Now what happened after this I get very confused about, as if I don't quite want to remember and my brain says, 'All right, love, you shan't remember if you don't want to.' The wireless was still on with Housewives' Choice, I do remember that, not yet having reached Five to Ten, which was a very short religious programme about a saint called Quentin Hogg or some such name. Howard put his paper down and said, 'I shall go upstairs now and have a shave and a bath and perhaps by the time I've finished, this one'll be ready to get ready and get out.' And Howard marched upstairs. Now that was one thing that struck me as silly, and showed that Howard's brain couldn't work like any ordinary man's, and that was that he'd had a wash and got properly dressed before breakfast, and he must have known that after breakfast he'd want to have a bath, having to get undressed, of course, to have it, and why did he take the trouble to get properly dressed before breakfast? It might have been the force of habit of going to work and only having a bath at week-ends except in summer, but still you'd think he might have thought. Anyway, he was up there in the bathroom, first having gone in to see how Redvers Glass was getting on, and from the mutterings you could tell that Redvers Glass was awake now though still in bed, and then the bathroom door clicked shut and the water was thudding away into the bath and Howard was sort of singing. We got our hot water, by the way, from an immersion heater which was already in the house and they had them in all the houses in our street. I told myself that I'd better go upstairs and bring down the coffee-pot and cup and saucer (no sugar or milk) that were in Redvers Glass's room, as I'd finished the other washing-up and I didn't want to waste the sudsy water still in the bowl (Fairy Liquid, just a squeeze), so I went up, the whole house being full of the noise of Howard's bath and his singing. I went into the spare room with a sort of bit of excitement, and there was Redvers Glass lying in bed with his eyes open and very bright his eyes were. He had a bit of a beard and his hair was all over the place and he seemed to be in the nude. When he saw me it was like a fever in his eyes and my heart sort of beat pretty fast. 'Quick,' he said, 'quick,' and he sort of held his arms out, almost pleading, and then before I knew where I was I was sort of on the bed and he was tearing at me, very excited and sort of panting, 'Oh, God, oh, God.' His beard was very rough and when he pressed his mouth on to mine I expected to get all the beer and drink he'd had the night before, but his breath was quite sweet, only tasting just a bit of coffee to make a sort of bitter taste. 'In,' he sort of panted, 'get into bed, just for a minute.'
There wasn't time, and I told him so. Howard was in the bath and I could hear the water lapping and plopping as he moved in it, and then the tap on again for more hot water, and he was singing a song very tunelessly, an oldie that somebody had made a record of and was very popular among the teenagers who thought it was a newie:
'Waking and sleeping it's always the same,
Waking and sleeping I whisper your name.
Give me your lips,
Give me your heart as well.'
It was a bit weird hearing Howard singing that. Oh, Howard was very nice to have in bed, but he was very gentle all the time, and there was something in me that didn't want this gentleness. And the poet Redvers Glass was not gentle, not a bit, but he went on as though he'd willingly die afterwards if he could just have me now. But I got away from him, I had to, panting a lot myself, putting myself right. It was amazing what he'd managed to do even in that short space of time, but I couldn't have that, any of it, it wasn't right. After all, I hardly knew him at all, I'd only met him the night before. So I said, 'No, no, no,' and took up the tray with the coffee on it, and Redvers Glass turned on his side and groaned as though he was dying.
I got downstairs just in time, because Howard was out of the bath, he was always a quick bather, and in no time at all he'd clicked open the door and was downstairs himself with a towel round him and saying he'd bought new razor-blades yesterday and they must be in the same paper bag as I had the feather finish in that I'd bought, as well as the mascara, and he knew that was downstairs on the sideboard, and that whole business was a very near thing.
Redvers Glass came downstairs yawning, not having shaved, and his hair not combed very well. But you could see he was an attractive man. That's a funny thing, about attractiveness. It's not a matter of handsomeness or a good figure or even a good brain. There was just something about Redvers Glass that seemed to bring out something in me. I looked at them both, him and my Howard, and I knew I loved Howard deeply and dearly, but there was something about Redvers Glass. Howard said:
'What train will you be catching?'
'Train?' said Redvers Glass, surprised. And then he yawned. 'I'm catching no train. I'm staying here in Bradcaster. I rather like the look of Bradcaster.' Then he said:
'Bradcaster, O Bradcaster,
There's holy peace and quiet there.'
'Where will you stay?' asked Howard. 'I take it you've tried all the hotels and they wouldn't take you and that's why you got drunk.'
'Oh, no,' said Redvers Glass, 'that wasn't it at all. I booked in at one place and then I went to have a drink, and I met a very nice sort of Jamaican and we got talking and we went the rounds of the pubs, and some very nice pubs there are, too. But I couldn't remember which hotel I'd booked in at, and it seems that I must have fallen down near that Swinging place, and I do believe that's where I booked in, but I fell down, I think, and after that I only sort of remember being carried.'
'You didn't have any luggage,' said Howard.
'Oh, yes,' Redvers Glass said, 'in the left luggage at the station. One bag. A big one.' And he winked at me in a very serious sort of way.
'Well,' said Howard, 'you'd better be on your way then, hadn't you?'
'I'm disappointed in you,' said Redvers Glass in a sulky sort of way. 'Money you'll give, yes, but no other sort of help, it would seem. Hospitality is better than money. I ask you, I ask you, is it conceivable that I could do this long poem in a hotel bedroom?'
'I don't see why not,' said Howard. I couldn't help it, I could feel these giggles coming on again. I don't know what it was, but there was something about Redvers Glass that made me feel sort of warm and humorous, especially with Howard being so stern about it all.
'You try it, that's all,' said Redvers Glass, just as stern. 'I have no home. The man I was sharing this flat with in Pimlico got married, imagine that, so out poor Glass has to go. And they won't have me in the ancestral mansion of Sir Percival Glass, knight.' He held out his arms, more or less as he'd done to me upstairs in bed, and I went a bit hot and cold. 'Sir Percy does not believe in the arts,' he said, 'except the very useful ones. His son has been a big disappointment to him. And so where can I turn? Only to my patron. My patron needn't think he can regard the giving of money as the end of his obligations. I want to stay here in that room upstairs and work down here at this table.'
'Do you think I'm crackers?' said Howard.
'No,' said Redvers Glass. 'I think you're generous, that's what I think. I want a home.' And, believe it or not, he went down on his knees.
'Get up,' said Howard, very gruffly. Then he thought, while Redvers Glass still stayed on his knees winking at me. 'Sir Percival Glass,' said Howard after a bit. 'Born 1899, married Penelope, only daughter of Richard Barker, 1932, one son, two daughters. Glass's Paper Products, old-established family firm. Knighted for political services, 1956--'
'How do you know all that?' said Redvers Glass, amazed, getting up from the floor.
'It's his photographic memory,' I said. Howard said:
'I was looking up something else in the library. All that Glass stuff just sort of got caught.'
'Well, you can see, can't you?' said Redvers Glass, excited. 'You can see that a man like that would have no time for a son like me.'
'I don't see why not,' said Howard. And then he said, as though he'd given this some thought, 'I tell you what I'll do with you. She and I,' he said, sort of jerking a bit rudely in my direction, 'are going off for a bit of a holiday. To New
York and the Caribbean and so on.' He said it without much joy really. 'You can look after the place while we're gone. We'll be back in time for her birthday.'
'Who's her? 'I said. 'The cat's mother?'
Howard said nothing to that. He said to Redvers Glass, 'You,' sternly, 'are a poet, which is the supreme and most memorable sort of writer there is.' He said it without much joy, like that about New York and the Caribbean. 'Well,' he said, 'I have a bit of a job for you. We, that is to say, she and I, will be going off in four days' time.'
'As soon as that?' I cried out.
'We'll be a week in London,' said Howard, 'staying at Claridge's or the Ritz or some such place before flying off from London Airport. So,' he said to Redvers Glass, 'you can move in here the day we go. I'm paying the rent in advance,' said Howard, 'so you'll have no worries there. Is that all right with you?'
'How long will you be away?' said Redvers Glass.
'Till January 20th,' said Howard. 'We'll be back on that day. And there's this job you can do for me, you being a poet.' He looked at me and said, 'Perhaps you'd better get out, love, and carry on with your shopping.'
'What's all this about?' I asked, a bit cross.
'Nothing much,' he said, in a secretive sort of a way. 'Just a little something that has to be arranged. I was going to do it, but why keep a dog and bark yourself?'
'I've got to pick up my mink,' I said. 'They had to make some alterations to it.'
'You do that,' said Howard, still looking at Redvers Glass. 'You go and see about the milk, I mean mink.' Money had become no object. So, mystified, I got ready to go out. And while I was up in the bedroom, getting ready, Redvers Glass suddenly appeared, having pretended to want to relieve himself, and with the noise of the lavatory flush drowning him, he put his arms round me. 'I'll be at the Swinging whatsit,' he whispered. 'I don't know what room, I've forgotten. Ask for me at the desk, ask for me.' And, like a fool from some points of view, I said yes.
Chapter 15
Was I being a fool or mad or wicked or what? Was it this new way of life that Howard had chosen for us that was causing me to say yes and really intend to meet him at the Swinging Lamp? I just don't know. It's not usual to want to go and meet a man you only met for the first time the day before and, what's more, want to be made love to by him, specially when you still love your husband. Anyway, I got the bus (fancy, with all our money I still got the bus, chiefly because it was a nuisance phoning up for a taxi from a box, but I certainly would pick up a taxi in town near the Town Hall and come home in that) and went into town to this furrier's, Einstein's, which is a very famous name in things other than furs but I can't think what, and there was my lovely mink all ready for me, there having been a bit of an alteration that had to be made to the collar. I'd already paid for it, of course, and the cheque had gone through the bank or whatever had to be done to it, and everybody was all smiles and bows at the furrier's. That's one thing I love about the Jews, their politeness and attentiveness and their real desire to sell you something, not like the rest of the people in England. To give you an example of the rest of the shop-people in Bradcaster, I went to one big store to buy three dozen nylons, and the girl just couldn't care less about it and so I said 'Never mind' and walked out, blazing. Anyway, with my mink on and looking the picture of wealth and loveliness, I wondered about going to meet somebody who was only a poet and a bit dirty and scruffy as well, to meet him moreover in his bedroom after only meeting him the day before when, first, he'd wolfed down all the walnut cake and, second, he'd been drunk and had to be put to bed and snored all night. But this was my new life and I could do what I wanted, thanks very much.
I supposed it was a bit early yet to see if Redvers Glass had arrived at this hotel. I decided I would go and have a drink all on my own at the Royal, which had a lovely cocktail bar with soft lights and I knew Agnes who served behind the bar, because once she'd been on the cash registers at the Hastings Road Supermarket. When I walked in with my mink you could see everybody having a good look and I was very proud, though my heart was thudding away for one reason or another. 'Well,' said Agnes, 'blow me down,' which was a saying of hers. She was smart in a platinum blonde beaky kind of way, and as it was only just gone eleven there weren't many in the bar and she could have a really good look and be really envious. 'Well,' she said, 'that's really smashing. Just like the Queen.' And it was, too, and it had cost as much. Still, I didn't pretend to be a great lady, though everything I wore was expensive, except my perfume. I'd bought a very big Schiaparelli Shocking, but to my nose there was less flavour or smell to it than what I always used, which was a reasonable-priced perfume called Juillet, which I pronounced as Juliet. Here I was being a real Juliet, going to meet my Romeo very secretly. I wish they'd let us read that or act it at school, but we were always told that we wouldn't really like Shakespeare or dig it, rather, it was real square, man. Anyway, I ordered a double gin for myself, with very sweet vermouth, and I asked Agnes what she would have, and she had the same. Then I had another, and I got both more calm and confident and at the same time more excited. But I didn't blab anything out, which is always a big temptation, but very dangerous to another woman, even a close friend, mark my words.
Well, it was time for me to go and my knees felt very weak, and Agnes said, 'You look a bit queer, love, you shouldn't drink that very sweet vermouth,' but I said I was all right. I hadn't said anything about what time I'd be back, and after all it was Howard who'd told me to clear out and do some shopping, but I thought if I got back at about one-thirty that would be all right. After all, Howard had had a good big breakfast and, anyway, he had to go out by himself, I remembered, something about arranging foreign currency for this trip abroad with the bank. Why the whole world can't have all the same money, like PS s d or dollars or cents, I don't know. Anyway, Howard had been frowning a lot about foreign money. So he'd be at the bank this morning getting money and traveller's cheques and things. I walked round with my head up, playing it cool as Mr Slessor would say, to the Swinging Lamp, a nice little hotel, and one or two of the rougher element of the town who were not working gave me the old wolf-whistle, but I kept my head well up in the air. I ought to mention that it was a cold misty sort of a day, but I was lovely and warm. Lovely. And warm. Get it?
I felt a bit shy about asking for Mr Glass at the reception desk, but I did, and they didn't look at me strangely, as you might expect. The girl said, 'One moment, madam,' having a good look at my mink, of course, while she said that. Then she rang up to the room and then she said to me, 'What name shall I say?' and I said, in a very high-class voice, 'Miss Glass,' that being an inspiration on the spur of the moment. 'His sister,' I said, just to make it absolutely above board. I had my gloves on and so nobody could tell whether I was engaged, married or what. 'Is he in?' I asked, which he obviously was. 'I'll go straight up if he is.' 'Room No. 142,' said the girl, and she went on with adding up somebody's bill or something, but not before she'd had another really good look at the mink.
Well, as it was on the first floor, I walked up the stairs, and even after the one flight I was panting a bit, but of course that wasn't all to do with climbing stairs. I found the room, No. 142, and knocked a bit timidly. 'Come in,' called Redvers Glass's voice, so I went in.
I'd read once in some woman's paper, Female, I think it was, about a poet who just leapt on women, Lord Byron it was, who married his own sister or something, why couldn't they teach us about him at school? Well, this was Redvers Glass, too, him all over. All over me, I should say. He had this mink of mine off and just lying on the floor of this little room of his, and he had his arms round me and his mouth on mine, he was like a madman, he seemed to want me so badly. It was funny, a man from London, where all the girls are smart and sophisticated, and the son of a sir, too, wanting me with a kind of hunger like that. I felt very queer, I can tell you. I'd never known anything like this before. It makes me blush now to tell about all this, the way he had me on that bed and sort of undressed ver
y skilfully without too much tugging and swearing at straps and things. When I say he seemed to be hungry for me I don't mean that he was selfish, the way some men are. He was hungry to make me love him and want him to love me. First of all I felt ashamed and guilty about Howard, but then this that was going on became far more important than any of those feelings. I just wanted him, that was all, and what I wanted he wanted, too. He did everything right without selfishness, but was still sort of wild and very excited about it all and kept saying, 'Oh, God, this is too much, I don't deserve all this,' over and over. They often talk about time standing still, but I always thought it was just a saying and didn't mean anything, but I should have thought days and days or at least hours went by, but it was less than half an hour from start to finish. When it was all over and I felt really relaxed and on top of the world he was gentle and tender and loving then. I noticed that he'd had a shave before I came up to his room, and he smelled of after-shave lotion, a spicy one, different from Howard's. 'When can I see you again?' he asked. But I just didn't know, it was a bit difficult. In some ways it was a good thing Howard and I were going off on this holiday.