Simon stood there for some time, studying the smooth skin of her uncovered body. He then took up the counterpane from the back of the chair, unfolded it, and spread it gently over her.
FOUR
Simon was woken the next morning when Willy, fully dressed, burst into the room. ‘Did you arrange it?’ he asked sharply. ‘What time is your plane?’
Simon lifted himself up off the pillows, rubbed his eyes and looked at his watch. It was a quarter to seven. ‘The airline offices won’t be open yet,’ he said.
‘You could have arranged it yesterday, couldn’t you? They’re open in the evening.’ Never, since Simon had been at the Villa Golitsyn, had Willy spoken to him so sharply, or showed himself so shamelessly in a bad mood. He sat down on the end of Simon’s mahogany bed and started to pick dirt from under the fingernails of his right hand.
‘There may be a problem …’ Simon began.
‘You promised you would,’ Willy interrupted.
‘I didn’t promise.’
‘You brought her here. You must get rid of her.’
‘I can’t see why it’s so urgent,’ said Simon.
‘Then you’re a fool. No. I’m sorry.’ Willy looked up, his face showing that panic had replaced his irritation as his dominant emotion. ‘Look, it’s urgent because they’re closing in on me.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘When I woke up this morning, the girl was lying next to me.’
‘Where was Priss?’
‘She spent the night on the sofa. She wanted the girl to be there on the off chance I’d just roll over …’
‘And father a child?’
‘You must help me, Simon.’
‘Just tell them that you don’t fancy her.’
‘But I do, and they both know it. Women always know. They can tell. And this morning, if I hadn’t been feeling so ghastly and sober, God knows what might have happened.’ He stood up and went to the window. ‘They don’t understand how important it is to me not to sleep with Helen. It’s the only thing I can offer to propitiate God. Isn’t that the word – propitiate?’
‘You may be making too much of it all,’ said Simon. ‘If you don’t want to sleep with her, don’t sleep with her.’
‘But I do.’
‘Then do so. If you don’t, someone else will soon enough.’
‘That’s not the point,’ said Willy – snapping again and then seeming to regret it. ‘I’m not responsible for what she does, or what is done to her by others, but I am responsible for what I do …’
‘I’ll talk to her again, if you like,’ said Simon, ‘but if Priss wants her to stay, then she won’t pay much attention to me.’
‘She will, Simon. She respects you. We all do.’
‘I’ll talk to Helen,’ said Simon, ‘but you must talk to Priss.’
‘I will, I will.’ He stood and went to the door. ‘You see, I’ve got to have a drink soon – very soon – and if I have one drink I’ll have another and then, if she comes to me like that …’
‘I’ll talk to her.’
‘I hope it works, because if it doesn’t, well, I’ll have to think of something else.’
He left the room. Simon lay back on his bed, calculating what he should do. He did not wonder what, in this mess of muddled feelings, would be best for all – or what would be best for one or other of his friends. He only asked himself what course of action would be most likely to get him what he wanted. Certainly he thought of his mission: he wanted to go back to London sure of the truth about the Djakarta leak. But his mission was now of only secondary importance: his passion for Priss came first. If Helen stayed and Willy gave in and slept with her; if she became the mother of his child and, in some sense, his second wife; if the birth of the child gave Willy a reason for living, led him to temper his drinking; if the girl nursed him back to health: how would all that affect Simon’s chances with Priss? When she saw that her brother was well, would she then come to London and marry Simon? Or would she, as she had said, get rid of the girl and remain where she was as Willy’s wife and the child’s adoptive mother?
The latter was more likely. As long as Willy was alive, there was little chance that Priss would ever leave him. On the other hand if the girl left then not only would Willy tell Simon about the Djakarta leak, he would also go back to the bottle. In a matter of months he would die – and as Charlie had said, why should he not die if he wanted to?
What would happen after his death? Next to Willy, Priss had said, she loved Simon more than anyone else. Once Willy had gone, she would be left with only him. She would marry him, faute de mieux. He would be rich with the Ludleys’ money. They would have a flat in London and the country house in Suffolk. What would Sarah and her little geologist make of that?
When Simon came down for breakfast there was no one at the dining table. He went into the kitchen, helped himself to some coffee and then returned to sit at his usual place like a longstanding guest at a boarding house. Soon afterwards Helen came down and having fetched herself some breakfast from the kitchen she sat down at the table opposite Simon.
‘Where’s Priss?’ he asked her.
‘She went to the market.’
‘Willy?’
‘In his room, in a foul mood.’
‘Charlie?’
She shrugged her shoulders. ‘Still in bed, I think.’
‘Good, because I want to talk to you.’
She looked at him with an uneasy expression on her face. ‘What about?’
‘I think the time has come to leave,’ said Simon.
She blushed. ‘I can’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘They need me.’
‘Listen,’ said Simon, leaning forward and speaking in a low but urgent tone of voice. ‘You’re grown up and basically sensible, but there are things – particularly things about marriage – which you can’t understand because they’re the sort of thing you can only learn from experience. Priss and Willy don’t need you, or me, or Charlie. They are wholly obsessed with one another, and if given the chance they’ll use you, or me, or Charlie, to revive their own relationship.’
He paused. Helen had taken on a sullen expression and looked down at the table as if she might not even be listening to what he said. He continued nonetheless: ‘Priss wants you to have a child, which may sound simple enough but it’s not. It takes nine months out of your life. You have to carry around a great weight in your stomach. It exhausts you; it’s very painful when the baby’s born; it spoils your figure; and for months afterwards you never get a good night’s sleep.’
‘I’m prepared to put up with all that,’ said Helen, ‘if it saves Willy from dying.’
‘That’s sweet and commendable,’ said Simon, ‘but it won’t save Willy. He’s a chronic alcoholic, and while a man may start to drink to drown some sorrow or some remorse, once it has reached the stage that Willy is at, it is a physical addiction. Only months of careful medical care can save him.’
‘If he had a baby, he’d have some reason to do that.’
‘And if he does come through, and a child is born? What will happen to you? Priss may be happy to use you now. You’re almost a child. You don’t threaten her. But in a year or two you’ll be a woman like her – the mother of Willy’s child, a rival for his affection.’
‘When she wants me to go, I’ll go.’
‘And the child?’
She shrugged her shoulders. ‘I don’t want a baby. It’d be for them.’
Simon gave a short snort – almost a sneeze – of exasperation. ‘But don’t you see that Willy doesn’t want a baby either?’
‘He does really.’
‘He doesn’t want to sleep with you.’
‘Only because he thinks he shouldn’t.’
‘And you think he should?’
She looked at him with the same stubborn expression as before. ‘I don’t see what would be wrong about it.’
‘You should at least respect his feelings.’<
br />
‘If he was well, he’d want to. He only doesn’t because he’s ill and dreams about devils.’
‘Willy wants you to go home.’
‘I know.’
‘So will you go?’
She shook her head. ‘No. Priss wants me to stay.’
‘Then will you tell Willy?’
Priss came into the room from the kitchen carrying a bag filled with peaches. ‘Tell Will what?’
‘That she won’t go home.’
Priss frowned. ‘Of course she won’t go home. This is her home.’
‘Willy wants her to.’
‘I know.’
‘You should respect his wishes.’
‘Don’t be absurd. He’s delirious …’
‘Everything he says makes sense to me.’
She laughed – a false laugh – and turned to Helen. ‘They do fancy themselves, these gentlemen, don’t they? If the roles were reversed it might make some sense, but for Willy to want Helen out of the house in case she might rape him is really a little ridiculous.’
‘It’s not quite that.’
Priss turned and looked sharply at Simon. ‘I thought you were on my side.’
He blushed. ‘I only want what’s best for Willy.’
‘Well, you’re doing the worst possible thing for his condition,’ she said. ‘You’re pandering to his paranoia and feeding his delusions. Helen, the baby – it was an idea, that’s all. If Will doesn’t like it, then we’ll drop it and that’s that.’ She emptied the peaches into a bowl.
The air was sticky and close. Simon left the table to read Nice-Matin on the sofa. A few minutes later Charlie came down followed by Willy, whose mood seemed to have improved. ‘Give Charlie some coffee, quick,’ he said. ‘It’s the morning after the night before.’
‘Please, Willy, it’s too early,’ said Charlie.
‘He’s black and blue after some particularly rough rough trade,’ Willy said to the others. ‘I warned you Charlie, Corsican S and M is not for the faint-hearted.’ He laughed, and then swung round to face Helen. ‘Now then, young lady, what time is your train?’
Helen looked at Priss.
‘She’s not going,’ said Priss.
‘She must go,’ said Willy.
‘Nonsense,’ said Priss. She seemed to avoid meeting his eyes.
‘This is my house,’ Willy said, his voice loud and firm, ‘and I say that she must go.’ He turned to Simon. ‘You’ll take her back, won’t you Simon? You’ll take her back to England?’
Simon shrugged his shoulders. ‘If she’ll come.’
‘I need her here,’ said Priss in a dull, stubborn tone of voice.
‘Need her for what?’ asked Willy.
‘To help look after you.’
‘Nurses don’t usually sleep in the beds of their patients.’
‘I … I just fell asleep,’ said Helen. Her voice was hoarse, as if she was close to tears.
‘You’re so bloody ungrateful,’ said Priss to Willy. ‘Here the two of us work day and night to look after you, to nurse you as you so aptly put it, and Helen – who spent all of yesterday at your beck and call – happens to fall alseep on our bed, and you react with the outraged modesty of a nun who’s been surprised in her bath by the window-cleaner.’
Willy did not laugh. ‘Why weren’t you in my bed?’ he asked. ‘Why did you sleep on the sofa down here?’
‘I was tired too,’ said Priss with somewhat less conviction.
‘You’re lying,’ said Willy, turning away from her. ‘You’re lying and scheming and treating me like a senile fool.’
‘Only because you’re behaving like a senile fool.’
‘Why, why?’ he shouted at her. ‘Is it a sign of senility that I now believe in a soul, a God and a Judgement?’
‘Yes,’ she replied with equal vehemence. ‘It’s the sign of an unbalanced mind.’
Willy wheeled round to face Charlie. ‘Do you think I’m mad, Charlie?’
Charlie glanced uneasily at Priss. ‘No, Willy, I mean I shouldn’t have thought so. Not mad.’
‘But strange?’
‘You were always different, Willy.’
‘What about you, Simon?’
‘No, Willy. I don’t think you’re mad, but I think you sometimes exaggerate things.’
‘What things?’
‘You seem a little paranoid, but that’s only to be expected.’
‘You think I’m imagining things, do you? You think that I’ve dreamed up the schemes of these two women?’
‘No, Willy. I know you haven’t. But I think you exaggerate their importance.’
Willy brought his pale face close to his friend’s. ‘Don’t you see, Simon? This is my last chance. At the eleventh hour I’ve been called to labour in the vineyard. God has given me Faith, and with Faith the knowledge of good and evil. The act – the simple seduction of a willing girl – what significance has that beside all the wickedness and injustice, the cruelty and suffering in the world? None. None at all. But my choice? My acquiescence? That is what matters to God. With my own sister as my Mephistopheles He has let Lucifer set me a simple test so that when, quite soon, I come before Him I can say that among all my many, many sins there was one – one small sin – which I might have committed but for His sake did not.’
‘If no one surfers,’ said Simon, ‘how can it be much of a sin?’
‘God suffers,’ said Willy. ‘When a man acts like an animal, He winces.’
‘Man is an animal,’ said Priss.
‘No,’ said Willy, turning with contempt on his sister. ‘Woman is the animal – women like Eve, like Jezebel, the Scarlet Woman of the Apocalypse – always belittling the spirit, always peddling your sexual oblivion as a substitute nirvana.’
‘Never again,’ said Priss.
‘No, never again,’ said Willy, and with that left the room.
For some minutes after they had heard Willy climb the stairs and close the door to his room, the other four sat in silence. Priss then looked at Simon. She opened her mouth, as if about to speak, but closed it again and turned to Helen. ‘Has he eaten anything today?’ she asked.
‘I don’t think so,’ Helen replied.
‘He must have something.’
‘I’ll take him some coffee,’ said Simon, rising from the sofa and throwing Nice-Matin onto the table.
‘He ought to have something more nourishing,’ said Priss.
‘I’ll make him some soup,’ said Helen.
‘No, I will,’ said Priss. ‘There’s a tin of consommé.’ She left the table and went towards the green baize door. ‘I warned you,’ she said to Simon. ‘He’s bad when he’s drunk, but he’s worse when he’s sober.’
She went into the kitchen. Simon went to the table again and looked at Charlie, who sat leaning on his two elbows, staring down into his cup, which was half-filled with cold coffee. ‘Are you feeling rough?’ he asked.
Charlie looked up. His eyes were bleary and bloodshot. ‘A bit down,’ he said.
‘Wasn’t it fun?’
‘It was at the time,’ he said, ‘but this morning …’ He shook his head as if trying not to remember the night before.
‘We all have something of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde in us,’ said Simon.
‘Except you.’
‘Even me.’
Charlie laughed. ‘Your Mr Hyde is never let out of the cellar.’
‘He’s there all the same.’
‘I’m sick of them both,’ said Charlie. ‘The one’s a bore and the other’s a brute.’
‘You have to live with them.’
‘Yes,’ said Charlie. ‘I suppose I do.’
Priss came back from the kitchen carrying a mug of consommé and some biscuits on a tray. ‘Will you take it up?’ she asked Simon. ‘I’m afraid we girls are persona non grata this morning.’
‘Yes, of course.’
Simon took the tray and carried it carefully across the hall and up the stairs, watching the brim of the la
rge blue mug for fear any of the steaming brown soup should spill out. He balanced the tray on his knee and opened the door to the Ludleys’ bedroom, where Willy lay fully dressed on the large four-poster bed.
‘So my angel of mercy daren’t show her face?’ he said.
‘She’s afraid you’ll shout “rape”,’ said Simon.
Willy did not smile. ‘Will she go?’
Simon put down the tray. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘You’ve joined the conspiracy against me.’
‘No,’ Simon protested. ‘I tried to persuade her but … well, she seems to feel at home here. You’re her family now.’
‘Children don’t adopt parents,’ said Willy.
‘Oh, but they do. And anyway, she isn’t a child.’
‘No,’ said Willy. ‘Unfortunately she isn’t.’
Simon pointed to the mug of consommé. ‘Drink up,’ he said, ‘before it gets cold.’
Willy picked up the mug, sniffed it and then sipped some of the soup. ‘Did you make this?’ he asked.
‘No. Priss did.’
‘I thought so.’
‘Is anything wrong with it?’
‘No. It’s excellent.’ He drank from the mug. ‘You want to go back, don’t you Simon?’
‘There’s no hurry. I’ve another two weeks of leave.’
Willy smiled. ‘And you still have to find out about Djakarta.’
‘There’s no hurry about that, either.’
‘But you can’t be enjoying it here. I’m being such a bore.’
‘You’re not a bore – especially if you keep off the drink.’
‘But I can’t, Simon. I know it and Priss knows it too.’
‘You’ll kill yourself.’
‘If I wanted to do that,’ said Willy, ‘I’d jump off the top of that block of flats.’ He nodded at Les Grands Cèdres. ‘But that sin would simply set the seal on all the others. I’ll never despair.’
‘If you go on drinking; you’ll die just as certainly …’
‘It’s not a sin to shorten the odds, is it? To want to die is not suicide?’
Simon shrugged his shoulders. ‘I don’t know. I’m not a theologian.’
‘The problem is,’ said Willy, looking down at his empty mug, ‘how can one shorten them still further?’
‘Why shorten them at all? If you can stay off the wine, get better and grow strong, then you can master those women …