“Yes, I know. Try and forget it.”
“We’ll never go there again.”
“I’ll be surprised if we’re ever asked, love.”
“That’s something, then. I wonder how Florence went on with them? Perhaps she’ll come over and mind them next week, and we could go to the pictures.”
“I don’t know. We’ll have to see.”
“I’ll have to take my coat to the cleaner’s first thing. Colin, it was awful, that man Yarker started interfering with her. With Charmian. I was embarrassed. I came out.”
“Yes, you did the right thing. Don’t get involved, that’s the best.”
They were the only car on the road, an icy ribbon unwrapping beneath them, the fields bare and still, the houses shuttered, the moon riding high and white.
“I haven’t been out at this time for years,” Sylvia said, adding, “thank God, and I don’t intend to be again.” She sounded cheerful enough, now that the whole ordeal was over. She stretched, arching her body in the seat, and yawned loudly. “Is that somebody behind us?”
Colin saw the flashing lights in his rear-view mirror. Sylvia saw them too, looking back over her shoulder. Colin pulled into the side of the road. For a moment neither of them spoke. Then, very quietly, very calmly, Sylvia said, “It’s like a nightmare.”
Colin wound down his window. The young constable whose face loomed up to fill their vision had a paste-coloured face in which freckles bloomed like the raisins in a steamed pudding. Shorn copper bristles extruded from under his cap, and for a chilling moment Colin thought Yarker had pursued him, metamorphosed, rendered youthful the better to hound him down the years.
“Are you aware, sir,” the boy said, “that your rear lights are defective?”
Slowly, Colin swung open the door and uncoiled himself from his seat. He set his feet as firmly on the ground as he could manage, but it seemed to give under his tread, as if swamp had bubbled through the tarmac. With one hand on the roof of the car he worked his way around to the boot. Something ghastly hung from the policeman’s hand, some membrane, shiny and swinging. Colin blinked.
“Would you please, sir,” said the constable, “breathe into this bag?”
CHAPTER 7
Colin woke up next morning to the sound of Sylvia talking on the telephone. The house seemed strangely quiet. Of course, he thought, the children are still at Florence’s. He fumbled on the bedside table for his watch, and when he raised his head a glancing pain swooped through it and settled behind his eyes. Just past noon. He allowed himself to flop back against the pillows. There was a foul taste in his mouth, and he felt slightly sick. I must get up, he told himself, and face things. Get the car; and the file, Isabel’s file, is still in the back of it. It came to him in a flash: Axon, Muriel Axon, their neighbours at home. How stupid that he shouldn’t have remembered, after all the years that the Axons had lived round the corner; next door, in fact, but because of their front gate being in Buckingham Avenue you didn’t think of them being next door. Not that he’d ever known the Axons, but you didn’t think of them as the kind of people who were a problem for Social Services. You didn’t think of Social Workers operating at all in the Lauderdale Road area, people were generally pretty self-sufficient, they kept their problems to themselves. He had a vague idea that there was something wrong with Muriel, not altogether there, but it wasn’t something you talked about. He supposed Mrs. Axon was getting on a bit, maybe she did need some kind of help. Hadn’t Florence been going on about them a few months back, saying she never saw them out and about? Not that you listened to half that Florence said. Wearily, Colin pushed the covers back and swung his legs out of bed. He sat on the edge of the mattress, rubbing his eyes. With the threat of motion, the pounding inside his skull had increased. Never mind the Axons, he thought, I’ve done my bit for them. I’ve got to sort myself out.
He went into the bathroom and cleaned his teeth. His face in the mirror was that of an elderly rake, parched and neurasthenic; as if with Frank’s Valpolicella he had drained the dregs of experience. He went downstairs. The living-room was unnaturally tidy; he realised that Sylvia had been cleaning. A sort of exorcism for her, he supposed, driving out the bad memories of Frank’s kitchen. Already the foul taste had come back into his mouth, mingled with toothpaste.
Sylvia came through from the kitchen carrying a duster and a tin of spray-polish. She was very pale, and looked suddenly much more pregnant.
“Oh, there you are. I’ll make some tea, then. I tried to get you up at ten o’clock, but you were sleeping like the dead.”
“I’m sorry. What a night!”
“You’ve nothing to be proud of, anyway.”
“I’m not proud. Do I look proud? Oh, for God’s sake, let’s not have a row.”
“I phoned Florence. I suggested she should bring them over on the bus. She didn’t seem keen. She’s waiting for you to fetch them.”
“Yes. All right.”
“The police said not to drive till late afternoon.”
“I’ll have to risk it, won’t I? How am I going to get to the car, is there a bus?”
“You can get the number ninety, and get off at the top of the hill by the Express Dairy. I think you’d better phone your solicitor, hadn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“What’ll happen?”
“I’ll lose my licence.”
He felt almost tearful. Sylvia was treating him as if he were somehow disgraced, and yet he thought that he could have been in a much worse state, and that considering the circumstances he had managed extraordinarily well. Of course, he could not tell her what the circumstances were.
“What was that thing you had under your arm? Was it that file?”
“Yes.” He saw no point in denying it.
“What do you want to go and get involved for?”
“I’m not getting involved. I just want to give it back to the people it belongs to.”
“What’s Frank going to say when he finds it’s missing?”
“I don’t know what he’ll say.”
“Well, you’ve got to face him on Tuesday. Oh, I don’t know.” Sylvia said. “I’ll get that tea for us. I think you ought to have an aspirin.”
What day was it? Sunday. You got so mixed up at half-term. The streets had a Sunday quiet. He waited twenty minutes for the bus, his stomach rumbling, his knuckles turning mauve in the raw air. Not raining, thank God. Off the bus, he trudged by a dripping hedgerow, by grey litter-blown fields. At the first phonebox he stopped and dialled Isabel’s number. She answered at once.
“Colin here. I got it.”
There was a pause.
“I’m grateful, Colin.”
Isn’t she going to ask how? Clearly she’s not. All right, he thought, I won’t tell her about the party, I won’t tell her about the breathalyser, I’ll cut her out of my life. But he blurted out, “It wasn’t easy. I had to hit someone.”
“Oh, Colin.” She sounded…gratified? Embarrassed? “Did you?”
“It was Frank. My Head of Department. Isabel, are you still there?”
“Yes, I’m still here. But I can’t think of much to say.”
“Shall I bring it to your house?”
“Please.”
“This afternoon?”
“Well, if you can.”
“Will you be there?”
“Yes, I’ll be there. But my father will answer the door.”
“But Isabel—”
“I’m grateful. But it doesn’t change anything.”
I have to keep her talking, he thought, before I lose her altogether. “There’s just one thing—of course I’ve not read the file, but I noticed the name, and the odd part about it is that I know the Axons, known them for years. Would you believe it, they live next to my sister, round the corner. The daughter’s a bit backward, isn’t she?”
“Yes.” He heard tension creep into her voice; she wanted to be rid of him, he thought, she found him a nuisance.
&n
bsp; “Will you be making a home visit to them now?”
“I’m in court tomorrow. A child battering case. Tuesday’s all spoken for.”
“But you ought to go, oughtn’t you, after such a long gap?”
“Maybe Wednesday. I’ve got the file. That’s the main thing. There’s no reason for you to worry about it, it’s for me to sort out.”
“You know, I’ve been piecing things together, and I realise you might have mentioned them once, and I just didn’t make the connection. We were in the pub, you see, talking—you said you didn’t like the case, you couldn’t come to grips with it.”
“I can’t discuss my clients with you. You know that. The fact that they’re your sister’s neighbours makes no difference to anything.”
“It’s funny, though, isn’t it?”
“These things happen. We live in the same town. It’s not such a coincidence, really.”
“But I lived in the same town as you,” he burst out, “and I never knew.”
“Yes, well, now you do. Thank you for getting the file back. Goodbye.”
“Is that all?”
“What else is there to say? The situation hasn’t changed.”
“But could I see you, just once?”
“You made your choice, I thought.”
“Shan’t I ever see you again, then?”
“I expect you will, sooner or later. After all, as you say, we live in the same town.” A moment’s pause, and she put the phone down. Colin came out of the box, and stood blowing his nose. As he tramped towards his car, it began to rain, little grey tears running off his anorak and trickling in his wake.
Evelyn sat in the kitchen staring into her teacup. It seemed absurd that she had suddenly become an invalid, but she felt she had hardly the strength to put out her hand, pick up the cup, and carry it to her mouth. The tea was going cold, her hand shook, the cup rattled in the saucer. The sleepless night had left her drained and muddle-headed.
The baby, which was born before dawn, had been very small. She could not bring herself to look too closely at it. At first it would not breathe. Muriel’s eyes signalled something to her. Leave it, she was saying. Shocked, Evelyn gripped the slippery thing and shook it. A thin hopeless bleating came out. A fine idea of Muriel’s, the ghost under their feet for years, learning in the parallel world to crawl, walk, and talk; and perhaps blaming them for its demise. She ventured downstairs, her flesh crawling, and brought Muriel some mixed biscuits on a plate.
Yesterday Muriel had been bothering her about a pram. As if she could push it about the streets, with her bad chest; as if Muriel was fit to be let out with it.
It was all as complicated as it could be. Muriel didn’t seem to have the knack of feeding it. Her milk hadn’t come, or the baby wouldn’t suck; it would have to have powdered milk out of a bottle, she supposed, but where was she to get such a thing on a Sunday?
“You realise,” she said to Muriel, “that if I go to the Parade asking for baby’s milk, they’ll probably ring up the Welfare? I’ll have to go where nobody knows my face. It’s a lot of trouble. Have another try with it.”
But Muriel yawned and rolled over onto her side and closed her eyes.
All that morning there were rappings and banging at the front door. The screams and laughter of spiteful children rang in Evelyn’s ears. She went down the hall at last, and threw the door open; but no one was there.
Florence will be furious with me, Colin thought. He sat in the car outside Isabel’s house; his sister had been expecting him for the last hour and more. He pictured his hand reaching out for the ignition key, turning it, engaging gear, moving off down the street. His real hands lay loosely inert, one at his side, one draped over the steering wheel. Driving about and driving about, that is all the last months have been, lying, driving from one set of hostile eyes to another. This is the last time I will have any business on Isabel’s street.
The eyes were not really hostile, of course. Just the bored indifferent eyes of strangers, slow to be roused to curiosity, slow to notice anything. Strangers in public houses, strangers by the roadside. He had long ago given up the writing class; he had got nothing from it, no pleasure, no profit.
He was angry; angry that she could now seem so immature, so callous. And she had been trained, he thought, trained to be in charge of other people’s lives, selected for it. It seemed that she had set out in their last conversation to demolish the picture he had built of her in his mind. It was not a reasonable picture. But reason has grown tired of its own successes.
Mr. Field came to the door. Without his spectacles, he blinked at Colin.
“I think you are expecting me, Mr. Field.” He held out the file. “This is for Isabel.”
“Ah, yes. Yes, thank you.” Mr. Field took the file from him and held it carefully in both hands. “Thank you so much. I hope it has been no trouble to you. Goodbye. Drive carefully.”
Have I failed her, let her down? Did she expect too much? I am too tired to think about it any more. Colin climbed into his car, slammed the door, set the windscreen wipers going. Life came home to him as blind chance and triviality, a series of minute disappointments impatiently endured. I shall never see her again, he thought, as he drove away.
“Monday morning, Muriel,” Evelyn said. “I should think you’ll be up and about later today, don’t you?”
She had hit on a brisk and reassuring tone, like the one that the Welfare visitors used. Talk loudly; keeps matters at bay.
The child was not deformed, but she did not take to it. Since its birth it seemed definitely to have changed for the worse. It seemed feeble, and it cried all the time with a noise like the mewing of a cat. It took no notice of them, never smiled. For all the company it was, it might have been inside Muriel still.
“I’m going now,” she said to Muriel. “It looks like snow. I hope it holds off.”
She took a bus. It was years since she had been in a bus. There was no conductor, and the driver called her lady. She had to give him her money.
“Don’t you know where you want to go, lady?”
“Yes, I do. I want to go to the shops in Kenilworth Road.”
Muttering to himself, the driver pulled out a book of fare tables and laboriously followed a column with his stubby finger.
“Fifteen pee,” he pronounced, and rolled up the book and shoved it away. She offered him some coins. “Right money,” he said, “right money. No change will be given. God help us.”
“That’s all right,” Evelyn said. “I don’t want the change, if it’s so much trouble. You can keep it.”
“What do you think I am, a hackney carriage?” the driver said. “What’s up with you?”
“I know what you are, a most ignorant and unpleasant man.” She pulled her ticket from the machine and handed herself down the bus to an empty seat. Her heart fluttered. It was warm and damp on the lower deck, the breath of the swaddled passengers steaming up the windows. She rubbed the pane with her hand, so that she would know when she got to Kenilworth Road. No one bothered about her; an old man with a loose cough, women with string bags, two young lads sharing a cigarette. A girl brought on a big collie dog and took it upstairs; up it ran, its jaws laughing, used to riding on the bus. A nice woman leaned towards her and offered her a mint.
“I heard that cheeky devil,” she said. “You did right to tell him off.”
“He was very rude, really he was.” She turned to the young woman. “I’m on my way to the chemists at Kenilworth Road. I’m shopping for my daughter. She’s got a new baby, you know.”
“Oh, that’s nice,” the woman said. “I’m expecting myself. Nice to be a grandma.”
“Yes,” Evelyn agreed. “It’s lovely.”
Her eyes were bright when she stepped off the bus. In spite of the driver, it had been a lovely journey, and perhaps she was rather at fault in not knowing the procedure. In the chemist’s shop, a girl in a lilac overall was opening cardboard boxes and putting bottles of egg shampoo
on a shelf. She smiled over her shoulder at Evelyn. A man in a white coat came from the back of the shop.
“All right, Carol, I’ll serve this lady,” he said. “Good morning, madam.”
“Good morning,” she said. “I want some milk for my daughter’s baby, and a bottle, if you please.”
The chemist seemed most interested, very attentive. He sold her some fluid for sterilizing and carefully explained to her what Muriel would have to do. “I’m surprised the midwife didn’t sort you out,” he said, “and being your daughter’s first, frankly I’m a bit surprised that she’s not in hospital.”
“Oh, she likes to be at home,” Evelyn said. “She wanted it like that.”
“Well, they say it’s the modern trend among the young mothers,” the man said, “and there’s a lot to be said for a home confinement. They go in for it in Holland, you know, and they’ve a lower mortality rate than here. Anyway, you’ll have the Health Visitor along, won’t you? Any problems, she’s your girl.”
Then the telephone rang in a back room, and the chemist had to go. Nodding to Carol, she pushed her purse into her bag and went out. She felt dazed as the shop door closed behind her. She could have stood there for ever, she thought, talking to that considerate man. She hadn’t told him that the baby had only been born yesterday, much less mentioned its odd behaviour. Perhaps he could have given her some good advice. She hesitated, wondering whether to turn back. But better say nothing perhaps. We’ve got this far, managed for ourselves. Her own convictions had carried her forward, her convictions about what was best for Muriel in the long run; and it was she, Muriel’s mother, and not the Welfare workers, who ought to know about that. She did not wish to admit to herself that now that the child was born she was confused, beginning to be frightened; menaces from the tenants she had expected, but she had not reckoned on a deep shrinking antipathy to what Muriel produced, the feeling that even their precarious foothold in the house was crumbling further; and that feeling dated, she knew, from her first good look at the baby’s face. She began to walk towards the bus stop, as slowly as she could, looking at the people she passed.