by Francis King
We halted on the terrace. ‘What’s going on?’ Bob asked. Already, from far off, we had heard Ma accuse Tim of being ‘ disloyal, utterly disloyal’ and, a few seconds later, of being ‘ a bloody liar’. What Tim had replied to these accusations we had been unable to hear.
Now Ma was saying: ‘The first time you said you’d been to Como, I believed you. I always believe people, that’s my nature, to believe and trust people. But when you said you were going over there to get the English Sundays and then came back empty-handed, saying you couldn’t find any, well, that was when I began to wonder. And then I saw that English woman – the one who works in the Bank of England – at that coffee place and she was reading the Sunday Times. So I asked her where she had bought it. And do you know what she answered?’ There was a pause; Tim must have made some reply, inaudible to us. ‘‘ ‘In Como. This morning.’’ That’s what she answered. And then I asked her if they had all the Sundays and she said, Oh, yes, they had heaps and heaps of them – heaps and heaps of them, those were her words – even the News of the World.’ A silence followed. Then Ma demanded: ‘Well, what have you got to say to all that?’
I tugged at Bob’s arm. But, jerking away, he refused to budge.
In a calm voice, Tim was replying: ‘It’s a fair cop. That’s what I have to say. It’s a fair cop. But if I’ve lied to you, it’s because you make me lie to you.’
‘I make you lie to me! What the fuck do you mean?’
‘By this absurd possessiveness of yours. I daren’t tell you I’ve gone out to meet a friend because then you immediately jump to conclusions.’
‘And who was the friend you went out to meet when you were supposed to be getting the Sundays?’
‘Do you really want to know?’
‘Of course I want to know.’
‘Well, if you must know, it was Aaron Plata.’
‘What!’ Ma screeched the word. ‘Aaron Plata? What the hell is he doing here? Did he follow you?’
‘He was coming to Italy in any case. Something to do with some co-production. So when I told him we should be here in Bellagio, he thought he might come here too for a few days of rest.’
‘I bet he did! And you thought it might be fun for you to have that old queen’s company when you got bored with mine.’
Tim remained calm. ‘ Bella dear, your company is far more amusing than Aaron’s. He bores me rigid. But one has to face the fact that he can do far more for my career than you can. I’ve always wanted to break into films, really break into them, instead of merely being an extra. He thinks I’ve got the right looks.’
Ma gave a jeering laugh. ‘I bet he does! I just bet he does! He thinks you’ve got the right looks and the right cock and the right bum!’
Bob clapped a hand over his mouth, to staunch his laughter.
‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ Now Tim too was angry; his voice had risen in both volume and pitch. ‘There’s nothing like that in our relationship. You should know that by now!’
‘Oh, you’d be prepared to swing any way if it suited you. I’m afraid one just has to face it. You’re always on the make.’
‘It’s all very well for you to talk in that superior way. You’ve never had to fight for anything in your whole bloody life. You’ve no idea what it’s like to have been born with nothing, literally nothing, and to have had to struggle every inch of the way.’ Now self-pity was leaking, an ever-widening stain, into his voice. ‘You’ve always had it easy, bloody easy!’
Again I tugged at Bob’s arm. I whispered: ‘Let’s go. Come on, let’s go.’
But he shook his head, once more refusing to move.
‘Oh, why do we have to quarrel like this, always quarrel like this?’ Ma was suddenly wailing.
‘Because you’re so possessive and jealous, that’s why! Because you’re bloody impossible!’
Suddenly, we heard the crash of what I took to be a plate or a vase. In the past, Ma had hurled things at Dad, in sudden frenzies of rage. ‘ Fuck you, fuck you!’ she was screaming.
Bob, no longer able to contain himself, guffawed. Then, fearing that he might have been heard, the two of us hurried away, round the side of the house.
‘God! What a scene! I’ve never heard a scene like that,’ he said to me as we entered the house through the kitchen door.
‘Well, I have. Often.’
As so often after Ma and Tim had had a quarrel, they were literally inseparable. Arms linked, they swayed into dinner ahead of us. During dinner they were constantly touching each other, he putting a hand to her cheek, she putting a hand to his shoulder, one feeding the other with some titbit. Dinner over, they sprawled on the same sofa, she all but on top of him.
Eventually they announced that they were driving over to Como, to go to a night-club of which they had heard.
‘May we come too?’ I asked. I had never been to a night-club.
‘Certainly not! You’re far too young. You can both go to bed.’
For a while, Ma and Tim having left, Bob and I played chess. But bored with the ease with which he could defeat me – one game lasted little more than five minutes – Bob eventually pushed the board over, scattering the pieces across the marble floor.
‘What did you do that for?’
‘Oh, I can’t be bothered to play with a nitwit like you. You learn nothing, you remember nothing.’ He said it in so good-natured a way that I could not be upset.
‘It’s strange how quarrelling can arouse people sexually,’ Bob went on. ‘I’m sure they had a good fuck before dinner, after she’d screamed at him and thrown that vase at him. And when they get back from Como, I’m sure they’ll have another good fuck.’
I was now on my hands and knees, picking up the scattered pieces.
‘I shouldn’t say this, I suppose, seeing that she’s your mother. But she really is a terrible woman, isn’t she?’
‘Certainly not!’
But for the first time I realised that he was right. She was a terrible woman. It was only the pathos of her that had for so long disguised it from me.
‘She caused your father’s death. Yes? As good as.’
‘Rubbish!’
But was it rubbish? I was doubtful.
‘Only a little while ago you were telling me how wonderful she was,’ I reminded him. ‘ You even stole some roses to give to her.’
Legs stuck out from the sofa on which he was reclining and hands deep in pockets, Bob scowled out through the trench windows at the rapidly darkening sky. ‘I know. The trouble is that she’s so bloody attractive. Half the time I want to fuck her and half the time I want to kill her.’ He laughed. ‘Have you ever wanted to do either of those things?’
‘Of course not! Don’t be such an idiot!’
There would be a storm, I was sure, with one of those spectacular exhibitions of lightning, forking around the lake, which so much delighted Bob and me and so much terrified Ma. It had become so oppressive that I was lying out on top of my bed in only my pyjama trousers, reading a copy of Apollo bought at Victoria Station on our way out. Even after all these years I can remember that I was reading an article about Britannia ware, of which I then knew little.
The door opened and there was Bob. He was wearing only a grubby pair of boxer shorts. He had, I had discovered, only one pair of pyjamas with him and they, along with the dirty laundry which he had brought with him from Bexhill, were being washed. ‘I hope he’s going to give Violetta a good tip at the end of this stay,’ Ma had commented, and I had then replied: ‘ Oh, Ma, he’s got hardly any money at all. His parents keep him terribly short.’
I wasn’t pleased to see him. I wanted to forget what he had said about Ma, I wanted to hear nothing more from him about her.
‘There’s going to be a storm,’ he said. ‘I can’t sleep. I was wondering whether to steal one of your mother’s sleeping tablets.’
How did he know that Ma had sleeping tablets? She had never spoken of them in his presence, as far as I could remember. ‘Have you ev
er been in her room?’
He laughed impudently. ‘Not when she was there.’
‘But at some other time?’ I was indignant.
‘Oh, don’t take that high and mighty, holier-than-thou line! You’ve never been infatuated with anyone, you’re far too cold and immature. But if you had been, then you’d know that, at such times, one wants to know everything, absolutely everything about the other person.’ He threw himself down on to my bed, so that we were facing each other, his head at one end, mine at the other. ‘I had a quick look at that medicine chest of hers. Those slimming pills are said to be dangerous. She really shouldn’t take them. People say they contain tape-worm eggs.’
‘Oh, bilge! All they contain is dexedrine. Ma told me.’ In those days it was possible to buy dexedrine over a chemist’s counter.
‘Anyway …’ He closed his eyes. ‘This sort of sultry weather makes me feel incredibly sexy. No wonder in Africa they do nothing but fuck.’ He clasped my ankle in a hand, squeezed it and then began gently to stroke it with the ball of his thumb. I pulled my leg away.
‘What’s the matter? Don’t you like me to do that?’ ‘No.’ I could feel my heart stumbling in my chest. ‘How about this?’ He raised himself and leaned over to put a
hand on my thigh. Once more he first squeezed, then stroked.
Horrified, I realised that I was getting an erection. ‘ Stop it!’
Suddenly he was on top of me. I tried to push him off but could
not do so. His mouth descended on mine and, before I had clenched
my teeth, for a moment I felt his tongue. His hand went down to
my cock.
Then, like a candle in a gale, all my resistance was extinguished.
‘Well, you enjoyed that, didn’t you?’ Through the window I could see lightning zigzag down the sky. Almost immediately there was a splutter of thunder. Then I heard the rain, as noisy as hail, on the terrace beneath.
‘No. No!’ I was seething with mortification and rage.
‘Of course you enjoyed it! You did, you did! Otherwise you would never have come!’
‘Oh, get off!’ I tried to shove him off the bed; but he only laughed, put his arms round me and once more hugged me to him. Then, struggling, I managed to strike him a glancing blow on the cheek.
‘Careful, careful,’ he admonished me, still laughing.
At long last he released me and got off the bed. He tweaked at his boxer shorts, which were sticking to him. ‘ I’ll have to wear these tomorrow with all this spunk on them. Violetta’s washing my other pair. Ugh! Perhaps I’d better give them a wash now and hope they’ll be dry by the morning.’
I was thinking: Oh, God! I can’t let Violetta see these pyjama trousers.
‘Well, perhaps now I’ll be able to sleep.’
He gave me a little ironic bow and then blew me a kiss, equally ironic, before quitting the room.
I myself could not sleep. For a long time I watched and listened to the storm. Then, when at last it was over, and the only sound was the gentle shush-shushing of the rain, I listened for the return of Ma and Tim. I had a crazy longing to rush up to Ma, a child tormented by guilt for his misdemeanour, and to cry out to her: ‘Forgive me, forgive me! I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to do it.’
Eventually, at almost three o’clock, I heard them come in. Clearly drunk or at least tipsy, they made no effort to be quiet. Ma must have slipped on her way up the stairs, since there was a sudden thud and clatter, followed by Tim saying: ‘Whoa! Whoa! Be careful.’
Then Ma was laughing. ‘ Oh, Tim, Tim, Tim! You really are priceless. Utterly priceless.’
Were they now going to fuck, as Bob had predicted?
I got out of bed and stood at the window, staring out at the lake. The air had become suddenly damp and chill. I shivered and shivered again.
Chapter Twenty Six
Ma and Tim did not appear for breakfast.
I was the first down, my head throbbing and my stomach unsettled. It might have been I, and not Ma and Tim, who had returned home drunk in the early hours. Maria, setting down a cup of coffee before me, seemed to peer at me with unusual intensity through her short-sighted eyes. At once my guilt persuaded me that, somehow, by some miracle of intuition, she had guessed what had happened between Bob and me the previous evening.
At the door to the kitchen, she turned: Did I want an egg?
I shook my head and muttered: ‘Grazie.’
The rolls, brought up by her from the bakery that same morning, were wonderfully fresh. But for once, as I chewed on the end of one, I felt none of the usual pleasure. The coffee tasted unpleasantly bitter.
It was as I was about to get up from the table that Bob appeared. Cheerfully he greeted me: ‘Hello! What a difference that storm has made! It’s going to be a wonderful day.’
I said nothing, as he sat down opposite me and drew his napkin out of its ring.
Then, as on the night before, all my resistance suddenly expired, even though I had no intention that it should do so. I looked up at him and eventually gave him a hesitant smile.
‘Did you solve the problem of your pyjamas?’ he asked. When I did not reply, he went on: ‘My pants seem to be okay. I washed them in cold water and then left them to dry on the towel rail. So Violetta will be spared any shock.’
‘What do you want to do today?’
‘Oh, I think I’d like another go at swimming. It’s absurd that I can’t pick up the knack.’
‘In the hotel pool?’
‘Why not?’
‘We might meet Tim’s friend.’
‘So what?’
Aaron Platz was not by the pool. The only people using it were three German girls in their early teens, with large bosoms and bottoms and beautifully bronzed skins. While I lay out in a deck-chair after my swim, reading Apollo, Bob tried to get off with them. But he was hardly successful. They laughed derisively when he cautiously waded in at the shallow end, and they laughed even more when, one foot on the bottom, he attempted a clumsy breast-stroke. Eventually, hauling himself out, he went and lay near the chairs on which they were sitting. ‘Guten Morgen,’ he said.
‘Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, good night,’ one of the girls responded. Then all of them went off into shrieks of laughter.
‘So you speak English?’
Another of the girls replied: ‘Et aussi je parle français.’
After some more of this, Bob gave up. Dragging his towel disconsolately behind him, he trailed over to me. ‘Cheeky little bitches! They have far too high an opinion of themselves. Only one of them is in the least bit BW.’
‘BW?’
‘Bedworthy. Haven’t you heard that before?’
‘Nope.’
‘Oh, God, you’re innocent!’
Side by side we sauntered back along the rim of the lake. People, many of them German, French or English, chatted at the tables set out between the cafés and the water. Others wandered past us. Then, all at once, coming towards us with an oddly stumbling gait, I saw the middle-aged American whom I now knew to be called Aaron Platz. He gave a little start when he recognised us, slowed his pace, and attempted a nervous smile. ‘Good afternoon,’ he said, although Tim had never introduced us to him.
Saying nothing, we walked past, our heads averted.
Then, to my embarrassment, Bob burst into a high-pitched cackle of laughter. He turned. ‘Oh, my dear!’ he called out after the American, in a whooping falsetto.
Head lowered, Aaron Platz hurried on.
When we returned to the villa, Ma and Tim were out on the terrace, glasses before them and the cocktail shaker between them. Ma was in her skimpy bathing costume, Tim in only shorts. They looked exhausted, they looked happy. Bob must have been right. After their row, they must have had an orgy of fucking.
Ma. stretched luxuriously. ‘Beautiful day, beautiful day!’ she trilled out. Then she asked: ‘What time is it?’
Bob looked at his cheap watch, its le
ather strap frayed. ‘Almost quarter to one.’
‘Oh, good! I’m tremendously hungry. I suppose it’s because I missed any breakfast. I’d better go up and put on some clothes. I don’t want to shock old Maria,’ As she passed Bob on her way to the door into the sitting-room, she stared appraisingly at him. Then she said: ‘Your skin’s bright red. You look like a lobster.’
‘Would you like to eat me?’
‘God forbid! I can’t think of anything I’d like to eat less.’
Bob glanced over to me and winked.
‘So what have you two been up to?’ Tim asked, running a hand lovingly over a sunburned shoulder and then across his chest. ‘By the time we got down, you had vanished.’
I told him about our trip to the pool of the Hotel Serbelloni. I wondered if he would ask if we had seen Aaron Platz, but he did not do so.
‘Would you like one of these martinis?’ he asked.
‘Why not?’
‘In that case, perhaps Bob could fetch you a glass. And for himself too, if he wants to join us.’
Bob lumbered to his feet with a sigh and went into the sitting-room.
‘Do you ever realise how lucky you are?’ Tim asked.
‘Lucky?’
‘You’ve been to so many places and yet you’re only – what? – seventeen.’
‘Yes, I suppose I am lucky in that.’
In an acrid, accusatory tone he went on: ‘I’d never been abroad until I was twenty-three.’ Clearly he had forgotten that he had only recently told us that his parents had moved to Alassio with him when he was a child. Bob and I had already caught him out in a number of such lies. ‘And then it was to Dieppe. This is only my third visit abroad, you know. I was lucky that a, er, friend gave me a few months in Florence some time back … But, that apart, if it hadn’t been for your mother … it’s not easy to be beholden.’
I didn’t know what to say. ‘It’s not necessary to feel beholden,’ I eventually got out. ‘Why should you? Ma likes your company, and if you can’t afford to pay, then she’s …’ I broke off.