“Luck?” I said. “Oh, no! You mustn’t pin your hopes on luck! Nor on experiencing life at merely secondhand. No one should ever feel content to live vicariously.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Poor woman—I sensed immediately that you were under stress. What can I do to help? My dear, you should try to relax a little more. Try to let go, lean back, give way. That’s the great secret of it all.” I smiled encouragingly.
Or was the trouble really something else, I wondered—something far less easy to prescribe for? In seeing me, was she perhaps seeing a younger version of herself, a heartrending image of what she, too, might once have been?
I can endure my own despair,
But not another’s hope.
Oh no. That was the last thing I wanted—to become a punishment to others, purely an object of envy, a knife-twisting reflection in some enchanted looking glass. I wanted to become so much more than enviable. I wanted to be viewed as an example. A pattern of what anyone could hopefully aspire to.
Radiant.
Charismatic.
Irresistible.
“Tell me your name, dear?”
She didn’t answer. She appeared flustered. It seemed I’d got there just in time—oh, thank God, thank God! She called through a curtained doorway for somebody called Doreen.
Doreen! Doreen couldn’t possibly be the name of the manageress. Doreen could only be the name of an assistant, a rather lowly one at that, quite probably a temp. Oh my! That made my flustered friend the woman at the helm?
“Are you?” I asked.
She didn’t answer that one either. I began to understand the full nature of my problem.
Issues over privacy in particular; communication in general.
But at least she tried. You’ve got to give her that. “Your daughter’s getting married, then?” A start—of sorts—no matter how inept. Or superfluous. Or borderline grotesque. A bit like Judy Garland tottering onto the platform in smeared makeup and peering out across the footlights at all those suddenly hushed thousands. (Oh, Judy! Whatever happened to Baby Dot?) “You say the wedding date’s been set?” I hadn’t spoken of any wedding date. “How nice. The young man. Is he local?”
Chillingly unnatural but, as I say, potentially encouraging. And of course I did what I could to reciprocate.
“Oh yes. He was local long before all others whom you’d see around today.”
She didn’t quite know how to deal with that. It was complex. “He’s thirty-three,” I added quickly, to make it all much simpler. “Naturally, he’s a little older than I am.”
(Anyway, she couldn’t truly have supposed I had a daughter of marriageable age; she must have seen it was a jest—would surely have ascribed it to shyness, though, rather than a sensitivity to the longing of others and a determination not to flaunt.)
Doreen finally arrived, really little more than a schoolgirl, pale, freckled, endearingly anxious to please. I was thinking she might have been the one who’d sold me my sky-blue but probably this shop had to replace staff every week... patently understandable. I wished her a smiling good morning—merry, magnetic, inspirational—although obviously it wasn’t only her I was thinking of as I did so.
The older woman laughed. I’m afraid it was a harsh and none too pleasant sound.
“Then in that case you’ll still be seeing a lot of them.” (She was getting muddled.) “That’s good.”
At her mother’s knee, I thought, she must have learned the Ten Commandments: make conversation, keep up pretences, never lose a sale, your conversation doesn’t need to make much sense... (Well, yes, I had to change my mind: that was one form of communication.) But even so I still wanted to say, “Oh, please, don’t strain! If it doesn’t flow just fill your reservoir in peace.” But I couldn’t of course; not in front of her subordinate.
Instead I told them the story of Howard Hughes sitting on the lavatory for seventy-two hours.
“Now to whom do I make out the cheque?” I hadn’t really forgotten though—it was all a part of the therapy.
The woman told me.
“Ah,” I complimented her, “much better! That truly is... much better.”
Her little helper could have given her a lesson or two in flow. She asked: “You live in Rodney Street, don’t you? I’ve often seen you.”
“Yes, yes, I do. Next time make sure you wave hello.”
“My mum has the teashop just across the road. Sometimes I help out.”
“That makes us almost neighbours!
“Hey, neighbour, say, neighbour,
How’s the world with you?—
Aren’t you glad to be alive this sunny morning,
Can’t you see the sky above is showing blue... ?”
Laughingly I went back to their desk to complete the writing of my cheque. “How foolish! I ask you! Where else would the sky be if not above? Yes, it’s foolish... but it’s fun. Oh, no, for heaven’s sake— please— you mustn’t try to start me off again!” I concentrated on the cheque.
“Is that young man, the one with the fair hair, going to be the bridegroom? He’s ever so handsome.”
“Yes, isn’t he? Like some sun-dappled Scandinavian god. He’s got a beautiful physique.”
“My!”
“You should see how all the muscles ripple in his back.”
“My boyfriend’s got a back like that. He goes to weightlifting.”
The other woman said sharply: “Thank you, Doreen. That will be enough! I can manage now.”
“He just came in to buy some cakes, Mrs. Pond.” The girl had gone a little red. I felt so sorry for her.
“Yes, that’ll do, Doreen, thank you!” The woman almost shrieked. Mrs. Pond. (I’d been wondering if the wedding ring might have belonged to her mother.) Undoubtedly divorced then or separated or widowed—or else the wedding ring must have belonged to her mother. Oh dear. I felt quite sorry for her too. I didn’t mean the mother—although she also, on reflection, could probably have done with all my sympathy.
I said to the departing Doreen: “Why don’t you pop in sometime for a cup of tea? We could talk about your boyfriend.”
“That would be nice.” She disappeared behind the curtain. “Don’t lose your spontaneity,” I called.
I thought I would extend the same invitation to Mrs. Pond. For on no account must she feel ostracized and the visit might do her good, poor thing—although I myself, naturally, could hardly be expected to look forward to it with avidity.
“These school-leavers... !” she said after a pause. “I’m afraid she still has a great deal to learn.”
“Haven’t we all,” I agreed. “‘And if it ever come to pass that I inherit wealth I’ll eat and drink, and drink and eat, until I wreck my health... ’ Those old songs can be remarkably comforting, don’t you think? They show us that other people do it too! We’re none of us alone, Mrs. Pond. No, dear—you’ve just got to believe this!—there is nothing new, nothing new whatever, under the sun.”
I added merrily: “Apart from this lovely silk and rose-embroidered wedding dress.”
“Oh, it’s futile,” she said.
“What is? What is? Dear lady, it doesn’t need to be wrapped up quite so beautifully as that. You mustn’t chastise yourself over the wrapping. The wrapping is not important.”
I didn’t believe this in the slightest but as I’d once pointed out to Tony (the recollection could now make me smile in place of want to weep) there had to be room in even the most truthful philosophy for an occasional— very occasional—little white lie.
“Here, let me help you.”
“Madam, it’s all right. Thank you.”
“No, Mrs. Pond, it is obviously very far from being all right! At least promise me that you will try to look for the silver lining, try to walk on the sunny side of the street, try to banish from your vocabulary, forever, such awful words as ‘futile.’ Remember that in thirty years’ time” (and I studied her most lovingly) “well, let’s say in twenty
years’ time, you will be looking back on all of this and thinking—oh if only I could have those sweet and precious days returned to me! That morning, for instance, when I sold the wedding dress... if only I had realized then just how happy I was, if only I had struggled then to appreciate each dear God-given minute!”
I smiled at her and spread my hands.
“How many minutes are there, Mrs. Pond, in the course of twenty years? How many breakfasts, lunches, dinners, teas? How many opportunities for joy?”
She gazed at me and I saw her lips begin to quiver. I wasn’t dismayed. A purification in tears. A baptism. A mulching for the young green shoots, the new and tender leaves, the freshly petalled flowers. I was ready to take her, warts and all, into my warmly reassuring arms, to soothe her, tell her she was not inherently rapacious, that all she needed was to reawaken love (or else to find it for the first time—which I thought in fact was probably more likely).
“You’re nobody until somebody loves you,” I would say, “and believe me I do know. Love is the answer; someone to love is the answer... ”
But by then she was shaking—positively shaking—and staring at me in a fashion that really seemed half-crazed. “Happy!” she cried. “Happy! Oh, I’ll tell you how to get happy! Care about nothing—care about nothing—that’s the only way you’re ever going to do it!” And as she spoke she flailed her arms... and in one of her hands was a pair of scissors. I stepped back rather than embraced her.
“Yes,” I said, “yes, that’s certainly one point of view. Indeed I believe it’s rather Buddhist. If sorrow is caused by desire then get rid of that desire. For those who are up to it I’m sure it sometimes works. But I wouldn’t want to waste much of my time or precious energy upon it. Strictly for the unintelligent is what I ’d say! Oh, gracious—you’re not a Buddhist, are you? I do hope I haven’t spoken out of turn.”
Again no answer. But at any rate she used the scissors just to cut the string. Also her shaking seemed to have lessened. Even to that extent, therefore, I had been able to calm her.
Hallelujah!
“Yes, I can certainly see how it would work.” I lied smilingly, wanting to consolidate the good I knew I’d done. “Care about nothing! Perhaps you’ve found the key! There was recently a ninety-minute programme about some Buddhist monks. Unfortunately I didn’t watch it.”
Before handing me the box she scrutinized my bank card. She scrutinized the cheque. For the first time it occurred to me that this was going to bounce.
I laughed. “Oh, Lordy Moses,” I exclaimed. “Then get thee to a nunnery.”
No, I didn’t exclaim it; in fact I said it rather gently, not at all in angry Hamlet’s tone. (And she was no Ophelia.) But it suddenly seemed the one entirely valid response to such a situation—a literally inspired piece of counsel—although admittedly a touch ambiguous... since I wasn’t fully sure whether it was directed more towards her or towards myself! All I knew was that if life had been less kind to me I could now have been travelling right behind her on that horrid downhill path.
( Behind, I mean, because of the obvious discrepancy in our ages. Right behind, perhaps not.)
She still hadn’t spoken.
At the door I shrugged. Last time she had opened it for me and on that first occasion too. This morning, clearly, I had given her too much to think about. “Of course,” I mentioned, “there is that other all-important thought. Yet here I have to leave you all alone with your god and your conscience and your priorities!” I gave her a moment in which to try to adjust to this. “But is it so much funnery... in a nunnery?”
She probably thought I was being flippant. However, if she really thought this, was there any point in my affirming it was just my style?
“By the way, you’ll have seen I wrote my address on the cheque. So please come to visit. We’ll continue with our merry little chat and by no means neglect—now, what does Billy Graham call it?—that all-important follow-up! I think what he really meant was... tea and sympathy. Or in our case sherry and sympathy: because this time we’ll do our very best to make it stimulating! Yes?”
* * *
On my way home I was reminded of something. By Doreen’s words, not Mrs. Pond’s.
Roger had never thanked me for those two pounds. It was most odd when you came to think of it. It wasn’t so much that one wanted to be thanked, but—
Yes, it was.
And he had never even mentioned them.
I didn’t like it when a person became careless over things; even quite trivial things.
44
He said everything I’d ever wanted to hear. I said the things which I had always wanted to say. It was bliss; it was sheer enchantment. I was twenty-five and beautiful and I moved through every day and night in a kind of dream, a dream of heaven which I took to be reality. I was happier than I would ever have supposed to be possible... as if we were living now in Eden long before the Fall. Yes, he was Adam and I was Eve and though we weren’t in the least ashamed of our nakedness I at length covered mine with my white dress to signify the purity that had always been his—that had always been awaiting him. And I wafted through my days and through my nights in a dream of heaven which was here on planet earth. And I looked radiant in that white dress: my mirror told me so but more especially did his eyes as he stepped towards me and held me close and together we waltzed across the gleaming ballroom floor, with chandeliers glittering beneath my dainty feet and all the other dancers stepping back to clear an avenue in whispered admiration—“Who is she? Isn’t she lovely?”—an avenue that led on to further enchantment amongst shimmering rock pools and coloured lights and down narrow winding paths all tucked away from view. And I was radiant. I was a princess—with my lovely black ringlets and my rosebud mouth, with my cheeks bearing the bloom of rouge and happiness, with my feet enwrapped in those scarlet satin slippers which would make me dance forever. (But that was a story which had ended tragically; this one was going to be so very different. I know —let me change the red to pink!) And yes it was all a fairy tale: the great four-poster in the magic glade to which we ran laughing in our wedding clothes—he had acquired his somewhere on the way. I shan’t describe what happened in that bed any more than I’ve described what happened in my own; but oh the feel of him, the feel of him, the feel of him. Bursting stars against a backdrop of black velvet.
The bed was like Elijah’s chariot (no—on second thoughts maybe not— poor Elijah!) or like some mythical Arabian carpet. It bore us smoothly to exotic climes while all the time the orchestra was playing, dreamily romantic, far below: we could just make out—still—the glittering barge on which it played, moored on an ornamental lake strung across with Chinese lanterns.
And I sang to him as we floated.
“Oh, fuck me once and fuck me twice and fuck me once again; it’s been a long, long time... ”
Then I giggled.
No, that couldn’t be right! Surely?
Well, why ever not? As he willingly turned over and took me in his arms again and prepared to carry out all my commands (while the moonlight played such naughty tricks: that sexy fleece upon his chest looked spun from purest gold!) he was finally able to demonstrate how much he’d learned from Bing.
“Rachel—you—are—quite—a—girl!”
And I returned the compliment.
We were off on a honeymoon that was going to last through centuries.
45
It was Celia who eventually turned up. She told me that she liked my dress; yet I could see she had her reservations. (I had of course removed the train—and just as obviously I wasn’t wearing the veil!) I saw things far more clearly now: I saw them through his eyes as much as through my own.
“Celia, why has it taken you so long? I wrote to you eight days ago.”
“Yes, we noticed. I’m afraid the letter was delayed.”
“Is Roger on his way?”
“No, he can’t come. Exams looming. But he sends you all his love.”
“
Oh, yes—the poor soul! Yet I’m sure that he’ll do well. If ever a man was born to carry all before him, that man was Roger Allsop. How’s Tommy?”
“Spending the day with my mother. Oh—he too sends lots of kisses.”
But she was again speaking absentmindedly. And she kept on glancing at me when she thought I wasn’t looking—she would never meet my eye for longer than a second. I had quickly realized why. She felt scared to witness such certainty, such calm... such evidence of attainment. For all that’s said about it people still aren’t comfortable in the face of liberation. They feel threatened. They affect a cynicism. Only cynicism can conceal, to some extent, the size of their own failure.
“What did you want to tell us?” she said.
I came directly to the point.
“Well, about your all living here, Celia... I’ve had to change my mind.”
I thought she turned a little pale. I went on.
“I can see now that it wouldn’t work. Yet I didn’t want to put that in a letter. It might have seemed perfunctory.”
“But we gave notice to the agent—oh, days ago, straight after your party!—and the new tenants have already signed a contract!”
“Oh dear. What a shame.”
“We thought it all so settled.”
“Yet if only you had come to see me sooner! I can’t apologize enough.”
She didn’t look appeased. I tried to introduce a calmer, more congenial note.
“But naturally it makes no difference to Thomas’s inheriting the house.”
“Well, at least that’s something!” she said. “Are you sure?”
She was disappointed, clearly; I had to make allowances. “Yes, of course I am.”
“Mark said you hadn’t yet been in to sign the papers.” Her tone was almost lifeless.
“Well, I can’t begin to tell you, Celia, how extraordinarily busy I’ve been!”
She didn’t reply to this. When she spoke again there was still that taste of coolness in her voice; before today I simply hadn’t encountered it.
Wish Her Safe At Home Page 21
