“You must stay with your friends and I must run and catch up with Abdul Wahid,” she said. “I need to be with my family.”
“You really can’t leave now, Dad,” said Roger, in a urgent whisper. “It would be the height of rudeness to Dagenham.”
“At least let me walk you out,” said the Major as Mrs. Ali walked away.
As he hurried after her, he heard Sadie Khan speaking. Daisy’s response, in a crystal voice, carried over the music and voices: “Yes, of course, you would be so much more suitable, my dear, only we are quite oversubscribed in the medical professions and the club works so hard to promote diversity in the membership.”
Out in the cold night, the stars were abundant in a way that increased the pain of the moment. Mrs. Ali paused on the top step and the Major stood at her shoulder, mute with humiliation at his own foolishness.
“We are always talking outside like this,” she said at last. Her breath steamed in the cold and her eyes shone, perhaps with tears.
“I made a mess of everything, didn’t I?” he said. Below them, Amina and Abdul were arguing as they walked down the driveway. Mrs. Ali sighed.
“I was in danger of doing the same,” she said. “Now I see what I must do. I must put an end to the family squabbling and see those two settled.”
“They are so different,” he said. “Do you think they can live together?”
“It is funny, isn’t it?” she said in a quiet voice. “A couple may have nothing in common but the color of their skin and the country of their ancestors, but the whole world would see them as compatible.”
“It’s not fair,” he said. “But it doesn’t have to be that way, does it?”
“Maybe, while they disagree about some big issues, they share the small pieces of their culture without thinking. Perhaps I do not give that enough weight.”
“May I come and see you tomorrow?” he asked.
“I think not,” she said. “I think I shall be busy, preparing to go to my husband’s family.”
“You can’t be serious. Just like that? What about our Sunday readings?”
“I will think of you whenever I read Mr. Kipling, Major,” she said, with a sad smile. “Thank you for trying to be my friend.” She offered her hand and he again put it to his lips. After a few moments, she tugged it gently away and stepped down to the driveway. He wanted so much to run down after her but he found himself fixed where he was, standing in the light of the doorway with the music spilling around him and the crowd waiting for him inside.
“I could come down early,” he called after her. “We could talk.”
“Go back to your party, Major,” she said. “You’ll catch cold standing in the dark.” She hurried down the driveway and as she disappeared, blue dress into deep night, he knew he was a fool. Yet at that moment, he could not find a way to be a different man.
Chapter 18
Mrs. Ali left the village. The Major did not see her go. He had meant to go down to the shop and visit her, but his anger and despair at having made such a mess of the evening seemed to help bring on the full-blown cold she had so carelessly predicted and he lay in bed for three days. As he dozed in rumpled pajamas and furred teeth, ignoring the shrill rings of the telephone and the torturing tick of his bedroom clock, Mrs. Ali went north to her husband’s family and, by the time he was well enough to walk down to the village, it was too late.
The Major put his head down and prepared to battle through the tinsel storm that passed for Christmas now in an England that he remembered had once been grateful for a few pairs of wool socks and a hot pudding with more raisins than carrots. He woke each day hoping to feel fully recovered from his illness but could not shake a dry cough and a persistent lassitude. He felt buffeted to the point of collapse by the tinny music in the stores and streets. The more the crowds in the town caroled and laughed and loaded themselves, and their credit cards, with bags of presents, cases of beer, and hampers containing jars of indigestibles from many nations, the more he felt the whole world become hollow.
Holiday preparations in Edgecombe St. Mary seemed to elbow aside all other concerns. Even the campaign against St. James Homes seemed to be muted. The “Save our Village” posters that had sprung up right after the shooting party were hardly noticeable in windows amid all the flashing fairy lights, the lurid lawn displays of inflatable Santas, and the electric-twig reindeer with endlessly grazing heads. Even Alice Pierce had taken down one of her three posters and replaced it with a painting on wood of a dove carrying a ribbon that read “Joy to the World.” It was illuminated at night by the pinkish glow of two bare compact fluorescent bulbs, mounted on a board below together with a timer that turned them on and off at excruciatingly slow intervals.
At the village shop, which the Major avoided as long as possible, Christmas decorations helped obliterate any trace of Mrs. Ali. A forest of foil dangly things and paper chains and large crêpe-paper balls promoting a beer had transformed the shop into a festive horror. There were none of Mrs. Ali’s handmade samosas next to the packaged meat pies in the cold case. The large caddies of loose tea behind the counter had been replaced by a display of chocolate assortment boxes of a size guaranteed to cause acute happiness followed by acute gastric distress in small children. The modest, hand-wrapped gift baskets, which the Major had decided to stock up on for the holidays, had been replaced by large cheap commercial baskets painted in garish colors and crowned with yellow cellophane; each was skewered by a bamboo stick adorned with a plastic teddy bear made furry with what appeared to be wallpaper flocking. Who would possibly take pleasure in a bear-on-a-stick was a mystery the Major could not comprehend. He stood staring through his glasses at the poor things until a hard-featured old woman who was knitting behind the counter asked him if he wanted to buy one.
“Good heavens no, no, thank you,” he said. The old woman glared at him. She was evidently able to knit and glare at the same time, as there was no pause in the furious clicking of her needles. Abdul Wahid, appearing from the back, greeted him rather coldly and introduced the woman as one of his great-aunts.
“Pleased to meet you,” lied the Major. She inclined her head, but her smile retracted itself almost at once into a pursing of the lips that seemed her usual expression.
“She doesn’t speak much English,” said Abdul Wahid. “We have only just persuaded her to retire here from Pakistan.” He retrieved a plastic bag from under the counter. “I am glad you came in. I have been asked to return something to you.” The Major looked in the bag and saw the little volume of Kipling poetry that he had given Mrs. Ali.
“How is she?” asked the Major, hoping not to betray any urgency in his voice. The aunt released a torrent of language at Abdul Wahid, who nodded and then smiled apologetically.
“We are all very nicely settled, thank you,” he said and his voice continued to brick up a barrier of cold and indifference between them. The Major could find no crack of warmth on which to turn the conversation. “My auntie wants to know what we can get for you this morning.”
“Oh I don’t need anything, thank you,” said the Major. “I just popped in to—er—see the decorations.” He waved his hand toward an extra-large round paper ball topped with the flat outline of a winking girl with fat lips and an elf hat. Abdul Wahid blushed, and the Major added: “Of course, there can be no question of excess where there is commercial imperative.”
“I will not forget your hospitality this autumn, Major,” said Abdul Wahid. His voice at last offered some hint of recognition, but it was combined with an unanswerable finality, as if the Major were also planning on leaving the village forever. “You were very kind to extend your assistance to my family and we hope you will continue to be a valued customer.” The Major felt his sinuses contract and tears begin to well at the loss of connection even to this strange and intense young man. A lesser man might have grabbed for his sleeve or uttered a plea for—he supposed he had become used to Abdul Wahid’s presence, if not his friendship. He dove in
his pocket for a handkerchief and blew his nose loudly, apologizing for his lingering cold. The auntie and Abdul Wahid both drew back from the invisible menace of his germs and he was able to escape the shop without embarrassing himself.
Christmas was still present, he hoped, in the church, where he went one morning to lend some carved wooden camels for the crèche by the altar, as his father had begun doing many years ago. It was a ritual to unpack them from their tea chest in the attic, to unwind their linen wrappings, and to give the cedar a light rub with beeswax.
The church was blissfully bare of any manufactured decoration. The simple crèche was supplemented by two brass urns of holly flanking the altar and an arrangement of white roses draping the font. Handmade cards from the church school hung from wooden pegs on a line strung across the aisle. Still tired from his cold, the Major dropped into the front pew for a few moments of quiet reflection.
The Vicar, emerging from the sacristy with a handful of leaflets, gave a small start—almost a hesitation—and then walked over to shake hands.
“Brought the dromedaries, I see,” he said and sat down. The Major said nothing but watched the sunlight pour across the ancient flagstone floor and light up the dust motes. “Glad to see you out and about,” the Vicar went on. “We heard you were laid up after the dance, and Daisy kept meaning to check on you.”
“Entirely unnecessary and so no apologies required, Vicar,” said the Major.
“Bit of a shambles, that dance,” said the Vicar at last. “Daisy was very upset.”
“Was she?” said the Major in a dry tone.
“Oh, she worries about everyone so much, you know,” said the Vicar. “She has such a big heart.” The Major looked at him, astonished. Such touching delusion must underlie many otherwise inexplicable marriages, he thought, and liked Christopher all the better for loving his wife. The Vicar took an obvious deep breath.
“We heard that Mrs. Ali has moved away to be with family?” His eyes were nervous and probing.
“That’s what I’m told.” The Major felt a choke of misery rise into his voice. “There was nothing to keep her here.”
“It’s good to be with family,” said the Vicar. “Among your own people. She’s very lucky.”
“We could have been her people,” said the Major in a low voice. There was a silence as the Vicar shifted his bottom on the hard pew. He opened his mouth a few times, to no effect. The Major watched him struggle like a fly with one leg in a cobweb.
“Look, I’m as ecumenical as the best of them.” The Vicar set his hands in his lap and looked at the Major directly. “I’ve done my share of blessings for mixed-faith couples and you’ve attended our inter-faith festival yourself, Major.”
“The Jamaican steel band was a nice touch,” said the Major in an acid tone. The parish had seemed, for many years, oblivious to the fact that hymn singing in the village hall with the local Catholic church might not encompass the full range of world faiths. More recently the Vicar had tried to broaden the welcome, against some stiff opposition. Alec Shaw had suggested adding a Hindu speaker this past year. They had been led in a couple of chants and basic arm stretches by a lady yoga instructor who was a friend of Alma’s and who had learned all about Hinduism while staying in India with the Beatles in the 1960s. The world’s major faiths had also been represented by paintings of foreign children done by the Sunday school and the aforementioned reggae entertainment.
“Don’t laugh,” said the Vicar. “People loved those chaps. We’re inviting them back for the fête next summer.”
“Perhaps you could have invited Mrs. Ali,” said the Major. “Put her in charge of the tombola.”
“I know you feel you’ve lost—a friend,” said the Vicar, hesitating over the word, as if the Major had been engaged in a steamy affair. “But it’s for the best, believe me.”
“What are you saying?”
“Nothing, really. All I’m trying to tell you is that I see people get into these relationships—different backgrounds, different faiths, and so on—as if it’s not a big issue. They want the church’s blessing and off they go into the sunset as if everything will be easy.”
“Perhaps they’re willing to endure the hostility of the uninformed,” said the Major.
“Oh they are,” said the Vicar. “Until it turns out the hostility is from Mother, or Granny cuts them out of the will, or friends forget to invite them to some event. Then they come crying to me.” He looked anguished. “And they want me to promise that God loves them equally.”
“I take it he does not?” said the Major.
“Of course he does,” said the Vicar. “But that doesn’t mean they’ll both be saved, does it? They want me to promise they’ll be together in heaven, when the truth is I can’t even offer both a plot in the cemetery. They expect me to soft-pedal Jesus as if he’s just one of many possible options.”
“Sort of like a cosmic pick-and-mix?” said the Major.
“Exactly.” The Vicar looked at his watch, and the Major got the distinct impression that he was wondering whether it was too early for a drink. “Often, I think, they don’t believe in anything at all and they just want to prove to themselves that I don’t really believe anything either.”
“I’ve never heard you talk like this, Christopher,” said the Major. The Vicar looked a little sick, as if he might already be regretting the outburst.
“Might as well get it all on the table, then, Ernest,” he said. “My wife was in tears after that stupid dance. She feels that she may have been unkind.” He stopped and they both understood that this admission, while pathetically short of the mark, was nonetheless extraordinary coming from Daisy.
“I am not the one to whom any apology is owed,” said the Major at last.
“That will be the burden my wife will have to bear,” said the Vicar. “But as I told her, the best way to prove our remorse is not to compound the injustice with a lie.” He looked at the Major with a determination in his tightened jaw that the Major had never seen. “Therefore I will not sit here and pretend that I wish things had turned out differently.”
The silence seemed to reach to the very walls of the sanctuary and hum against the rose window. Neither man moved. The Major supposed he should feel angry, but he only felt drained, realizing that people had been discussing him and Mrs. Ali and that they had evoked such a strong response that the Vicar would state his opinion, even though the subject was moot.
“I’ve upset you,” said the Vicar at last, rising from the pew.
“I will not pretend that you haven’t,” said the Major. “I appreciate your candor.”
“I thought you deserved honesty,” said the Vicar. “People never speak of it directly, but you know that these things are difficult in a small community like ours.”
“I take it, then, that you won’t be giving a sermon on this subject of theological incompatibility?” asked the Major. He felt no rage, only a calm and icy distance, as if this man, who had been both a friend and an adviser, was now talking to him on a bad phone line from an ice floe in the Arctic.
“Of course not,” said the Vicar. “Since the Bishop’s office did market research on the devastating impact of negative or unduly stern sermons on the collection plate, we’re all under orders to stick with the positive.” He patted the Major on the shoulder. “I hope we’ll see you back in church this Sunday?”
“I expect so,” said the Major. “Though, since we’re being candid, I’d rather welcome a stern sermon, since what you usually read puts me to sleep.” He was gratified to see the Vicar flush even as he kept a smile fixed on his face. “I thought your honesty deserved reciprocity,” he added.
Upon leaving the church, the Major found himself walking toward the lane in which Grace lived. He felt an urgent need to talk over his immediate sense of permanent estrangement from the Vicar, and he felt cautiously optimistic that Grace would share his sense of outrage. He was also certain he could bully her into telling him what people were really
saying. At her front door, he paused, remembering the night of the dance and how everything had seemed possible in the sparkling hours of anticipation. After he rang the bell, he placed his fingertips on the door and closed his eyes as if he might conjure Jasmina in her midnight-blue dress, but the door stayed stubbornly real and the hall behind it now sounded with Grace’s footsteps. He was grateful to hear her coming. She would give him tea and agree with him that the Vicar was being absurd and she would talk to him about Jasmina and be sorry that she was gone. In return, he now decided, he would invite her to join him at Roger’s cottage for Christmas dinner. “What a nice surprise, Major,” she said as she opened the door. “I hope you’re feeling better?”
“I feel as if the entire village is against me,” he burst out. “Everyone is a complete idiot.”
“Well, you had better come in and have a cup of tea,” she said. She did not bother to pretend she did not understand what he meant, nor did she ask to be reassured that she herself was not included in his sweeping denunciation of his neighbors. As he stepped into her narrow hallway, he was very glad that England still created her particular brand of sensible woman.
The Major, with Grace’s complete agreement, had decided he would look ridiculous, and be more talked about, if he avoided the village shop, so he continued to pop in though every visit was painful, like picking at a scab. Amina, who worked during school hours and in the evenings, had lost the spiky tufts from her hair and no longer wore any bright colors or wild footwear. She maintained a subdued, noncommittal tone when Abdul Wahid’s ancient auntie was around.
“How’s little George?” he asked during a moment when she was alone. “I never see him.”
“He’s fine,” she said, ringing up his bag of cakes and two navel oranges as if she had always worked a till. “Two kids were mean to him his first day of school and there was a rumor that one family was taking their kids out. But the headmistress told them they wouldn’t get a free bus pass to the school they wanted, so that told them.”