‘How dare you! Be quiet.’
‘Don’t you tell me to be quiet, Ann, because I haven’t started yet…Bring the car, Mr Emmerson’s taken bad…How bad is he, young man? Is he drunk?’
Pat moved his head back on his shoulders away from the red face, and he shook it slightly as he said, ‘No, no he’s not. He’s been beaten up.’
‘O…O…h!’
Pat looked quickly up at the woman as she groaned, then back towards the little man, who was standing straight now, his head wagging from side to side on his shoulders and a funny expression on his face, as he said, ‘Beaten up? Well, well, now the situation is becoming interesting. Likely another of her gentlemen friends didn’t take to the new arrangement.’
‘My mam’s got no gentlemen friends.’ As Pat’s fist shot out and caught James Wilcox in the thigh it was a question of who was the more surprised, he at the assault, or Pat at his own daring.
Ann now held Pat by the shoulders, pulling him to one side, and she was talking in a strangely quiet voice. ‘Get out, James,’ she was saying. ‘And I’ll thank you not to come back here again.’
‘I’ll be back again, Ann. Oh, I’ll be back, if only once, for I mean to have my say to that white-livered son of yours. And he’s finished, you understand, finished. Not only in my firm but in this town. And he may think that he can go farther afield and find a job, but he’s mistaken. If I have to spend the rest of my life putting spokes in his wheel I’ll count the time well spent…As for you, young fellow, we’ll meet later.’
Pat, wide-eyed, watched the little man almost throw himself out into the porch, so furiously did he move his body; then he watched the woman close the door, lean her back against it, cover her eyes with her hands for a moment and inhale deeply before she looked at him again. Then she took him by the arm and led him into a big white room, and staring down at him, she said, ‘Tell me what this is about.’
He looked up into her face and said hesitantly, ‘We…we were in bed, and there was a ring at the door and I heard me mam get up, and I waited. And then she told me to get up quick, and when I went into the room Mr Emmerson was lying on the floor. She said she had found him outside the door on the landing.’ He shook his head slowly at her now. ‘His face was all battered, he’s bad.’
He watched her hand go across her mouth again; then he said, ‘Me mam wanted to send for our doctor but he said no, he wanted you, and to get home.’
Ann was still staring down into the boy’s face. He was a good-looking boy; the mother was a good-looking woman; why was it she had come into their life? She had taken John from her. Yes, she had, although she was on a better footing with her husband than she had been since Laurie was born, she knew that she had lost part of him, and would never be able to retain it because it had been given to this boy’s mother. And now her son had become involved with her. How had this come about? Why? They were leading people of the town, highly respected, and they had become involved with this cheap woman. Because she was cheap; you had only to look at her, her good looks couldn’t hide it. Why was it that nice men were always attracted by cheap women?
‘Aren’t you going to come?’
‘Yes, yes.’ She put her hand across her brow, then said, ‘I’ll get a coat. Come along.’
A minute later he stood aside and watched her lock the front door. Then going to the garage, she beckoned him silently into the car beside her.
Within half an hour the car was back on the drive and Pat was once more seated beside ‘the stiff lady’ as he thought of her in his mind, while in the back seat were Mr Emmerson and his mother, and without looking round he knew that his mother was trying to keep Mr Emmerson up straight.
‘Unlock the door.’ The lady was thrusting a key into his hand and he scrambled out of the car and ran to the front door. After a moment of fumbling, the key turned and he pushed the door wide, just in time for them to pass, his mam on one side of Mr Emmerson, the stiff lady on the other. Mr Emmerson looked awful, like people, he imagined, when they were going to die. He took his eyes quickly from the blue-black distorted face, then from beneath lowered lids he watched them go slowly up the stairs, and when they had disappeared across the landing he stood with his back to the thick oak post from which the banisters started, and looked about him, and although he couldn’t quite make it out he connected what he saw with the stiff lady.
Upstairs Ann went to lower Laurie into a chair, but he made a movement towards the bed, and when they sat him on the edge he fell sideways, and it was Cissie who lifted his feet up, shoes and all, onto the grey satin quilted cover.
‘We should get him undressed.’ She spoke under her breath as she looked at Ann Emmerson, and for the first time since their meeting Ann looked fully into her face. Her own expression had a startled quality about it as if Cissie had suggested something improper. ‘I can manage quite well now, thank you.’
It was a curt dismissal, and Cissie felt the heat of indignation sweep over her body as she stared unblinkingly back into the cold, pale face before her. She wanted to make some protest against all this woman’s look was saying to her, but this was neither the time nor the place, so she turned swiftly about and went towards the door, only to be stopped as she opened it by a weak voice from the bed muttering, ‘Cecilia.’
She turned her head quickly over her shoulder, thinking for a moment he was speaking to his mother. She couldn’t remember anyone calling her Cecilia; no-one had ever given her her correct name. She still thought he was addressing his mother until she saw his hand lifted towards her, then she went back to the bed. And she took his hand and held it, and when, through his distorted and broken lips, he muttered, ‘Thanks, thanks,’ the only thing she could do was to nod towards the two narrow slits which was all she could see of his eyes. Then she turned from him and passed the woman who was standing at the door.
Ann followed her down the stairs, and in the hall, in the manner of someone who knows her duty towards her inferiors, she said, ‘I’ll phone for a taxi to take you home.’
‘There’s no need, thank you very much, we can walk.’
Cissie’s tone was bitter; and she added, as she held out her hand towards Pat, ‘It’s a doctor you want to phone for, and quick. And don’t try to cover this up by not getting a doctor or you’ll likely have something much more serious on your hands.’
Ann drew herself up and her flat chest took on shape as she exclaimed with chilling haughtiness, ‘I don’t need you to tell me where my duty lies, Mrs Thorpe. And were there more serious consequences of tonight’s business who, I ask, should be held responsible for them?’
Cissie was near the hall door now, and she turned quickly as she said, ‘You, Mrs Emmerson, you and no-one else. If I hadn’t known your husband I wouldn’t have known your son, and I leave you to work out how I, a common individual, because that’s how you consider me isn’t it, came to be acquainted with a man in Mr Emmerson’s position. Just you work it out, Mrs Emmerson. Goodnight.’
Pushing Pat before her she went out into the lobby, then through the front door and round the drive into the road, and when they had left the avenue and turned down the dark lane Pat stopped and, flinging his arms around her waist, pressed his head into her ribs, whimpering, ‘Aw, don’t cry. Ma, don’t cry.’
PART THREE
BREAD-AND-CHEESE AND BEER
One: The Proposal
John came in through the lower gate from the field path and began to walk round the garden. It was the last time he would ever walk round this garden, and he asked himself if he was sorry, and the answer came No. No, not at all.
Tomorrow they were starting on a three months’ holiday, going first to Denmark, then round the Kattegat and up the Baltic to Finland. On the return journey they were leaving the boat at Stockholm and were staying there for a time. Ann had planned it all. She had been wonderful really, because neither he nor Laurie had been able to see to a thing. She had even done the whole business of the new house. He thought he was going
to like the new house; it wasn’t as big as this and it was more homely. She had discussed the decorations with him. Her taste had changed quite a lot, for she had suggested having patterned wallpaper. He would have further to travel back and forth to the office from the new house—it was more than three miles beyond the town boundary, and it was rather isolated, but he didn’t mind that, not in the least. It was on a rise and had some splendid views; a most interesting feature was a piece of woodland with a stream at the bottom. All the garden had been set out in a natural way, mostly with shrubs, no stiff borders. Yes he felt he was going to enjoy the new house, and there would be only the two of them. Would he enjoy that? Why not? He stopped in his walk. It would be like starting a new life. Everything was different now. Yes, quite different.
He moved on again; past the greenhouse and the potting shed, and through the arch in the privet hedge that separated the vegetable garden from the lawns and flower beds, and up the side path that led to the terrace that flanked the french windows of the dining room.
There was a small rose pergola here that formed a wind break, and he sat down in the wrought-iron chair that stood beneath it and looked over the garden, but now without seeing it. The phrase, new life, had set his mind working, pushing queries out along paths that he didn’t want to explore. For some time now he had kept telling himself to take things as they came, that everything would work out; the main thing was not to hurt anyone. It was odd, but he hadn’t thought until recently that it was in his power to hurt anyone, but now he knew it was, and the possession of this power brought him no gratification.
To check his trend of thought he was about to rise from the chair when he heard a door open in the room at the other side of the pergola, and then Ann’s voice speaking to Laurie. Again he was about to rise when the tail end of what she was saying kept him still. ‘You can’t evade it any more. There’s not much time left.’
Then Laurie’s voice answering her. ‘There’s nothing to discuss, nothing to talk about, I’ve told you…Oh, for God’s sake, Mother!’
‘How can you say that when she’s been on the phone this very minute?’
‘Well, she didn’t ask for me, did she?’ The words were hissed.
‘No, but she hoped you would answer.’
‘Look, Mother.’ Laurie’s voice was patient sounding now. ‘I was in a devil of a mess, as you know, when she found me. She’s phoned three times in a month to find out how I am. I don’t consider she’s overdone it.’
‘Stop hedging, Laurie. I’m going away tomorrow and I can’t leave with my mind in this state; I’ve got to know what’s between you and her. Can’t you understand how I feel? First your father, and now you…It’s terrible to me, and disgusting…Yes, disgusting.’
John was leaning forward, his forearm resting on the iron table in front of him, his eyes riveted on a piece of grass growing between the slabs
of the crazy paving on the terrace. The voices from the room became indistinct. He knew that Ann was still talking and Laurie answering her, but what they were saying he couldn’t hear for the noise in his mind made by the whirling names: ‘Laurie and Cissie, Laurie and Cissie.’ He felt the beat of his heart quickening to the repetition of ‘Laurie and Cissie. Laurie and Cissie.’ And then he pressed his fist to his chest, saying to himself, ‘Steady, steady.’ And the noise in his head faded away and he heard Laurie speaking again, his tone low and harsh.
‘I’ve…I’ve seen the woman four times, and each time we’ve rowed, except the last time, when I was in no position to do anything, and from that you’ve got me living with her. You’ve convinced yourself that I’ve taken over where father left off, haven’t you?’
Out on the terrace John’s head drooped lower. ‘Taken over where father left off.’ Then he raised it slightly again as Ann said in a dull, flat tone, ‘It was because of her that you gave up Val, wasn’t it?’
‘Oh my God! Now don’t get me mad. Now look, I’m telling you, don’t get me mad.’
‘And don’t treat me as a child, Laurie, asking me to believe that you’ve only seen her four times and that you fought with her. If that is so, well, all I can say is that your manner underwent a great change the night she helped to bring you home.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You don’t hold a woman’s hand and call her Cecilia, and she doesn’t cry over you after four meetings in which you fought all the time.’
‘Cecilia? I held her hand and called her Cecilia? You must be bats. I didn’t even know she was called Cecilia, I’ve never called her anything but Mrs Thorpe.’
‘Laurie, Laurie.’ She was almost shouting now. ‘Be quiet. I don’t want to hear any more. If there was a doubt in my mind before over your association with the woman you have certainly dispelled it.’
‘I…TELL…YOU…MOTHER…!’
‘Please, please, Laurie, don’t protest any more. I don’t want to think of you as a liar too. But let me tell you this. Wilcox has ruined your career, that man Bolton has ruined your looks, but that woman will ruin your life. She’s gone a good way already. And I’ll say one more thing, one more thing…you’ll have to choose. I mean it, Laurie, I mean it. If you continue your association with her I never want to see you again. Do you understand what I’m saying? Don’t think I will soften, for the very thought of her makes me physically sick.’
As the sound of a door closing came to John he pulled himself up from the chair, went hastily from the terrace along the side path, and through the arch in the privet once again, and going into the tool shed, he shut the door behind him and sat on an upturned crate.
‘Cissie. Cissie.’ He was saying her name aloud, his voice, sad and tender, was yet threaded with reproach. Slowly he rested, his elbows on his knees and bowed his head over his hanging hands. He had been a fool, a fool. He could have had her and all she meant to life; gaiety, warmth, understanding and kindness. Yes, he could have had Cissie. He knew that morning she came to him in hospital that she was his for the asking, and because of this he had told her about himself. It had been quite easy to tell her, but he had not been prepared for the effect of the telling. When she had kissed him on the mouth he had wanted to hold her and never let her go. But he knew that he could not lay the burden of his deformity on her. He had watched Ann become crippled under it and he could not let the same thing happen to Cissie, although she would have known what she was taking on …
But Laurie had denied his mother’s imputation. Perhaps he was right and there was nothing in it. How could there be seeing her only four times? But he himself had only seen her once, well twice, and it had happened to him. But he had been lonely and ripe for such an affair, if you could call the relationship between them an affair…And he himself had sent Laurie to her, begged him to go.
He felt the old feeling of aloneness return, and it was more poignant now than at any time over the long bleak years, for then he’d had really nothing to lose, but during the last few months, whilst he had known Cissie, life had come back into his living, and when having lost her, as it were, he had found his son, he had thought that things usually balanced themselves out…And now, before he had hardly found Laurie, he was to lose him too, for if there was anything in it, it would be as Ann said, Laurie would be cut off from them. She wouldn’t bear to see him because of the girl, and he wouldn’t dare to see him…because of the girl.
‘Oh, there you are, dear. Why are you sitting in here? You are not feeling ill again?’
‘No. No.’ He pulled himself upwards and took the hand she held out to him, and as it gripped his firmly he thought what a sense of wonder it would have brought to him if it had been held out this time last year, but now between their hands would always be Cissie’s; no matter what happened it would always be there…No matter what happened.
At twelve o’clock the following morning Laurie stood on the quay and watched the boat move slowly from the dock. High up above his head on the first-class deck stood his mother and father. He did not raise his ha
nd until his father raised his, and then he waved back. His mother did not wave until the boat was some distance from the quay, and then it was a small movement of her hand conveying over the distance to him her worry and anger. Her last words to him had been, ‘You will go to your uncle’s, won’t you, Laurie? You’ll go straight away, they’re expecting you.’
And he had said, ‘Yes, yes, of course,’ knowing full well that he had no intention of going to his uncle’s.
She had bent forward then and he had kissed her, and he had smiled at her and said, ‘Now forget everything and have a good time.’
He had left her in the special suite which was filled with flowers, and going out on deck he had walked with his father to the gangway, and there for a moment they had stood facing each other. He had smiled at him too, and had been about to say what he had said to his mother, ‘Now forget everything and have a good time,’ when John muttered abruptly, ‘I have something to say to you, Laurie, and we haven’t much time. And please don’t be offended.’ John had glanced downwards for a moment before looking back into his face and adding under his breath, ‘I happened to be on the verandah last night when you and your mother were talking.’
He had closed his eyes and brought his teeth down onto his lip. The attitude was one of striving for patience, but he could not keep the weariness from his voice as he said, ‘Now look, Father, let me say this…’
But John cut in on him, ‘No, Laurie. No. Don’t give me any reasons, just listen to me for a moment. What I want to say to you is, follow your heart. Do what you want to do. Don’t, don’t, I beg you, sacrifice yourself for anyone, not for your mother…or me. You’ll get no thanks for it in the end and I’ve brought enough harm to you already.’ His eyes had moved swiftly over the discoloured face.
The Unbaited Trap Page 19
