by PETER DAVEY
“Yeah, one day maybe. But in the meantime I want to work. I want to do what I do. And I reckon I can handle it – now that I’ve got you.”
He took a long, slow drag on his cigarette. “And what about ‘Loss’?”
“Oh sod it, I’m sick and tired of that fucking book! I’ve made my confession. If people choose not to believe me, that’s their problem. And neither Hales nor the Connaught people are pressing charges. They’re going with the theory that I’m a delusional nutter.”
“You know it’s not going to be as simple as that. Most people may not believe you but there’ll still be plenty who do. And there’ll always be some smart-arse comic or a lone voice in the audience or some gossip columnist who’s got it in for you. They’re not going to let you forget, and I don’t want you put under that pressure – not now that you’re well again.”
“Yeah, but everything’s changed, don’t you see? It’s not about what’s out there – it never was. It’s about what’s inside. I feel clean inside now, and I feel strong because I’ve got you! Besides, there’s no mileage in accusing me of stealing ‘Tyranny’ because I’ve already admitted it.”
Dominic fell silent again, listening to the perpetual roar of the waves as the crimson sky darkened over the sea. Nicola reached out and squeezed his hand. “But I’m only going to do it if you’re okay with it.”
He sighed. “It’s just been so nice here. And I’ve felt...”
“Felt what?”
“Well... like your equal, I guess.”
“What are you talking about? You’ll always be my equal, wherever we are. I need you.”
“That’s good to know. So which one of these mouth-watering offers are you going to take?”
“I’m going to do 'Bernarda Alba'.”
“A play?”
“Yes, a play. I want to be a proper actress again, Dominic. I want to stand there in the flesh and look a real-life audience in the eye and be myself – or, at least, myself being someone else.”
2
They landed at Heathrow to rain and stormy skies. Separating from Dominic at passport control, Nicola – in jeans, a bomber jacket, baseball cap and her Dolce and Gabbana sunglasses – walked alone and unnoticed through the terminal then took a taxi to Greenwich where they met up again and installed themselves in a low-key hotel near the theatre. They bought a new car together – a Mercedes E220 CDI – and the old Cabriolet – battered and bruised but still faithful – was given away to two Pakistani boys who ran a car lot behind St Pancras Station. Nicola paid for the Mercedes, naturally, but she wanted it registered in Dominic’s name. When rehearsals began, he took a run to the coast.
*
He could just about remember the way. He parked by the pumping station, climbed out and stood for a while gazing over the marshes at the corner of Ted’s caravan protruding from its clump of bushes. Once again he was unsuitably shod but this time he didn’t care. When he reached his destination, his knuckle hovered a moment an inch from the door before knocking.
It opened almost at once. Ted stared at him. “Well I’ll be damned.”
“Ted, there’s something very important I have to say to you.”
“Right. Well, you’d better come in then,” he said, turning back inside.
Dominic clambered through the little door and glanced around at the cramped interior in dismay.
“Do you want some tea?”
“Yes, okay. That’d be good. Thanks.”
He didn’t really want tea but he thought, in the circumstances, that it might be politic not to refuse.
“I warn you, I use whisky instead of milk. It doesn’t go off. At least, that’s my excuse. Sit down.”
Unable to stand up straight anyway, Dominic was glad to be able to lower himself into the narrow bench seat behind the table. Ted struck a match and lit the gas.
“So what brings you to this neck of the woods?” he asked, filling the kettle. “I thought the whole boring business had finally been laid to rest.”
“Ted, I’m not sure if you’re aware of it, but I’m seeing Nicola.”
He laughed. “I am aware of it. Despite my official designation as ‘hermit’ I’m not completely out of touch. I daren’t think how you pulled it off though.”
“I went to visit her a few times in the clinic where she was a patient. I was hoping to get a confession out of her.”
“And they let you in? Just like that?”
“No, I was posing as a representative of one of her fan clubs. It was a very carefully-constructed ruse. I put a lot of preparation into it.”
Ted turned to face him, the kettle dangling in his hand. “You’re just not going to let this go, are you?”
“I’ve let it go now but I hadn’t then. I was going to write a book about it. That was my motive all along.”
“I always knew you had another agenda. So, did you get your confession out of her?”
“No. It turned out she had an agenda of her own. She suddenly discharged herself and came and stayed with me.”
“So the film star whom you made it your mission in life to destroy chose to come and stay with you?”
“Yes. Though she’s more than just staying with me. We’re an item. We’re in love.”
Ted responded with a laugh – or rather, a cynical rasping noise in the nasal passages.
“I know. Not quite the outcome anyone was expecting. Least of all me.”
“And has she confided in you now?”
“Yes.”
Ted looked at Dominic for a moment, then turned away to search for cups in the little cupboard.
“I know the truth, Ted.”
“Oh? And which particular version of the truth is that?”
“The true one. The one where you meet a girl called Nicola Pearson in The Queen’s Head where she’s working as a waitress and you commiserate about your respective artistic disappointments. And then, to cut a long story short, you propose to her that she submit ‘The Tyranny of Love’ with her name on the cover. And that she change that name to Nicola Carson. And that she call the novel ‘Loss’.”
Ted lowered his eyes from the cupboard. “That was her idea. I always hated that title.”
“But the rest is true?”
“Yes, it is.”
“So what you told me, and Anne, and the solicitor was all… lies? And the court case, had it gone ahead, would have been based on a falsehood?”
“Yes. Which is why I withdrew it. My conscience got the better of me.”
“Is that really why you withdrew it?”
Ted fixed Dominic with a flinty stare. “You wouldn't be capable of understanding how betrayed I felt. Nicola and I were soul mates, despite the age difference. When we were together in Richmond we made a pact – to pool our resources and help each other build our careers and get our revenge on those bastards who’d been knocking us back all our lives – people like your boss. But she never kept her side of the bargain. When she became famous – using my novel – she forgot me. Okay, she eventually got her secretary to send me some wads of cash but that was just to cover her back. She never put her weight behind ‘Summers’ like she promised to do, and that was all I cared about. And when – after you turned up – I tried to contact her to warn her we’d been rumbled, she was too busy being a superstar to see me. I just had a message from her stuck-up secretary – ‘Miss Caaarson sends her best wishes and her sincere apologies.’ She couldn’t even be bothered to come to the phone and speak to me in person. That was why I did what I did.”
“She’s spoken to me about that. You probably won’t believe me but she refused to see you because she was ashamed.”
Ted considered his words. “Yes, well, you’re right. I probably won’t believe you.”
“And that’s why she lied in her statement on television. I tried to persuade her not to, to protect her own reputation, but she was adamant.”
“You mean, she lied to protect my reputation?”
“Exactly.”
“Yeah, well, that’s great except that, thanks to her, I don’t have a reputation to protect.”
Dominic was fiddling with a piece of paper – one of many strewn on the table – curling its corner between his long, pale thumb and fingers, folding it over then pressing it into a tiny triangle. “Ted, the real reason I came is to ask you a favour. Quite a big favour. It involves yet more deceit, I’m afraid, but it’s not deceit that’s going to harm anyone.”
“Is there such a thing?” he murmured, but Dominic did not respond. He was in no mood for Ted’s moralising.
“Nicola’s insisting on coming to see you. She wants to ask your forgiveness – to your face. And when she does...”
“Oh I get it!” laughed Ted, cutting across him. “She doesn’t know, does she? She doesn’t know you know me.”
“No. She doesn’t.”
“Of course she doesn’t! Because if she knew you were the one who’d unearthed our little secret and spent five months of your life obsessively trying to destroy her, she wouldn’t be so in love, would she?”
“But I didn’t know her then! And I didn’t know the truth because you’d been lying to everyone! Once I got to know what she’s really like, I came over to her side.”
“So why don’t you tell her that? Why don’t you try being honest with her?”
“Because... I daren’t. She trusts me. And she’s been through so much. She’s still fragile – physically and emotionally. I’m the one person in the world she trusts...”
“You should tell her, Dominic. Get things out in the open.”
“I know. But then I think, why does she really need to know? It’s all over now and what really happened anyway? Nothing. The lawsuit was scrapped. And only you and Anne know I had anything to do with it...”
“So if you can square us you’ll be in the clear?”
“I suppose so. But not because I want to deceive her. I hate lying to her. I’m just trying to protect her.”
“You never protect anyone by lying to them. Lies grow, they grow from tiny seeds of deceit until they acquire a life of their own and become monsters.”
“With all due respect, Ted, I don’t think you’re in any position to lecture me on lying.”
“The lie Nicola and I told was entirely different! It was a ploy. A marketing strategy, nothing more. It didn’t hurt anyone. We weren’t betraying anyone.”
“And what about the lie you told Anne?”
Ted was stopped short. “I know. It was wrong. And I regret it.”
“Are you going to be honest with her?”
“I don’t know.”
They both fell silent again. Suddenly Dominic wanted to go. He wanted to get out of that tiny cage of a caravan, away from this man’s company and back to London.
“Look, Ted, all I’m asking is that for the few minutes you and Nicola are together you pretend I’m a total stranger. That shouldn’t be too big a challenge to your celebrated acting skills.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Oh come on. Those wads of cash you mentioned. How much did she send you? A million? Two million? Must have been quite a comfort while you were living the simple life of an ascetic – gazing at the sea and writing your poems about nature and the human condition. That performance alone is worthy of an Oscar.”
“I live like this because this is how I chose to live!” he retorted. “And I never received a penny I wasn’t entitled to!”
“Okay, okay. All I’m saying is that if you decide not to do me this little favour, don’t forget that I’m in a position to do you a favour back.”
“Really? How’s that?”
“By not telling Anne and the rest of the world the truth about you and Nicola.”
Ted laughed. “Are you threatening me?”
“No. I’m just pointing out that we’re in the same boat. You’ve got a secret about me that I don’t want told and I’ve got a secret about you that you don’t want told. So I think it’d be better for both of us if we keep our mouths shut. Don’t you?”
3
Anne picked up Ted and they went to The Lemon Grass – a Thai restaurant in Eastbourne which had a good reputation. They were greeted by a diminutive waitress who was exquisitely pretty but had rather limited English: “Good evening, you are very happy nice day?”
“Thank you, we are and we have,” smiled Ted.
She showed them to a table by the window then brought them menus and crackers and took their order for drinks. When she left, Ted cast a glance at the other customers scattered among the tables. The place had a pleasant, peaceful ambience, enhanced by a formless dribble of oriental music emanating from the walls. He briefly surveyed the menu then laid it down.
“Anne, I’ve been thinking about what we were saying that day, at Linda’s. If you really feel strongly about me moving out of the caravan, I will. But, as I said, I’m just not sure where I’m going to go.”
“I’ve been thinking about that too,” she said. “And I was wondering if we could maybe... look for somewhere together. Start afresh.”
He stared at her in stunned silence. He had been hoping against hope that the opportunity might present itself, sometime in the future, for him to make that proposition to her. He had never imagined it would be the other way around.
“What’s brought this on?”
“It’s got nothing to do with Nicola’s confession, if that’s what you’re thinking. Nor with the possibility of you publishing. I’m not that shallow.”
“You’re not shallow at all. Anything but.” Then he glanced down at her hand, which was touching the base of her wine glass. “You’ve never stopped wearing your wedding ring.”
“I couldn’t get it off!”
“You can’t imagine how long I’ve waited for this moment. But... there’s something I have to tell you first.”
She withdrew her hand as the waitress reappeared with the drinks. Having carefully set them down, she asked, “You ready order now?”
“If you could just give us a minute,” said Ted, whereupon she smiled and melted away.
He adjusted the position of his fork, even though it already lay precisely parallel to his place mat, which was adorned with a profusion of pink and purple orchids.
“Anne, as I said, there’s something I have to tell you. About the book. And about Nicola.”
She looked at him a little warily but said nothing.
“It’s something I was going to say in that interview, but then I decided against, not because it would’ve destroyed my chances of being taken seriously as a writer but because I’m not sure that anyone would have believed me. And I think it could actually have harmed Nicola, which wasn’t what I wanted – especially after she made that confession on television.”
He adjusted his small knife, even though it could not have been more perfectly parallel to its larger companion. “It’s not that what I did initially was so terrible in itself. The world would have forgiven me for that, would have understood. It was just a strategy – like George Eliot publishing under a man’s name to get around the prejudice against women writers in the nineteenth century. It was what I did afterwards – making out that Nicola stole my manuscript and threatening to take her to court. That was what was unforgivable.”
Anne frowned, mystified. “But she did steal your manuscript.”
“Well, she didn’t. Not exactly. What she said happened and what I said happened – neither was true.”
“Ted, what are you talking about?”
“I knew about it. I knew about it all along. In fact… it was my idea.”
She stared at him. “What?”
“I knew I’d never break in on my own, no matter how good my writing – my face, my age, my background – everything was wrong. With her, on the other hand, everything was right. She was young, fresh, beautiful, charismatic, she had her whole life ahead of her. She could be marketed. And she was. That’s how it is nowadays.”
Slowly, haltingly,
and frequently repositioning the cutlery, he told her everything: about Nicola's enthusiasm for Tyranny, about her suggestion that she promote it for him and his suggestion that they go further and present her as the author; and about how, when she was famous, she would use her influence to help him get his own career off the ground. “That was what we were doing in Richmond,” he concluded. “She wasn’t helping me with ‘Summers’. We were getting ‘Tyranny’ published.”
Anne had gone pale. “And what about all the money that book must have made? And the Connaught Prize money?”
“We were going to go fifty-fifty.”
“And did you?”
“Not really. She took ages to send me anything, even though her agent had screwed a fifty grand advance out of Jonathan Hale.”
“Fifty thousand pounds!” Anne exploded, attracting curious glances from the other diners.
“Yes, that was entirely her doing. She was very motivated. But, as I said, it took her ages to pass any of it on to me. Then when she made it in films she starting sending me wads of cash, care of the Queen’s – just money stuffed into jiffy bags – no note with it, nothing.”
“So all this time you’ve been living like a pauper in that caravan, gaining all that spiritual enlightenment, you’ve literally been sitting on a fortune! That was how you paid off Peach and the barrister! All that stuff about inner peace and serenity was all… rubbish! It was all an act!”
“Well no, not entirely. I’d have chosen to live like that anyway. Believe it or not, I've been happy out there in the wilds.”
“So where is all this money? Buried under your vegetable patch?”
“Some of it, yes. I didn’t want to put it in the bank, where it would have attracted attention, and there’s no security at the caravan. But most of it I gave away in dribs and drabs to the children.”
“They never said anything.”
“I asked them not to. I told them I was making a bit of money writing articles. They never questioned it or expressed any interest in the articles – they despise the very ground I walk on, after all, though it didn’t stop them taking the money. But it made me feel a bit better about having been such a lousy father.”