by Noel Virtue
‘Sorry, there’s no one of that name registered,’ she said eventually. ‘Fitzpatrick. No, doesn’t look like it. Have you got the right hotel? Oh, hang on. Sorry. We did have a Mr Fitzpatrick, yes, Ivan, staying here, but he suddenly booked himself out yesterday afternoon. I remember now. Sorry. There was a problem of overpayment. Whoops, shouldn’t have said that!’
‘Did he leave a forwarding address?’
‘Not… that I know of. He might have signed the visitors’ book. Just a moment.’
The woman disappeared into a back room but returned almost immediately.
‘Here we are. Now, let’s have a look.’
Jean glanced around the reception area. It seemed a very bright and cheerful hotel. A few people were sitting about on sofas and chairs sipping tea or coffee. It was quiet. Sunlight streamed across the floor, green-tinged from the window glass.
All he put was Farm Road, Brighton. But I think that’s in Hove … No proper address. I don’t suppose I should have told you that either! But do I care? I’ve just handed in my notice.’
‘Thank you so much,’ Jean responded and smiled as warmly as she could. She was aware of the young woman’s appraising gaze before she turned and headed swiftly back out on to the street.
Farm Road was somewhere along towards the end of Western Road, just before Palmeira Square, Jean vaguely recalled. She had walked along that way numerous times with the children, looking out for blue plaques – Winston Churchill went to school somewhere near Farm Road – heading for the indoor swimming-pool, in the days when Brighton had become as familiar to her as the streets of St John’s Wood. She had walked for miles, it seemed, back then. Jared had nagged for them to move down, just so he could be closer to her parents. He had adored her father to the point of idolatry.
She took a circuitous route, not wishing to retrace the streets she had once walked along, Gemma and Jared holding her hands and urging her onwards. It seemed, also, that William had never been with them on those treks, that it had only ever been her and the children. She walked at a quickened pace, along the front, past the paddling-pool, the empty and abandoned boating-pool to Brunswick lawns and across the road, up through the square, emerging again into Western Road. She could see the Farm Road street sign down to her left. She stood opposite for some time, uncertain about going on. The morning had grown warmer, though the sunlight was thin. She was tempted to turn back, to sit for a while in Brunswick Square. Was it necessary to visit William’s father? She had never been close to him. Why had she so readily and without thought told William she would visit? What on earth would she find to say?
The street was narrow in parts and not inviting. She would walk up it, then back and then decide what to do. There was no one about as she moved into it, the time of morning before the lunch-hour when local people had already walked dogs and were now at work or indoors. So she noticed the lone figure sitting on the front steps of a rather decrepit-looking building straight away and paused, trying to decide if she should cross and ask him if he knew where Ivan Fitzpatrick lived. Hardly likely, she supposed. Then the man stood up. He went to turn, to go inside. He stared straight at her and over his gaunt, pale face grew a slow smile of recognition. He’d been smoking a cigarette which he flicked out into the gutter and then stood gazing at her. He nodded once but did not speak. Jean tentatively crossed the road, not looking at him as she did so but watching for traffic.
‘William said you might come down. Here you are. I’ve been watching for you.’
‘Hello, Ivan. I’d no idea of your address …’
‘Oh, I sit out here a lot, you know. Passing the time. It’s growing warmer. You went to the hotel?’
Jean nodded. Her former father-in-law did not look well. He was far thinner than she remembered, as well as much older. He wore a pair of faded, loose-fitting jeans and his hair was unbrushed. She had never seen him out of a suit before. He had dressed immaculately, even on holiday. She and William had spent one long weekend with Ivan and May in Suffolk before the children were born. It had not been an enjoyable weekend. Ivan Fitzpatrick had worn a suit even on the walks they’d taken along grassy lanes beside the flat grey sea. Very little had been said and he’d acted morose, even distant. May Fitzpatrick had spent most of the weekend with pursed lips and wearing a disapproving smile when she hadn’t been rummaging in her handbag or complaining about the hotel they’d stayed in.
‘Would you like to come in? A cup of tea? I can just about manage that,’ Ivan asked her in a neutral tone. She followed him up the steps and through the open door into a dingy and dark hallway. At the far end were uncarpeted stairs. The walls were bare. An old bicycle was propped upside-down, a wheel missing. Ivan turned and pushed open a door to his right.
‘Home,’ he said. ‘Don’t be alarmed. Don’t expect much. I have tidied up a little. William thought you’d find me at the hotel. Still thinks so, no doubt. He’ll be gone now. Back to New York. Sit yourself down. The chair’s clean. I’ll rummage for tea bags.’
The room was rather large with a high ceiling yellow from years of cooking and smoke and neglect. There was a bed covered by a patterned continental quilt, a table and chairs, one armchair. In a corner stood a cheap fitted unit on which sat a microwave and a gas ring. Opposite was a built-in wash-basin.
‘Bathroom’s along the hall if you need it. Long walk from the hotel. I’m surprised you bothered, quite frankly. No, that sounds rude. The problem of living alone.’ Ivan attempted to light the gas ring, which was old and basic. Jean quickly looked away and winced as Ivan lit a second match. She moved to sit on one of the hard wooden chairs at the table. The room was warm. The carpet looked new. She gazed curiously at a small framed Constable print hanging crookedly above the bed.
‘I decided to come back,’ Ivan told her, ‘as I couldn’t stand the hotel. Too impersonal. Fortunately this place is still mine. William rushed me out of it as if the building was about to collapse, so I went along without protest, just to make him feel he was doing something worthy, as my son. After one night in the hotel I simply returned. I don’t mind it here. Pleasant landlord. Lives a few doors away. Decent sort. His wife fusses over me, lets me use the machines at the launderette for free as she works there. Brings down the occasional meal.’ He turned and smiled at her. ‘How the mighty have fallen, Jean. I know what you’ll be thinking. Old age has brought many changes. Without May, life is not beautiful.’
‘You should have contacted me when she died,’ Jean said quietly. ‘I could have helped. In some way. William never bothered to let me know at the time.’
Ivan shrugged but didn’t immediately respond. Carefully he poured boiling water into two mugs, then dropped in tea bags from an opened box. He spooned in milk powder. There was no refrigerator in the room.
‘You had enough to contend with yourself, Jean. Didn’t wish to burden you. I thought of it. I’ve coped. Mostly. I’ve started to talk to her recently, you know. To May. I natter on about my days. I have her ashes, hidden away. It helps, talking to her. Loony tunes, perhaps.’
He carried the two mugs of tea across to the table and sat down opposite, pushing one of them over to her. He took a sip of his tea and sighed.
‘It was decent of you to come down. You needn’t stay if you don’t wish to. I’m sure it was your own idea, to visit. William bluffed about it, said he’d insist, that you had little better to do and would appreciate the outing. He was always a patronizing bastard even when he was young.’
‘I’d rather like to take you out to lunch.’
Ivan stared back at her. From his shirt pocket he took out a tobacco tin and matches and began to roll a cigarette.
‘How’s the singing going?’ he asked. ‘William’s told me nothing about you. How you’ve been faring. She’s OK, he’d say. She’s still up there living in that house. He never took to the idea of it being solely yours.’
‘I don’t sing any longer, Ivan,’ Jean replied. ‘Not in public. That’s all over with. I gave
up completely, after …’ She fell silent and stared down at her mug. ‘I thought you knew.’
‘I’m sorry. Shouldn’t pry. Don’t, normally. You know, May talked about writing to you, before she was diagnosed, before the illness set in. She felt some need after the grandchildren … well, you know. Never told me what she wanted to say. She never did write as far as I gathered. May had a lot of regrets in her life and never did anything about any of them. She found relating to people very difficult. She was …’ he stopped speaking and lit the rolled cigarette. Jean looked up and watched him. His face contracted and he opened and closed his mouth as if a sudden memory gave him pain. His hands shook as he reached up to wipe one of them across his eyes. Then he hung his head.
‘You’ve caught me at a low ebb, Jean. I am sorry. It’s the loneliness. It eats at you.’ He spoke so quietly that Jean had to lean forward to hear. ‘Day after day. It’s like an unremarked disease for which there’s no cure. I sit out there on those steps on fine days for hours. Sometimes I imagine I can see May walking up towards me. It’s never her, of course. Always someone else. A stranger. One of them might nod as she passes by. A lot of widows living down here, Jean. Living out their lives in much the same way I live out mine. I walk, for miles some days. There and back, to see how far it is. Right down to the marina and back or along to the lagoon. Rarely speak to anyone. You become invisible when you reach a certain age. That’s the one thing you notice. That you’re invisible.’
After the speech he leant back in his chair and sipped tea and smoked. He looked exhausted and suddenly embarrassed. He glanced at her, then away.
‘I used to walk a lot near here with the children, when they were small,’ Jean said. There’s a plaque, just across from the end of your street, somewhere there. Winston Churchill went to school close by.’
Ivan did not answer, but he nodded.
‘I’ve been worried about Freida,’ Jean went on. ‘You remember my friend Freida? Freida Weinreb.’
Ivan suddenly sat forward and grinned. It was obviously an effort.
‘Of course. Freida. How could anyone forget meeting her. May disliked her, but then she was never a good judge of anyone. Is she ill?’
‘No, no, nothing like that. Well, I suppose she’s disappeared. I can’t get hold of her. Every time I call, the phone’s either out of order or some stranger answers. It’s been quite a while. It’s the first time she’s ever failed to appear, annoying me every few days. We’re very close. What does one do when a friend goes missing? Call the police?’
Ivan shook his head. He turned slightly, stubbing out his cigarette and gazed fully at her, smiling.
‘Gone away? Off to Paris? You told me once that she always flies off to Paris when she’s fed up. Spends money with no regard to self-control.’
Jean stared at him.
‘Fancy remembering that. Paris. Of course. You’re probably right. Freida wasn’t happy, about something. Someone. Why hadn’t I thought of it myself? Thank you, Ivan. I have been rather distracted lately. Aunt Elizabeth lives with me now and a young man I’ve taken pity on. He’s only seventeen and was thrown out of his parents’ home. At seventeen!’
Ivan looked at her with his smile still in place, but his eyes had grown cool and they’d narrowed.
‘You didn’t have to do this, you know,’ he said. ‘Come down to cheer me up. Try to distract me so obviously. It’s a little patronizing. We don’t owe each other a thing.’
‘Well, I’m here. I wanted to come. Really.’
‘I’m sorry. Please forgive me. As I said, not a good day. Let me take you out to lunch. We’ll go to Browns. Not far away. Excellent restaurant. Very … English. There isn’t enough made of being English these days. I’ll get changed and we can stroll along. I’ve a couple of suits left. You know, I found this shop, down the other end of Brighton. Jewish owner. Place is chock-full of suits and jackets and hats for gentlemen. All in perfect order. Extraordinary. I sold … But I digress. William condescended to give me some pocket money. We shall enjoy a glorious English lunch together and then you can go back up to town in the happy knowledge that you’ve done your duty. I shall report favourably. There, all settled.’
‘There’s a lot we could catch up on,’ Jean suggested.
Ivan shook his head. ‘No. I wouldn’t say that. We’ll just pass the time pleasantly. I’d enjoy that more.’
‘William didn’t say anything outright, but I did sense he was hoping I’d come down and sort you out.’ Jean tried not to smile but failed.
Ivan laughed. ‘My son was always a prat, Jean. Now there’s a grand word. He married above his station, I always knew that. Told him so once and he stared at me as if I was barmy. Didn’t understand. I suspected he had designs on your house. Secret designs. He was greedy. He should have been born much later, grown up amidst Thatcherite greed. Then he may well have become one of the monsters that that time produced. As it is, he was too weak to succeed in such a direction. Fortunately. Did he tell you he would be back?’
Jean nodded.
‘Thought so. He won’t be. He will have realized there’s little in it for him. He’ll decide that he’s done his bit. He did love you, Jean. He loved you deeply. I should give him credit for that. But when the chips were down he fled. I let him book me into the hotel just to make him to feel he was helping. I had no intention of staying there. To be perfectly honest, I hate living here, too, but there you have it. Life without May.’
He fell silent.
Jean waited outside the house in the sunlight while Ivan shaved and changed clothes. She watched a tiny woman in a filthy, grossly stained blue overcoat and plimsolls wandering down Farm Road on the opposite pavement with an equally tiny dog attached to a length of string. The dog kept barking shrilly at nothing in particular. The woman stopped to examine the contents of a rubbish bin. Her hair was damp or greasy and so thin that her scalp showed through. There were whiskers growing from her chin. She was still in sight when Ivan appeared, in suit and overcoat, hair combed, face flushed and smooth.
‘Now she’s a real character,’ he told her. ‘Lives in the next street, always about. Talks eloquently about religion and literature. Calls her dog Persephone. Speaks to everyone, but most shy away as she smells. Had many a long chat to her. She lived in India for most of her life. Knew a maharajah. Intimately, she told me. Keeps advising me to get a small dog and to talk to people. She sometimes breaks into song as she wanders about. Seems perfectly happy with her lot in life. I rather envy her.’
Over a lunch of braised lamb chops and perfectly steamed vegetables, followed by an old-fashioned steamed pudding, Ivan did tell her a little about his days, despite having rejected Jean’s suggestion that they might catch up. What impressed itself on her was that, away from his room, he was cheerfully pragmatic about his loneliness, not seeking sympathy but talking about it as if he was describing someone else, in an ironic manner that warmed her to him. The routine, the tiny details were entertaining because they were related with a certain resigned humour. He did grow close to tears twice, yet pulling back and silently controlling what she could see as a fear of what might lie ahead. Without his wife, without May. He could not stop bringing her into the conversation. They talked, without pause, relaxed in each other’s company to an extent that almost surprised Jean. He was nothing like William at all, in any way.
As they sipped perfectly brewed tea she looked across at him and said gently, ‘Why don’t you come up to London for the rest of the day. And evening. Or for a few days. A little break. Goodness knows I have the room. You could stay at the house. You’d like my aunt. I think you met, once, long ago. Christopher’s fine, a little maudlin but fine. He’s out most of the time. We could visit a few places, galleries, whatever, have more lunches out.’
Ivan stared down at his cup, running his finger around its delicately thin rim. His face was unreadable. She thought he might have taken umbrage.
‘I’d really like you to come up, Ivan. Just pack a
bag. We can take a late afternoon train. There’s no reason I can see to prevent it, is there?’
He raised his head and gazed at her. For a second his lips trembled slightly. He licked them.
‘I’d like that very much,’ he said almost in a whisper. ‘I’d like that very much.’
‘We’ll not decide on any time limit,’ Jean said quickly. ‘Just come up with me, today. Take it from there.’
Jean insisted on paying for the lunch. Ivan acquiesced rather reluctantly and glanced about as if the only other couple there might notice and show disapproval. As they headed down to the front Jean put her arm through his.
‘I almost didn’t come to visit you at all, you know,’ she said.
Ivan chuckled. ‘And I wouldn’t have blamed you one bit. Did you plan to ask me up to London? That is, if you had fully intended to visit?’
‘No. Quite honestly I would rather have spent the day down here shopping. But one makes one’s choices.’
They exchanged doleful grins then began to laugh.
‘I’d rather William not be told, my dear. That I shall be staying with you.’
‘I shan’t say a word. My lips are sealed if he should call. I agree with you, I doubt that he will. Anyway, that’s enough. Does this mean that you will stay up in London for a few days? A week perhaps?’