Daphne asked me how I was, with that unusual tone of voice that suggested she really wanted to know. In an effort to reciprocate this kindness I didn’t tell her. Instead I admired her kimono and her Madame Butterfly hairdo. She’d bought the kimono on holiday in Tokyo. They’d gone on a ten-day trip to Japan together with their well-travelled neighbours. I would never have guessed how much you pay for a cup of coffee on the Ginza but Daphne had adored every moment of it, even the raw fish. She said Gloria was looking well. I agreed and reflected upon the fact that it had taken over three years for the Cruyers to decide that Gloria and I were socially acceptable as a couple, and that this momentous decision had coincided with the moment I learned that my wife was about to return.
‘Dicky said everything in the office got into a terrible muddle when you went away,’ said Daphne.
‘I think it did,’ I agreed.
‘Dicky became awfully moody. Awfully withdrawn. I felt sorry for him.’
‘I came back,’ I said.
‘And I’m glad,’ said Daphne. She smiled. I wondered how much Dicky had told her about my time on the run in Berlin. Nothing I hoped: but it wouldn’t be the first time that Daphne had wormed information out of him. She was awfully clever at handling Dicky. I should get her to give me a few lessons.
‘We built on to the attic,’ said Daphne. ‘I have a little studio upstairs now. You must see it next time you’re here.’
‘For painting?’
‘Still-life pictures: fruit and flowers and so on. Dicky wants me to go back to doing abstracts. But he was always adding blobs of colour to them. I got so angry with him that I finally went back to fruit and flowers. Dicky is such a meddler. I suppose you know that.’
‘Yes, I do.’
When Daphne had moved on I said my hellos to everyone including Sir Giles Streeply-Cox – a retired Foreign Office man – and his wife. ‘Creepy-Pox’ with his sanguine complexion and bushy white sideburns might have been mistaken for a prosperous farmer until one heard that baroque Whitehall accent. Nowadays he grew roses between visits to London where he chaired a Civil Service interview board and prowled around the more languorous latitudes of Whitehall spreading alarm and despondency. Like all such senior officials and politicians he had a prodigious memory. He remembered me from another dinner party not so long before. ‘Young Samson isn’t it? Saw you at that gathering at that girl Matthews’ little place. Nouvelle cuisine wasn’t it? Ummm I thought it was. Don’t get enough to eat, what?’ The Streeply-Coxes certainly got around.
He leaned close to me and said, ‘Tell me something, Samson. Do you know the name of this damned tune?’
‘It’s called “Cordoba”,’ I said. ‘Albeniz; played by Julian Bream.’ I answered authoritatively because after purchasing his hi-fi Dicky had played it over and over to demonstrate the track selector.
‘Catchy little piece,’ said Streeply-Cox. He looked at his wife and nodded before adding, ‘My wife said you were a know-all.’
‘I try, Sir Giles,’ I said and moved away murmuring about getting another glass of wine.
Once clear of the dreaded Streeply-Cox I decided that finding another glass of champagne wouldn’t be a bad idea. I waylaid the old man with the drinks and then took a moment or two to look around. The same rather battered painting of Adam and Eve dominated the fireplace. Dicky always called it naïf in an attempt to give it class but to my eyes it was just badly drawn. The framed colour photo of Dicky’s boat had gone. That rather confirmed the rumours I’d heard about him putting it up for sale. Daphne had never been happy about that boat. She was rather prone to sea-sickness and yet if she didn’t join Dicky on his nautical weekends she knew there was a risk that some other female would share the captain’s cabin.
The antique cabinet that had once held a collection of matchbox covers now held a Japanese dagger, some netsuke and an assortment of other small oriental artefacts. On the wall behind it there were six framed woodblock prints, including the inevitable ‘Breaking Wave’. They’d fitted a fine mesh screen across the artificial coal fire. I suppose too many people threw litter into it. Dicky was always on his knees, clawing cigarette butts and screwed up scraps of paper from the plastic coal.
I reflected that every decoration in the room was new except the Adam and Eve that Daphne had found in a flea market in Amsterdam. It was a sign of the Cruyers’ widening horizons and deepening pockets. I wondered how long Adam and Eve would last and what they’d be replaced with. Adam was already looking a bit apprehensive.
It was while trying to decide about the expression upon the face of Eve that I spotted my errant sister-in-law Tessa, and her husband George Kosinski. They were both dressed up to the nines, but even Tessa in her Paris model-gown didn’t excel the stupendous Gloria, who looked more enchanting than ever.
Tessa came over. She must have been getting on for forty but she was still vibrantly attractive, with her long fair hair and bright blue eyes, and she still had that breathless way of speaking that made one think that she’d been waiting anxiously to see you again. ‘I thought maybe you’d been sent to the bloody moon, poppet,’ she said, giving me an un characteristically coy kiss. ‘I’ve missed you, darling.’
I confess to a frisson as she kissed me: I’d never noticed before how much like Fiona she could look. Tonight especially so. Perhaps it was just an accident of her dress or make-up. Perhaps it was something to do with Tessa getting older; or Fiona getting older; or me getting older. Whatever it was, for a moment it made me stare at her, deprived of words until she said, ‘Fuck! Is my lipstick smudged or something?’
‘No, Tessa. You’re looking more lovely than ever. Just stunning.’
‘Well that’s really something coming from you, Bernard. All we girls know that being noticed by Bernard Samson is the ultimate accolade.’
The old fellow – whom I heard Daphne address as ‘Jenkins’ – came round with a big silver tray of champagne. Tessa selected one unhurriedly and held her glass up to the light as if silently offering a toast but I knew she was trying to identify the champagne from its colour and the bubbles. It was one of her party tricks. Her mastering it must have cost George a fortune.
Having approved of what she saw, but without naming it, she drank some. ‘Did you ever see such a darling butler?’ said Tessa as Jenkins moved away. ‘How sweet of Daphne to find an evening’s work for some poor old pensioner.’
I wondered how I was going to persuade Tessa to return Fiona’s fur coat. What was I going to use as an excuse? And where was I going to put the damn thing without having to go into a lot of discussion about it with Gloria?
‘I was thinking about Fiona’s fur coat,’ I began.
‘Oh, yes, darling. Do tell.’
‘I thought perhaps I should put it with all the other things.’
‘All what other things?’ She swung her hair back from her face.
‘Some bits and pieces that Fiona liked especially.’
‘It’s a beautiful bit of fur, you know. Daddy paid the absolute earth for it.’
‘Yes, it’s something of a responsibility for you.’
‘I’m not wearing it, poppet, if that’s what you’re on about.’
‘No, I’m sure you’re not, Tessa, and it’s kind of you to look after the damned thing all this time. I just thought that…’
‘No trouble at all, darling. It’s with my own furs and when summer comes…if it ever comes, they’ll all go into refrigerated storage together.’
‘Well, you see, Tessa…’ I started. She tilted her head as if very interested in what I was going to say but let her fair hair fall forward, so that she could hide behind it. At that moment we were interrupted by an old acquaintance of mine: Posh Harry, a CIA trouble-shooter from Washington. A short thickset man of vaguely oriental appearance, he was of that mixed Hawaiian and Caucasian ancestry that in his birthplace is called hapa haoli. He was in his middle thirties, always carefully groomed and of pleasing appearance. It would be easy to imagine hi
m, suitably costumed, singing baritone in Madame Butterfly, or more credibly perhaps South Pacific.
‘And who is this glorious young lady you’re talking to, Bernard?’ said Harry.
Tessa put an arm through his and said, ‘Have you forgotten so soon, Harry? I’m mortified.’ Posh Harry smiled, and before he could start an explanation the sonorous voice of Jenkins announced, ‘Ladies and gentlemen. Dinner is served.’ I caught Tessa’s eye and she smiled sardonically.
Tessa’s husband was talking to Gloria. He was fortyish. Born in London’s East End of impoverished Polish parents, he had become rich selling cars and, later, property. I had the impression that George put himself in the hands of the most expensive tailors, shirtmakers, outfitters and hairdressers he could find. So he was to be seen in a succession of dinner suits cut to ever changing fashions.
This evening George seemed to notice Gloria for the first time, for he fell deep in conversation with her soon after we arrived. I was somewhat surprised by this, for George had always seemed ill at ease with women, except the ones he knew well. Sometimes I wondered how he ever came to get married to Tessa; and why. Fiona used to say that it was Tessa’s inexhaustible infidelities that had driven George to making so much money, but George was on the way to riches long before Tessa married him.
George was a man of irreproachable integrity, something I wouldn’t have thought of as a prime asset in the secondhand car business. Once I’d said this to him. Characteristically George had given me a short lecture upon the probity and good will of his profession.
George and Gloria were talking when dinner was announced. Because George was very short, she had perched herself on one arm of a sofa so he didn’t have to look up to her. George liked her, I could see that in his face, and when others came to join them in conversation he was determined to keep her attention. Jenkins now repeated his announcement in a louder voice. They all looked up.
After a couple of false starts, Jenkins heaved open the doors of the dark, candlelit dining room to reveal the long polished table set with flowers and gleaming tableware. The assembled company paused for a moment to gaze at this spectacle. This I felt was the beginning of a new age of Cruyerdom, a bid for the better life, a home background that would suit a man destined to rub shoulders with the mighty, brilliantly administer the secret dimension of political affairs, and retire with that coveted K. The only question that remained was why had I been invited.
‘Daphne! How picturesque!’ called Tessa as we moved in. ‘Un véritable coup de théâtre, darling!’
‘Shush!’ I heard George say to her as we circled around to find our name cards. He said it in a quiet impersonal way, as a member of a theatre audience might react to a latecomer without interrupting the action on the stage. As we sat down, George, with his enviable memory, recalled a meeting with Posh Harry a few years previously when Harry visited George’s used motorcar emporium in one of the less salubrious parts of Southwark, south London.
Posh Harry smiled without either confirming or denying it. That was his way. Harry could be inscrutable. He was dressed in a remarkable shiny black dinner suit with a lace-trimmed shirt that Beau Brummel might have worn except that it was a bit too frilly. Harry was always a fancy dresser, and it had to be admitted that he could carry it off. With him, and wearing a strapless satin gown cut very very low, was the same American woman I’d seen him with in Southwark. She was in her middle thirties and would have been pretty except for the rather plump features which gave her a look of unremitting petulance. This impression was heightened by the strident candied-yams and black-eyed peas accent she affected. At dinner she was sitting next to me. Her name turned out to be Jo-Jo.
I was interested to watch the inter-action between Posh Harry and our host. I wondered when it was that they first met, and I wondered if Harry’s presence in London signalled some CIA development that I should find out about. I knew that there was a new Station Chief in London: maybe Harry was his trouble-shooter.
‘What’s your new boss like?’ Dicky casually asked Posh Harry once we were all seated and the wine was being poured.
Harry, who sat across the table from me, replied, ‘Say Dicky, what does die neue Sachlichkeit really mean?’
Dicky said, ‘The new realism. It means realistic painting. Isn’t that right, Bernard?’
Constitutionally incapable of answering such a question in any way but fully, I said, ‘And poetry. It’s nineteen twenties jargon…a reaction against Impressionism. Also against beauty in favour of functionalism.’
Dicky said, ‘You see, Bernard isn’t just a pretty face.’ He laughed and so did Jo-Jo. I could have banged their heads together.
Posh Harry smiled and said, ‘My new boss keeps talking about die neue Sachlichkeit like he’s going to be a new broom and give everyone hell.’
Dicky smiled. I suppose it was Harry’s prepared answer to an expected question. Posh Harry spoke damned good German. I’d be surprised if he really didn’t know what it meant.
Posh Harry added, ‘Never mind Bernard’s “pretty face”. I want to know where he’s been hiding this gorgeous little girl all this time.’ He was sitting next to Gloria, who sipped her wine to conceal her self-satisfied smile.
The first course was a crab soup with garlic bread. While Jenkins ladled it out with studied care there was the usual small-talk. Daphne Cruyer, relieved of her kitchen duties and with Jenkins to serve the food, was for the first time a guest at one of her own dinner parties. She seemed to thrive on it. Dicky too seemed delighted with this chance to play host. He was beaming the whole evening except when Jenkins – offering a second helping of crab soup from a heavy Japanese bowl – poured some of it over him. Even then Dicky only said, ‘Steady on, Jenkins man!’, albeit rather loudly.
It was at this stage of the proceedings that I overheard Daphne’s loud whisper that told the evidently unsteady Jenkins not to try to dish up the salmon. Instead he was to put the whole fish in front of Dicky. It must be said that Jenkins didn’t do this with good grace. He slammed the platter down with enough force to make the cutlery jingle.
‘I’m totally with Jefferson’s interpretation of the Tenth Amendment,’ Dicky was saying as the fish arrived so dramatically before him. He’d been treating his end of the table – which is to say me and Harry, for the ladies each side of him were trying to hear Daphne at the other end – to his views on federal government.
Dicky stared at the newly arrived salmon as if bewildered. His confusion might have been partly due to the huge pale green scales the fish wore, although on closer inspection these proved to be wafer-thin slices of cucumber, laboriously arranged in overlapping rows. Dicky looked up and saw Daphne – at the other end of the table – staring at him and making energetic sawing motions with her hand. He looked at Posh Harry, who gave an inscrutable smile and murmured something about his position as a government employee making it inappropriate for him to voice any opinion on states’ rights.
Dicky had to be satisfied with this because he was, by that time, struggling to divide up the poached salmon. I don’t know what persuaded Dicky to try slicing through it rather than fillet it from the bone; perhaps he took Daphne’s mime too literally. But he soon discovered that even an overcooked salmon’s spine is not easily severed with a silver serving spoon. Yielding to considerable force, for Dicky was nothing if not strong, the head seemed to slide off the platter, hide under the flowers, and look at Dicky reproachfully.
Daphne, while watching Dicky, got everyone’s attention by suddenly beginning to describe a place in north London where she was going for skiing lessons on plastic snow. Everyone turned to face her. There was a certain shrill note in her voice, perhaps because the skiing season was over. As if suddenly remembering this she said she was going to lessons there all through summer and winter so that next year she’d be really good. Only Tessa – sitting on my right – turned to see what had happened when the head came off. She said, ‘What a gorgeous fish. Did you land him yourself, D
icky?’
Dicky smiled grimly, and so did the indomitable Jenkins, who I now noticed was leaning slouched against the sideboard and watching Dicky’s efforts appreciatively.
‘It’s not farmed salmon,’ said Daphne. ‘It’s wild.’
‘So would I be, darling,’ said Tessa turning back to her.
Daphne gave her a frosty smile. Tessa was suspected of a torrid affair with Dicky some years previously and Daphne had not forgotten it.
‘Jenkins,’ said Daphne in a trilling nursery school voice. ‘Would you pour the wine please.’ And because Daphne had spent so many years monitoring Dicky, she was able to add in time, ‘Not the Chambertin, Jenkins; the white Hermitage.’ And this time her voice was less composed.
As Dicky said afterwards, the wonderful beurre blanc sauce completely concealed the broken pieces of fish. But Tessa’s stated view was that it was like eating darning needles wrapped in cotton wool. Tessa was one of those ladies who didn’t like finding fish bones in their fish. Anyway, there were plenty of second-helpings.
Moreover there was hare cooked in red wine to follow. It came ready-sliced on plates. The little old lady in the kitchen was working miracles. And rhubarb pie followed by a huge Stilton cheese with vintage port.
Fully recovered from his contest with the salmon, Dicky was in top form, which meant attentive and charming. There was never a time when I more easily understood Dicky’s success in everything he did. He told jokes – good jokes – and laughed at his guests’ stories. He made sure everyone had what he or she wanted, from aperitifs to cigars, and was even cordial with Daphne.
George and Sir Giles were sitting each side of Daphne but I noticed that Tessa had been distanced from Dicky. I wondered if Daphne had chosen the place settings. The cards were in her handwriting. And it was Tessa whom Daphne looked at when she stood up and called upon the ladies to retire. I thought Tessa would make a fuss and say no – as I’d seen her do before when she was feeling bolshie – but she got to her feet meekly and left the room with the rest of them.