MARCH HOUSE Page 12

  ‘I’m terribly sorry, but you could see it was an accident . . .’

  ‘Why didn’t you go in the bar if you wanted to shout and yammer all the evening?’

  Punter clambered up the bank and shook himself briskly.

  Iris said, ‘Let me buy you a drink.’ She turned to Julian’s rescuers who seemed more willing to take up her offer. ‘What will you have?’

  I waited a few minutes to give Julian a good start before putting on Punter’s lead and setting off for home.

  It had all been much less dangerous than I had imagined. In spite of their aggressiveness there was some element in their relationship which kept them safe. I had had about as much understanding of the situation as Punter. I still did not understand. In particular, I did not understand Julian. It was not just that I would never have talked to my parents like that; I would never have thought about them in that way.

  When I got back to the house my father said, ‘You’ve had a long walk.’

  ‘Punter wanted a swim.’

  He hesitated, not satisfied with the answer; his eyes searched my face, seeking permission to be concerned and loving but afraid of a rebuff. I decided that I must be more like Julian; Julian, if abrasive, was positive in his attitude. I said to my father, ‘You are a silly old thing. I’ve only been out about an hour.’ My voice sounded loud and up hockey sticks. He looked startled, not unreasonably. I abandoned the positive approach and said persuasively, ‘You mustn’t worry about me.’

  ‘But I do worry about you.’

  ‘You never used to.’

  ‘But you’re all I’ve got now.’ He was quite testy. ‘So naturally I worry.’

  ‘Oh darling, I’m sorry.’ I flung my arms round him. ‘I love you. I know I’m beastly sometimes, but I do love you.’ I hoped that he would say he loved me, too, and we might both have a little cry, but he patted my head and said, ‘You’d better not go back to work next week.’ He was no longer in a demonstrative mood: co-ordination seemed to be our problem as much as anything.

  ‘Better tell Eleanor you’re here. I think supper is spoiling.’ He frowned, mock severe, making a scapegoat of Eleanor.

  I went into the kitchen where Eleanor was adjusting the position of dishes in the oven. Her face was a dark wine-red, perhaps from the heat of the oven.

  ‘Are you going back to work on Monday?’ She sounded very much my aunt and I remembered how little I had liked her when I was a child. I shrugged my shoulders.

  ‘You’ll have to get a doctor’s certificate if you stay away any longer, won’t you?’

  ‘I don’t suppose he’ll refuse me one,’ I answered, resenting her tone. ‘I’m not often away from work.’

  She took plates down from the rack. ‘Do you feel you can eat?’

  ‘I expect so; I’m not sick, just tired.’

  ‘I’m sorry if I sound unsympathetic, but sometimes we’re better off at work even if we don’t feel a hundred per cent.’

  She’s afraid ‘we’ are going to have a breakdown, I thought. I said, ‘I’ll see what the doctor has to say.’

  ‘Suppose he gives you a week off, would you go away? It would probably do you good to get out of this house.’

  ‘I’m tired. I don’t want to make plans.’

  She said sharply, ‘You’ll have to make plans sometime in your life, Ruth.’

  ‘Oh sod off, Eleanor!’

  She was startled and so was I. She occupied herself with removing dishes from the oven and I tried to make amends by carrying plates into the dining-room.

  My late arrival had unsettled my father and he had been further disturbed by a television programme on the third world. Until recently he had been liberal in his attitudes and he had kept up to date in his knowledge of current affairs, politics, art and music. For a good many men, the learning process seems to stop with school or university; many of my friends’ fathers had put ideas away along with their student gear. I had been proud of my father. My boy friends had enjoyed talking to him, he listened to them with interest and put his own views diffidently. There was nothing diffident about him now. He was angry and bewildered and he made bitter, destructive comments about the government’s policy on Northern Ireland and Rhodesia; he condemned the new purchases by the Tate; he deplored the National Theatre’s choice of play and the B.B.C.’s late night music programmes. Anything which demanded a change in his way of looking at life seemed not only to anger, but to frighten him. He was letting go his hold on modern life. He had often criticised Eleanor because she was a dissatisfied person; but tonight he looked to her for support. He found her company congenial because they could grumble together and he seemed to look forward to a union of discontent.

  Eleanor, to my surprise, was not prepared to accommodate him. After a few non-committal replies, she said, ‘They’re not all as bad as that, surely? I don’t think you would describe Stoppard as decadent, would you?’

  ‘I wouldn’t describe him as a playwright.’ My father looked at her severely. ‘I don’t go to the theatre to listen to long monologues about Lenin, do you?’

  Eleanor looked over his left shoulder, musing. ‘I remember being rather moved by that.’

  ‘Moved?’ He put his knife and fork down and stared at her in pained incredulity. ‘Moved by someone sitting in a corner of the stage recounting reminiscences you could go and read for yourself in the public library if you had a few hours to waste!’

  ‘And I thought the ending was extremely moving.’

  ‘The ending!’

  ‘Extremely.’ Eleanor took a sip of wine and savoured it appreciatively.

  ‘I wouldn’t have said it did end. It just came to a halt.’

  We finished our fish, which was haddock in a tasty garlic sauce, in silence. My father several times glanced sideways at Eleanor as though reappraising her. She had been tractable in the garden and perhaps he had expected that she would accept his lead in other matters. When she had served a lemon soufflé, he said, ‘You’ll tell me you liked the Tate’s bricks, next.’

  ‘No, they were beyond me. But that was a long time ago . . .’

  ‘It wasn’t such a very long time.’ He was offended by the idea that his measure of time was different to hers. ‘And as for saying that they were beyond you, you surely can’t be serious? You’re much too sensible to accept the rubbish that is served up as art by the lunatics we have in charge of our galleries.’

  It was a statement which demanded Eleanor’s recapitulation. She said equably, ‘I’m too sensible to get myself worked up about it, at any rate.’

  ‘This is a nice soufflé,’ I said anxiously.

  Eleanor looked at me in amusement.

  My father said, ‘Very nice,’ and refused a second helping. Eleanor suggested we had coffee in the drawing-room. While we waited for her to make the coffee my father sat with his hands clasped, occasionally cracking the knuckles and then staring at them in surprise. It occurred to me that he was as disturbed as we were by his behaviour but unable to do anything about it. He looked drawn and ill. I said, in a miserable attempt at solidarity, ‘I must say I thought the bricks were pretty silly.’

  After Eleanor had handed round the coffee cups, he said, in the tone of one who has no intention of letting go of a grievance, ‘It’s good of you to come down here, Eleanor. You must find it dull when you have such a stimulating life in London.’

  ‘I don’t have a stimulating life in London.’ She was immensely calm and looked like a strong, squat goddess sitting there on our sofa.

  ‘But you are so well-informed about art and drama and music.’ He looked at her with disfavour.

  ‘You are the one with the knowledge, Stewart. I’ve always enjoyed listening to you; you are so sensitive and discerning. Do you remember taking Lillian and me to the National Gallery and I said I didn’t like Van Dyck? You stood me in front of a Van Dyck and said, “Look at the painting of that hand, the texture of the ruff, the vein in the forehead . . .” ’ She was unexpectedly gentle as
she offered him this picture of himself as he had been in days not so far off, before my mother died.

  It was a gift he was unable to accept. He said in the same bitter, complaining voice, ‘Where would you see anyone painting like that now?’

  ‘Six months ago you would have given me the answer to that!’

  ‘I’ve tried to keep up with things, I’ve told myself that we’re going through a period of change and that something worthwhile will emerge.’ He looked at the rim of his cup, wincing as though he had toothache. ‘I can’t delude myself any longer.’

  I got up and left them. I went into the kitchen and did the washing-up. As I came into the hall, meaning to return to the drawing-room, I heard Eleanor saying quite pleasantly, ‘. . . since you ask me, I think that for the present you’d be much better being miserable on your own, Stewart.’

  I wondered what it was that he had asked her. I halted near the door, eavesdropping shamelessly. My father said, ‘Well, if that’s the way you feel . . . It’s been very kind of you to give us so much of your time.’

  ‘I’ll come again later in the summer, if I may.’

  ‘As you please.’

  There was a long silence which Eleanor did not break. I was beginning to have a grudging admiration for Eleanor. Becoming involved with another person is dangerous work with a high risk of injury; if the involvement led to marriage, she would have to learn to live with my father, and this sort of learning is a never- ending process. How could she contemplate it? The thought of the emotional energy which would have to be expended, apart from anything else, made me feel so exhausted that I decided to go to bed.

  Eleanor left after lunch on Sunday. At half-past three Mrs. Libnitz arrived. I did not have time to wonder what had occasioned this visit because she said immediately I opened the front door, ‘Iris telephoned me to come. She saw you last evening but you went away before she had a chance to ask how you were.’ She stepped into the hall and looked round with interest, but made no comment. She had dressed formally for the visit in a grey suit and a black pill-box hat with a veil and she carried gloves.

  ‘Did you walk?’ I asked, thinking how odd she must have looked coming along the lane.

  She shrugged. ‘It is not far.’ She had rooms in the village. Iris had taken advantage of this on previous occasions to get her to deliver messages to local clients. It was the first time, however, that she had been to my home. In fact, she was the first person from the clinic to come to my home. I took her into the drawing-room. She sat on the edge of the sofa. ‘I do not stay long,’ she assured me.

  We sat and looked at each other. This was a situation governed by different rules to our clinic meetings. It was apparent that, in so far as visiting was concerned, Mrs. Libnitz observed the rules of the country of her origin. She looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to open the conversation. I did not want my private world invaded and, although I did not think Mrs. Libnitz planned an invasion, I decided it was important to keep her in her place.

  ‘How are things at the clinic?’ I asked, as though I had been away for months instead of days.

  She looked surprised, perhaps one was not permitted to talk shop in the drawing-room. But she had lived a long time among barbarians and was prepared to make small accommodations. ‘Friday!’ She showed the whites of her eyes. ‘Friday was terrible. Douglas has the children for the week-end. When they arrive I cannot find him so I put them in the playroom. What else should I do with them? I can’t help that they talk to the clients’ children and tell them their daddy lives with another man.’

  ‘Was Douglas upset?’

  ‘It is Iris who makes the fuss. She takes the clients and their children up to Di: then she come down and asks why Douglas’s children are in the playroom; the children cry; then Douglas comes and stands there looking . . . you know how he looks.’

  I could visualise his standing there with that look he so often had of being immobilised at a time when action of some kind was needed, like one of those on whom the gods have cast a spell.

  ‘Poor Douglas,’ I said. ‘I hope he knows what he’s doing.’

  ‘He’s doing nothing. Don’t be sorry for him. He knows all about doing nothing, that one.’

  Conversation did not flow with Mrs. Libnitz; all her statements were so conclusive.

  ‘It was nice of Iris to worry about me,’ I said tentatively.

  ‘She does not worry about your health, she worries about her typing. She is crazy about this hypnotising and she is writing it all down. She means to make a television script of it. So you stay away and have a good rest.’

  ‘I hope she has told Dr. Laver. He’s the hypnotist, after all.’

  ‘Why worry? She will write it down, and alter it, and tear it up and start again, and in the end she won’t know the end from the beginning.’

  ‘That’s only when she’s doing several things at once; when she really concentrates, she’s formidable. I saw that series she did on local TV and it was good.’

  ‘Formidable? That one!’ Mrs. Libnitz could never accept the common verdict; of a beauty, it would be ‘pah, nothing, nothing at all, in fact, I find her ugly.’ So Iris, who was generally regarded as being gifted, was to Mrs. Libnitz an incompetent. Had Mrs. Libnitz been on the sidelines she would in no time have reduced Bjorn Borg to an all-time loser. I saw now why it was that Iris hated Mrs. Libnitz.

  ‘How about Di?’ I asked.

  Mrs. Libnitz softened. Di was a favourite; she and Mrs. Libnitz were the only smokers in the office and this shared vice seemed to draw them together.

  ‘She has another man—“a super bloke”. You know the way it is with her? He has a boat on the canal and the children love him and they are all going on holiday on the canal. You know what she says to me? “At least my kids have a man around; I think that’s important, don’t you?” She never learns from experience, that one; but if all your experience is bad . . .’ Mrs. Libnitz shrugged her shoulders. ‘Who shall blame her?’

  I looked surreptitiously at the clock on the mantelshelf, wondering if it was too soon to offer tea. I decided to ask about Dr. Laver and then offer tea.

  ‘Now you are away he comes down to me for coffee. He plays with the switchboard and how he talks! He tells me I know more about the clients than anyone else, so he comes to consult me. He thinks to flatter me, but it is true; of course I know more than anyone else. How can I help it? I have ears and eyes. He says while the clients are waiting I will be noticing things about them which the professional never sees. “They will use a different language with you, too.” He tells me as if I don’t know already. He says the professional has too much knowledge, it cuts him off from the reality of people. “Whether she is real or not, I don’t know,” I say to him, “but you have just cut that caller off from Iris.” He says that people in his profession view life from behind a glass screen, “we are sheltered, protected and immune.” And I am trying to work the switchboard and make coffee! He does not have to tell me all this; I give him the coffee without it.’

  ‘It was a forfeit—confession in return for coffee.’

  ‘Forfeit?’

  ‘Just a silly joke.’

  ‘He is mad, that one!’

  And this one, Ruth Saunders, what is she? I did not want to be told, so I said that I would make tea. My father joined us and engaged Mrs. Libnitz in the kind of conversation she had obviously expected. They talked about the death of Tito, whom Mrs. Libnitz had not liked, and what effect it would have on the policy of non-alignment.

  ‘At first they thought Tito was a code name and then they thought perhaps it was a woman. Did you know that?’ I did not speak the words, they just ran through my head.

  Where Mrs. Libnitz was sitting, I saw my cousin Hilda. She had been attending an independent girls’ boarding school for two years and it had changed her. She had become muted and considered in her speech. I had looked forward to being with her again and was disappointed by this talk of Tito.

  ‘Don’t you
want to come upstairs and get on with our families?’ I asked.

  ‘No, Ruth.’ She spoke earnestly, as though she was giving up a vice. ‘I couldn’t, not any more.’

  ‘But why not?’

  ‘I don’t think it’s right, all this imagining.’

  ‘But it’s so dull, talking about Tito.’

  ‘I could lend you this book by Fitzroy Maclean, if you like. It’s very instructive.’

  ‘Any book you got out of a school library would be dull; it wouldn’t be in it otherwise. I think imagining is much better.’

  She looked at me anxiously as though something about my behaviour reminded her of things she was trying to correct in her life.

  My father said, ‘I think perhaps Mrs. Libnitz would like another cup of tea, Ruth.’

  It was no use arguing, I thought as I poured tea. Hilda had changed. The school had made her into a different person.

  ‘What are you going to do about your exams., Ruth, when you get older?’ she asked reprovingly. ‘If you keep on with this imagining it will interfere with your studies.’

  ‘I don’t care about exams.’

  ‘You will never achieve anything without passing exams.’

  ‘I don’t want to achieve anything.’

  ‘My teacher would say you are a member of the counterculture.’

  ‘I’m not a member of anything.’

  Mrs. Libnitz finished her cucumber sandwich, made some disparaging remarks about Fitzroy Maclean, and took leave of us.

  As he cleared away the tea things, my father said, ‘I enjoyed her. A very fierce little lady.’

  On Monday I went to the doctor. He gave me a more thorough examination than I had expected and said he would give me a certificate to cover the rest of the week and then he would want to see me again. The day passed slowly. My father was late home. A change had come over him. He was very subdued and he still looked drawn and ill; but the bitterness seemed to have left him and there were no more outbursts of self-pity. There was also an indefinable change in his attitude to me. It was as though, very reluctantly and for what reason I could not guess, he had moved a little further from me.