by David Lodge
‘Yes, I rather gathered that,’ says Helen.
‘How?’
‘Oh, just something he said.’
‘What?’
‘Something quite trivial.’
‘Tell me,’ he says, with some insistence.
‘Something about your being the master of the scientific sound-bite.’
Ralph gives a short, mirthless laugh. ‘I can’t help it if the media ring me up, and not him, every time they want a comment on artificial intelligence.’ When Helen does not comment, he goes on. ‘They tell a story about Duggers, before I came here. He was always sneering about media dons then, as now, but one day he came into the coffee room looking pleased as punch and let drop the information that he’d been invited to appear on a radio discussion programme for a fee of fifty pounds. “What are you going to do about it, Duggers?” somebody asked him. “Oh, I thought I might as well accept,” he said. “So I’ve sent off my fifty pounds.”’
Helen laughs. ‘I don’t believe it,’ she says.
‘Neither do I, unfortunately,’ Ralph says, grinning, his poise restored.
The rest of the ducks arrive and are collected in a net by the Boy Scouts, pulled out of the water and borne away in a great dripping bundle. The crowd at the finishing line begins to disperse. Carrie comes up and asks Ralph to go with the children to buy ice-creams, and he moves off obediently. ‘And bring us one each,’ she calls after him.
He turns. ‘What flavour?’
‘You choose,’ Carrie says. ‘Surprise and delight us.’
‘This is Bourton-on-the-Water, Blondie,’ he says. ‘We’re talking village shop here, with a fridge full of paper-wrapped cones and choc-ices on sticks, not Howard Johnson’s.’
‘I know,’ Carrie says. ‘Whatever.’ To Helen she says, ‘You know, that’s what I miss more than anything about home, the ice-cream.’
On his way to the ice-cream shop, Ralph meets Stuart Phillips and Marianne supervising the Boy Scouts as they pack the plastic ducks into cardboard boxes.
‘Hallo Stuart, I didn’t know you were a scoutmaster, on top of all your other skills,’ Ralph says.
‘Yes. You’ll be glad to know I’m introducing a computing badge,’ Stuart says, with a grin.
With a movement of his head Ralph draws Marianne aside for a private word. ‘Oliver just asked me if I’ve got a Sainsbury’s Reward card. What was that about?’
‘Did he recite the number of my card?’ Marianne asks.
‘Yes, he did,’ says Ralph.
‘It’s a favourite party trick of his.’
‘Oh. It wasn’t a hint about seeing us in the car-park that day?’
‘Oliver doesn’t know how to hint,’ Marianne says.
‘Has he said anything to Jasper?’
‘Not as far as I know,’ says Marianne.
‘Thank Christ for that,’ Ralph says. ‘How are you anyway, Marianne?’
‘I’m all right, thanks.’ She looks away from him towards the Boy Scouts.
‘Well, I’d better be going. I’ve got to get some ice-cream.’
‘Mitchell’s is best. Halfway up the street on the right.’
‘Thanks,’ says Ralph. ‘Can I get some for the Scouts?’
‘No, I promised them a cream tea.’
‘Right,’ says Ralph, and moves off.
Helen and Carrie sit down on a rustic bench in the shade of a large oak tree, facing the river. The spectators have all drifted away, back to the village.
‘About last Friday,’ Carrie says.
‘You don’t have to explain anything to me, Carrie,’ Helen says quickly.
‘You must have wondered what was going on.’
‘It’s none of my business.’
‘Well, maybe it isn’t,’ says Carrie. ‘But I’d like you to know a few things anyway.’
‘I haven’t told anyone else, and I don’t intend to.’
‘I know you won’t, Helen. You’re not a gossip, you’re a writer. You store up all the dirt and recycle it in your novels.’
Helen glances at Carrie as if to gauge the feeling behind this remark. ‘If that’s what you’re worried about, I can assure you –’
‘You don’t need to, Helen,’ Carrie says, smiling. ‘You told me the other day, at the Brine Baths, you wouldn’t write anything that would embarrass anyone.’
‘Oh. Well, good.’
‘But I was less than honest with you,’ Carrie says. ‘I said I trusted Messenger not to play around with his female post-docs and graduate students. And that’s true. He’s far too smart to get trapped that way. But that’s exactly how far I trust him – not an inch further. I know he has other women when he’s away from home.’
‘How do you know?’ Helen says.
‘I’ve developed an instinct. When he wants to have sex as soon as he gets back from a trip, for instance, that’s a sure sign. He’s trying to demonstrate that he missed me while he was away.’
Helen smiled. ‘You must have more to go on than that.’
‘Sure. Sometimes faculty who go to the same conferences as Messenger tell their colleagues or their wives what he’s been up to, and eventually it gets back to me. Sometimes I get anonymous letters. Those are probably from guys in Messenger’s field who hate him, or maybe they’re from women who hate me, or people who hate both of us. There’s a lot of envy and malice out there. When Private Eye ran a paragraph about Messenger being a woman-chaser, three anonymous informants sent me the clipping, just in case I hadn’t seen it. As it happens I had – some thoughtful friend slipped it into my Fanny Farmer cookbook at one of our parties.’
‘How horrible,’ Helen murmurs.
‘The main thing is not to betray for a moment to anybody that you’ve been upset, or even that you got the message. You just ignore it. Deny them any satisfaction.’
‘That must be difficult sometimes,’ Helen says.
‘Once a woman he’d had a fling with in Australia wrote to me herself. Signed the letter. She felt she’d been used. She wanted revenge.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I tore it up.’
‘You didn’t confront Ralph with it?’
‘What would be the point? He’s not going to change, and I don’t want to divorce him. We make a good team. He’s a good father. The kids would be devastated if we split up.’
‘I don’t think I could be so tolerant. I know I couldn’t,’ Helen says.
‘Well, I made it clear to Messenger that I wouldn’t stand for anything in my own back yard, meaning the University, Cheltenham, anywhere round here. I never spelled it out, but it was understood between us. Then it began to dawn on me that this was a very one-sided arrangement. I mean, there was no way I could have an occasional adventure, because I don’t get to swan off on trips abroad on my own or pop up and down to London to meet publishers or make TV programmes requiring location shoots and stopovers. Then Nick came on the scene. We had a lot in common – history of art, interior decoration, period furniture. He’s good company. And he’s very kind, very considerate. He thinks ahead, about little things that might please you, and he does them. We became close friends. Then Nick wanted more than friendship, and I thought, why shouldn’t I? It’s been going for over a year now, and you’re the first person who’s caught us off guard. Lucky it was you. I guess we’ve been getting a little careless.’
‘Did you know,’ says Helen, ‘that some people think he’s a celibate gay?’
Carrie laughed merrily. ‘Yeah. Nick and I have had a few laughs over that. He doesn’t know who started it – he certainly didn’t. But he hasn’t bothered to deny it, either. Messenger believes it, which is kinda convenient . . . No, Nick isn’t gay, though he was confused sexually as a young man. Those English public schools, you know. He likes to be spanked. Otherwise, he’s completely straight.’
‘He likes to be spanked?’ Helen says, wide-eyed.
‘Yeah, and you know what? I get quite a buzz out of it too. It’s fun to be the domina
nt partner in the bedroom for a change.’
‘I see,’ says Helen.
Carrie laughs. ‘Don’t look so shocked, it’s only playacting.’
‘I’m not shocked – really. It’s just . . . surprise.’
‘What about that scene in The Eye of the Storm, with the rope and the masks?’
‘That was fiction,’ Helen says, with a touch of embarrassment.
‘You never did that type of thing yourself?’ Helen shakes her head. ‘You should try it some time,’ says Carrie. ‘Here’s Messenger coming back, we’d better change the subject.’
Helen looks about her, as if in search of one. A wink of yellow on the river catches her eye. ‘Oh look,’ she says, pointing. ‘The last duck.’
Ralph joins them and distributes ice-cream cones.
‘I take it all back,’ he says. ‘I found a little place that makes home-made ice-cream.’
‘Mmm, delicious!’ says Carrie, tasting hers.
‘What were you pointing at?’ Ralph asks Helen.
‘A duck,’ Helen says. ‘A straggler.’
They go to the edge of the river bank and watch the little toy bobbing along in a sluggish current. Who knows why it is such a long way behind all the others? Perhaps it got caught in some obstruction further upstream, and was overlooked by the Boy Scouts, but then freed itself. Anyway, here it comes, towards the finishing line, the last to cross it.
‘Shouldn’t we try and fish it out?’ Helen says.
Ralph looks around, sees a broken branch lying on the ground, and, leaning out perilously from the bank, with Helen clinging to his belt, drags the duck to the side of the river and pulls it out.
‘What number is it?’ says Carrie.
‘Forty-eight,’ says Ralph.
‘My number,’ says Helen.
When the Messengers get back to their house in Pittville Lawn, the little red light on the answerphone in the kitchen is flashing to indicate that several messages have been received while they were out. Ralph presses the playback button, and Carrie fills the electric kettle to make a cup of tea.
‘Carrie, this is Mom,’ says the voice of Carrie’s mother, as clear as if she is speaking from the other side of Cheltenham rather than from California. ‘Bad news, I’m afraid, honey. Your father’s sick. They think he’s had a heart attack.’
‘Oh my God,’ says Carrie, dropping the kettle with a clatter. She goes across to stand beside Ralph, listening intently to the messages, recorded at intervals during the day, from Carrie’s mother, sister and brother-in-law. The children who come into the room whistling, or with questions and demands, are shushed and made to wait, silent and motionless, until the messages have finished. They become grave and subdued, as they absorb the information that their grandfather has had a serious heart attack and is in hospital, in intensive care.
‘I’ll have to fly out tomorrow,’ says Carrie, dialling. She calls her mother and her sister. Both of them are at the hospital, but she talks to her brother-in-law, Gary, who tells her that her father has had a second heart attack and his condition is critical. ‘I’ll get there as soon as I can,’ Carrie says, and puts down the phone. She turns to Ralph. ‘Can you book flights on a Sunday evening?’ she says.
‘Sure, if you go direct to the airlines. You don’t want to wait till tomorrow morning? See how things are?’
‘No, do it for me now, will you?’
‘I can’t go with you. We’re interviewing for the new post all this week.’
‘I know. Anyway, you’ll have to look after the kids.’
Ralph calls British Airways and books Carrie a business class seat on a plane from Heathrow to Los Angeles at noon the following day. Carrie and Emily prepare a scratch meal of scrambled eggs and ham.
They eat the meal at the kitchen table. Hope breaks a silence.
‘Is Grandpa going to die?’
‘No, honey,’ says Carrie.
‘It’s possible,’ Ralph says at the same moment.
Carrie flashes Ralph an angry look.
‘There’s no point pretending,’ he says defensively.
‘And there’s no point assuming the worst.’
‘I wasn’t assuming the worst. But we might as well be prepared for the possibility.’
‘What happens to people when they die?’ Hope asks.
‘They get buried,’ says Simon. ‘Or they get burned.’
‘Simon!’ Carrie says, frowning.
‘Try not be an asshole, Simon,’ says Emily.
‘And enough of that language,’ Carrie says to Emily.
‘Sock is, however, perfectly correct,’ says Ralph.
‘Not necessarily,’ says Mark. ‘In India they put corpses on the tops of buildings for vultures to pick their bones clean.’
‘That’s so gross,’ says Emily.
‘Is that true, Daddy?’ Hope says.
‘Could we change the subject, please,’ says Carrie.
‘I believe so,’ Ralph says to Hope. ‘But only one particular religion does it, and it’s not allowed here, or in California, so you needn’t worry about it, Kitten.’
‘Shirley Blake’s grandpa died last term and Miss Hackett said he’s gone to heaven,’ Hope says.
‘That’s right,’ says Carrie.
‘No it’s not,’ says Ralph. ‘Some people believe that, Kitten, but they’re wrong. There’s no such place as heaven. It’s a nice idea, but it’s made up. It’s like a fairy story.’
‘Messenger, I really object to this very strongly,’ Carrie says, in a level but steely voice.
‘So where will Grandpa go when he dies?’ Hope says.
‘He won’t go anywhere, sweetheart,’ says Ralph. ‘His body will be buried in the ground, or cremated, as Sock says, but it won’t really be Grandpa anymore. Grandpa won’t exist, except in our minds. We’ll think of him and remember all the nice things he did for us and the presents he gave us and the stories he told us.’
Carrie gets to her feet and walks out of the kitchen, leaving her meal unfinished. Ralph carries on talking as if nothing untoward has happened, but the children are silent and ill-at-ease. He leaves them to clear the dishes and goes out of the room. He finds Carrie in their bedroom, on the phone, talking to British Airways, with the flight details which Ralph wrote down, and her own credit card, in front of her. There is a half-filled suitcase open on the bed.
‘What are you doing?’ he asks.
Carrie concludes her conversation and puts down the phone. ‘I’ve booked a ticket on that flight for Hope. I’m taking her with me.’ Carrie resumes packing her suitcase, walking backwards and forwards between the bed and the fitted wardrobes and chests of drawers.
‘Why?’
‘I couldn’t believe what you were saying just now. You were talking like Daddy was already dead.’
‘It seemed to me a good opportunity to get Hope used to the idea of what death means. When kids ask these questions, it means they want to know the truth.’
‘The truth! Who knows the truth? Who really knows what happens to us when we die? You don’t know, Messenger, not for sure.’
‘I know there’s no such place as heaven.’
‘If a kid wants to believe in it, why not let her? Until it drops away naturally, like a milk tooth coming out. Why use force?’
‘I’m not going to have an argument with you, Carrie –’
‘I thought we were already having one.’
‘You’re upset, understandably. Just tell me why you’re dragging Hope all the way to California.’
‘She always had a soft spot for Daddy, and he for her. It may do him good to see her.’
‘You’re going to take a young kid into an intensive care ward, to see an old man with drips and tubes coming out of him? You must be crazy!’
‘Who’s trying to protect her from the truth now? Your trouble is, Messenger, you’re very hot on facing facts in the abstract, but not when they’re physical, in your face.’
‘She’ll miss at least
a week’s school.’
‘Too bad . . . And if the worst should happen, well, I’d rather she was with me than with you. I don’t rate you very highly as a grief counsellor, Messenger.’
Ralph is silent for a moment, ruminating with pursed lips.
‘OK, have it your own way,’ he says. ‘I’ll drive you to Heathrow in the morning.’
‘You needn’t bother,’ Carrie says.
‘I don’t have anything important till the afternoon.’
‘I’ll book a car with a driver. I’d prefer it that way. It’s less stressful.’
‘As you like,’ says Ralph, with a shrug, and leaves the room.
26
IT’S WEDNESDAY, 16TH April, 9.05 p.m. A day to remember. A day to record – though not on the Pearlmaster. I’m at home in my study, writing this straight on to the computer. The kids are all in their rooms doing their homework or watching TV, or possibly both simultaneously (teenage behaviour is the best evidence I know for consciousness as parallel processing. I once found Mark in his bedroom watching a football match with the sound off, listening to Oasis on his personal CD player, and writing an essay on the Corn Laws, all at the same time, without apparent difficulty), but even so I don’t feel like dictating this, just in case one of them should come quietly up the stairs with some question or request and overhear me saying that this afternoon I fucked one of England’s finest contemporary novelists. That’s how she’s described on the back of Carrie’s paperback edition of The Eye of the Storm, which lies on my desk at this moment. ‘A novel of exquisite sensibility and artful restraint,’ the Spectator said. Well, she wasn’t at all restrained this afternoon, and I have lovebites on my left shoulder to prove it. She damn nearly drew blood. I hope to hell the marks fade before Carrie gets back.
Fortunately it seems likely that she will be away for at least another week. Daddy Thurlow’s condition has stabilized, and it looks as if he’s going to pull through, though whether this will be a cause for rejoicing remains to be seen. He may be seriously disabled. Carrie is staying on for a while, anyway, to see how things develop and give her mother support. Which is fine by me. I’m glad the old man didn’t die, because if he had I think Carrie in some irrational way would have blamed me for it, or at least associated it with my allegedly cruel and heartless handling of Hope’s questions over supper on Sunday. Needless to say I made no apology for that. Carrie went off to Heathrow the next morning in a huge hired Daimler with a dark-suited driver, as if to a funeral, wearing a black topcoat and a grim expression. She spoke only of practical arrangements over breakfast, and offered me her cheek, not her mouth, to kiss when we parted. Hope looked on anxiously, picking up the bad vibrations, so I gave her an extra big hug and cracked a joke to make her smile. She waved to me through the back window as the car turned out of the drive, but Carrie kept her head turned sternly to the front.
