Five Roundabouts to Heaven

by John Bingham

  I heard him murmur something to Beatrice, and saw him stand up and automatically straighten his tie and smooth his dark hair with his hands. I saw Beatrice sit bolt upright, suddenly and quickly, and she, too, put her hands to her hair.

  It was difficult to know what to do. I had a quick tempting thought that it might be better to walk away, back to the car, as though I had seen nothing; and greet them some other day as though the incident had never happened.

  I might have done so, except that even while I hesitated, the first dim realization of what this involved for me was beginning to emerge.

  I decided to compromise, to walk round to the kitchen door, slowly, giving them time to recover, and then allow John or Beatrice to make the running. If they said nothing, I would be content to say nothing, at any rate for the time being.

  I moved away from the window, but I had not gone more than two or three paces when the French window was opened, and John’s voice called:

  “Hey, Pete!”

  I looked round, and tried to put a surprised tone into my voice.

  “Why, hullo, John! I was just descending upon Beatrice and Barty for a breath of fresh air.”

  “The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold,” said John, with a bitter little laugh. “Well, come in this way.”

  “Thanks,” I said and retraced my steps, and entered the drawing room by the French window which he was holding open for me.

  Beatrice was standing by the fire.

  “Hullo, Beatrice,” I said. “Got a bed for a poor London sparrow with soot in his lungs?”

  “Of course I have, Pete. You know that, or you wouldn’t be here.”

  In the incredibly quick way in which women can do these things, she had managed to straighten her hair and clothes, and even plump up the cushions on the settee, all within the few seconds which had elapsed since I had turned away from the French windows.

  She stood with her hands behind her back, her fine hazel eyes meeting mine without flinching. She was smiling, in friendly and hospitable fashion. Only her chin was a little higher than usual. There followed a short conversation which, in the circumstances, was the most futile I have ever taken part in. We were all trying so desperately hard to appear normal. The only real normal living creature in the room was the dog, Brutus. Sleepy with age, he lay with his big, square, white-and-brown bulk stretched out before the fire.

  “God, what a lovely evening,” I said.

  “Isn’t it absolutely heavenly?” said Beatrice.

  “Should be fine tomorrow, too, judging by the sunset,” said John.

  “I don’t know why I live in London.”

  “Nor me,” said John. “Why not make the break, like I did?”

  “Maybe I will, one day.”

  “Have you had tea?” asked Beatrice.

  “Not yet.”

  “I’ll put the kettle on.”

  “Don’t make it specially for me.”

  “We haven’t had any yet, either.”

  “I could do with a cup,” said John, and I thought: That doesn’t surprise me, either, brother.

  “Or even two,” said John facetiously. Or even, I thought, a bloody great whisky and soda, but that’s just what you can’t have, because it’s too early.

  “And some toast,” John plunged on bravely. “Lashings of toast. Eh, Beatrice?”

  Maybe it was a case of telepathy, because he paused for a moment, and then said: “Or would you prefer a whisky and soda, to warm you up after the drive? I expect Beatrice could provide it.”

  I suppose he would have made some pretext to join me in one, to judge by the hopeful way he was looking at me.

  “I think I’d just as soon have a cup of tea, thanks,” I said.

  There was a pause. Beatrice moved to the door.

  “I’ll take my bag up to my room,” I said at last.

  I went upstairs. Beatrice went into the kitchen to put the kettle on. After a few moments, I heard John join her, and they talked in low tones. I began to unpack, very slowly, for I wanted to give them time to sort things out. After about a quarter of an hour I went down to the drawing room, and found tea laid out on a gate-legged table before the fire.

  Beatrice and John were sitting side by side on the settee, eating crumpets. I sat down in one of the deep armchairs, and helped myself to a crumpet from the dish which John passed to me. Beatrice poured me out a cup of tea.

  Nobody spoke for about two minutes, and I thought: They’re going to have the matter out with me. If they weren’t, they would have started to talk trivialities. They are going to get down to business. I waited patiently for one or other of them to make a move.

  John spoke first. He wiped some butter from his lips with his pocket handkerchief, and drained his teacup, and replaced it on the table, and turned his rather heavy red face towards me and said:

  “Well, now you now, don’t you?”

  “Know what?”

  “Now you know how things stand between Beatrice and me.”

  I hesitated. “Yes,” I said, “yes, I do.”

  He nodded. Beatrice was looking down at her fingernails, hands in her lap.

  “At least,” I added, “I know how things appear to stand. But appearances can be deceptive. I saw you kissing her, if that’s what you mean.”

  “That is exactly what I mean.”

  “Yes, well, it’s no business of mine,” I went on. “I’m not married to Beatrice. It’s no concern of mine to cause trouble. Beatrice is not the first girl to have a bit of a flirtation in her husband’s absence.”

  Neither of them said anything.

  “As far as I’m concerned,” I finished, “I’ve seen nothing. The firelight can play strange tricks. It’s not for me to pass on stories which could be based on a figment of the imagination.”

  In my opinion it was a pretty fair offer. I had not yet become fully involved personally in the implications of what I had seen.

  Beatrice wouldn’t have it that way. Beatrice, the courageous, the clear thinker, the woman who faced every issue fairly and squarely, declined the easy escape.

  “It is not a flirtation,” she said, flatly. “I’m in love with John. And he says he’s in love with me. That is the position.”

  The lamplight fell on her red hair, and in the same light her skin looked creamy white and rose. She looked beautiful and very seductive. There was no trace of shame in her demeanour. There was no tremor in her voice. Yet to call her shameless would be unfair; she was more a fearless woman who recognized that a certain situation had arisen and was prepared to cope with the consequences.

  “That’s the position,” she said again, when I remained quiet.

  “I suppose you’re quite sure?” I asked.

  “Quite sure,” replied John firmly, and loudly.

  “Absolutely,” said Beatrice.

  “Divorce?” I said, looking directly at Beatrice. I saw John place his hand over hers on the settee, and surmised that the subject had been pretty thoroughly discussed.

  She shook her head. “No, no divorce.”

  “Not-ever?” I said.

  “No, not ever. I made a bargain with Barty, and I’ll keep it. If I thought he didn’t need me so much, I think-well, I think I would. But I’m all he’s got to hang on to, you know. His job is a bit of a failure.”

  She reached forward to toss a log on to the fire. Then:

  “I’m still very fond of him, you know. And I can’t stand the thought of what he might do if I left him.”

  “Do you mean he might commit suicide?”

  “Not so much that.”

  “What, then?”

  Beatrice made a vague little gesture with her hand. “Oh, I don’t know. Drink, perhaps. And his clothes would all go to pot. And he might get the sack. Or get caught on the rebound by some untidy little slut who would drag him down.”

  “What do you think, John?” I looked at him.

  I had always liked old John, with his Irish lightheartedness, even thoug
h I had thought he was rather self-indulgent in matters of food and wine. I thought he might oppose her.

  “Beatrice knows him best,” said John softly. “She honestly thinks that Barty would go to pieces without her. She may be right. The poor chap hasn’t had much fun out of life.”

  I felt my heart beginning to beat faster. In a few words I could set their consciences at rest, make them two of the happiest people in England, and settle Barty’s problem for him, too.

  “I’m so terribly sorry for him,” said Beatrice suddenly. “I remember not long ago he returned late one night, very cold and tired. I had written him a little note to cheer him up, and left it with a mince pie. I heard him read the note as I lay in bed, half asleep. Then he got into his bed, and I put out my hand to him, and in the end he went to sleep. He was so cold and tired, you know. I was glad he didn’t have to come back to an empty flat. That’s what would happen if I went away with John.”

  “He works too hard,” said John, and got up to put another log on the fire. “And it doesn’t get him anywhere. That’s the trouble. He’ll never make a really good salesman.”

  “Too modest,” said Beatrice. “Too modest and gentle. I think I could do it, if he was a real success, if he was making lots of money.”

  “As it is, you can’t,” said John. “That’s ironic, really. He’s a failure at his job, and because he is a failure he’s a success with the one person in the world who matters. Queer, isn’t it?”

  Beatrice caught the bitterness in his voice.

  She reached out and gripped his hand and held it tight, and looked up at him.

  I thought: Bartels was right. There is indeed one man in the world with whom she can be in love, and now she has found him.

  But by now, ruthless as ever in the pursuit of that which I desired, I had made up my mind what to do. Just as I had planted and watered a seed of doubt in Lorna’s mind, so now I crushed all generous thoughts about revealing the true position to Beatrice and John O’Brien. For if Philip Bartels obtained his freedom from Beatrice, I should lose Lorna.

  I had no intention of losing Lorna.

  Doubtless Bartels, that over-kind man, would have acted differently. But Bartels was a failure in life. I was not. So I did not hesitate for long.

  I spoke quietly and a little sadly, in the tone of voice of one who has deliberated deeply, and has come to the conclusion that however unpleasant his decision it must nevertheless be announced: the old family friend doing his stuff, the trusted adviser, impartial and benevolent, throwing his opinion into the scales. What hypocrisy it was!

  “Would you like my views?” I asked mildly. And before they could reply I continued: “I think-I’m afraid Beatrice is right.”

  She turned quickly and looked at me, and then looked away. It was only a glance, yet I thought I caught a flash of pain behind her eyes as though she had hoped, in spite of all she had said, that I would counter her arguments with some of my own.

  I thought I saw, too, a tinge of despair. As if all hope were now indeed lost. I regretted it, but it did not deter me.

  “I think he would be pretty lost without Beatrice,” I said. “I think he would certainly try to kill the pain in some fashion, quite possibly with drink. And I think that he might well end up by losing his job. He’s hardly indispensable in the firm, is he?”

  Beatrice said: “Thank you for being frank.”

  John said nothing for a moment. Then he said:

  “Don’t you think he might marry again? Some nice woman or other? Don’t you think he might?”

  I heard the note of urgency in his voice, and recognized it as a kind of last desperate appeal. One half of my mind was sorry for the poor chap. The other half, the part that looked after my own interests, was completely unmoved.

  “No, I don’t,” I said flatly. And to ram the point well home I added: “I don’t think he would ever fall in love again. And don’t forget-I’ve known him since childhood.”

  I got up and walked over to the window and stood looking out into the darkness. The wind had risen, and the trees were tossing against the night sky. I thought that in three hours, perhaps less, Bartels would be no longer with Lorna. Kissing her and fondling her. Pawing her. Mouthing phrases like a lovesick youth. Kissing her…kissing her…kissing her again. The wave of jealousy mounted higher and higher inside me.

  I clenched my fists in my trouser pockets, and swung round again to Beatrice and John.

  “I don’t think there is the slightest chance that he would marry again,” I said loudly and harshly. They thought, no doubt, that I sounded stern because I was concerned about Bartels’ well-being. Poor simpletons!

  He came back about 9.30 that evening: Philip Bartels, my friend. Beatrice was very nice to him, and he was very nice to her.

  He was glad to see me, too. He said so.

  I didn’t know that in an inside pocket of his overcoat was a bottle marked ASPIRINS, that it had been there for some days, or that the contents bore not the slightest resemblance to aspirins.

  Chapter 12

  I shall always remember that Saturday, because as it turned out it was the last day which Philip and Beatrice Bartels and I spent together.

  I did not know that, of course, and there was nothing to indicate it. It began as one of those days which make you think that winter is past, and that spring is not very far ahead; the sun shone out of a brittle blue sky, dazzlingly bright, and the sprinkling of frost on the lawn sparkled and danced in the pale, intense light.

  I always sleep with the windows partly open, but when I got up that morning, I opened them wider still, and looked out, and breathed in deeply and felt glad to be alive.

  The air was cold, and as I was not even wearing a dressing gown, it penetrated quickly to my skin, and raced over my face and neck and chest, yet left behind no feeling of chill, but rather a tingling, invigorating feeling as though I had been massaged.

  It was quite late, past nine o’clock, for the Bartels took things very easily at weekends, as is right and proper, and we usually wandered down for breakfast at about a quarter to ten.

  A robin fluttered down on to the lawn, hopped a few paces and stood listening. Somebody, presumably Beatrice, was moving about in the kitchen handling crockery.

  The air was very still; so still that when the dog Brutus wandered out of the French windows below me, I picked up the sound as his heavy body disturbed the pebbles on the path.

  The dog Brutus moved slowly on to the lawn, took a few paces and stopped, and stretched, his forelegs thrust out before him, tensing his hind legs in turn. The robin took no notice, as though aware that so old and heavy a body was incapable of sudden and dangerous attack.

  The dog lowered his head to the ground, and sniffed, and then raised his half-blind eyes to the sun; his head moved slowly from side to side, as though he were trying to discern the source of the rays which were warming his body. He took a few more steps, and stood uncertainly looking across the lawn to where the vegetable garden lay.

  “Brutus!” I called. “Hello, Brutus, boy!”

  The dog took no notice, so I called louder: “Brutus! Hello, boy!”

  The dog turned his heavy head and peered in the direction from which my voice had come. His stump of a tail moved gently from side to side, then he turned his head away and continued to gaze down the garden.

  I thought: He is so old now that he does not much care whether human company is around or not; he is a half-numbed entity, for whom the hours and the days bring either warmth and comfort, or cold and discomfort; either food and satisfaction or vague stirrings of hunger and restlessness.

  Men come to it, like dogs: but men have their memories to amuse and comfort them, or to torture and plague them. Memory is a mixed blessing. Time soothes most of the wounds of the past, but the ugliest remain unhealed; perhaps they are even exacerbated by the play of the imagination. Dogs don’t suffer like that. Dogs die easy deaths, devoid of hopes or fears. It’s a consolation for having to eat t
he half-cold remains from people’s plates, I thought.

  I closed the window, and bathed and dressed, and went down to breakfast. Beatrice and Barty were already at table, reading the newspapers. There were boiled eggs for breakfast, two each, for Beatrice, efficient as ever, had good local contacts.

  We did not talk much. I think that each of them was conscious that I shared his or her secret that bright February morning. As for me, I was merely concerned that neither should discern the true feelings of the other.

  Of the two, as I thought even then, Beatrice was the finer character; she had made her bargain, married without being in love; but having made it she was going to keep it, even though it nearly broke her heart to do so.

  Not so Philip Bartels. Unless I could prevent it, he was going to break what he considered to have been a bad bargain, and marry Lorna.

  Such being the case, I had to take swift action in two directions. I had to consolidate the position in regard to Beatrice and John O’Brien, and I had to see Lorna Dickson and strengthen the idea that it would be wrong of her to take Bartels from Beatrice.

  Yet all my plans were put in peril in a most unexpected way that same morning.

  To begin with, everything went according to plan. After breakfast, Bartels went out into the garden to fix a piece of trellis-work that had come loose in the night, and I offered to help Beatrice with the washing-up.

  Beatrice washed the things. I dried them. At first we did not speak; each knew the subject which lay uppermost in the other’s mind; each was reluctant to broach the subject, or perhaps Beatrice, like myself, did not know how to start.

  At length, as I was drying the last few knives, I said abruptly:

  “I have thought some more about you and John.”

  “What have you thought?”

  She turned her head and looked at me anxiously. I did not know whether she was hopeful that I might have changed my mind, in order that she could have some moral backing for reconsidering the problem herself, or whether, having now reconciled herself, she was fearful lest I put up arguments which would cause her to weaken.