by Brian Aldiss
As everyone clapped, Squire put on a puzzled expression and asked, ‘But which are you going to do, Mother — get married or live together?’
Amid the laughter, Willie said, ‘Madge and I are determined to start anew, as far as that’s possible at our advanced age. She’ll sell her place, I’ll sell up mine, and we’ll buy a little bungalow, possibly in Hunstanton. Settle down like Darby and Joan, whoever they were.’
Shaking his uncle warmly by the hand, Squire offered his congratulations. He embraced Mrs Davies.
‘Tom, I hope you won’t find anything too…’ She hesitated for a phrase which had vanished without trace.
‘Does Teresa know?’
‘We told her before she went off to Malta. I mean, your uncle and I are just going to be close friends.’
‘I shouldn’t trust him if I were you, Mother.’
‘It’s thirty-four years since Diana died,’ Willie said defensively. He brought out his pipe and lit it.
Broadwell moved to get more drinks. Mrs Davies’s news was received with amused pleasure. She herself became flustered and apologetic and reminiscent and flirtatious.
When Broadwell returned with champagne, she thanked him and said, ‘If Will and I are to be united, it is important to us that Tom and Teresa — you see, she’s still a child to me, Mr Broadwell, although she’s in her forties, and she and I have always been very alike in our tastes. Not all perhaps, but many. She’s always been artistic. Next year is going to be a good one for Tom, I know, so he can afford to be kind to Teresa and try and understand her point of view. As his publisher, you can exert a good influence on him, I’m sure.’
Ron Broadwell laughed. ‘That’s not a view people generally have of publishers!’
‘It’s dreadful how everyone seems to quarrel nowadays. I’m sure it was never like it is today — I don’t know what’s happening in the world. I heard just this morning that the Persians are demonstrating against the Shah. That man’s done so much for his country, it does seem ungrateful. I saw him in London once, several years ago, and he looked so distinguished.’
They all drank a toast to Madge and Willie.
‘I must remind you that Teresa will not return to Pippet Hall,’ Squire told his mother-in-law a little later. ‘You must understand my position. I will not eat humble pie forever, although I would like our life to resume as soon as possible. Do you have any notion of my present difficulties? I think you should speak to Teresa, Mother. She can manage her new business from the Hall, if that’s the problem.’
‘Oh, dear, that’s not the problem. I’m afraid you brought this on yourself, Tom, all this unfaithfulness, it’s dreadful. Such things never happened in the twenties, when I was young.’
‘Really, Mother? You surprise me. Historians regard the twenties as a period of noted licence, if not licentiousness. Twenties, forties, sixties, the even-numbered decades, all periods of so-called low morals, separated by outbreaks of so-called morality.’
She smiled placatingly at him.
‘Well, whatever it is, I think it’s all wrong. You’ve only to read the papers. They’re full of it. Something’s gone wrong with the nation. People don’t know their places any longer. All your encouragement of these so-called arts doesn’t help, either. You should know better in your position. I don’t blame you especially, Tom, but don’t you think all this dreadful rock and roll demoralizes young people? When Ernest and I got married all those years ago, we started out with such high hopes. We worked hard, we went to church, we kept ourselves properly to ourselves… No, oh, England has become — well, I feel it is hostile, I don’t recognize it. Some mornings I feel the world’s going to collapse. Now you and Teresa…’
She left the sentence dangling, as being too dreadful to finish.
He regarded her with sympathy. ‘I feel just the opposite. But perhaps the instability of the world was demonstrated to me rather early in life. I think everything’s all right, despite the newspapers. It’s true we confuse material and moral values. It’s true husbands and wives fall out. It’s true the divorce rate is going up and the birth rate down. It’s true there is a quality we call evil in individuals, which gets magnified by theories and ideologies which have power to rule our common sense. But still humans aren’t bad, and we’re rather lucky to be living together on this snug little planet. Your announcing your engagement to Uncle Willie makes us all feel even luckier.’
Mrs Davies pursed her lips. ‘I don’t understand you, Tom. How you can be so happy away from your wife, I don’t understand. You used to be so loving. Make it up with her this evening — to please Willie and I.’
Squire took a judiciously deep drink of his champagne.
Mrs Davies set her glass down on a side-table, among small silver objects, resting her ringed and wrinkled hand over it. ‘I don’t understand what’s happening. But then, you always were a mystery to me. You’re so intellectual, I suppose. Then there was that rather unpleasant business in Yugoslavia you were involved in — I never could understand that. And I remember when you got married you insisted on having that red Aga installed, whereas poor Teresa had set her heart on a white one. She’s not happy either. Her business is going wrong — she and her partner are in trouble, and I know she owes lots of money all over the place, even New York. Isn’t New York bankrupt, too? I don’t pretend to understand these things, and she won’t confide in me any more. I even have to feed the dog.’
As if the word had been a signal, two enormous spaniels, liver and white, burst into the room. They made straight for Mrs Davies, springing on her with the mindless abandon of their kind. As her hand was knocked, the champagne glass went flying, to finish in pieces against the wall. She lay back on the sofa with her hands before her face, and the dogs trampled over her as if over a small muddy hill. Belinda appeared among them, dragging them off by their collars and cursing them cheerfully.
‘Oh, you canine delinquents! Mrs Davies, how can I say how sorry I am? I hope you like dogs. They were shut in the back hall, weren’t you, you bums, and they made a spirited dash for companionship, freedom and you, not necessarily in that order. Would you like something to eat?’
Willie appeared chivalrously to assist his bride-to-be, the broken glass was cleared, the dogs were returned to captivity, more champagne was poured, and, as the fuss died down, Squire managed to deflect his uncle into Ron Broadwell’s study.
‘I should have written you a note, my dear Tom, but you have been rather elusive. I do hope our news doesn’t come as too much of a shock? Madge is a good woman.’
‘Not at all, no.’
‘We’re going to stay in town tonight. At Brown’s. Haven’t stayed at Brown’s for years. It’s still very comfortable. Separate rooms, of course.’
‘Of course. Now, Uncle, I want a little plain talk with you. Perhaps I’ve been rather slow on the uptake — ’
Willie looked unhappy. ‘Do we have to talk personally, Tom? After all, it is New Year’s Eve. Doesn’t your publisher have a telly?’
Squire stuck his hands in his pockets. ‘My present position is unsatisfactory. I cannot endure it much longer. My life is no life. I’m in a grey area. I shall be under general scrutiny, no use pretending otherwise, when the “Frankenstein” series starts its run at the end of February; the gossip columnists are after me already. You know all about Teresa’s and my situation — and about Laura Nye. Well, in case you didn’t know it, I renounced Laura as promised. I did so in September, three months ago.’
Uncle Willie had become cautious and took refuge behind his pipe. He sat down on the arm of a chair, adopting a lawyer-like attitude.
‘October, the way I heard it.’
Making an impatient gesture in the air, Squire said, ‘October, then, for God’s sake! That’s still two months ago, Uncle. Whenever it was, I renounced her. I loved Laura, Uncle, and she loved me.’
‘You’re your father’s son, Tom. She was half your age.’
‘And you’re getting married again
in your bloody seventies. Try to understand. It was real. And I gave it up for Teresa’s sake.’
The older man shook his head. ‘In my experience, no good ever comes of renunciations. No good at all. They have a reputation for being noble, and I suppose it’s made you feel noble. But my experience in law has shown me that renunciations lead only to bad blood and recrimination, often over years.’
The words took Squire by surprise. He sat down opposite his uncle.
‘Anger, disappointment, a trail of disaster,’ Willie said. ‘Sorry.’
‘Very well, Uncle, I am angry, I am disappointed. Laura gave me a great deal — qualities I don’t get elsewhere. I admit, I have admitted to Teresa, that I was in the wrong. I feel very bad about it. Yet Teresa still plays difficult, still will not come back. Do you know why not because, if so, I want to know too.’
Willie chewed his lower lip and looked embarrassed. ‘My dear Tom, Madge and I now naturally want you two youngsters back together again more than ever. You must understand that, and it’s more than sentiment. There’s the fate of the Hall and everything — ’
‘I don’t wish to talk about the Hall. Answer my question, please. What is Teresa playing at?’
‘Don’t start bullying me. That won’t help, just because you’ve messed up your affairs.’
‘Give me a straight answer, then. Madge has just told me that Teresa’s business is virtually bankrupt, and that she and her partner are broke. All news to me — bad news. I didn’t even know she had a partner. Who is it? Who’s the partner?’
‘I thought you knew.’ Evasively.
‘Who is it? I’m asking you.’
‘Look, Tom, keep your voice down. Oughtn’t we — ’
‘Who’s the partner, Uncle. Tell me. Not her mother?’
‘Vernon Jarvis, of course.’
‘Who’s Vernon Jarvis?’
‘You know who Vernon Jarvis is. You’ve met him. Teresa told me you’d met him.’
‘Jarvis? Christ, that little sod whose brother wanted to run in Moscow. Yes, he sneaked into the Hall once, one morning, shortly after I got back from Singapore. I bumped into him in the passage… Uncle, are you telling me that that fellow is screwing my wife? Is that what’s going on? Jarvis?’
Uncle Willie rose, put his pipe down and started shaking his head and rolling his eyes. ‘Tom, Tom, don’t get excited. You must already know all this. Why ask me? It’s none of my business, only what I’ve heard from Madge. Why pretend not to know? First you were away, then you went off and gave him a clear field.’
‘He has been screwing Teresa? He still is? That’s what she’s up to… God, I didn’t know. I never suspected — why should I?… Has that little bastard been in Malta with her? Oh, God, no… She was so bloody self-righteous, so bloody self-righteous about the way I carried on, spying on me with field-glasses, and all the while she was getting him up to the house. I can hardly believe it of her. Teresa. In our house, our rooms… God, I’d have killed them both, I swear, shot them like dogs, if I’d have caught them…’
He choked. A bottle of Bell’s whisky stood on Broadwell’s mahogany bookcase. Squire went over to it, poured a generous measure into his empty champagne glass, and drank it neat.
‘It’s too much. The husband’s always supposed to hear these things last. Why didn’t you warn me?’ His cheeks blazed red.
Uncle Willie was also flustered. ‘Damn it, I did try to warn you. In summer of last year, June or whenever it was you came up to my office in Norwich. And other times.’
Squire let out a long groan. ‘My guilt, I suppose; I remember — I believed you were warning me to watch my own behaviour. I thought you were laying on a few preachments. Why not simply say outright, “That little shit Jarvis is fucking your wife”? Then it might have got through to me.’
He stood calming himself, stretching his arms, gazing bitterly out at the darkness beyond the window-panes.
His uncle came behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. ‘She doesn’t mean anything. She still loves you. She just needed comfort. Jarvis is what you’d call a temporary measure, I’m sure of that.’
Turning, Squire said, ‘So she doesn’t mean anything by it? A few fucks are neither here nor there, is that it? Well, I’d accept that theory, you see, I’d be bloody well prepared to accept that theory — but how come when I had a few fucks here and there she made my life such a misery? All that moral gush I had to wade through? And you damned well siding with her, you utter hypocrite, just because you’re planning to get your leg over her mother!’
‘Tom, Tom, I’m only saying — ’
‘The bitch! There’s no excuse… God!’ He drank off the rest of his whisky and started pacing.’ The promptness with which she must have got back at me. As if she was waiting for the excuse… You don’t have to be a male chauvinist to see through Women’s Lib and all that tripe. Biology takes care of that. There are biological and ontological differences in sexual behaviour between men and women which no cultural cosmetics can disguise. It’s a simple fact of existence that a man can father far more offspring than his mate can bear. A woman is limited in her potential for reproduction by her capacity to nurture her young — not to mention those long tedious months of gestation.’
‘But that’s — ’
‘Throughout the history of the human species, males compete to fertilize the bloody females, and not vice versa. You may have observed as much yourself. Why else do men always look at women and women at themselves? We’ve got no instinctual investment in fidelity as a sex — we sow our seed whenever the opportunity arises. If it wasn’t so, the bloody rats would be strutting about in charge of the planet.’
‘Oh, calm down, Tom. She could be here any minute. She’s still your wife.’
‘Fucking well try telling her that!’
‘Don’t spoil New Year’s Eve! Think of these other people. I’m going. I’ve had enough of your Army language.’
Squire took to pacing again.
‘Take Teresa’s and my case. We married, we had children. We had four children. I suppose you remember Georgie, who died at the age of two — that was in 1956, of all miserable years — because Tess and I still do, if you don’t. We cared for them, educated them expensively — so that they could turn anarchist and bugger up the country and consort with the likes of Fred Cholera. All that represents a considerable existential investment on the part of this male!’ He struck his chest. ‘So I am under evolutionary pressure to protect myself against being cuckolded, and to reject other brats, fat devouring cuckoos, sired on my spouse by any passing male who fancies her, never mind some little shit whose brother plans to run the four-hundred metres in Moscow.’
‘Don’t get worked up again. Where did I put my pipe?’
‘For these reasons, deep-seated, deep as artesian wells, the male has a far greater concern than the female in the fidelity of his mate. For these reasons, the male suffers from his partner’s infidelity more strongly than the female does. For these same reasons, the male often responds to external interference by shooting the unfaithful female and the offending interloper, if he can catch him. Aren’t most murders sexual murders? And I’ve bloody well been apologizing to my unfaithful female!”
In an attempt to mollify his nephew, Uncle Willie clasped Squire by his arms, and gazed at his dark face.
‘There now, no talk of shooting and killing people! You’re not in Yugoslavia now. It’s terrible to hear you carrying on like this at your age. I told you that renunciation was not good for the soul. You must forgive Tess — she wants to come back, despite everything.’
‘Take your hands away, Uncle. I’m not going to forgive her for your asking. Indeed, I’m not sure I can forgive her at all, after the way she went at me for a lesser offence.’
‘Well, dear boy, the same offence, the same offence. Be fair.’
‘I’ve told you why I think infidelity is a lesser offence in men. I don’t care what the libbers say — it’s subscribing to silly
wishy-washy ideas like that, or opposing nuclear energy, or believing communism can solve human problems, which has got the country into its present rotten position. In any case, she’s now going to come running to me for money to bale her and her lover out of trouble, isn’t she?’
‘It’s nothing to do with me, is it? Be reasonable.’
‘I won’t give her a penny, he can pay up or bloody well be declared bankrupt. Imprisoned, with luck.’
More shaking of the avuncular head. ‘I have advised Teresa on financial matters, I admit, and the position as far as I understand it — which isn’t far, by the way — is that you, her legal husband, are responsible for her debts…’
Squire looked round wildly, as if hoping to see a pair of loaded duelling pistols hanging conveniently on the wall.
‘There’s no way in which I will take the bitch back or settle her debts for money squandered on behalf of that nasty little sneak, Jarvis. When I think of the way she has humiliated me…’
They heard the distant chime of the front-door bell.
‘That — that may be Teresa now,’ Uncle Willie said. ‘Tom, my dear boy, I know this is most upsetting for you, and I’d have felt just the same in your position, once upon a time. But please don’t make a scene in someone else’s house.’
‘Why not, for God’s sake? Ron’s only my bloody publisher, isn’t he?’
Squire went to the study door, flung it open, and advanced along the passage. He paused before entering the front hall, gathering himself, checked at the sound of his wife’s voice, that familiar voice so poignant that his anger faded before it. She was explaining something to Belinda.