by Angela Huth
‘I believe there’s something next week in Ealing. That’d be quite convenient for you.’
‘Fine: any night.’ Considering the exciting life as a chartered accountant that Jack sometimes described, Grace was always puzzled by his lack of engagements in the evenings. ‘Check it with Dad and get back to me.’
Grace paused again. She had a sudden impression that there was someone at the window. She turned. It was almost dark. No one.
‘I will,’ she said. ‘But don’t be surprised if he’s reluctant. You know how nervous he gets if you’re in the audience. He knows you’ve no patience with the Quartet’s music’
Jack laughed. ‘Nor he with my sort of music,’ he said. ‘Well, whatever.’
‘I’ll let you know. It’s a kind offer, anyway. Laurel all right?’
‘Busy’ Laurel, second-in-command in a travel agent in Shepherd’s Bush, was never not busy. Variety in the answer was supplied by the seasons. ‘Heavy early bookings for skiing.’
‘Ah.’ It was completely dark outside now, but in the extra density of darkness made by the laurel bush across the drive Grace thought she saw a pale, smeary movement. The wave of a white handkerchief, perhaps. A needle scraped down her spine. ‘I must get off the line, now,’ she said. In these weekly perfunctory conversations between mother and son, they had reached the point where neither found it necessary to give an excuse for ending them.
‘Righty-ho. Look forward to hearing.’
Grace went to the window, looked out. Pure darkness, no sign of anyone. She drew the curtains, heart beating fast. This was a relatively safe neighbourhood: the odd burglary, occasional vandalism to cars parked in the road, a spate of bricks thrown through conservatories a few years ago–someone with a grudge against symbols of affluence, it was thought. But Artisan Road, with its good streetlights towering over the trees planted every few yards, was a place the inhabitants were not afraid to walk with their dogs by night. Grace had always felt safe in the house alone, although William insisted she lock the doors when he was out late. Curtains drawn, she put down her possible sighting of something or someone to imagination. All the same she decided not to wait till she went to bed to lock the front door.
She switched on the hall light. The brightness made her bolder. She decided to take a quick look outside.
There was a man in the porch. A long grey scarf was wound round his neck, hiding his mouth. He was tall, thin, scruffy. He pulled down the scarf and she saw it was Lucien.
‘Sorry if I gave you a fright.’ The porch light–a lantern of stained glass from Portugal, Christmas present from Jack last year -swung a little in a cold breeze. Its sickly reds and blues and greens cut across Lucien’s pale face. His eyes–now red, now blue, now green of the ugly glass–had shrunk back into his head, as they did when he was in one of his states. ‘Didn’t ring. Saw you were on the phone.’
‘Jack.’
‘Your son Jack, right.’
‘Want to come in?’ Grace shivered.
‘I won’t come in, no thanks.’
‘On your way somewhere?’
‘Not really, no. Just wandering about.’
‘Well, if you really don’t want …’ Grace put her hand on the door, longing to shut it.
‘I’ll be on my way. Guess what? She’s back. She and the pharmaceutical bugger. They come back loaded with all these fat-cat bags of food, start spreading gin and paté and a lot of crap all over the kitchen table, bawling me out because there was a single fag end in the ashtray. Enough to do your head in, she is, they are.’
‘Didn’t they ask you to join them for supper?’ Even as she asked the question, Grace was aware of its presumptuous middle-class overtone, and at once regretted it. Although there was no doubting Lucien’s own origins, he liked to think he had left the middle-classes long ago. In his adoption of ‘classless’ speech and unattractive clothes, he could be taken for a youth from an underprivileged background. To note any more refined signs through this disguise caused him great offence. Usually, for peace, Grace remembered to ignore the fact that his living just down the road meant they had something in common. She was careful to avoid any reference to middle-class behaviour with which he might be acquainted. So her thoughtless question was a mistake, she realised at once, she would have to pay for. Lucien looked at her with utter scorn.
‘Didn’t they ask me to join them for supper?’ He mimicked her voice perfectly. Then, pulling the scarf back up over his mouth, turned away. Grace waited till she saw he was through the gate, and shut the door.
There was the rest of last night’s cottage-pie in the oven, but she had no appetite. She was unnerved. The thought of Lucien prowling round the house at night was disturbing. When he came in the morning Grace felt tense, but safe. William was usually upstairs. If Lucien, spurred by the thought of his mother, had become worry-ingly aggressive, William would have come to the rescue, turned him out. In fact, for all his anger, Grace had only been really alarmed on one occasion. She had innocently enquired after Lobelia, not realising then that he was the one who liked to bring up the subject. No one else was permitted to do so. He yelled abuse at Grace for mentioning her very name, and picked up a saucepan drying by the sink. He raised it, swung round poised to hit her. Grace covered her face with her hands, cowered in a corner, terrified by the look on his face. But her fear made him laugh. He scoffed at her for even thinking he was going to attack her. She’d just got on his wick, he said. He was sorry. He put down the saucepan and hugged her, kissed the top of her head. Grace was only partially soothed: the look in his eye had been that of a man temporarily deranged, and her heart had battered for a long time after he left. It was hard to be sure Lucien would never resort to violence, though his good manners (which must have been instilled, somewhere, in his childhood, dreadful though he claimed it was) nearly always came to the rescue of one of his rages. Tonight, though, there had been something sinister about him she had not seen previously. But then, of course–she tried to be rational–he had never come visiting at night before.
Grace did not want to think about the scene up the road when Lucien returned to find his mother and her lover enjoying their innocent dinner. She did not want to think about Lucien at all. It was one of those moments she wished she had never met him. She sat in the armchair by the unlit fire, glanced at the clock. At least four hours before William would be home. What could she best reflect upon to calm herself?
Jack and Laurel–that was the answer. The very thought of them was always soporific. As she imagined her son’s earnest, bespectacled face (which bore no resemblance to either her or William, everyone said) her limbs felt heavy, mossy. It was very hard to take a maternal interest in his life–though she did try–for there was little in it to interest. This lack of enthusiasm between parents and son was mutual. Jack had always been a good, dull boy–clever, hard working, cautious. He had decided to be a chartered accountant in his teens, and worked consistently towards that end. Now, for some years, he had been the youngest partner in an apparently ‘thriving’ firm in Shepherd’s Bush. It was buying tickets one lunch hour for an Easter break (alone, all his holidays were alone) to Portugal that he had met Laurel. She was a girl as ambitious in the travel agency world as Jack was in his profession. Recognition of their mutual desire for success drew them quickly together, and four years ago Laurel joined Jack in his depressing flat in Hammersmith. It took six months for him to introduce Laurel to Grace and William. When he did so he called her his ‘partner’, a description neither of the Handles could bring themselves to say. To them, a partner was a business partner, and Laurel was his girlfriend. Grace could see this lack of co-operation irritated Jack by the way he jerked his head and pulled at his right ear. (He had done this, when put out or worried, for so long that his right lobe was now considerably longer than his left, but in Laurel’s eyes this was no impediment. Or perhaps she did not notice. Grace had judged at once that Laurel was not a keen observer, or surely she would have been demented
by Jack’s personal habits.)
Laurel described herself at that first meeting as a career girl, and Jack had supported her. ‘I should say she is! My partner’s a great career girl. She’ll go far.’
William and Grace saw there was some truth in that. Laurel was so consumed by her love of the travel agency business that it had inspired even her language. Words such as ‘exotic’ and ‘snow-capped’ littered her talk. Early on in their relationship, when she and Jack decided to go away for a weekend in the country, she telephoned Grace to tell her they had chosen ‘a very exclusive hotel, river frontage’. Oddly, its exclusivity did not inspire them to many other weekends away: these days their Saturdays were spent in the office, while their Sundays were spent ‘catching up on paperwork’ at home.
‘It’s like this, Grace,’ Laurel once explained. ‘If you want to be top dog, you’ve got to give it your all. Work must come first.’
‘Surely,’ Grace had said, ‘you very nearly are top dog. You could give yourself a break sometimes.’
‘No way. There’s Danielle above me. When she goes–and I heard her husband’s to be posted to Bahrain quite soon–I want to see myself in her chair. The boss.’
‘Well, I’m sure you will.’ Grace had suppressed a sigh.
During the course of their son’s arrangement with Laurel, Grace and William had learnt a great deal about the travel agency business, and were aware they often disappointed Laurel in their refusals to accept her discount offers to almost any exclusive, exotic, sun-bathed, palm-fringed place they liked to think of. Although Laurel herself had only been as far as Spain, on a late-season special bargain tour, her need to acquaint herself with the brochures from all over the world gave her the feeling she knew the places she read about as well as if she had been there. So at the infrequent meetings of Grace and William, Jack and Laurel, there was much talk of places foreign to all of them and of little interest to two of them. (Jack, on these occasions, took a back seat. His only contribution was to agree with all Laurel’s rhetorical questions.)
‘I’d say Jamaica, with its golden sands, would be nice for you one February’ She was trying yet again to persuade the reluctant Handles to contemplate a ‘relaxing break’. ‘Wouldn’t you, Jack?’
‘I’d say yes to that,’ nodded Jack.
Grace remembered thinking that surely Jamaica’s beaches were white. But it was the sort of reflection best kept to herself. Perhaps they looked golden in Laurel’s brochures. William, later, said to Grace that if Laurel tried to sell them one more of her ruddy ‘leisure breaks’, anywhere, Economy class upgraded to Club class by her ruddy string-pulling, whatever, he’d strangle her.
At every meeting between the two generations Laurel’s progress towards being top dog was the main topic of conversation. Jack rarely said much about his office life except that ‘it keeps on doing very nicely, thank you’. Once he mentioned that he intended to take up jogging–so refreshing, it was, on the tow-path, fortunately only yards from their flat–in the early mornings. But there was not much to add to this information. And what the two of them never revealed were any domestic plans–marriage, for instance. Grace and William had long since accepted that actual marriage did not seem to be a priority these days among the young, and perhaps that was of no great importance so long as the commitment was there. ‘In fact,’ William had once ventured, ‘if they’ve not actually tied the knot, and another girl should come along with, shall I say, wider horizons than Laurel, then it wouldn’t be too difficult for Jack … to swap.’
The unsubtle intimations of this suggestion made Grace laugh, but she thought it unlikely. Jack was not the sort of man to whom lively girls were drawn. Her own sadness was total lack of plans for children. Never a mention of a baby, and Grace rather fancied the idea of being a grandmother. Perhaps they intended to marry first. Should they have a baby in their present state of live-in lovership, or whatever it was called, well, Grace did not know what she would feel about that. Her reflections were interrupted by the telephone again. Unusual, two calls in one evening.
‘Hello, Grace? It’s me, Laurel.’
‘Oh, hello, Laurel.’ The voice flat again.
‘I was just ringing to say I think Jack’s plan about William’s birthday treat is a lovely one.’
‘Yes, well as I said, I’ll …’
‘So I hope you’ll persuade him. We could make a night of it. -You all right?’
‘Fine, fine.’
‘Mega busy at the agency–as you can imagine. Whole world wants to go skiing. Well, we’ll look forward to hearing. I’ll say bye for now.’
Grace turned on the television to watch the news. She didn’t want to think any more about Jack and Laurel, and the scarfed Lucien still troubled her. By now William and the others would be halfway through the Britten. She rather wished she was in the audience. Perhaps she should start going to more concerts again, as she used to before Jack was born. William would be so pleased. Well, tomorrow morning, his birthday breakfast, she would put to him the idea. Cheered by this plan, she turned her attention to the latest sleaze scandal among politicians. Sometimes, she felt very remote from the real world.
‘Good audience,’ said Grant in the interval. ‘Northampton’s woken up or something.’
William nodded. He, too, had sensed a particularly lively attention from the audience. Returning to the platform, he felt more eager than usual to achieve a near-perfect rendering of the second half of the programme.
And then, when the last note had finally evaporated into an intense silence, the audience broke into applause so rapturous that William, Grant and Rufus exchanged looks of astonishment. They were not used to this sort of thing. Quartet audiences were enthusiastic, knowledgeable, appreciative. But they did not usually respond with such eager applause. One or two of them were even standing. There were shouts of hear, hear! There were shouts of more.
Bonnie, William observed, was smiling a delighted smile, swinging it from one side of the hall to the other. William frowned. Smiling, grinning, was not something the Elmtree players did. In gratitude for the appreciation they were shown, they would stand, give a curt, tight-lipped nod. They would let the clapping continue for a moment or two, then, when William judged it had reached its peak, leave the stage. Nothing worse than to be stranded in the dying fall of applause: undignified. To get off quickly was the Elmtree’s way–always had been.
Shocked by the vigour of tonight’s applause, after the encore, William remained seated for longer than usual. Rufus nudged his arm. All four players then stood. The men gave a couple of nods. Bonnie’s gesture was a deeper bow, a well-trained courtier sort of bow. Then, when she rose again, she stretched out her arms, viola in one hand, bow in the other. She was laughing. Grant, William observed in a quick sideways glance, was grinning. Grinning. By God, he’d have to speak to Grant. To Bonnie, too … there should be no more of this larking about.
His plans were cut off by further, more hectic applause. Several people were shouting for a second encore. A second encore? They almost never gave two except at Christmas. What was all this? In his confusion, William felt his mouth, very dry, fall open. Warm air from the hall fell like a pad of velvet on his tongue. Rufus was whispering something. Hard to hear, all this confounded clapping.
‘Hadn’t we better … play something?’
‘For Christ’s sake, we never …’ But this was no time for an argument, exposed on the platform in front of three hundred people demanding more. ‘What could we do?’
‘Scherzo of the Schumann A minor?’
Good old Rufus, quick-thinking as always. That was nice and short and they all knew it well. But Bonnie … what about Bonnie? They’d never rehearsed … could she manage it? The applause rattled on.
‘Fine. Ask Bonnie.’ William himself did not want to risk not being able to hear Bonnie’s answer. Rufus whispered to Bonnie, she nodded. William mouthed to the elated-looking Grant. Rufus returned to William.
‘Better say somethi
ng.’
William took his point. There was no time to be nervous. He stepped forward. The applause stopped abruptly.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he said, ‘this is un-prec-e-dented.’ His voice was oddly high. There was a ruffle of sympathetic laughter. ‘As some of you may know, the Elmtree players are not accustomed to giving second encores. But if I’m reading your message correctly, and I think I probably am, what you are demanding is that the arrival of our new poor relation should be celebrated with an especial evening …’ The words were tumbling out quite easily now, no thought: William listened to himself, fascinated, as if it was someone else speaking. The reference to the musical in-joke about the viola player (always referred to as the poor relation) was appreciated by many in the audience: there was yet more laughter. It was all rather enjoyable. ‘Bonnie, here,’ he went on when the laughter had died down, ‘has gallantly replaced dear Andrew Fulbright, who was sadly forced to take early retirement. But after just one concert we knew we’d found the perfect replacement in Bonnie. And you, tonight, seem to be in agreement.’ Bonnie was smiling uproariously, all over the place. ‘So just for once, in celebration of her joining our little band of players, we’ll give you one more … But please bear with us. We haven’t rehearsed the Schumann A minor with her. But we’ll do our best.’
It was during the Schumann that William noticed Bonnie’s sleeves. Previously he had taken in that she was wearing a long black velvet dress, very demure and appropriate, just as she wore at the first concert. Indeed her choice of clothes had been so good–no sign of the alarming shoes–that William had felt there was no need now to have the sartorial discussion he had been dreading. In the Green Room before the concert he had heard Grant complimenting her on the medieval design of the sleeves. William had no idea what he meant by this. To him they were just long, flowing sleeves, a little wider than usual at the bottom.
During the Schumann he glanced constantly at Bonnie to see how she was doing–this was a nerve-racking experience, playing something they had never practised together in front of an audience. As far as William was concerned, it would never happen again. He did not believe in quartets playing two encores. In the event, it seemed to be going better than he could ever have expected. Bonnie was swaying back and forth, afloat on the music, wholly at ease, as if she had been playing the piece with the others all her life. As she moved her arms William saw that the wide velvet sleeves tipped and swung, and as they did so there were strange flashes of shining green: a deep, jade green, it was, that caught the light and was flared for moments with emerald. William realised this green flashing stuff was some kind of lining, designed to intrigue subtly as jewels on a wrist. He was moved to think of the trouble Bonnie must have taken to achieve such beautiful sleeves. How clever she was to have designed them. He then thought that if he was captivated by them in his few glances over his violin, what effect must they have on the audience? Enchantment, perhaps. And audiences should not be deflected by external factors. He would have to speak to Bonnie, after all.