Going Gently

by David Nobbs

  ‘But you were told?’

  ‘No, I discovered. When Olga first came to me, I already knew he was a major talent.’

  ‘But you didn’t mount an exhibition?’

  ‘It wasn’t the time, Kate. People weren’t ready.’

  ‘But they are now, when he’s dead?’

  ‘Exactly. I needed him dead.’

  ‘You don’t mean you killed him?’

  ‘Good God, Kate, what do you take me for? Where do you think this is? Chicago? No, but he had very frail health and I hung on. I gambled, if you like.’

  ‘That’s dreadful.’

  ‘It seems so to you. It was a commercial judgement. A Begelman exhibition five years ago would have created interest. Sold a bit. Not a lot. He isn’t easy art. People would not have been comfortable with his work on their drawing-room walls. It needed to become fashionable. With his death it will. The artist unappreciated in his lifetime. Every now and then we need that story.’

  ‘But poor Daniel!’

  ‘Yes, very sad, if one believes that the truest rewards are in this world.’

  ‘Your rewards, by a remarkable coincidence, just happen to be in this world.’

  ‘That is true. But I have no misgivings. I’ve achieved a remarkable coup for the Begelman reputation. Single-handed I have catapulted him to fame. I’ve earned a fortune for Olga.’

  ‘She wasn’t in on this?’

  ‘Good Lord, no. Olga is even more naive than you.’

  Kate longed to find something devastating to say to this man. On the whole she felt that she could have done better.

  ‘I disliked you from the moment I saw your cuff-links,’ she said.

  She went up to one of Daniel’s paintings and stared at it. Tears were running down her face, and she wasn’t really seeing the picture, she was seeing Daniel at Tregarryn, Daniel in the back of a lorry full of onions, Daniel in the Bandalero. Somebody had said that the past is another country. That was a true remark, and yet another remark that contradicted it was also true. That, she had discovered, was the nature of truth, and of remarks. The past is our own country. We live in a country that was formed by the past. We deny it at our peril. Farewell, dear Daniel, I wish I could believe that you were witnessing all this.

  Kate wiped her eyes and blew her nose. She was aware that people around her were aware of her and leaving her alone. She was grateful to them. She was even more grateful to Enid, for what she had said. She resolved at that moment to live her individual life to the full, to the best of her ability, without selfishness or self-absorption. She would continue to bring sunlight into rooms, but she would do more. She would do things that needed doing, good things, bold things, beautiful things.

  ‘Penny for them.’

  She turned to see a tall man, big-boned but lean, with a long nose, very full lips and blue eyes that gave nothing away. His hair was slicked back, lending great prominence to his long forehead. She guessed that he was a little younger than her, perhaps in his very early fifties.

  ‘Penny for them,’ he repeated.

  ‘No, I was just thinking that I must do things with my life,’ she said.

  ‘What sort of things?’

  Oh dear, this is going to sound . . . no, don’t be bashful.

  ‘Bold things, good things, beautiful things.’

  ‘My word! What things exactly? Can you be a bit more specific?’

  ‘No. I haven’t a clue.’

  They laughed immoderately. She liked his laugh.

  ‘I’m Graham Eldridge,’ he said. ‘I’m a journalist.’

  ‘Hello, Graham. I’m Kate Copson.’

  ‘Hello, Kate. Bold things, you say?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What, like going out to dinner tonight with a man you don’t know and whose intentions for all you know may be completely dishonourable and who may indeed for all you know be a complete fraud and a sham?’

  ‘That sort of thing, yes.’

  ‘Terrific. Where shall we go?’

  ‘Oh, I was giving a hypothetical answer, Graham, to what I thought was a hypothetical question.’

  ‘No. Real question. How about it?’

  ‘I’m afraid that’s not possible. I’m going out with my brother and sister. They’re over there.’

  ‘Tomorrow, then?’

  ‘Sorry. I’m going out with my third husband tomorrow.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’

  ‘Oh, we’re divorced.’

  ‘Ah. I mean, not that I’m pleased. I’m sorry to hear it.’

  ‘I hope you aren’t. He’s here tonight. The trim chap with the goatee beard looking at that big picture of Salamanca.’

  ‘It seems as though it’s been quite an evening for you.’

  ‘More than you think. My second and fourth husbands are here too.’ She enjoyed the effect of this on his face.

  ‘Really? Which are they?’

  ‘Not “they”. “Him”. Great awkward man with wild black hair over there.’

  ‘The one with the tarty woman?’

  ‘I’m getting to like you. Yes.’

  ‘Do you like this picture? I saw you staring at it very intently before.’

  ‘It’s difficult to say. It’s difficult to be dispassionate about it. It’s a portrait of my first husband.’

  ‘Good Lord! Do you have a fifth husband here, by any chance?’

  ‘No.’ She laughed.

  Can a remark become a lie retrospectively? Kate’s ‘no’ was true at the time. She wouldn’t have believed anyone who had told her that Graham Eldridge was going to become her fifth husband.

  13 Hilda

  HILDA MANDRAKE’S RETURN to Ward 3C could not by any stretch of the imagination be described as a success. For Kate it came at a particularly irritating time. She was feeling completely exhausted that afternoon, the ward was unusually quiet, Glenda was asleep and miraculously not farting, neither Angela Critchley nor Lily Stannidge was causing any disturbance, and it was Elizabeth’s turn to sit with her, and she found Elizabeth’s visits particularly undemanding. Every now and then Elizabeth would give her hand a little squeeze, and at the end of the visit she would kiss her cheek and say, ‘I’m off now, Mummy. Sleep well,’ and that would be that.

  So, the October afternoon slid gently by, less than three months now to the millennium and all quiet on the Western Front. Kate slipped in and out of sleep. The hubbub of the private view buzzed still in her head, and it was the quintessence of poignancy to drift between that lively and sparkling scene, when she had outshone, even at fifty-five, all the ladies in the room, and this smelly, stuffy little ward where she lay silent and helpless.

  Kate was extremely tired that afternoon. She’d been tired on the night itself, after the exhibition, but she was forty-four years older now and the reliving of it had tired her even more than the living of it.

  She was tired but also immensely peaceful. That evening in the Corncrake Gallery had been a turning point in her life. It should have been a cause for yet more guilt. She had met Graham that night, and to fall in love with a shadow, to be utterly fooled by a man at the age of fifty-five, it should have been shaming. But dear, long-dead Enid had persuaded her that evening to put away guilt and shame and self-pity for ever. The peace of mind that she had found that evening in the Corncrake Gallery returned to her in Ward 3C that afternoon as a result of her having relived the whole evening that very morning.

  And now here was Hilda, intruding, spoiling things. Now that her body was so useless, Kate found that her senses had heightened to compensate. She didn’t know who it was standing at the door, but she knew it was a visitor, and she was sure it was a woman.

  ‘Good afternoon, ladies,’ said fat Janet with the eating disorder brightly. ‘Look who’s come all the way to visit us! Aren’t we just the luckiest ladies, ladies? It’s our old friend, Hilda.’

  Kate’s heart sank. She knew it would be a fiasco. She could see Hilda in her mind, standing there, hands tense, mouth working anxious
ly, smiling too broadly, pale, podgy, dumpy – remember, gentle reader, this is Kate’s regrettably ungenerous picture of Hilda. She may indeed have looked exactly like that. Sadly, it’s more than probable. But we can’t be sure.

  ‘Hello, ladies. Well, I just couldn’t keep away!’ said Hilda in a bright, brittle voice. ‘I must have had a good time here, mustn’t I? Well, how are we all today?’

  Kate heard Glenda give a low moan and a muffled fart like the croaking of a hoarse toad and she heard Hilda say, ‘Hello, Glenda dear. I’ll let you wake up properly before I come and talk but I’ve brought you some grapes.’

  Kate’s heart sank for Hilda’s sake, but also for her own. She didn’t want to be visited, that afternoon, by those two old friends of hers, compassion and sympathy. She wanted to rest up before the rigours that were approaching. A woman is lying in bed, paralysed, unable to speak, and she has set herself a task that has baffled even Inspector Crouch himself, thoroughness his middle name.

  ‘And I’ve brought some for you, Mrs Critchley, there you are.’

  She hadn’t set herself this task out of conceit or as an academic exercise, but as a burning necessity, something that she hungered to solve before she died. She realised now that she had never dared to attempt to solve the problem before, because, if she had solved it, she would have had to act upon it. She would have had to have one of her dear sons arrested, tried, imprisoned. Now she could satisfy her natural curiosity and feel the joy of knowing that two of her sons were innocent, and she wouldn’t need to do anything about the murderer because she wouldn’t be able to. She wasn’t proud of her behaviour in the matter, but she felt it to be understandable in a mother.

  And now the moment of truth was almost upon her; she’d already met Graham, another night of recollections and he’d already be dead. Tomorrow she would have to begin what it seemed increasingly pretentious to call her investigations. And now, instead of peace and quiet, here was Hilda saying, ‘Hello, you won’t know me, but I used to be in your bed. The technical term is, I believe, “the previous occupant”. Ha ha!’

  ‘I hope you didn’t soil it,’ said Lily Stannidge.

  ‘What?? Good heavens, no. Good heavens, what a thing to say! It’d have been changed anyway, even if I had. Which I hadn’t. And I’m awfully sorry, but I haven’t brought you any grapes, because I didn’t know you’d be here.’

  ‘Good. I don’t like grapes. They give me the pip.’

  ‘Oh, well in that case . . . oh, pip, very good, I was slow there, smack smack, Hilda! Have you met Doctor Ramgobi?’

  ‘Which deck’s he on?’

  ‘Well, don’t listen to him. He doesn’t know his job. He sent me home and I’m not fit, not with my nerves, I just can’t manage, you see. Well, it’s such a long way to the shops. I mean, what are old people supposed to do these days?’

  Lily Stannidge must have rung the bell. Kate heard Janet say, ‘Why have you rung your bell, Lily?’ (Easy deduction. Harder one tomorrow. Oh Lord!)

  ‘This woman is a stowaway,’ said Lily Stannidge.

  ‘Oh good heavens!’ exclaimed Hilda.

  ‘She said she was the previous occupant of the bed. How did she get back on board if she hadn’t stowed away?’

  ‘Yes, yes, Lily, good point, we’ll sort it all out. Hilda, why don’t you go and talk to your old friends and not Lily who you don’t know, know what I mean?’

  ‘Well, all right, but I was only trying to cheer her up.’

  Kate sensed that Hilda was looking at her now, and wondering whether to say anything. Her body tensed, then relaxed as Hilda moved on.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Critchley.’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Who am I? Oh! Ha ha! I’m your old friend, Hilda, from the end bed on the left.’ Hilda lowered her voice. ‘A very strange woman’s there now. I’m not sure if she’s quite right.’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t be surprised if she wasn’t. This place has gone down. I was speaking to the manager the other day, he’s ethnic, well, you aren’t allowed to say foreign these days, are you, but he’s very nice, and I said, “Is it true they’ve stopped the tea dances?” and, yes, they have, can you imagine? Who did you say you were?’

  ‘I’m Hilda. You know. Hilda. Hilda Mandrake.’

  ‘Are you one of the Gloucestershire Mandrakes?’

  ‘No, I live in . . . well, it’s hard to say whether it’s Edgware or Stanmore.’

  ‘Oh. Only I knew some Mandrakes in Gloucestershire.’

  ‘No. That wasn’t me.’

  ‘Get away from me!’

  ‘What??’

  ‘You killed my daughter!’

  ‘What?? No!! Oh good heavens. Mrs Critchley, really.’

  Mrs Critchley must have rung her bell. Kate heard Janet say, ‘Well, well, how our bells are buzzing this afternoon. What’s up, Mrs Critchley?’

  ‘This woman’s annoying me.’

  ‘Oh Lord. Oh, Hilda, I’m sorry, but . . .’ Kate could sense Janet leading Hilda away. Janet continued in a hushed voice. ‘Mrs Critchley’s a bit funny today, know what I mean? Glenda’s all right, though. You have a nice chat to Glenda.’

  Kate almost expelled a sigh at Hilda’s humiliations. Just in time she realised that a sigh might reveal even to someone as insensitive as Elizabeth that she was understanding a great deal more than she was letting on.

  ‘Hello, Glenda. You remember me, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes. You were in the next bed. Hilda.’

  ‘That’s right! And I thought, I know what I’ll do today, I’ll go and see my friend Glenda. It’s taken me three buses, it’s one of those awkward journeys, but never mind, I thought, I’ll go and see Glenda.’

  ‘Why don’t you just shove off and get three buses back home again?’

  Oh no!

  ‘I can’t believe what I’m hearing, Glenda. What harm have I ever done to you?’

  ‘I hate you.’

  ‘Glenda!’

  ‘I should have been sent home, not you. What did you do, bribe Doctor Rambogi?’

  ‘Ramgobi. Glenda!’

  ‘Promised to sleep with him, did you?’

  Ha! Awful, but you have to laugh. How cruel is comedy!

  ‘Glenda!! I’ve a good mind to just walk out.’

  ‘First sensible thing you’ve said.’

  ‘But no, that would be the easy way out. The coward’s way. Glenda, I didn’t want to get sent home. I’ve got nothing at home. I had to have the cat put down before I came in. There’s virtually nothing on the television. All those trendy people in the media, there was a very interesting article at the hairdresser’s . . . and the girl I like has gone, and the new one’s hopeless, I said to her, “You just don’t understand my hair. What my hair is is sparse.” Where was I?’

  ‘God knows.’

  ‘Oh yes. Television. I read they want programmes with street cred. I don’t know what street cred is. I live in a grove. I don’t know whether there is such a thing as grove cred. They make programmes for young people and what’s the point, they’re at their clubs taking their drugs. The only decent thing an old lady in her own home can watch is the Antiques Roadshow, and I expect quite soon they’ll have suggestive jugs on that.’

  Glenda must have rung the bell. Kate heard Janet saying, ‘My my my. What a plague of bells ringing we have today. What’s up, Glenda?’

  ‘This woman’s annoying me.’

  ‘Oh dear. Oh dear oh dear. I’m really sorry, Hilda. It’s just not been your day, has it?’

  Kate felt Hilda stop at the bottom of her bed.

  ‘Who are you? The daughter?’ asked Hilda.

  ‘Yes,’ said Elizabeth. She was never a great conversationalist but Kate thought she could have done better than that.

  ‘Well, I’ll tell you something about your mother,’ said Hilda. ‘She can’t speak, she can’t see, she can’t hear, she can’t move, but she’s more fun than the rest of them put together.’

  14 Graham

  DURING T
HE LONG night that followed Hilda’s disastrous visit, Kate relived her life with the man she knew as Graham Eldridge.

  It had begun quite gently. It hadn’t been a whirlwind romance. Kate hadn’t felt any overwhelming urge to get married again. She was still recovering from the shock of her separation from Walter. She was still going through a complicated divorce settlement. And there was Heinz. He would have married her again like a shot. ‘Really, Heinz,’ she said, on the evening when he actually proposed, ‘to marry one man twice seems a bit excessive. To marry two men twice would be positively greedy.’ In the end, she had to say, ‘I like you enormously, Heinz. I just don’t love you. I fell out of love with you when I realised that Walter had become a man I could truly love. I love him still.’

  He pushed bits of pork round and round his plate, the way he did when he was tense. ‘I realised you’d need time,’ he said. ‘I’m prepared to give you time.’

  ‘I’ve had time,’ she said. ‘I’ve tried, Heinz.’

  ‘Oh God, that sounds awful. I didn’t want you to try. I didn’t want effort. Is this it, then?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know quite what you mean by “it”. I hope we can continue to see each other.’

  ‘I’m afraid not,’ said Heinz. ‘It makes me too sad.’

  ‘Don’t you think we should tell Elizabeth who her father is?’

  ‘Is there any point now?’

  ‘Don’t you think the truth matters?’

  ‘Only sometimes.’

  But Elizabeth didn’t get on with Linda. They were jealous of each other. And although Walter didn’t exactly take sides, his interests, if not his feelings, lay with Linda. Elizabeth left home in a huff and a taxi. She moved into a bedsit with Sylvie, and enrolled in a secretarial college. Heinz was very upset when Kate told him.

  ‘A secretarial college? Isn’t she clever enough for university?’

  ‘She says she thinks she’s just clever enough. She says it’d be hell, at university, to be just clever enough, to be hanging on.’

  ‘That’s defeatist.’

  ‘Heinz, it was you who decided that she should have a throne. She has every right to prefer a typewriter.’

  They decided, now that Elizabeth was disillusioned with Walter, that it was time to tell her. She took it calmly, said she was glad she knew, said she wanted to keep in touch with Heinz. The three of them had a meal together, at L’Etoile, a good, affectionate but rather sad meal, and then Heinz took a taxi out of Kate’s life.