‘I’m glad.’ Angell hung up. Perhaps he was mistaken, perhaps he misheard, but there had been other times on the telephone in his life when the voice of the speaker at the other end had betrayed nuances that gave hidden feelings away. Insolence, was this? Something slightly more. Or perhaps it was just triumph, the triumph of a little man who thought that at last he was on the road to success.
He returned to the flat at 5.30 but Pearl had already gone. There was a note: I’ve made buns. Back about ten. P. He boiled himself a pot of tea and wolfed five of her buns, then guiltily distributed the others about the dish so that she might not notice how many had been eaten.
Like that time at school Sylvane had caught him eating the cakes; Angell, bend over, you greedy little lump of horse dung. I’ll teach you to steal from your betters. Beatings, the terror of pain, the sheerterror of pain. Always this consuming fear for the first three years at his public school. The endless beatings, for being two minutes late, for forgetting his pads, for belching in chapel, for having mud on his shoe. After these three years it had been better as he moved up the school and as he grew taller, bigger … But even then. He hadn’t been fat in spite of his appetite. There had been no Billy Bunter taunts. His name had been the worst thing to endure. Angell. He’d been called Gabriel, Halo, Lucy (for Lucifer). The last had stuck and had been the worst because in the minds of some it implied girlishness. His hatred of games, his lack of physical agility. Come on Lucy, always the last. Now then Lucy, pick up your skirts. Lucy’s not too well, it must be one of his periods.
He’d never been a bully at school in the sense of wanting to inflict pain, but in his fourth year when he became a senior a need to dominate and bully had developed from the defensive spasm. It developed suddenly, in a sudden fit of violence against one boy who had tried to continue the old routine of jeering persecution, and the boy had spent two days in the san. Wilfred had needed the two days in bed just as much, but had somehow survived, and no one had split on him. Thereafter he had been on the side of the oppressors, the change having occurred unspoken and in the course of a few days. Nevertheless he blamed most of the hesitancies and fears of his later life on those three formative years at Sherborne. They became a convenient peg on which to hang any inadequacies.
But the inadequacies, most of them, had been successfully hidden for so many years that often he did not recognize the memories of them as belonging to the man he now was. And the inadequacy of his unmarried state, which he had elevated and rationalized into a virtue, and which he had sincerely believed to be no less, was no longer in being. Thanks to his prevision in marrying Pearl.
After his tea he padded into her bedroom for a few minutes and sat on the bed. He would have been embarrassed if Pearl had caught him then, but alone it gave him some satisfaction to gaze round this room and see and smell the evidence of her occupancy. The stockings decorating rather than disfiguring the back of the French Empire bedroom chair, the freckle of powder on the Mansel mirror, the mules kicked off carelessly on the Jushagan carpet, the short flimsy lace nightdress folded on the pillow, the women’s magazines on the Regency table beside the bed.
Since he had begun to find Pearl physically attractive, he had sometimes asked himself whether the rational process by which he had picked her out and married her were in fact as rational as they had appeared to him at the time. He had read somewhere that men who married several times often chose women who were alike. What had first struck him about Pearl was her likeness to Anna. And those weeks and months during which he had hesitated – the tentative move and then the withdrawal, the next tentative move and so on – had it all been a deception practised upon his mind by his body? Without these subconscious urges towards Pearl, would he have ever made the moves at all? Looking back on them now, they seemed to have a quiet enormity that surprised him. A growing physical desire masquerading as a cold logical appraisal?
Of course the cold logical appraisal was not altogether dormant even now. He recognized that intellectually she was far his inferior, and he resented that because of her looks and because of his desire for her she could at times seem superior to him. Conversation many evenings was a morass of platitudes. And he hated to go out and spend money – as he sometimes found himself doing – in fashionable places merely to satisfy a female desire for display. He despised the people who patronized such places, their fatuous behaviour, their herd instinct for doing what was the thing, their acceptance of mediocre ideas because the equally mediocre arbiters of taste told them to do so. He had little use for a world in which second-rate minds assumed a tinsel coating of fashion which passed for brilliance. Pearl unhappily was all too ready to fall into the rut, to become a victim of the mass hypnotism of the day; but at least when he corrected her she more often than not saw his point of view and came to agree with him. If she could not always judge for herself she willingly accepted his judgment. There was no doubt but that she acknowledged him as her mentor, and this was a pleasure in itself, to feel that she looked up to him and saw him as a man in the prime of life, experienced, wise and kind.
He picked up the nightdress gingerly and smelled it. It had her scent about it, she might have been there, in it, vulnerable, soft, inviting. He rationed his times with her, not wanting to use up all his strength, especially as he had not been accustomed to it, and sometimes afterwards he had heart flutterings. Two days, three days more? Joyous thought. Lying on this bed, her long strong slender legs. The nightdress … Oh, dear! He threw it down and then carefully gathered it and folded it as she had left it.
He patted his own stomach. He had lost about seven pounds this month. It already made a difference to the buttons. This suit, six years old, had become tight; now there was comfortable room. It just made a difference. He fancied he even felt better for it. There was a world of difference between seventeen stone nine and eighteen stone two. Perhaps another half stone. It would be incredibly difficult but it might well be worth it. So long as it was done gently. He had seen men looking ravaged after too hasty a course of dieting. Skin sagged, did not contract with the flesh. He might well lose his handsome looks and that would be far more disastrous than a little healthy weight.
He got up and went to the French dressing table, stared at the personal things on it. It gave him a thrill to feel he was invading her privacy: he opened a drawer and with his forefinger stirred the stockings, the handkerchiefs, the scarves. In a box were safety-pins, Kirby-grips, needles, in another box some letters; he slid one out and it smelt old and the ink was faded, signed Mummy. A school report, an ‘O’ level certificate showing that Pearl Friedel had passed in Geography, History and Art. A medical card, a recent photograph of her on skis, a birth certificate.
He shut the drawer and went to the built-in modern wardrobe – a tasteless thing she had had put in but adequate for its purpose. God, what money she must have spent! There were ten or twelve frocks, all apparently new! He was shocked. He could not tell from the labels on them whether they were very expensive but he thought not. Nevertheless they had quality of material and must have cost her altogether two or three hundred pounds. Of his money! Given to her, thanks to her Jew of a father, but nevertheless his money in the first place, and now she was squandering it. In a good cause perhaps: it was delicious to see her in something new, but this was going beyond reason. And shoes too! He bent to grasp a flimsy pair of high heeled gold slippers and picked up instead a programme which was lying as it had fallen between them. ‘Royal Albert Hall. Welterweight Championship of the World. Tuesday, 8th October.’
He turned it over a couple of times and then opened it. In the list of supporting fights was: ‘8 (3 min.) Round Featherweight Contest at 9 stone. Godfrey Vosper, Kensington, versus Vic Miller, Dundee.’
Angell carefully put the programme back where it had come from and picked his nose for a moment. Then he closed the door of the wardrobe and rummaged among the scent bottles on the dressing table. Too extravagant. Altogether too extravagant. She had told him she
could still get all perfumes at wholesale prices. It was natural she would be prodigal in the use of such things as she had once been concerned in the sale of them. Anyway he loved to have the scents about her. But extravagance was still extravagance wherever it was found. What was that thing out of Cato? Emas non quad non opus est. How did it go on? Buy not what you want but only what you have need of; what you do not need is dear at a farthing. Couldn’t remember the rest of the Latin. Not that she would understand it anyhow. Ten new frocks and eight new pairs of shoes. He would have to reason with her. He would have to scold her for her spendthrift habits when she came in. Gently – but firmly. It could not go on like this or the wardrobe would not hold it all.
‘You smell smashing,’ said Godfrey. ‘I like the smell. What is it?’
‘Diorama.’
‘It was different last time.’
‘Yes, it was different last time.’
‘What was it last time?’
‘I can’t remember. Jacques Fath, I think.’
‘Fat! You should keep that for your husband!’
‘I don’t want you to talk like that. Otherwise I shall go again.’
‘Sorry. My little Oyster. No harm meant. I won’t say his name again.’
‘Every time I think of him I feel vile. We’ve not been married a year!’
‘That’s not your fault. That’s his fault for marrying a fabulous girl young enough to be his daughter.’
‘That’s an easy excuse. I went into it entirely of my own free will. I married him with my eyes open.’
‘That’s just what you didn’t do, see.’
‘What d’you mean?’
‘You didn’t have your eyes open. Not like a woman should. You don’t mean to tell me that what happens between you and he is anything like what happens between you and I.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because I know not, see. Already – not the first time when you was all tensed up – but the last three times you been different, you been learning all the time, see. It isn’t as if I didn’t know.’
‘I suppose you think you know everything.’
‘Pretty near. In this line of country.’
‘I suppose you’ve had hundreds of women.’
‘Not hundreds. Scores maybe.’
‘So one’s much like another. Why did you persecute me?’
‘You’re not like the others. And aren’t you glad I did?’
‘No, I’m sorry. I was perfectly happy until you trapped me—’
‘Liar. Oyster’s a liar. I opened the oyster and found the pearl. And I’m going to do it again tonight.’
‘I’m sorry I ever met you! You’ve got no respect for anybody. You just look on women as playthings—’
‘Which they are. I’ll show you.’
‘Now that you’ve got me you think I’m no different from other women. Just another one to add to your collection! Just to make you more conceited than ever. Little God!’
‘You’re not sorry you ever met me, Oyster, and you know it. And you show it. So stop being funny, see. Or I’ll stop you. That’s better, I’ll stop you.’
‘You’re no Little God. You’re just a naughty little boy that likes collecting things. Why not caterpillars? Did you ever collect caterpillars?’
‘Butterflies,’ he said. ‘Butterflies. You pin ’em down.’
‘You know you’re not even as tall as I am. You’re just a little boy wanting to hurt people. All this—’
‘Do I hurt you?’
‘Sometimes. All this—’
‘Don’t you like it?’
‘All this pretence of being in love with me. Don’t. Don’t. You’ll tear it.’
‘Then take it off.’
‘Why should I? Why should I please you? Why can’t you have patience? You’ve got no manners. You don’t love me. Stop!’
‘Then take it off.’
‘You see? Just the bully. You think you’ve got me here now and can trample on me any way you want.’
‘I’ll not trample on you, Oyster. I’m not kinky. Grant me that.’
‘Kinky? A bully is kinky. What do they call it?’ For a long time then she could not get her mouth free. ‘Sadism!’ she gasped at last.
‘What?’
‘Sadism. That’s what they call it. That’s what you are. A beastly little sadist, wanting to hurt. Oh, Godfrey …’
‘Stop talking.’
‘Oh, dear, oh, dear, oh, darling. I – I want you so much and you don’t care anything for me. Nothing! Nothing! Nothing!’
‘Everything!’ he said. ‘ You bet your sweet life. I’m nuts about you.’
‘Nuts,’ she said. ‘That’s love talk, isn’t it? Nuts. That’s what you call love talk. You’re a horrible boy. Vile, horrible, beautiful. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you, Godfrey. Stop it, leave me alone, take your hands off me! Be more gentle, be more gentle. I hate you. Godfrey. Leave me alone. Leave me alone, oh, darling. You destroy, you always destroy. There’s nothing left. Godfrey, I love you, darling. I wish … I wish … I wish …’
No word from Switzerland. Francis Hone fumed, as Parliament was due to reassemble in a couple of weeks, and there would probably be an announcement about the Handley Merrick development. In answer to a parliamentary question probably. That was the way it would come out.
In the meantime Simon Portugal had been putting up the proposition that they should buy a row of houses on the opposite side of the stream from the Vosper property, and he suggested Angell should go down and meet the local solicitor who, although he practised in Sudbury lived in Handley Merrick and seemed to hold most of the strings of village life in his hands. It would be premature to disclose the size of their plans but perfectly reasonable to meet and get mutually acquainted over this small deal on the side, for his help would be valuable later on. The weather was sunny and warm for late October, so Angell suggested to Pearl that they should go together on the last Saturday. Pearl said unfortunately she had a hair appointment. Wilfred said, what, in the afternoon? Well, it won’t be difficult to cancel, ring them up now. For once Pearl looked sulky, but when he was adamant she gave way.
They went down in the Princess, Simon Portugal with them, and carefully talked no business on the way. The width of the car enabled them to sit in some degree of comfort. Wilfred joked about his size and confessed to Simon he was on a diet. Pearl who was sitting between them raised an eyebrow at this, for until now he had made it a condition of his mildly restricted regime that no one, no one should be told. At lunch at Chelmsford he refused to eat anything but an apple and some dry toast. He had been in a slightly peculiar mood, Pearl thought, for two or three days.
It was not until they reached Handley Merrick that Pearl realized this was where Lady Vosper had her family home. They passed the grey, porticoed Italianate mansion standing back some fifty yards from the road, and a chord of unease, like something half understood, half premonitory, twisted inside her.
While they called to see the lawyer, Pearl walked through the little village, which was tiny but beautiful. Its nucleus was a score of ancient timbered houses which leaned about in all directions like survivors of an earthquake. There was also a church with a square tower and a curious ornamented spike on the top, a pub called the Admiral’s Arms with an inn sign of a sailor with a patch over one eye, and a few village shops. All were gathered about a stream-fed pond which had harshly pollarded elms and willows at its edge. In the church were three monuments to the fighting Vospers. North of this centre were a few bungalows and a score of council houses and a garage, but there had been no new building towards Merrick House which was some five hundred yards away to the south.
She walked back to the house and leaned over the gate looking up at its gloomy façade. Any moment, she fancied, Godfrey would drive round to the front in the jade-green Jensen, and that dark stocky vivid woman would climb in beside him. She did not know what the relationship was between them but the liberties he took suggested it was too close.
Godfrey took liberties with everyone. Godfrey took liberties with her. If she thought about them she would not be able to walk back.
Angell and Portugal were about an hour inside, and then they came out and all took tea in the village teashop. Wilfred drank hot water and lemon and refused all food, but continued to be in good spirits and told Simon Portugal all about a hand of bridge he had played on Tuesday night. He had played it, he said, partnering his old colonel, who was now well up in his sixties but in the days when they first met had been one of the youngest full colonels in the British Army.
‘I somehow never connect you with war, Wilfred,’ Portugal said.
‘Nor should you. Nor should you.’ Angell lifted an imperious hand to the waitress. ‘Our bill, please. Sometimes one is forced into situations which are entirely unnatural and unwelcome; but, being there, one endeavours to make the best of it. D’you know. Of course I was almost too young. But naturally one went. A good case could have been made out for deferment – I was a law student – but naturally one went.’
On the way home Angell, spreading his legs and linking his fingers, had more to say about his war experiences. The essential boredom and inconvenience, the endless organization and difficulties of maintenance behind the lines, the hideous lack of privacy, the shortage of reading matter, the advance to and retreat from Tobruk; the souvenirs he had picked up, the German helmet, the Luftwaffe wings all of which he still retained as mementoes; the ruined white houses of Mersa Matruh looking out over the blue Mediterranean; the never-ceasing sand, smoking, biting, burning; the corpses, broken tanks, smashed machine guns, half buried in the drifts of Halfaya Pass.
‘This would be 1942?’ Portugal asked, thinking perhaps as Pearl was thinking that it made Angell older than he admitted.
‘I was little more than a boy at the time. Little more than a boy. Later in the war I was sent back to England, worked in Whitehall. But those early days were the days of great hardship, and – if I may say so – great courage. Those were the days when one hardly dared think of victory, only of the avoidance of defeat. This is where I fancy the English spirit is at its best. I sometimes fancy we don’t really enjoy winning. The wonderful camaraderie of our race shines in adversity. I remember an occasion when an English pilot was shot down in the desert …’