Kate was charming, and he spoke mainly to her. She looked ten years younger, and not merely because of the make-up. Her shoulder was better. The manipulation under a general anaesthetic had worked brilliantly. Even if it hadn’t been for the problems with Peter – here she lowered her voice – she’d have been able to manage on her own now.
‘Did Peter get back to you?’
‘Yes, he sent me a very nice letter saying how pleased he was I was better and thanking me –’
‘What was he thanking you for?’
‘The experience – he said it had been very important to him, and…’ A self-deprecating smile. ‘I gave him a month’s wages in lieu of notice.’
‘Kate.’
‘We-ell… I thought, in the end, what’s the point of having a confrontation? And when I look back, I think my own reaction was pretty odd. Mad. I must have been very low in confidence or something because I really felt that dressing-up thing was saying something about me. And, of course, it wasn’t – it was entirely about him.’
‘You think you overreacted? I don’t think you did.’
‘No, I think I was right to get rid of him. It’d… It was really peculiar. It’d turned into a kind of battle…’ She raised her hands. ‘Anyway, it’s over now, and my shoulder’s better, and… It’s great, just to be able to put on a sweater and not get stuck halfway.’
Faced with the mental image of Kate pulling on a sweater, Stephen became aware of her perfume, her closeness. Sunlight gilded the lines of her throat and neck where Ben’s amulet caught the light and glittered. She asked how he was getting on with the book, and he told her quite well. He was two thirds of the way through the final draft, though he might have to break off and go down to London for a few days to sort things out down there. ‘The money’s come through on the house. So we ought to be able to get the divorce settlement sorted out, and then…’
‘Will you move back to London?’
‘I don’t know. The obvious thing to do is rent and wait for the market to collapse. And I’m happy here, for the time being. I don’t know what it’s going to be like when the book’s finished and I’m trying to earn my living freelance. I know people say you can do it with just e-mails and faxes, but I’m not sure. I don’t know to what extent you really need to be a face on the scene.’
‘You won’t go back full time?’
‘Oh, no.’
‘Congratulations. You’ve actually done what Ben always said he would do.’ Her fingers strayed to the amulet round her neck. ‘And never did.’
Stephen said quickly, ‘Anyway, all that’s in the future. At the moment I feel everything’s on hold till the book’s finished. It’s ridiculous. I know I shouldn’t be doing it.’
‘What?’
‘Sacrificing life to work.’
She laughed. ‘Tell me about it.’
She seemed genuinely interested in his plans, and that meant a lot. If he only came away from his time in the north with Kate’s friendship, it would have been time well spent. Meanwhile, he really ought to cut back on the drinking. Robert, who was a generous host, kept replenishing his glass, which made it difficult to keep track. He was slightly drunk, not incapacitated, but floating on a golden cloud two or three inches above the carpet. He’d reached the stage of being in love with all the women in the room: the glint of down on Angela’s cheek, Justine’s ferocious blue-eyed stare – she seemed to be glaring at him, he couldn’t think why – Kate’s hands, which she was so ashamed of. Even with make-up on, and jewellery, she did nothing to draw attention to them, no nail varnish, no rings, except her wedding ring, and he wanted to say, ‘You’re wrong about them. They’re beautiful.’ Justine’s mouth was up to its usual trick of erasing lipstick. He found that incredibly erotic: the body rejecting artifice, so much sexier than any of the obvious things. He was trying to remember a time – he couldn’t even recall where, let alone when – he and Ben had been at some kind of lap-dancing club. God knows why, it wasn’t the kind of thing they went in for, but somehow there they were. Crowded room, smoke, drink, blue berets everywhere. Wherever two or three peace-keepers are gathered together in the UN’s name, there is a lap-dancer in the midst of them – not always voluntarily either. And despite knowing that many of these women were victims, he’d had a glimpse of why some men hate women. It’s demeaning to find yourself salivating like one of Pavlov’s bloody dogs just because some woman you don’t even fancy pushes her arse into your face. How much sexier the glimpse of a nipple under a white shirt blouse, especially when the girl doesn’t even know she’s showing it. Justine was now positively glaring, but when he raised his eyebrows and mouthed ‘What?’ she turned away and focused her whole attention on Mark, who was gazing at her like a love-sick calf.
When the time came to clear the table, Justine did it with such a startling bang and clatter he feared for the plates. Alec looked at her, reflectively, and then at Stephen. Stephen found it surprisingly difficult to meet his gaze. Are your intentions towards my daughter honourable? Somewhere, in the air above their heads, the ridiculous Victorian question hovered, and could not, despite the modern world with all its changes and complexities, be entirely discounted. No, not honourable, Stephen said, looking at the flicker of sunlight on the table cloth, but, at least, I hope, kind.
They went into the drawing room for coffee, and Stephen sat by Angela, who answered his remarks almost at random, her eyes never leaving Alec’s face. There were two hectic spots on her cheeks, she had a general air of recklessness and abandon. She’d grown tired, he could tell, of being the person she was, this silly menopausal woman who kept rams as pets and arranged flowers in the church and fell obviously, humiliatingly, in love with the vicar. What an identity to cart about in the twenty-first century. She had no possible grounds for believing in her own existence. Yet here she was, and he could sense her summoning up the courage to change or ruin her life.
Alec was talking to Robert about the ethics committee they both served on. Oh, God, Stephen thought, blastocysts again. Robert was unfailingly courteous, but he was off duty. Alec, of course, was not.
After a while Stephen became aware that Justine had not joined them. He went down to the kitchen to find her beginning to wash the dishes. Beth, he knew from previous visits, never trusted this particular service to the dishwasher. Justine squirted washing-up liquid at the bowl as if she were wielding a flame-thrower. A huge foaming monster drooped and glooped over the edges of the sink, and when she turned round to face him, shaking her hands, great blobs of foam flew off into the air, one landing on his cheek where it popped stinging bubbles into his eye.
‘Leave that. Come on upstairs.’
‘It won’t take a minute.’ Tight-lipped. ‘Anyway, I’m surprised you noticed I wasn’t there.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘You know what I mean.’
He put a hand on her shoulder. ‘Justine.’
‘Sober up, Stephen, you’re pathetic.’
‘What?’ He tried a cooler approach. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Your bloody sister-in-law, for one thing. She should concentrate on her own marriage, not go poking her nose into other people’s lives. I suppose you know Robert’s screwing around?’
‘I think he might have a girlfriend.’
‘A girlfriend? He fucks his way round the conference circuit like a rabbit on amphetamines.’
He was shocked. ‘Has he tried it on with you?’
‘Oh, come on. Do you really think your brother’s stupid enough to shit on his own doorstep? I don’t think so. Anyway, he’s never here. And neither of them’ – she jerked her thumb at the window – ‘pay anything like enough attention to that.’
Adam had slipped away from the table as soon after the pudding as he reasonably could and was now mooching about in the garden, poking a long stick into the pond.
‘What’s he doing?’
‘Getting dead leaves out.’
‘She wasn’t really interfer
ing. She just invited a few people for lunch. That’s all she’s done.’
‘Bollocks.’ Another plate banged down on to the draining board. ‘She knows exactly what she’s doing. It’s bad enough having Romeo and bloody Juliet up there, without you slobbering over Kate as well.’
He couldn’t believe his ears. ‘Slobbering?’
Another clatter of irreplaceable Georgian glass.
‘Justine. Leave the dishes. Hit me.’
‘Don’t tempt me.’
There was a tremor in her voice that he hoped was the beginning of laughter, but he wasn’t confident enough to presume on it. He was right.
At that moment they heard an embarrassed cough and turned to see Mark Callender hovering in the doorway, red-faced and awkward, with a tray of coffee cups in his hands.
‘WHAT DO YOU WANT?’ Justine roared.
It was blindingly obvious what he wanted, the poor sod.
‘I brought these.’
Stephen pointed to the table. ‘Just put them down there, will you?’
Mark retreated to the safety of the hall. ‘I think Mr Braithewaite’s leaving.’
‘Right,’ Justine said, pulling off her apron. ‘I’m out of here.’
Stephen tried to take her in his arms, but she pushed him away. ‘Don’t burn too many boats,’ he called after her.
‘You’re the one who’s done that. The whole bloody armada.’
Twenty-two
Stephen hadn’t expected Justine to come to the cottage that evening, but she did, late, tear-stained and miserable.
‘Dad and Angela are getting married,’ she said.
‘Good,’ he said, after a second’s pause.
‘Good?’
‘It’s going to make it a lot easier for you to go away. You wouldn’t want to leave him on his own.’
‘No-o.’
Then the wails started. He hadn’t believed her capable of such uninhibited, childlike distress. ‘What’s wrong?’ he said. ‘What is it?’
‘Nobody loves me.’
‘Your father loves you.’ A bit late, lamely and lacking all conviction, he added, ‘I love you.’
She uncovered her face, and gave him a sharp look. She wasn’t so far gone that insincerity didn’t penetrate. ‘You don’t have to say it.’ Suddenly, she stopped crying, and said briskly, ‘My mother didn’t love me.’
‘I’m sure she did.’ But he cringed as he said it, aware of the pointlessness of pronouncing on the feelings of a woman he’d never met.
‘Not enough to stick around. You know, it’s difficult to expect other people to treat you decently when…’
‘No, I know.’ The darkness at the uncurtained windows pressed in on them. ‘And Peter can’t have helped.’
‘No. So OK, he was bad news, and he would’ve been for anybody, I don’t think it was just me, but I fell for him. I can’t help thinking somebody else mightn’t have done, not in the same way. I clutched at it.’
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, stop beating yourself up. He’s attractive, he’s charming, he’s good-looking. If it came to a pulling contest, he’d do a helluva lot better than Mark.’
‘That’s true.’
‘Though apparently not as well as my brother.’
‘You’re jealous.’
‘Too bloody right I’m jealous.’
How could he have got his own brother so wrong. But he couldn’t sort that out now. ‘Look, getting back to Peter, in ten years’ time you’re going to believe you had a bloody good screw and dumped him. You dumped him. So just press fast-forward and start believing it now.’
She was lying in his arms on the bed, looking through the open curtains at the moon drifting between high towers of cloud.
‘It isn’t as easy as that. And in any case you don’t mean it, you know you don’t.’ She sniffed, wiping tears away on the back of her hand. ‘Dad liked you, by the way.’
‘I can’t think why. He must know I’m married.’
‘I haven’t told him.’
‘He knows.’
‘Well, I am nineteen –’
‘More to the point, Mark liked you.’
‘Yes, I know. He asked me to go out with him.’
‘Before or after you yelled at him?’
‘After.’
‘Kinky sod. Will you go?’
‘Do you think I should?’
‘Do you want to?’
‘I didn’t think he was all that attractive. Perhaps as a friend…’
‘If he’s a possible friend, you should go. Mind you, I’m not sure that’s what he wants.’
‘He’s just finished doing Medicine at Cambridge.’
‘Well, then.’
‘You’re supposed to be jealous.’
‘I’ve no right to be jealous. Have I?’
She didn’t answer. After a few seconds, she rolled over and, in a tense silence, they tried to get to sleep.
He woke the following morning knowing before he opened his eyes that something was wrong. Looking into the mirror as he shaved, his expression was not that conspiratorial self-acceptance he’d found so attractive in Goya’s self-portrait. Far from it. He craned his head back, guiding the razor underneath his chin, and he didn’t like anything he saw.
He made coffee and then took his toast into the living room to watch the television news. Israeli tanks bombarding Jenin. An old woman in a headscarf crying in the ruins of her home. Justine, who seemed to have lost her appetite for fry-ups, peeled and ate an orange.
When the news was over, she said, ‘Dad says you were asking questions about Peter before lunch. Why?’
‘I wanted to hear what he’d say.’
‘He says you kept asking what Peter did.’
He didn’t answer.
‘Whatever it was, he’s been out five years and he hasn’t done it again.’
‘How do you know, if you don’t know what it was?’
‘You don’t give anybody the benefit of the doubt, do you?’
‘Not often.’
‘The truth is, you’ve been digging around in violence so long you can’t see anything else.’
‘I see you.’
‘Do you?’
Stephen sighed. This was a surprisingly married conversation to be having with a girlfriend. It had that intense acrimonious pointlessness that only comes from long years of cohabitation.
‘Why do you do it?’
‘What?’
She jerked her head at the girl who was talking to camera. ‘That. Be a war correspondent.’
‘Foreign.’ The distinction mattered. He was damned if he was going to call himself after an activity he despised.
‘You covered a helluva lot of wars.’
‘They were there to be covered. I didn’t start them.’
‘You know there’s a Barbara Vine book called A Dark Adapted Eye? That’s what you’ve got.’
‘Now you’re being silly.’
‘No, I’m not. People get into darkness, to the point where it’s the light that hurts.’
‘OK,’ he said. ‘Why did I do it? Adventure, proving myself, proving I could take it – and once that wore off, which it does, very quickly, being in the know. That sort of thing.’
She was looking at him scornfully.
‘Yeah, OK. I know – pathetic. But why do you think people become doctors? Pure altruism? I don’t think so.’
‘Why, then?’
‘Knowledge. Access to secrets. Power.’
‘Not the only reasons.’
‘There are plenty of good reasons for being a war correspondent. Witnessing. Giving people the raw material to make moral judgements.’
‘But you said yourself, the witness turns into an audience, and then you’re not witnessing any more, you’re disseminating.’
He’d forgotten he’d said that. ‘If you mean, “Was I damaged by it?” Yeah. I don’t think it’s inevitable, I can think of plenty of people who haven’t been, but, yeah, I think I was. Can it be repai
red? Some of it. Probably not all of it, but that’s me –’ He turned to face her. ‘Imperfect, messed up, thoroughly unsatisfactory – and you’d better get used to it, sweetheart, because there’s a couple of million more of us out there.’
She stared directly into his eyes, the skin around her own eyes swollen from last night’s tears. ‘You’re getting tired of this, aren’t you?’
‘It’s not that.’
‘What, then?’
‘I’ve always known it can’t last. I accept that. And whenever you go, I won’t try to hold you back. You will go with my blessing.’ That sounded cringe-makingly pompous, but it had to be said.
She nodded. A few minutes later, still silent, she started to get dressed.
At the door, as she was leaving, she said, ‘Oh, I almost forgot. Beth wants to see you.’
‘What about?’
A shrug, and she was gone.
He couldn’t guess what the summons to the farmhouse might be about. If it had anything to do with Justine, he was prepared to hit back. He no longer saw his brother’s wife as the fragile half-erased victim of Robert’s more forceful personality, but as somebody altogether more formidable. But she had no possible right to interfere. Locking the door, deciding that no, he didn’t need to wear a sweater for the quick walk up the lane, he planned what he would say: something about the advisability of taking care of her own family first. Adam was getting a bloody raw deal in this situation, and, if provoked, he was prepared to come right out and say so. At some level, anyway, she must know that.
He walked to the farmhouse along the narrow path that led between high hawthorn hedges bursting into leaf, passed the pond with its rutted edges, green goose shit everywhere, and the geese themselves hissing and swaying towards him. The back door was open. In the band of sunshine that fell across the stone-flagged floor, there were three pairs of wellingtons, standing side by side, two of them green, the other, smaller pair in navy-blue and red. Once, not so long ago, he’d have felt a twinge of envy.