman and her child. The mother looked nice – pretty, rather friendly, ready to be faintly amused – and the little girl gazed at him very intently but as if she too might like to be friends.

  As he grows up, the awareness of that child’s existence hovers at the edge of his consciousness. Once, he attempts to raise the subject with his mother.

  ‘That woman we saw in Parhams,’ he begins diffidently, ‘do you remember, Mother? Do you know her?’

  He sees the all-too-familiar expression – contempt, anger – take possession of her face as she stands at the kitchen table, kneading pastry. She looks neat and sensible in her well-cut tweed skirt with a green, thin wool jersey. She’s taken off her rings and he picks one up – the diamond that his father has given her on their engagement – and turns it in his fingers, watching the jewel flash.

  ‘Your father knows her,’ she says. ‘She’s an actress. I met her once or twice in Bristol.’

  ‘But why was she here?’ he asks.

  His mother hesitates, lips compressed. ‘She came here hoping to see your father,’ she answers. ‘They are very close friends. He spends time with them when he goes to Bristol. In fact he probably thinks more of them than he does of us.’

  ‘But why does he?’ he asks anxiously.

  She shrugs, pounding the pastry with the rolling pin, her hands white with flour; there is something almost violent in her actions.

  ‘I’m afraid to say that your father is not a particularly loyal person,’ she answers at last.

  Piers has a feeling that she is not afraid to say it; rather, he believes that she has enjoyed saying it, that the words have given her some kind of bitter pleasure. He decides after all that he doesn’t want to hear any more; he puts down the ring and goes out into the garth, calling to Monty, and as he roams about he wonders if his father truly loves the woman and her child, and why he wants them when he has a family of his own. Perhaps he would rather have a daughter than a son; perhaps that other woman, the actress, smiles more than his mother – from what he can remember of her this might well be the case – and makes him laugh?

  For a period of time he lives with two fears: the first that his father might leave them for the actress and her little girl; the second that something should happen to the actress that means that he brings the little girl to live with them. Being away at school helps to keep these fears at bay. However, quite soon after the scene following the cricket match, he is told that the Bristol office had been closed or sold – whatever the reason given it means that there are to be no more visits – and he is able to relax a little. His parents settle into a kind of truce: fewer icy silences on his mother’s part but, despite his father’s efforts, not much joy either.

  One of the things that attracts him to Sue is her cheerfulness, her readiness to laugh, to share. Being in her company has the same effect as coming from a cold, wet night into a bright room with a blazing fire: full of life and warmth. She is irresistible, her energy sweeps him off his feet. His mother doesn’t care for her much, but this isn’t new. His mother, until then, manages to take the edge off any budding relationship; that curling lip and cool eye – ‘Must she wear her skirts quite so short? So common, apart from being quite disastrous with those legs,’ or, ‘Is she capable of original thought, Piers? I suppose she can read?’ – destroy his confidence and happiness so readily.

  His father always stands up for him, which generally makes things worse: ‘I think she’s rather a swee
tie,’ he says, or, ‘When you’re eighteen you don’t particularly want to take a Nobel prize winner to a party, Marina.’

  The cool eyes rake him with contempt. ‘We all know in what direction your tastes lie, Felix. I’m hoping for something better for Piers.’

  Once, suddenly angry, his father says: ‘Should you criticize my taste so freely, Marina? After all, I married you, didn’t I?’

  Humiliated, furious with both of them, Piers leaves them on the verge of a row and, until Sue, simply ceases to take his girlfriends home. After the Royal Agricultural College, he moves into the cottage at Porlock, glad to be on his own despite being away from Michaelgarth.

  As the years pass his fears recede but his love for the old house increases and when, finally, he moves in with his young family it is one of the happiest moments of his life. Whenever he sees Michaelgarth standing like a landmark on the hill, as he drives through the archway into the garth or sits in silence in the old chapel, he feels an overwhelming sense of safety and belonging. It is his home. He knows it in all the seasons: washed in gold, its windows fiery as it reflects a blazing midsummer sunset; or with its grey stone walls sombre against the backdrop of a snowy hillside. He loves the peace of the square, elegant drawing-room on an autumn night, its heavy brocade curtains drawn against the roar of a north-easterly gale, logs settling in the grate, a sudden burst of flame casting fantastic shadows in the lamplight. This tranquil atmosphere contrasts satisfactorily with the busy untidiness of his study, with its window into the garth: that small crowded room where Joker likes to curl on an ancient, saggy sofa in a patch of sunshine whilst Piers, distracted from his desk, leafs through some long-forgotten book or listens to a recording of Miles Davis. Sometimes on these occasions he wonders what might happen if this half-sister should appear, demanding her share, forcing him to sell, and he is gripped with an icy dread. He tells himself that he has inherited the house from his mother’s family, that Michaelgarth is his now, but he cannot quite quench his fear of losing it. Even so, he has never been able to confront his father, never had the courage to ask that one vital question.