Chelsea was a village, the Arts Club at the western centre, bordered by the river to the south and Fulham Road to the north. Her daughter was in that village, and sometimes, he knew, she saw her, from afar, walking to school, or sitting in the garden. He had stopped strolling past the little cottage, he didn’t know why. But he knew Hester did, he knew she spent her days prowling the streets, hoping for a glimpse of her girl. Still, unlike the rest of London, indeed England, in Chelsea no one seemed to care where you were from or what you did. Girls in slouchy jumpers, boys with longer hair, no twitching curtains in dank boarding houses, less grime and filth and more hope than in the rest of the city. Life had taken on some sort of shape, to his surprise. He couldn’t see beyond the next few months; Simon knew Hester lied, but Simon was – yes, he was – sometimes almost happy.
Chapter Twenty-One
Simon was never entirely sure of the arrangement between the Raverats, whether Digby Raverat was actually suing his wife for divorce, nor of Sylvia’s role in it. Her solicitor, an ancient man who had always handled her family’s affairs, was clearly not up to the job, and considered the whole matter of divorce, and the Honourable Hester’s behaviour, distasteful. Simon had the feeling Digby was a cat, playing with Hester, the mouse, trying to hurt her, disorientate her.
Sometimes Hester would take a telephone call in the echoing chilly hallway. Her pleading would float up to him – always the tone, never the actual words. Afterwards she would thunder back upstairs, weeping silently, bitterly, and refuse to come out of her room, and Simon would slink back to his quarters, not knowing how to help, and hoping she didn’t think it was just that he wanted her. Other times, usually at the weekend, she would dash out suddenly, in a flared green skirt printed with pink apples, a sign she was cheerful, pulling a scarf over her head, gold hoops dangling from her ears, flashing in the sunshine. She would be back in the evening, and would race up to tell him about it.
‘I saw my girl today. We went on the Serpentine, and we took two buses. We rode on the top deck – she adores them, and she was so sweet with the conductor, called him “sir”.’
‘I took my girl to tea at Fortnum’s today. We used to have tea parties when she was here. She still holds the cup just so with a little finger – oh, Simon, it was awfully sweet.’
Sylvia never stayed over – though her room, next to Hester’s, was kept ready for her. It still had a baby’s cradle in it. There were brightly coloured cloth children’s books, tooled in gold, and Kate Greenaway prints on the damp walls. And there was a patchwork quilt, neatly folded over a wooden rocking chair, and sheep’s wool stuffed into the gaps in the floorboards and in the window frame. Still, though, the draught from the window was strong enough that sometimes Simon would pass by and see the chair gently rocking on its own, as if fulfilling its purpose in that empty, sad little room.
Occasionally he was still taking Miss Inglis out and about. Sometimes they’d go for a drink at the Hart, just off Sloane Square, where they’d sit in expectant silence, she nursing her cream sherry, he his whisky and soda. He liked the companionship, the quiet. She didn’t require anything from him. Didn’t want him to give himself up, to take, take, take. ‘I never know what you’re thinking,’ he’d said once, in a rare effort to try and flirt with her.
‘No,’ she’d said. And given him a small smile.
He’d walk down to the Six Bells pub, where there was jazz on Monday nights, or up towards Victoria, to drink in one of the quieter pubs in the streets leading towards the river. He had given his address to one or two old friends – occasionally he got a postcard or a letter forwarded on from them, including one from the Galloping Major (In town hunting for treasure, he’d written. Care for a drink next time I’m up?), but he never answered.
Simon was glad his mother was dead – both of his parents, in fact. She had been so proud of her son, in his dress uniform, had been so mortified when he returned from the war, grey-faced and silent. How far he had sunk from their dreams for him: living in a bedsit in Chelsea with a married woman with whom he enjoyed carnal relations, spending his evenings walking, or in jazz clubs or espresso bars, mixing with all sorts. He had taken up painting again – he thought perhaps he might give it a serious go, if there was interest in it. He had shown one to Miss Inglis, who thought it was good, though she thought everything he did was good. He’d shown the same little painting – of barges by Albert Bridge – to Hester. ‘What a reductive load of crap,’ she’d said, briskly. ‘You can paint, Simon, but I wouldn’t give this to my worst enemy. I wouldn’t even give it to Digby. There you go.’
‘I’d like to meet Sylvia again properly,’ he said one evening, as he was watching Hester climb back into her skirt. She straightened up and paused, haunches still facing him, then slowly turned round.
‘Why?’
‘Because . . . well, she’s your daughter. And I haven’t seen her to talk to since the day I invited myself in for tea.’
She tied her white shirt up into a knot, fluffed out her hair. ‘Darling, that’s very kind, but there’s no need.’
He shrugged. ‘Of course. I merely – I did think . . . if she comes to live here . . . I barely know her, and if . . . I thought we –’ Sweat started to run down his brow. ‘It’s of no importance, after all.’
Hester came and sat down on the bed. She patted the dull, snagged surface of the eiderdown near his leg, as if unable to bring herself to comfort him. ‘Don’t be like that, Simon. It’s vastly complicated, that’s all.’
‘I don’t understand it, really, I suppose,’ said Simon. He could hear himself, like a bleating goat.
‘I don’t either. Look –’ She leaned forward, so one creamy, blue-veined breast fell heavily against the shirt, almost out of the material. He looked away, wanting to concentrate. ‘I have to be whiter than white. Digby knows I have lodgers, but if he knew I was – you and I – well, that’d be curtains. I’m not sure he even knows you’re here at all.’
‘What’s the difference between me and the others?’
‘I don’t want to fuck Mrs Krapolski or Mr Thaddeus,’ she said.
‘What about Lovibond?’
‘Maybe Lovibond.’ This was their joke about the young, earnest, awkward history lecturer who had rooms on the top floor and clearly had a crush on Hester. He was recently down from Cambridge and was always popping round. ‘Mrs Raverat, I have a leftover scone. Mrs Raverat, I wondered if I could polish the chandelier? Mrs Raverat, would you care to borrow my transistor radio?’
At that very moment there came a creaking sound from upstairs; young George Lovibond getting ready for bed. They were silent, Simon trying not to laugh. But Hester said: ‘Please promise me you’ll be careful. He’d know. Raverat . . . he just knows everything.’ She gave a little shiver, and sat up again, tucking herself in, as if afraid he was watching. ‘I can’t explain it.’
‘You always say that.’
‘Yes . . .’ She bowed her head, closing her eyes briefly. ‘All right then. Before we were married, there was one time – one time, at the Dorch – I laughed at one of his friend’s jokes about him, and afterwards in the corridor he grabbed my arm, so hard. I couldn’t move it for days. He’d twisted it half off.’ She looked up at him, and he saw the violet shadows under her eyes. ‘He didn’t do it again, not until after we were married. It’s when he’s drunk. He loses control. I think it’s the war. He was Digby Raverat, jolly good chap, first to pour the gin, didn’t matter if someone else had paid for it. Oh, then the war came and he couldn’t fight, and he applied for a few posts, doing hush hush stuff, but he never got anything . . . he was living off my money and all our friends were dying or being terrifically secretive and there was he, this joke . . . he’s a joke, darling. A bad one.
‘He drinks too much. I do too, of course, he got me drinking, I barely touched it before I married him.’ Her long lashes rested on her white cheeks. ‘Course not. I was a kid. But both of us drank together, only he gets nasty. Really nasty, Sim
on. The slightest thing . . . He’s sorry afterwards. He says he is. But it happens. And I have to be good. I have to get Sylvia away from him. Then I can start to make plans, darling.’
‘How can you bear to let her live with him?’
‘He would have killed me if I’d stayed, Simon.’ She put her hand on his arm, gently, as if shielding him from her awful truth. ‘I had to leave. I was left this place when Daddy died. I had to leave.’ A shadow crossed her face, like clouds scudding in front of the moon. ‘Or, rather, I asked him to leave . . . and he did. He walked out one day when I’d gone to Fulham to buy some more drugget for the bedroom floors. Packed everything up, and took her with him. So perhaps it was all a huge mistake but . . . What can I do?’ She laughed, almost pityingly. ‘The law isn’t on my side. Nothing is. He has them all lined up. Liz, the doctor, Pandora, they’ll all say the same thing. That I went loopy after I had Sylvia and I drink. If I make a fuss I won’t ever see her again.’ She said again: ‘You don’t know what he’s like.’
They were silent. The wistful sound of a Polish folk song floated down from Mrs Krapolski’s gramophone above them. ‘Who’s Pandora?’
‘My best friend. We did the Season together. She’s married now, living in Ireland. She’s Sylvia’s godmother. She saw her on a bad day . . . I wasn’t sleeping well, Nanny had left . . .’ A shadow of memory passed over her face. ‘A bad day. Digby was so cross with me that evening –’ She gave a deep shuddering breath, as if struggling to hold on to her composure.
‘Aren’t you afraid he’ll – hurt Sylvia?’
Hester ran her hands through her hair. ‘It’s not the same – she’s learned to keep quiet.’ She swallowed; he knew she was struggling to maintain her composure, and he wished he hadn’t asked her about it. ‘He barely sees her in any case. He’s out all day. It’s five minutes in the evening and his housekeeper brings him a drink and he gives Sylvia a kiss and tells her to say her prayers. I had her all day.’ She closed her eyes; it was unbearable, Simon felt it too. ‘I taught her to read, to throw bread for ducks. I brushed her hair every night, I folded down her socks, I mopped her up when she tripped, or when she started school. I know her. She looks like a fragile scrap of a thing, yet she’s tough as steel here.’ She thumped her chest, her mouth downturned in misery. ‘She needs me, Simon. She’s growing up and she needs me. So I have to do this. Live like this, to get her back. You see?’ Her lovely face crumpled, but she didn’t let herself cry. With a small sob she said: ‘It’s bloody hard, I tell you.’
‘She’s a lovely girl,’ Simon said. Their fingers tightened. ‘You should be damned proud of yourself, Hester.’
‘Look, will you promise me something? That you’ll look out for her?’ She inhaled, her shoulders rising again, and scratched her head furiously, as she did when she was nervous. ‘If something . . . happens to me? Will you?’
He took her hand. He said, solemnly: ‘I promise I will.’
‘Daddy’s dead, her aunt’s dead, my mother’s disowned me . . . I’m the last of my family. She has no one, no one to take her side. Promise?’
He reached over and took a sip from the glass, his hand clasped around hers. ‘Yes. I promise. For the rest of my life. I’ll look out for her.’
‘If I can simply wait out a few more months, he’ll get bored. It’s if I annoy him, or challenge him – he can’t stand it, he can’t stand being made a fool of, or thinking his friends are laughing at him. He’s already furious he married the daughter of a baronet and she got fat and didn’t go with him in bed the way he wanted and didn’t have as much money as he thought. He wants me out of the way. That’s the thing. Out of the way and then he’ll marry . . . oh, the bishop’s daughter, or any of those new debs. Fresh meat, more money, and he can carry on as if it all never happened.’
‘You don’t – you mustn’t say things like that,’ Simon said, feeling nauseous.
‘No, darling. I mustn’t. But you’ve promised now.’ And she mimed a throat being slit, and something about the way she did it, her face white in the darkening light, the knowledge of her nakedness under the shirt and skirt, was as matter-of-fact and brutal as anything he’d seen in Naples. It haunted Simon, for the rest of his life.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Miss Inglis got into the habit of teasing Simon about Hester. She read the society columns in The Times, and got the Picture Post. In June, she was most exercised about Princess Margaret’s hat choice for Royal Ascot. She knew all about Hester.
‘The Honourable Hester Bingham,’ she told Simon. ‘They said she was the most stylish deb of her season. Me and Mama read all about her. That was the first season after the war, you know, and she wore a Hardy Amies dress when she was presented to the King and Queen.’
‘Mmm,’ said Simon, pushing a beer mat around. They were in the Star Tavern, just off Belgrave Square, he having persuaded her to see an Arnold Wesker play about working-class life in rural Norfolk at the Royal Court. It had not been a great success. Miss Inglis had worn a silk shantung dress and her best jacket, navy blue velvet. ‘I might as well have not bothered,’ she said. ‘Everyone there was so dirty. It wasn’t what I thought the theatre would be like, not at all.’
‘I thought it was very interesting,’ he said. ‘The struggles of ordinary people and all that.’
‘Ordinary people are dreary.’ She wiggled back in her seat, making herself more comfortable, and pulled the seam of her dress around. ‘I don’t want to watch ordinary people on television. Or see them up on stage, or read about them. I want to escape.’
‘Don’t we all,’ he said, touched, and he clinked his glass of beer against her sherry. She met his eyes and they smiled, awkwardly.
Afterwards, walking through the dusky Chelsea streets, he felt her small frame closer to him than she had been before. There was something oddly touching about her primness, after the weeks of Hester’s sensual, abandoned approach to life. They headed down the King’s Road towards her bus stop. ‘Why don’t I walk you home,’ she offered, gamely.
‘It should be the other way around, shouldn’t it?’
‘It should, but I’m on the King’s Road now. It’s very exciting. I don’t ever get this far in my lunch hour. Besides, I want to see the famous Wellington Square, don’t I?’
‘I suppose so,’ he said, but his heart sank, and he felt the whisky he had drunk out of the hipflask earlier, hastily, in the Gents sloshing together with the beer in his stomach. He didn’t want Miss Inglis meeting Hester. He didn’t know why, just that it was a bad idea.
But he smiled politely, and listened as she chattered away, more voluble than usual – sometimes it was hard to keep up a conversation with her. Perhaps it was the sherry.
‘Did you see The Horse’s Mouth? Princess Margaret went to the premiere, a couple of months ago now it was, and she wore a beautiful dress. Huge bow. Mother was going to go, but her knees weren’t good, although she used to walk into Covent Garden every day.’ She stopped, facing him. ‘I’ve told you that, haven’t I? She worked on the fruit stall with her father.’ As if confessing something.
‘Yes, I did see it.’ Simon kept on walking. He could feel the last of the whisky, sliding around the hipflask in his breast pocket. He wondered if he could just swig it, here and now.
‘She’s so beautiful, don’t you think? Poor lady . . . She was so brave, what she did – I say. Is this it?’
‘I turn off here. Are you sure you don’t want me to wait for the bus with you?’
‘No, ta. I said I’d walk you to your door, didn’t I?’
She took his arm, looking up into his face, and he smiled gallantly as if he could think of nothing nicer. They turned off the King’s Road and towards the square, the white buildings glowing in the dusk. Honeysuckle draped itself over the wall leading to Hester’s house. ‘Which house is yours?’
‘That one,’ said Simon, stopping. ‘The one with the lighted windows, and the people in the doorway.’
He could hear voices,
slightly too loud. Hester was talking, and at the same time someone was singing. It was that song. That dratted song again.
‘Four for the honey makers,
Three, three, the rivals,
Two, two, the beloved girls,
Clothed all in green, O,
One is one and all alone and evermore shall be so.’
‘Is that her?’ Miss Inglis whispered. She drew closer to him, pulling his arm, and he smelled her scent. Yardley. It reminded him of the shop, of the endless working day, of tedium and despair. The little house by the sea, the market town, the boat – all these things he had proudly promised Sylvia he’d have one day were further away than ever.
‘Yes,’ he said, looking at Hester’s black outline, illuminated in the glare from the hall lights. ‘That’s her.’
‘Who’s that man?’
‘Not sure.’ But Simon stopped, at the sound of the stranger’s speaking voice.
‘Awfully kind of you,’ he was saying. Hester looked up. She was vacant, her eyes bleary.
‘Well, there you are, there you are. We’re all pals, aren’t we? All pals.’ She gestured at Simon, flapping her hand at him, like a broken wing of a bird. ‘Simon. He says he’s a friend of yours. I’m so sorry,’ she said, some of her great charm washing over him. ‘I seem to have for-forgotten your name.’
Early evening was, he knew, the worst time for her, when she was used to washing up tea things, running baths, laying out nightdresses, reading stories – and her daughter was twelve, and could do all these things for herself, needing her mother less and less with every day that passed.
The figure turned around, lifted his battered tweed cap. ‘Simon, old man. Good to see you. You mysterious beast. I’ve been trying to get hold of you for weeks, what what? Went to see your old landlady and she directed me here.’ He came towards them and then
The Beloved Girls Page 27