Lady Jean

by Noel Virtue

  He arrived at exactly ten thirty. Jean let him wait at the front door for at least two minutes while she sat in the morning-room, the french windows open to the crisp morning air, breathing deeply and practising an air of indifference by making facial expressions that had more to do with nervous tics into a hand mirror. She decided at the last moment that artifice would not do. She would simply be herself, if that were possible. William, however, who had for so long been confrontational, defensive and inclined towards verbal aggression, was about to surprise her. Uncharacteristically he smiled warmly when she opened the door. He had brought her a tasteful arrangement of camellias and fern fronds, expensively wrapped.

  ‘Hello, Lady Jean,’ he said in a low voice that, like his smile, also exuded warmth. Before she could pull back he leant forward and delicately planted a kiss on her cheek that did not quite connect. She allowed him to step past and followed him along the hall, examining him from behind. He had not put on an ounce of extra weight and wore an expensive suit with a haircut to match. He was lightly tanned, his eyes clear and sharp. For a moment a pang of nostalgia bit into her which she managed to suppress. He stopped short at the large gap on the hall wall, turning to glance at her with a raised eyebrow.

  ‘I’m having it reframed,’ she said quickly. ‘The glass broke completely. Thank you for noticing.’

  Jean had closed the doors along the hall. William moved confidently through into the morning-room, standing there smiling at her, handing over the flowers then peering out through the french windows as all visitors did, the room so dark, the garden so spring-bright.

  ‘Everything looks healthy,’ he commented, referring, she assumed, to the garden.

  ‘I have someone who takes care of it,’ she told him. ‘Would you like coffee now or later?’

  ‘Now would be perfect. May I sit down?’

  William sat before she could reply. She stepped past him to take the flowers into the kitchen. With no vase at hand to put them in – Uncle Fergus’s contribution sat elegantly in her bedroom – she ran water into one of the sinks and left them there in order to attend to the coffee. She did not return to the morning-room until the coffee was ready and on a tray, listening for any sounds but hearing nothing. William was examining one of her reissued collections on CD when she rejoined him. She had deliberately left a pile of them where he would be bound to notice. He glanced up and smiled.

  ‘Doing well?’ he asked, angling the CD towards her. She nodded.

  ‘As far as I know. What is it you want, William?’

  She knew straight away from his expression that she’d been too abrupt or even rude, but the words slipped out and she winced. Old habits died hard. He stared across at her and smiled again, a little sadly, she thought. For a moment an image of Anthony Hibbert came to mind. The image rather checked her. Anthony Hibbert looked a little like William when he had been in his twenties.

  ‘The coffee smells delicious,’ he said.

  ‘There’s a new deli up in the high street. Chr… someone gets it for me. Milk, sugar? I can’t remember,’ Jean asked and then began to laugh. William stared at the CD, then carefully placed it back on the pile.

  Eventually he told her a little about New York. Still speaking in a low, modulated voice, he did not sound like the William she remembered. He had been prone, in the last months of their marriage, to shout at her. Jean had been a fucking cold, irresponsible and mean bitch. There had been other endearments which descended into true obscenity, communicated on an almost daily basis. Now he sat across from her looking relaxed, fit, behaving with easy grace. His eyes revealed nothing but warmth, as if the two of them had always been casual, respectful friends.

  ‘What about you?’ he finally asked.

  ‘Oh well. Aunt Dizzy’s here now. Living here. Almost a mutual agreement. She won’t have aged that much since you last saw her, but she’s more forgetful. Contrary but hardly fragile. She’s become quite energetic. In fact she’s out almost every day, with Chr … With Christopher. He lives here with me, too’, and when William said nothing but stared at her with a slightly uncertain, quizzical gaze she added, ‘Oh, nothing like that. Christopher’s seventeen. He’s a student. Takes care of the garden. He cooks. Fetches and carries. He had troubles at home. Aunt Dizzy adores him.’

  ‘Same old Jean. Champion of the weak.’

  She stared back at him coolly and smiled.

  ‘Did I hear you are going to publish a biography?’ William asked.

  ‘Autobiography. There were plans. I came to the conclusion that I really had no interest in one at all. I had nothing to say. It just… lapsed. I made a few tapes for someone. Wrote notes. I didn’t enjoy it. The publisher offered a small fortune in a sycophantic way.’

  ‘But.’

  ‘Yes, but. You look well. New York agrees with you?’

  ‘Yes and no. I do miss London. The two places aren’t comparable.’

  They were sipping the last of the coffee, had talked of inconsequential topics such as weather and theatre and the change of government, when William suddenly got up from his chair and went to stand at the french windows with his back to her. Two collared doves flew up into the pale sky from the lawn.

  ‘I came to see you about Father,’ he said gently. For a second his shoulders shook and he bowed his head. Then he straightened, coughed and returned to his chair, leaning forward in it and resting his elbows on his knees. His eyes were quite dry.

  ‘He’s got himself into a bit of a state,’ William said. ‘He hadn’t told me. You know how uncomplaining he always was. I went down to Brighton, just after I flew over.’

  ‘Hove, actually,’ Jean said into the following long silence, but William did not even smile. He went on as if she had not spoken at all.

  ‘Father claims he had to sell the house. Numerous unpaid debts, large ones. He somehow owed a small fortune in back Community Charges he’d ignored. Insurances he let lapse didn’t cover anything. He then had to have a couple of operations, refused to go on a waiting-list and went private. To do with his legs. He even spent time in a wheelchair. Where he was living – I knew he’d changed his address but I’d no idea what it was he’d moved to – well, he’d lied about it. I found him in a squalid bedsit, in a grimy little street near the end of Western Road. Living off benefits. All his savings are gone. The place is – was – an utter disgrace. Not entirely his own making. He was doing the best he could, too proud, too obstinate to tell me. He wrote a few times to New York. Never said a word about any difficulty. Just that he’d decided to sell the old house and buy something central. I’ve moved him into a hotel for the interim. Along the front. Saw he was comfortable, paid for all he needed in advance where I could and wrote him a cheque. It isn’t the money that’s the problem. I really don’t know what to do about him. I wondered … I was hoping you might go down to visit. He kept asking about you in his letters, didn’t wish to intrude and contact you. His circumstances all happened rather suddenly. So he said.’

  ‘Of course. Of course I’ll go down. Oh Lord. And you honestly had no idea? No inkling at all?’

  ‘No. He sent cheerful cards and notes to New York, seemed contented, still missing Mother of course. I really had no forewarning. I gather he assumed I was so settled in New York that I wouldn’t be back. I just turned up, which displeased him immensely. It all rather shocked me.’

  ‘Couldn’t you tell from the address? Something, surely?’ Jean asked.

  William shook his head.

  ‘He was being devious. Lying about everything so as not to worry me. I really did believe he’d bought a smaller house and he was pleased with it. He wrote nothing about his illness.’

  ‘Which was?’

  ‘Oh, blocked arteries in his legs. Extremely bad circulation. He said he almost lost one of the legs. All those years smoking. They managed to save both legs, but he can’t walk as far as he wants to, as he used to. The operations were formidably expensive. It was those that cleaned him out, I suspect. Had one
of those electric chairs for some time, bought it second-hand. Kept it under a cover on his doorstep. It was still there. A ground floor bedsit, easy access to the street. One room barely furnished. Ripped wallpaper. Really squalid, Jean. The room smelt.’

  ‘Poor Ivan!’

  ‘You know, the most upsetting part of it was that he seemed quite resigned to living like that. Said it was all he needed, that with Mother gone he never minded where he’d live. He’d neglected himself. Some sort of social worker turned up while I was there. Treated him with barely concealed casual contempt. I told her to leave. I moved him out the same day. He tried to hide his gratitude with bluster, but I know he was enormously relieved.’

  ‘When do you go back? To New York?’

  ‘I have to be back by tomorrow evening at the latest. I thought I’d arrange some time off, spend time with him. Get him settled somewhere. There’s no one else. He’s refused to join me in New York. He doesn’t appear to have any friends down there. He doesn’t like the idea of a hotel. In fact he hates it.’

  ‘I’ll go tomorrow, I’ve just decided. There’s no reason I shouldn’t go down straight away. Which hotel?’

  ‘The Thistle, on the front. I suggested the Grand. Too pretentious, he said. He would love to see you, Jean. He may never have shown it, but he was rather fond of you. Too unable to say, while Mother was alive.’

  ‘Understandable.’

  William stared down at his hands, examining his fingers as if he had never seen them before. He glanced up at her and looked away.

  ‘Mother spoke of you just before she died. She regretted never having got to know you better. That she’d judged you harshly. All those years. I was with her the morning she went. She sat there in bed wearing a new bedjacket I’d bought her. Got into a panic that it was buttoned incorrectly. She didn’t want to be laughed at by the nurses. They’d been treating her as if she were a child. She prattled on. After a while she lay back quietly, smiling at me. Then she closed her eyes and in a moment she was gone. I thought she’d gone to sleep.’

  William sat staring down at the floor. Jean had an urge to lean forward, to reach out, but stayed where she was. William was genuinely close to tears.

  He stayed for less than an hour. Jean guessed that he did not wish to encounter Aunt Dizzy. He wrote the details of the hotel on a slip of paper, along with his mobile-phone number.

  ‘Look, I’ll call you from New York to let you know when I’ll be back. I can’t avoid a couple of meetings, I did try to wangle my way out of them but…’

  ‘I understand, really. I’ll go down tomorrow morning. Take him out to lunch, whatever he might like.’

  He turned to look at her as he went out the front door. She could see on his face that there was something more he wanted to say, but instead he carried on up into the street. She followed him as far as the gate and watched as he hurried towards the tube station. He didn’t look back. He swung his arms and appeared to be gazing at the grey sky. The morning had turned cold; heavy cloud hung low. Jean shivered and went back into the house.

  ‘Utterly disgraceful behaviour if you ask me,’ Jean heard Aunt Dizzy say as she came in the door. Jean was in the front reception room, sitting on the bed, deep in thought. ‘I should have been rude, just out of spite. I’m sorry, Christopher, but your damned mother is a foul-mouthed fishwife who doesn’t deserve you. You’re a fine lad, even if you are an ugly duck.’

  Jean remained where she was, but Aunt Dizzy, noticing her as she passed, swept into the room and stood with legs apart clutching her handbag to her sagging bosom. The jacket of her pale-lemon dress-suit was wrinkled. Her face was a study of indignation.

  ‘I am livid, Jean. We ran into Christopher’s mother in the high street and she treated him to what I can only describe as verbal abuse. Ignored me. Right there, with people watching! She began by shouting that the Devil had claimed him now and he was damned to unhappiness and eventually to Hell. I could have swiped at her. It didn’t help when Christopher began crying. We’ve bought lunch. He’s gone to prepare it. Nut cutlets and a selection of French mushrooms. I’m bloody starving. Good exhibition. Fascinating. You might have enjoyed it. So what have you been up to? Nothing, I expect. Mooning about.’

  Jean had not told Aunt Dizzy about William’s planned visit. There had never been any form of affection between the two.

  ‘I told Christopher, cry and you lose a barrel of salt. Laugh and the world respects you. The poor lamb was in a dreadful state after his mother flounced off. She has victimized him for years, it seems. There is no accounting for a son’s love.’

  After Aunt Dizzy had gone upstairs to freshen up, Jean tried to call Freida again. The line having apparently been repaired, the telephone rang and went on ringing. Jean was about to replace the receiver when someone answered.

  ‘May I please speak to Freida?’ Jean asked. The voice sounded nothing like Mandy’s but she was not sure that it wasn’t her.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Freida. Freida Weinreb. Who am I talking to?’

  There was a mumbled response, then the receiver was clunked down. In the background Jean heard several voices and then laughter. The receiver was picked up and unceremoniously put back into its cradle. Jean tried again. This time she received the engaged tone.

  Christopher had stepped into the hall and was staring at her. He offered a thin smile. His eyes were swollen and red. His lips sagged.

  ‘Lunch,’ he said. ‘Nut cutlets, onions, mushrooms. I’ll make coffee. Who brought the flowers?’

  Jean replaced the receiver.

  ‘No one. I mean … I did. Bought them. Christopher, are you all right?’

  Christopher shrugged. He began to wring his hands. Jean had a sudden urge to shout at him, just as his mother evidently had. She felt angry and irritable but could not take it out on him. It was William she wanted to shout at. Christopher turned away and she followed him through into the kitchen. There was a scratching sound in the walls.

  ‘Rats,’ she muttered. ‘Bloody sodding rats.’

  EIGHT

  The Brighton train was almost full. Jean sat beside a woman in a full-length white leather coat who kept sucking her teeth and scratching one of her over-large purple-veined legs. She glanced at Jean as she sat down as if a piece of over-ripe dog poop was attached to Jean’s shoe. Jean smiled politely. She regretted not buying a first-class ticket.

  She had left the house early, leaving a note sitting on the breakfast table in the kitchen, written in large letters. GONE SOUTH. DAY OUT. TAKE CARE. LOVE, EARTH MOTHER. Aunt Dizzy had kept Christopher up until gone one o’clock playing Scrabble in her room. Jean had lain in bed listening to their arguments and laughter, worrying about Freida, then about the missing poster. It seemed obvious that Catherine Truman had taken the poster. It was hardly a collector’s item, but it was signed – Freida had insisted – and Jean had remained, however uninterested she had become in her abandoned career, hugely popular. ‘LADY POPJAZZ’, had been a recent headline in a music magazine. Jean had appeared on the cover. ‘She truly connected the specialist world of jazz to popular soul.’ The author of the piece had written at length, which Jean didn’t mind as she was judged solely on her work and not on her character or her past or her looks or how she behaved in public, which is what mainly appeared to matter elsewhere when it came to success. It did irritate her a little that she was written about as if she didn’t exist any longer. There had been no mention in the article about an autobiography. There had been talk at the publisher of her touring ‘marketable points of reference’ when her autobiography was launched. Appearing here, appearing there. Flying to America, Australia, even Japan, where her popularity was increasing. Not once was it mentioned that she would sing. There was a heated discussion over what she should wear and say, especially about her private, harrowing past.

  The woman in the white leather coat got up and moved somewhere else a half-hour out from Victoria. Jean was able to move into the window seat and relax, cle
aring her mind by peering into rear gardens and at the occasional meadow. By the time the train pulled into Brighton she was even looking forward to the visit to a town she had, in the past, begun to enjoy. The mixture of sleaze and old grandeur, the busy, traffic-choked streets were hardly a complete change from London until the stroll down Queens Road eventually revealed the endless expanse of the sea. She had considered, numerous times, selling Acacia Road and moving down to Brighton. The children had wanted to do just that, years ago. It was a little dream that she’d told no one about, even Freida. The dream comforted, as it had remained simply a small fantasy which could be made to come true with not a great amount of effort or sacrifice. The dream had, at times, been vivid. It comforted her the most after William had walked out of her life.

  The morning was clear and slightly chilled as she made her way out through the station and across into Queens Road. There were large signs announcing a complete renovation of the area, which somehow depressed her. Brighton, like London, did not invite change. Though tempted to turn off, once she reached and crossed the North Street junction, to visit Duke Street, she kept on down to King’s Road and to the sea, crossing the busy, noisy front to stand on the promenade, leaning on the familiar pale-blue railings. She gazed to her right towards the partly restored but still derelict West Pier, breathing in deeply the pungent odour of the sea in front of her, gazing upwards at the sky. She could live down here, she thought. People passing, in groups or alone, walked in a relaxed manner. Two long trails of teenage European students streamed by in different directions, some wearing backpacks, chattering loudly. An elderly couple sat on a bench eating steaming chips with wooden forks. Below, a young woman with bright red hair, wearing green tights and a yellow top, was doing balletic aerobics on the puce-coloured pebbles. To the left, yards away, workmen were removing a tarpaulin from an ancient merry-go-round Jean had not remembered seeing before.

  The hotel was not far from where she’d emerged on to the seafront. She almost passed it as she walked, deep in thoughts of leaving London altogether and perhaps buying one of the small terraced houses in one of the streets off Madeira Drive. She sauntered, hands in the pockets of her woollen coat, aware of people occasionally glancing her way with incurious eyes. For a moment she stood outside the hotel staring up at its green-glass frontage, now a little reluctant to enter, when the Brighton streets and familiar places tempted her to spend the day in nostalgic self indulgence. A little window-shopping in the Lanes, a visit to the museum, perhaps a taxi down to the Marina for afternoon tea before heading home. It was a perfect day for walking. Yet she dutifully went up the steps and into the hotel foyer, briskly heading across to the reception desk. A youngish woman with thin lips smiled sweetly when Jean asked for Ivan Fitzpatrick. She studied the ubiquitous computer and then began to frown.