The Last Word

  Twenty-nine

  In the kitchen Alice led Mamoon to the sink. She staunched his bleeding cheek, cleaned the wound and applied a plaster. Harry put the kettle on and made tea. He tried to catch Alice’s eye to indicate that this might be a good opportunity to leave, but he guessed they wouldn’t be able to get out until this dispute was settled.

  Mamoon was upset, but not devastated; he had seen this before. Later, he would open a bottle of champagne for Liana. All would be well. Glancing at the notebook which Harry always carried with him, he said, ‘I hope you’re not writing this down in bad English to make us look like mad people.’

  ‘Maestro, I’ll make sure he won’t,’ said Alice.

  Mamoon said, ‘I’m sorry that Liana somehow blames you for this.’

  ‘She does?’ said Alice. ‘Is it really my fault? Harry, please tell me if it is.’

  Liana came down, carrying a suitcase. ‘I am wearing my necklace of skulls – a piece I hate. But I slam the door and goodbye! Alice, please hold onto the dogs.’

  Mamoon hurried across and took her arm. ‘Liana, I beg you, this has gone too far.’

  ‘Yes, who will change the batteries in your toothbrush? Who will rub cream into your injured foot and give you your pills? You will die here alone. Do you really believe these young exploiters care for you?’ She pulled the case towards the door. ‘I will go to those who love and appreciate me.’

  ‘Like who?’

  ‘You can take Alice, you old fool, but you’re too stupid to see how she used you!’

  ‘What nonsense!’

  ‘Harry sent her to persuade you to confess to things with Marion that you never did – I heard it from Rob.’

  ‘You didn’t do that, Alice?’ Mamoon said, in incomprehension.

  ‘In a way I did,’ she said.

  ‘Dear girl, I cannot think of you like that,’ said Mamoon. ‘Harry must have been behind it. Don’t worry, I’ll take him down for that.’

  Harry said, ‘Why don’t you sit, please, Liana, and we can talk this through.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Mamoon. ‘Please, Marion, I mean Liana, you are working yourself up too much!’

  Mamoon tried to pull the suitcase from her, but she pushed him away. He fell against the table, turned, twisted and collapsed.

  ‘Oh my God, Mamoon,’ said Alice, going towards him. ‘Your back’s gone!’

  ‘You see, you see!’ cried Liana. ‘Now give me the car key!’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘I will walk across the fields to the station,’ she said, disappearing out of the door and into the rain. ‘Goodbye for ever!’

  ‘Don’t let her go,’ said Mamoon to Harry.

  ‘What can I do?’

  ‘It’s dark already. Suppose she falls in the pond and drowns! Fetch her back!’

  ‘I will,’ said Alice, and out she went.

  Harry had to pursue her as she headed for the track up to the road. The rain was heavy and the wind was loud, but Harry could hear her yelling for Liana. It didn’t take him long to find Alice. She was his priority. He had to lead her back to the house forcibly, while urging her to be quiet. Yet he could hear nothing of Liana.

  Alice was soaked through, and when Harry had brought her in, he found a towel and fetched her warm clothes. Then he went to Mamoon with a blanket. ‘Please, just lie down on the sofa and wait. Liana will be back soon.’

  Mamoon said, ‘If you pick up Liana on your way to London, I will kill you straight away.’

  Harry made Mamoon comfortable on the sofa and said, ‘Sir, I can tell you she won’t want to come with us.’

  ‘She talks about you all the time,’ said Alice. ‘If she didn’t love you so much, she wouldn’t be so worked up. She’s trying to give you a fright.’

  ‘I’ve got one, along with a chill and palpitations.’ Alice found Mamoon’s painkillers and brought him water. ‘This time I really will pass over,’ he said. He had started to sob. ‘I can’t take any more. You won’t leave me here like this, will you? Where’s Ruth? What will I eat? Who will look after the animals?’

  Harry had already phoned Julia, who said she and her family would take care of it. Whatever happened, she did not want Alice and Harry out there; two hysterical and confused townies afraid of the dark wouldn’t help anyone. She knew the terrain ‘intimately’.

  It wasn’t the easiest evening in Mamoon’s kitchen as Alice, Mamoon and Harry ate, made tea and worried about Liana. Julia, Ruth and Scott were scouting for her with torches, shouts and blankets. They didn’t believe she could have got far; she was probably going around in circles. Mamoon refused to allow Harry or Alice to leave him alone, and lay on the sofa staring into the distance, or he closed his eyes and seemed to drift off.

  While they were waiting for news, Harry reiterated how competent and reliable Julia was. If anyone could find Liana, it would be her. Alice added that it had been helpful to have her staying with them in London. She wanted to make it a permanent arrangement, and Julia had agreed. Julia would look after them and the babies, for at least the next eighteen months.

  Harry was surprised at this; his view was that it would be best if Julia returned to Liana and Mamoon, and the rest of ‘her community’. But Alice was firm; she’d heard catastrophic stories about au pairs and nannies. She couldn’t see any reason why Julia wasn’t suitable. She was willing, good with kids, and they knew her and her family.

  He couldn’t win; he was fated to live with both of them. Mamoon may have been lying there contemplating eternity, but he wasn’t so oblivious he didn’t find the time for a micro-smirk.

  It was another hour before Liana was located. Her fury had carried her quite far, but at last she had collapsed in a ditch and was found by Scott and Julia moaning and whimpering. She was taken to hospital, where she was checked over by a doctor who decided that since she was exhausted and suffering from minor injuries she should stay the night. Harry drove Alice and Mamoon to visit her. She slept well, and the next afternoon he brought her home, where Alice put her to bed. Mamoon was solicitous, kind and quiet.

  The day after, when Alice and Harry were finally leaving, Mamoon was still worrying about whether he would have to share his writing room with Liana, and he kept asking Harry what he should do. He wouldn’t be able to work with Liana sitting next to him; it was absurd.

  Going to the car, Harry found a film crew in the yard, unpacking their equipment. A German TV station, encouraged by Liana, apparently had an appointment to make a documentary about Mamoon. They said Mamoon had agreed, for a nice fee, to give his opinion on many contemporary subjects he knew nothing about.

  ‘One of them has a clipboard full of questions,’ said Mamoon to Harry. ‘I fear it will be my martyrdom video. Tell them to get out.’

  ‘Only you can do that,’ he said.

  ‘You’re just clearing off and leaving us like this?’

  ‘Yes.’

  In London, mortified by what she believed she’d brought about, Alice went to bed for two days, wearing a woollen cap. Harry and Julia were deputed to bring her carrot juice and soup, hold her hand and hear her complaints.

  ‘It didn’t occur to me that they would be so vulnerable,’ Alice said. ‘I love them both so much. They’ve become like parents to me. What should I do? Write or phone to apologise? Oh God, she’ll never forgive me . . . Harry, why didn’t you warn me? You didn’t seem to mind me being with him. Or were you just pleased I could fetch you material? Please, answer me. Will you be speaking to them tonight?’

  Harry couldn’t answer. He was glad to be away from Prospects House. He had no wish to see Mamoon or Liana for a while; he would go into a room for at least eighteen months and write his book as he wished. Mamoon would remain Mamoon; Harry neither liked nor disliked him. In Harry’s mind he was becoming something else, an invented or made-up man, someone who had lived only so that Harry could write a book about him.

  Thirty

  At a literary party, Harry felt flat and not at all like talking.
Leaning against a wall, drinking and watching seemed a more agreeable idea, until he saw Lotte. She had been Rob’s assistant, had left for a while, travelled and had therapy, before going back to work with Rob, this time as an editor, looking after Mamoon’s collected essays. Harry was glad to see her, though he wondered if she might be annoyed with him after the Queen’s Park incident. She only laughed and said that Rob had exaggerated. She was glad to see Harry and had nothing arranged for later. Might they have supper together?

  After two years of serious writing, Harry had time, indeed whole long nights of time, on his hands. He suspected he might have plenty to say to Lotte now. Having worked harder than he had ever worked before, he had at last stopped, and was waiting for Liana to read and sanction the biography, while wondering whether he’d accept the next job Rob had offered him.

  He needed the money. The twins had been an event. They were born prematurely, and one of them almost died, remaining in hospital for a month. Alice and Julia were drained. When Alice did go out, it was with other mothers and au pairs, and the women talked about sleep as addicts talked about dope.

  Harry’s father had liked being a father, as did Harry’s brothers, and Harry found that he took to it. He walked for miles across London, pushing the boys in their huge buggy. As their engine, umbilical and life-support, he existed now, mostly, to serve them, as they became flirts and celebrities, getting presents everywhere they went. He loved his boys’ mouths, their flesh, the smell of their hair – which might often conceal pieces of broccoli or corn – as he’d loved those of women.

  Alice, whose company he’d quite enjoyed once, a long time ago, was only a tense mother, as if she had gained a burden she’d never be free from. Harry’s father, in his louche suit at his London club, and always the optimist, had said with a satirical giggle that Harry would become familiar, as at no other time in his life, with the parks and museums of London, while becoming increasingly unfamiliar with his partner and his friends. There were few lonelinesses like that of the new father, as Harry suddenly found himself in places and with people he would otherwise have avoided. It would, his father suspected, be at least five years before Alice emerged from the orgy of motherhood, and only then with considerable persuasion from Harry. The boys, wailing fascist phalluses in nappies, would be the only little pricks she wanted. He would have to wait, if he had the patience. When, after this advice, Harry was told by his father to plod off, his father slipped him £20, as he always did on these occasions, as if he were paying off a tradesman, murmuring, ‘Dear boy, do be sure you have female cover. And do make sure, next time, only to go with women who have had good fathers.’ Harry thanked him. His father went on, ‘And, otherwise, with a woman, be sure to find out what was done to her, because before long she’ll be doing the same to you. Ha, ha . . .’

  ‘I wish you’d said that earlier.’

  ‘It only just occurred to me where you were going wrong. Glad to be of help.’

  Harry’s priority and pride, his other child, had been the book. Working twelve hours a day for months, he had completed a decent draft in a cafe around the corner from where they were still living. After delivering it, Harry found that Rob as editor was arbitrary and sadistic. The manuscript was scribbled over with remarks like, ‘This is shit’, ‘rubbish’ or ‘improve a million times’. At first Harry argued with Rob over the changes and cuts, though the stress was awful; then he gave in, and went along with it, but he felt worse: humiliated and bullied. Alice urged him to change what needed changing, and resist the rest. Harry saw how authors could get a reputation for being difficult.

  After shoving Harry head first through a grinder, Rob pronounced the biography lively and authoritative, predicting it would be a little success. It was sold into several languages and Harry would front a television documentary on Mamoon. The publication date had been provisionally set. Rob had instructed Harry to send the book to both Mamoon and Liana, which was the condition he had agreed. Harry knew that Mamoon wouldn’t even have a secret peep, but Liana would read it, and would not want for opinions. Harry believed he could hear her pencil violently scratching from here.

  While he’d been waiting, he spent time with Julia, who in her time off had become part of a London Harry didn’t know, London as an international city of students, refugees and drifters. Her friends were Brazilian, Angolan, Somali, Indian, and when she took him out, he was introduced to night buses, dark new bars and cheap food, crawling around the city in the early hours. He liked being on a bus at four in the morning, when you could see the city and what a wonder it was. He and Julia had the compatibility of fond ex-lovers, and she continued to be devoted to him; he had never seen such love before, resembling madness in its irrational fidelity.

  Lotte took his hand, and whispered, ‘I’m going to take you out of this dull party. Don’t worry, you’ll like it much better where we’re going. You need to hear what I’m going to say.’

  She took his hand, led him through Berwick Street Market, around a corner into a narrow street, and through a black, broken door into a semi-derelict eighteenth-century house. They went up the carpetless stairs and into a large undecorated, peeling room with a sloping floor. An exhausted book reviewer and a minor poet sat at a wobbly table, served by a woman who might have been painted by Lucian Freud. After Lotte had kissed the staff and the patrons, he and she sat close; he stroked her hair while she poured talk into his ear.

  Lotte had driven down for lunch with Mamoon and Liana. Mamoon was still weak and distressed after the serious stroke he’d had three months ago, but his speech had improved. He’d even said, ‘Death had been avoiding me, but I know that he wants me now, since I have been receiving Lifetime Achievement awards most days.’

  Lotte said, ‘I don’t think you went to see Mamoon, did you?’

  ‘I had to feel free to make him up.’

  ‘He was, as Rob might have told you, in an uncreative state for a while. He hated being flat on his back, and became even more depressed. Liana got him moving. But there’s some excellent news: despite his physical setbacks, he’s finished a short new book, his first for a long time. You put an idea in his head.’

  Harry said the only thing he remembered was nodding across at Liana in the kitchen once, and saying the novel had always been concerned with marriage, and that perhaps Mamoon had been doing research without knowing it. Mamoon looked almost interested, but of course didn’t say anything. ‘Is it about that?’

  ‘Don’t you know?’

  ‘I’ve concentrated on the early and middle life. Once he marries Liana they just stay home not having sex and bickering, like everyone else. The literary public won’t eat that up.’

  Lotte said she wanted to show Harry something. She took him back to the flat she’d recently moved into, near Goodge Street. Most of her things were still packed up and her bed was in the middle of the room. She lit candles. As there was nowhere else to sit, they lay down, in their clothes, drinking brandy.

  She asked him what he was doing, and he told her he was making notes to start work on another book, about psychosis and his mother. His father had said Harry’s mother was liable to fall for mouth-merchants of all varieties. He’d given Harry letters from one of the writers he’d referred to. Harry had pictured some local Vargas Llosa, but this character was living in a dingy flat in a council block.

  ‘Surrounded by piles of mouldering paper, he was a conman full of swanky talk and a mile of continuous bullshit. He said Mum was an enthusiastic and flexible lover, but she talked too much and couldn’t listen. One time she grabbed him by the hair and smacked his face against her knee. She wouldn’t let him alone, until he had to cover the windows. He was surprised I turned out so reasonable, and tried to touch me for a few quid. I should have learned, shouldn’t I, that biography is a process of disillusionment.’

  ‘What will you do?’

  ‘There have been too many fathers and old men. It is the time for mad mothers. I want to get into women’s minds, rathe
r than their bodies. Except for you.’

  They drank some more, before she patted a slim manuscript perched on a pile of books. ‘This is what we’ve been talking about. Mamoon’s latest.’

  She put it in his hand. He looked at it and noted the title, A Last Passion, and then handed it back. He was tired of Mamoon. He asked her to whisper him the story, briefly.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  He said, ‘He kept saying I was nothing. He wanted me to feel like nothing. He mocked and almost destroyed me. There were times when I thought I’d lose my mind. Then I had two babies, and I couldn’t get out of bed for weeks. I thought something was going to fall on me, and I had a stomach and bowel infection. My mother and Peggy as ghosts wouldn’t stop talking. I could have murdered the world. Our help Julia was kindness itself. Dad fixed me up with a therapist.’

  ‘Where was Alice?’

  ‘She just drifted away, leaving the kids with Julia so she could visit friends. Otherwise she’d go to bed early with a headache and shut the door behind her. She had better things to think about than me. Since I’m a kid who brought himself up, I did the same again. I forced myself to get out of bed, and wrote Mamoon out of me. Pass the brandy: I’m free of him, Lotte. Cheers!’

  ‘I wouldn’t go that far.’ She was looking at him. ‘The new book is unusual for Mamoon. It concerns a young admirer who comes to stay with an older man, a writer, and begins to write a book about him. So, the old writer secretly writes about the younger man as the younger one writes about him. Unusually for Mamoon, it’s pretty funny. It’s a love story.’

  ‘What does the old guy say about the young guy?’

  ‘Harry, it mostly concerns the older man’s love for a younger woman, the hot but cold, vanilla-haired wife of the acolyte, whom he describes as having the stillness of a Modigliani. Displaying at least five of the eight fatal symptoms of love, he adores and mythologises her, as one does.’