When I Was Otherwise

by Stephen Benatar

  She delivered this truth, which had gradually shaped itself out of her anguish, delivered it like the message of inspiration it undoubtedly was. And then she turned—always knowing the best line on which to make her exit—she turned, swiftly and magnificently, to sweep back up the stairs. Yet even as she did so the magnificence acquired a quality of dizziness. She meant to thrust out her hands to slow down her accelerating world; her newly accelerating world. But where were her hands? Her legs buckled under her and she became entangled with her walking stick and she lost consciousness; and she fell.

  Part Six

  47

  “I don’t want to die,” he’d said.

  “I know, dear. I know.”

  She took his hand and held it tightly and for sometime they just sat in silence.

  “Your work!” she told him. “You’ve got to lose yourself in your work. It’s the only thing that matters. It’s what you’ll leave behind you, to say that you were here.”

  “My work,” he repeated, bitterly.

  “Yes!”

  “No good. The poetry’s all dried up.”

  “What poppycock! From now on it’ll be better than ever.”

  “There’s not a single thing I want to write about.”

  “Write about Lourdes, of course.”

  They’d only just come back.

  “Oh, what’s the use?” He pulled his hand away in despair and clenched his fists wildly, struggling to express himself. “Nobody cares,” he cried. “We’re always so alone.”

  He looked—really he did look for just a minute—as though the devil might have entered into him.

  Yet then the feverish quality departed; the desperation and the drama; mere despondency remained.

  “So alone,” he repeated.

  Well, that was probably quite true. But it wasn’t apropos, she thought, and it was better not to speak of it. Things somehow grew more real as soon as you put them into words.

  Or some things. Her belief in miracles—her belief in the possibility of delayed reaction, in the possibility that just because so far the symptoms hadn’t magically cleared up—all this had paradoxically grown less real when she had attempted to express it. Paradoxically, since here she had been dealing, obviously, with articles of faith.

  She concentrated on the poetry. “It’s the first line that’s always the difficulty, isn’t it?”

  And she took a sheet of paper from a pile she’d set beside his bed and sucked with much determination on her pencil.

  Later she went out and along with the groceries bought him more books, trying to encourage him to read and hoping that stimulation might arrive through entertainment. (Or at least—one was a dictionary of quotations; did that quite qualify as entertainment?) She also bought him more gramophone records. He liked Carroll Gibbons and Jack Payne. She would have preferred something classical—an oratorio perhaps—but she sat near him and kept rewinding the machine as zealously as if it had been Handel or Purcell or Gluck to whom they listened.

  These things could be expensive. She was broke; she never quite knew where she was going to find the money. Somehow she always did. (But she categorically refused to go to his mother to ask for help.) For the time being she had given up her physiotherapy, both in Thayer Street and in the Harrow Road.

  The following day she said to him: “You were wrong, dear. You aren’t alone. I shall be here. Always. Every moment. I do care. We all care. We none of us want you to die. And the miracle could still happen.”

  Well, that was true enough too, all of it, so far as it went. The world was founded on half-truths; though it frequently ran terrified from whole ones.

  But of course he did die. And she didn’t know if he had ever quite believed in her attestations of concern—even while delivered to the beat of Jack Payne. (During the final half hour, however, it had been entirely true: empathetically, she had fought for every last gasp almost as strenuously as he had; her own heartbeat had felt wholly attuned to his—their futures had been one.) Later on, though, she’d remembered only her impatience; and she’d felt sad and worthless and ashamed.

  “What will you do after I’m dead?” he had once asked.

  “Carry on as I did before,” she’d almost answered. But, thank goodness, her usual innate tact had stopped her. “Oh, I don’t know. Somehow I suppose I’ll manage.”

  “I only wish I had been able to provide for you.”

  She merely smiled; then pursed her lips and shook her head.

  “You’ve been a good wife, Daisy. You’ve been the best thing that ever happened to me. If anyone could have made anything out of me,” he said, “that person would surely have been you.”

  “You silly ass.” She busied herself, rather unnecessarily, with tucking in his blanket again—the blanket which Dan and Erica had given them.

  “I hope that things go well for you.”

  “Oh, perhaps I’ll achieve something,” said Daisy. “Of some sort. Despite myself!” She chuckled. “And if you can achieve something despite yourself that’s quite a feather in your cap Lord dild you!”

  “Yes. It is. I really hope you will,” he repeated. “Dild?”

  “Shame upon you! Don’t you know your Hamlet? ‘Well, God dild you! They say the owl was a baker’s daughter. Lord, we know what we are but know not what we may be. God be at your table!’”

  “Yes, and at yours, Daisy. May he be forever at your table! Even when you’re dying.”

  “Thank you, dear. I trust he will. I certainly sent out an invitation! But I forgot to put RSVP, so you can never be quite sure.”

  “Oh, yes,” he said, “I think you can.”

  That was the Saturday before he died. He seemed to have discovered a certain strength during those latter days.

  48

  About one hour later Dr Ballad was at the door. By then Dan and Marsha had got Daisy into bed—she was only a small thing and even as a dead weight she was finally manageable for the two of them, although Dan was breathing very heavily, more so than Marsha, and seemed to be looking to her for guidance as to every move. She didn’t mind that. When Daisy was arranged neatly on her bed—and the counterpane too pulled neatly across, right beneath her chin (“Tomorrow, Dan, I’ll put her in pyjamas and tuck her cosily between the sheets!”)—Marsha led her brother down to the dining room and sliced off the tops of his eggs for him, which mercifully hadn’t grown hard (she noted, with much gratitude, that had they eaten them as soon as she had set them on the table the whites would surely have been watery; none of them enjoyed a watery egg). She cut his bread and butter into strips so that he could dip them in the yolk. “Soldiers,” she said, and smiled at him. “I’ll go and warm some milk and put a lot of sugar in it. I think you’ve had a shock.”

  And, of course, they’d both had a shock, a dreadful shock. But she was stronger; she was younger; she could handle it. (All right, she had misjudged the timing of the eggs. Yet even that had turned out for the best.)

  Daisy, too, must have received a shock. Poor thing. Even though she’d brought it on herself! Obviously. One only hoped that it would prove a valuable lesson to her. Both valuable and lasting.

  When she returned with the milk Dan hadn’t started on his meal; he was just sitting at the table staring across at the wallpaper. She didn’t scold him. She dipped in the first of his bread-and-butter fingers and held it out to him and he obediently opened his mouth like a young bird.

  “I wonder who first thought of calling them soldiers,” she said as she watched him chew and swallow. “And why.” She pursed her lips a second. “I know that Daisy regards me as unintelligent, yet I’m not so sure she’s right. I do wonder about things—I always have: things, maybe, which she just takes for granted but doesn’t really know the answer to.”

  “Is the doctor coming?” asked Dan. He had asked her several times already.

  “Now don’t you worry your head about the doctor, darling. You just drink your hot milk and eat up those nice eggs. There’s a jam
Swiss roll for afters. You know I phoned the doctor as soon as it happened, don’t you?—although I’m not really sure I need have done so, now.”

  “Why, is she dead?” He stopped his chewing and looked at her in trepidation.

  “Good heavens, no, darling, she’s not dead.” She handed him another strip of bread and he accepted it mechanically; she saw it now not as a finger or a soldier but as a fat white juicy worm dripping with yellow goodness.

  “Because I know I saw her breathing,” he said.

  “Of course you saw her breathing. Of course you did. I only meant—one does so hate to trouble people without proper cause. Doctors are such busy folk as well. It would be selfish if one brought them out for nothing.”

  “I think I heard her moan a bit, too. I’m fairly sure I heard her moan.”

  Marsha continued feeding him. “Well, yes, I’m sure you did. That would only be natural.”

  “She may have broken bones,” he persisted. “In fact, she probably has. She looked quite funny, didn’t she? All sort of twisted up—before you straightened her and pushed her into place?”

  “Dan, dear, I can see the food in your mouth! It isn’t very nice. You must remember that broken bones do knit. Everything heals with time. Well…nearly everything.”

  Marsha scraped around the bottom of his first egg; got out every scrap of white and then with satisfaction popped the spoon into his mouth. She hated wastefulness. Even the skin which had formed on the top of his milk she drew off with the same spoon and slipped carefully on to the congealing yolk of his second egg. The two other eggs, her own and Daisy’s, she would boil up again tomorrow; she would use them either in sandwiches or in a curry or a salad.

  “Besides, Dan. What makes you speak of broken bones?” She shook her head at him with unchallengeable authority and gave him a broad and reassuring smile. “Haven’t you heard Daisy tell us—time and again—that people only need to know the proper way to fall? If there’s one thing you can safely leave to Daisy it’s any problem concerning the correct way of relaxing while you’re having an accident. Or is it the correct way of arranging your limbs? I seem to have forgotten but anyhow the point is…” She hardly needed to say what the point was. “Isn’t that so, my precious?”

  He nodded then, his own thoughtful nods staying in harmony with hers. He seemed much comforted but also just a little uncertain. And despite the care she’d taken when she put the cup to his lips and brought it down each time, a particle of creamy skin dangled from one corner of his mouth. She ministered first to his physical requirements and then to his mental.

  “You see, Dan, all you need from now on is complete trust in my judgment. Marsha knows best. Marsha knows what’s best for all three of us. She’ll look after you; she’ll take care of things. Because you haven’t forgotten, have you, what happened here that morning you were out and there was a spider in the bath and she, silly thing”—Marsha jerked her head towards the ceiling—“was absolutely terrified? Well, who was the one who coped? Who was the one who brought tranquillity back into this house? And do you know how I did it? I put myself into that poor little spider’s head. I said to myself: now what is the best way to set about this, not only from Daisy’s point of view and from Marsha’s point of view, but from my own point of view as well (said the spider!—oh, what a clever old spider I am, I am! What a clever old spider I am).”

  She laughed, wiped his mouth again on the crisply laundered napkin (checked that it was still well anchored in his collar and fully spread across his chest), then bent to kiss him gently on the cheek.

  “She stoops to conquer!” she exclaimed merrily. “And if you like, Dan, dear Dan, dear Desperate Dan, I’ll tell you the whole long story later on. We’ll call it ‘The Sleeping Spider’, shall we? I think that would be a good and thrilling title. But right now I’ve got to go and get ready for the doctor. So, darling, if I cut you an extra large slice of Swiss roll you’ll promise me you won’t leave any of it? There’s my good boy! Not so much as a single crumb, mind! I don’t want to see so much as a single smear of jam!”

  Then she went upstairs and sat down at her dressing table and looked at herself in the mirror. My goodness—what a fright! she thought. Oh, somehow I’ve got to do something about this!

  And even twenty minutes later, when the doctor came, she was barely ready for him—although in the intervals between darting to the window to look out for his car she had worked so very fast.

  In fact she actually had to keep him waiting a while, but that didn’t matter. She had always heard it was good to keep a gentleman waiting; it served to whet his appetite. And Dan wouldn’t hear the bell, of course. He never did, poor thing.

  She took a final look in her full-length mirror before she left the room—swivelled and glanced across her shoulder, smoothing her hands down carefully, appraisingly, over her bottom. There! Would she pass mustard? She rather felt she would. She had quickly changed her dress; had chosen a little floral thing, simple but quite effective—sweet English roses for an English rose!—which fitted snugly round the hips and really suited her, she thought. She’d put on a spot of fresh makeup. (Indeed, because she’d considered she had been looking a trifle wan she’d put on more than just a spot; had maybe torn a leaf out of someone else’s book—she hoped she hadn’t overdone it!) But she had needed to give herself a boost and with any luck the doctor wouldn’t even realize it was camouflage! With any luck he’d think it was the natural her! For Dr Ballad was young, you see, and very handsome. He made her think of Andrew.

  She ran downstairs; or went as swiftly as she could; her chilblains were worse these days and to add to this she had a corn.

  But she reminded herself: not now, not any longer. All that was in the past. Such things belonged, exclusively, to the frightened folk. They existed only in the mind.

  She ran downstairs.

  “Dr Ballad. How could I keep you waiting?”

  “Oh, that’s all right.” He’d been standing way back in the road, looking up at the house, but now he came swiftly forward. “No doubt you had your hands full.”

  “Yes.”

  He stepped inside and Marsha found him looking at her in perceptible surprise. Perceptible admiration. Well, he’d never seen her so dressed up before.

  She dimpled shyly; glanced down from under spiked, mascara-ed lashes. “Where shall I find Mrs Stormont?” he asked.

  “In the lounge, Dr Ballad. Please step into the lounge.”

  “This door?”

  “No!” She said more gently: “No, the other. Allow me to lead the way.”

  He looked at her enquiringly when he saw an empty room. She closed the door behind them.

  “Thank you so much, doctor, for turning out like this; I appreciate your promptness—although your wife did say you’d come the very moment you got back. That was your wife, I imagine? She had a sweet voice.”

  He nodded.

  “Do you love her?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Oh, I know. That was exceedingly personal of me. Please forgive…?” She glanced down again—and dimpled again, demurely apologetic. Then she met his eye once more and started on a new sentence.

  “But I only hope I haven’t brought you out here on a fool’s errand.”

  “I’m sorry? I don’t understand. You said that Mrs Stormont had had a fall?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then, please, where is—?”

  “I’m afraid it was extremely silly of me.” He was checked abruptly in mid-sentence.

  “Silly?”

  “You see, I know I did say Mrs Stormont. But I meant me. I was rather shaken, doctor; I’d had a very nasty shock. It was the last in a long line of things as a matter of fact—only this morning my older son and his family departed for Australia—”

  “And?” Now it was his turn to interrupt. He did this gently but with firmness.

  “Well, foolishly—I don’t know why it is—I often think of myself as Mrs Stormont, not Mrs Poynton
. But I’m sure you’ll understand. You grow up as Miss Stormont, you have a Mrs Stormont living under the same roof, you hear the name so often used… I imagine it could happen to anyone? I daresay it could even happen to you, doctor?”

  “Er…yes…I’m certain it could. But the main thing is, Mrs Poynton, it’s you who had the fall? Well, at least you don’t appear to have hurt yourself too badly—not on the surface anyhow. But, as you say, it must have given you a fearful shock. Do please sit down. Have you taken anything to calm you?”

  “No, I haven’t, doctor. But would you like to join me in a glass of sherry? I feel certain there’s a little left.”

  He was holding her wrist. She enjoyed that, and the sherry of course could wait.

  “It happened on the stairs, my wife wrote down. Did you fall a long way?”

  “No, no; no great distance at all. I’m afraid on the telephone I may have exaggerated.”

  “Well, better safe than sorry; especially perhaps—I know you won’t mind my saying this—if one happens to have reached a certain age…” He added: “Now, would you say it was three stairs?—four?—more than that, or less, would you suppose?”

  “But what has age got to do with it?” She laughed. “It’s the way you feel that counts.”

  “Exactly, Mrs Poynton. I couldn’t agree with you more. Now if you’d like to lie on that settee for a moment I think I’d better give you a very quick once-over just to make sure.” He helped her from her chair, then went down on his haunches to open up his black bag.

  “Shall I take my dress off?”

  “No, I don’t think that will be necessary.”

  “But I wouldn’t be embarrassed. Truly I wouldn’t. I’m wearing my prettiest set of undies.”

  Both the tone in which she made this statement, and the smile with which she accompanied it, heightened his feeling of anxiety. Nor did her giggle, when he used his stethoscope, do anything to reassure him. He kept the physical examination brief. After all, there were patently no broken bones; not even a ricked ankle; no obvious symptoms of internal bleeding. In fact, if it had really been a proper fall, the whole thing was utterly amazing—in somebody of Mrs Poynton’s age. And he wasn’t happy about any of it. No, not in the slightest.