Moonshine

by Clayton, Victoria

  ‘Strike me purple and knock me down with an express train,’ said Fleur. (This was one of Billy’s favourite expressions.) ‘I don’t ever remember you agreeing with anyone before. You always say that unanimity makes for dull conversation.’

  ‘On this occasion I reserve the right to contradict myself. Must you do that?’

  Fleur was tossing scraps from our plates to Lancelot, her red setter, who was leaping to catch them, knocking against the table and making the knifes and forks rattle. She stopped at once.

  ‘I like agreement,’ said Dickie. ‘It’s pleasant and restful. I hate quarrelling.’

  ‘Not agreeing with someone isn’t the same as quarrelling.’ Burgo leaned across the table to pour me a glass of red wine to accompany the camembert. ‘Discussion – or argument if you like – is the proper way to get to the truth.’

  ‘I don’t know that I care about truth as much as all that.’ Dickie cut himself a piece of camembert. ‘I’d rather be comfortable and jolly any day. What do you say, Bobbie?’

  I had the sensation – probably due to the heat and the wine and the pleasure of being in the garden – of having reached some plateau of happiness and the idea that if I remained exactly as I was and made no conscious mental effort in any direction I should be able to retain this for a while longer.

  ‘I want … I want everything. Truth, beauty, comfort, jollity – I don’t want to have to choose between things.’

  ‘I agree.’ Burgo took a fig and quartered it, exposing crimson flesh, crammed with pips. ‘It’s too perfect an evening to be serious about anything.’

  Fleur began to laugh, though at what she would not say.

  ‘I see now,’ said Kit. ‘It was the Garden of Eden. Ripeness and plenitude. Beauty and deceit. Fleur and Billy munching happily away at the fruits of the tree of knowledge without retribution. And slowly, steadily, resolutely the serpent was gliding towards you.’

  ‘That makes it sound as though I couldn’t help myself. I’m afraid that isn’t true.’

  ‘Well. We shall see. Go on.’

  ‘I think I’ll turn in.’ Dickie groped for his stick and stood up. ‘You’ll forgive me, Bobbie, if I leave Burgo to do the honours. I was up at six watering the strawberries. Beddows always forgets.’

  Moths dithered around the candles, repeatedly flopping down to the table as though scorched to death, only to revive minutes later to dash back into the flames. My head was spinning with the combination of wine and the scent of flowers and grass, intensified by night.

  ‘I’ll go home now,’ I said as Dickie bent to kiss me. ‘Thank you for a wonderful evening.’

  ‘You can’t go,’ Fleur said to me. ‘We’re so happy. You’ll spoil everything if you leave now. Remember that poem about the strawberries you used to tell me when I was little?’ Fleur offered her cheek to Dickie but looked at Burgo. ‘Something about a wood. Do say it again.’

  ‘If I can remember it.

  ‘The man in the wilderness asked of me,

  How many strawberries grow in the sea?

  I answered him as I thought good,

  As many red herrings as grow in the wood.’

  ‘What a relief!’ said Fleur. ‘It isn’t meant to make sense. As a child I thought I must be stupid because I didn’t understand it. There are some advantages to being grown up. I used to feel confused, like watching a film or a play in a foreign language. Now, though I don’t often feel the same, I’ve some idea what the plot’s supposed to be.’

  ‘Ah, but then something extraordinary happens that turns logic on its head and again you’re floundering.’ Burgo’s face was hidden in shadow. ‘You think you know where you’re going, what you want, what other people want of you. But then you read something, or see something, or meet someone who startles you out of your preconceptions and you’re left bewildered.’

  I got up. ‘I really think I will go home.’

  ‘We’ll walk back to the house with you.’ Burgo stood and began to put coffee cups and brandy glasses on to a tray.

  Fleur put her hand on his sleeve. ‘But you haven’t seen inside the China House yet. He must, mustn’t he, Bobbie?’ She took a candlestick and went across the grass to the little pavilion. ‘Look at the bells hanging from the roof.’ Fleur tapped one so that it rang with a sweet shivering chime. ‘Bobbie did drawings of them and Dickie got the blacksmith to make them. But come inside. That’s the best bit, though it isn’t finished yet.’ She tried to open the door. ‘Help me, will you? It still sticks a bit.’

  Burgo applied pressure and opened it.

  ‘See!’ Fleur held the candlestick up high. ‘There’s the Chinese daybed. Bobbie designed it. Don’t you love its little curly roof like an hysterical four-poster? It isn’t finished yet. It’s to have silk curtains and cushions embroidered with dragons. Someone Bobbie knows in London’s making them. It’s costing a fortune but Dickie’s adoring doing it—’

  ‘’Scuse me for butting in.’ Billy’s head and shoulders appeared round the door. ‘Evening, all.’ He nodded at me. ‘Sorry to bother you, Mrs Sudborough, but Stargazer’s leg is troubling him, like, and I was wondering if a bran poultice might do the trick.’

  ‘I’ll come at once.’ Fleur was at the door in an instant. ‘Bye, Bobbie.’ She kissed me briefly. ‘Burgo’ll see you off. I’ll ring.’

  We were alone.

  ‘We’ve had a lot of fun,’ I said. ‘Isn’t the lantern a success?’ I pointed to the wood and glass lamp in the shape of a pineapple. ‘It’s charming, isn’t it?’

  ‘Oh yes.’ Burgo ignored the lantern.

  ‘Don’t you think Fleur’s looking well?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m so grateful to you for introducing me to them. I’m feeling enormously cheered up.’

  ‘Good.’ I thought I saw a suspicion of a smile.

  ‘It must have been marvellous in Provence. I haven’t been for ages. I once spent a month in a villa near St Rémy. We were students so we could barely afford to eat.’

  ‘Really.’

  ‘We had fish soup every day at a little café. I can still remember the taste of the rouille – you know, the hot peppery sauce that goes with it.’

  ‘I know what rouille is.’

  ‘Of course.’ I felt a complete fool. A silence fell which I felt I must break at the cost of making more of an idiot of myself. ‘Your wife must have been so pleased to have you to herself for a while.’

  ‘We had people staying all the time.’

  ‘Oh. Oh, how sad.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Well … because … I mean, you must miss each other and … and you know that saying about absence – La Rochefoucauld, wasn’t it?’ I laughed unnaturally. ‘It usually is.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Oh, something about absence extinguishing little passions and increasing great ones, like the wind that blows out a candle but blows up a fire.’ Another pause. ‘So obviously, in your case, absence must be a good thing …’ What on earth was I doing, talking about his marriage? It was an extraordinary impertinence.

  ‘A good thing for us to live apart?’

  ‘Yes … no … I don’t know.’

  I stared at him in hopeless confusion. He did nothing to help me. If he’d made the least attempt to flirt I could have made it quite clear that there was no possibility of anything between us. As it was, he was entirely cool and collected while I stammered and stuttered like a schoolgirl.

  After a pause, Burgo said with a solemnity that might have concealed annoyance, or possibly amusement, ‘It’s kind of you to be concerned.’

  ‘It’s late. I’d better go home.’

  ‘I’ll see you to your car.’

  ‘Don’t bother, really. It’d be a bore for you. I can manage. Goodnight.’

  In a moment I was through the door and the gap in the hedge and running along the path that led back to the house. Tricked by fitful beams of moonlight, I stumbled into flowerbeds, twisting my ankles and sc
ratching myself on thorns and twigs. When I arrived, panting, within the area that was lit by the lamps each side of the garden door, I wondered what on earth I was doing, behaving like a child frightened by my own imagination. I walked round to the Wolseley, feeling indescribably foolish, and drove back to Cutham, thoroughly out of humour with myself.

  The silent house welcomed me into its chill embrace with an exudation of floor-polish and damp. By the light of the dim bulb in the hall I saw there was a message by the telephone in Oliver’s hand.

  Jasmine rang. She says to call her the minute you get in no matter how late as she won’t be able to sleep a wink until she has spoken to you. Is she as pretty as she is crazy?

  TWELVE

  ‘You mean he had you for a second time all to himself in that seductive little Chinese grot and he didn’t make love to you? Or at least attempt it? Can he be flesh and blood?’

  ‘Not every married man behaves like a fourth-former let out of school the minute he’s alone with a girl not his wife.’

  ‘That’s just what you’d like to believe, my dear Bobbie. And now he’s one of the powers in the land. It bodes ill for the country, that’s all I can say.’

  The telephone rang for a long time and I began to feel worried. Eventually someone lifted the receiver and I heard the sound of snuffling and rustling.

  ‘Jasmine? Is that you? It’s Bobbie.’

  Several yawns and groans. ‘What … Who … Oh, hello, darling. I was asleep …’

  ‘I’m sorry. The message said to ring you at once. I’ll telephone you in the morning.’

  More yawning and sighing. ‘No. Don’t ring off. I’m dying to talk to you. Just let me gather my wits …’ A long pause.

  ‘Jazz? Are you still there?’

  ‘Sorry. I’m awake now. You know how hopeless I am first thing in the morning.’

  ‘Actually it’s last thing at night. It’s just after twelve.’

  ‘No, really? Well, anyway, what the hell, it’s all the same to me now. Teddy’s left me!’ She began to cry. I had a vision of tears shining in her coal-black eyes and spilling down her golden cheeks.

  ‘Oh dear! Poor Jazz! I’m so sorry. You must feel wretched!’

  ‘I’m going to kill myself. I just thought I’d say goodbye as you are my very best friend in all the world.’

  ‘Thank you, but for God’s sake don’t do anything rash. Teddy isn’t worth it. I understand how you feel but, believe me, this despair will pass.’

  ‘You don’t understand! You’ve never been agonizingly, sickmakingly in love with anyone ever, have you? You were a tiny bit fond of David and perhaps that Russian, whatever his name was, for a week or two, and that man with the Daimler Dart who had that collection of dreary old books.’

  ‘Incunabula.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘That’s what you call books that are pre fifteen hundred … Oh, never mind. I expect you’re right. I’ve never been properly in love and I don’t know what you’re going through. But, dear Jazz, Teddy’s made you so miserable so often. There are other men in the world. Nicer, more intelligent, more amusing men who aren’t married. Better-looking men.’

  ‘Teddy’s the only man I’ll ever love. No one else interests me in the slightest. I can’t live without him. He only has to touch me and I feel faint with desire.’

  I saw in my imagination Teddy’s porcine eyes in which there was always a leer, heard his self-satisfied laugh, remembered his damp hands that found excuses to clutch at any girl young enough to be his daughter. The paunch and the shining scalp were perhaps just a question of taste.

  ‘You think that now, but if you could only get through the first few miserable days you’d begin to see that he wasn’t so perfect. Don’t you think it’s rather mean of him to treat the two women he’s supposed to love, you and his wife, so badly and make you both so unhappy?’

  ‘Lydia isn’t unhappy a bit! She still doesn’t know about me.’

  ‘Hang on, I thought you’d insisted that he tell her. You said how much better you felt now the affair was out in the open.’

  ‘Apparently he only said he’d told her to please me. He couldn’t face telling her. That’s why he’s left me. Because he’s afraid she won’t let him see the children ever again. That’s the sort of woman she is! She’s bullied my poor darling Teddy, playing on his paternal feelings until he’d rather stay in a loveless, sexless marriage than desert his children. He’s got such a strong sense of duty. It’s one of the things I love about him.’

  ‘Either that or he’s a lying, two-timing bastard.’

  This provoked such a wail of misery that I repented at once.

  ‘It’s a difficult situation for everyone,’ I temporized. ‘But remember that you’re a beautiful, kind, funny, delightful girl whom any man would be lucky to have. They’ll be falling over themselves to take you out once they know Teddy’s off the scene and you won’t have time to mourn the end of that particular affair.’

  ‘What do you mean, funny?’

  ‘Well, entertaining. You know, good to be with.’

  ‘You mean I’m not brainy like you and Sarah.’

  ‘No, not at all … I didn’t …’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry. I know it’s true. Sarah said her little brother’s stick insect is more intelligent than I am.’ Sarah could be extremely forthright. ‘She says Teddy has the charisma of a senile skunk.’ She wept again.

  ‘Don’t cry, Jazzy. Go back to bed and get some sleep. I’ll ring you tomorrow to see how you are.’

  ‘I shan’t sleep a wink. Everything here reminds me of him.’ I could not imagine why since Teddy rarely spent an evening at Paradise Row. I think he was conscious of Sarah’s and my dislike of him. ‘Bobbie darling, would your parents mind if I came to stay with you? I long to get away.’

  ‘Oh. Well … it’s a bit awkward with my mother being ill … and it’s so horrible here I think it would only depress you even more. It depresses me.’

  ‘You don’t want me. Nobody wants me! I’m going to be alone for the rest of my life! I’m too boring and ugly and stupid …’ The rest was drowned by sobs.

  ‘All right, Jazzy, if you think it will make you feel better, of course you can come. I’d love to see you. But you mustn’t mind if my father’s bad-tempered. He’s like that with everyone.’

  ‘Of course I shan’t mind. My father’s not exactly a thrill on wheels. How many evening dresses should I bring, do you think? And do you have a pool? I’ve just bought the prettiest bikini …’

  Before hanging up I advised her about sensible shoes, jerseys and mackintoshes and assured her that we would not be attending Cowes Week. In fact, I reflected as I climbed exhausted into bed, she would need nothing but jeans. The only social life I had enjoyed while living with my parents had been suspended, temporarily or permanently. I could not go to Ladyfield while there was any danger of meeting Burgo there. Jasmine’s telephone call had been a timely reminder, if I had needed one, of the inadvisability of having anything to do with a married man. The greatest excitement I could offer Jasmine was a Viennese split at the Bib ’n’ Tucker in Cutham High Street.

  I thought a lot about Jazzy the following morning as I dawdled through the trivial round, the common task. Or was it the common round and trivial task? Anyway, I made soup and chicken liver pâté, scrubbed out the larder as Mrs Treadgold’s back was playing her up again and she had a mysterious pain in her knees, and took out the rubbish, including a sackful of rejected paragraphs from the great work, Sunlight and Cucumbers. As I was returning from the dark little yard that housed the bins and coal I heard the telephone ring. It was Dickie.

  ‘Bobbie, you’ve got to help me. If ever a man needed a friend it’s now.’ I could tell from his tone that the crisis was not of the life-and-death kind so I told him to hang on while I cradled the receiver under my chin and attempted to bandage with my handkerchief a finger dripping with blood. I had cut it on some broken glass in the dustbin.

  ‘I wi
ll if I can,’ I said cautiously when the flow had been stemmed.

  ‘It’s the Ladyfield Lawn Tennis Club’s annual doubles thrash this afternoon. This year they’re playing the Tideswell Parva team. It’s a grim occasion but they’ve always had it here and I can’t let them down. We’ve got a hard court and a grass court, you see, so what with the two courts at the village school just down the road and a grass court at the Rectory next door they can get through the whole tournament in one afternoon. I’d like to get rid of them both, really – the courts, that is – since neither Fleur nor I play. Ugly things with all that wire netting. If you’ve got children of course … Anyway, there’s a certain obligation if you’ve got the only house of any size in the area to host these things. I’m sure you have the same problem.’

  ‘Actually, when the vicar last asked us to have the fête my father said it was too much wear and tear on the grass. Luckily the vicar’s never seen our balding, moss-ridden lawn. And the tennis court’s got a forest of elders growing through the tarmac.’

  ‘Really?’ Good husbandry was second nature to Dickie and I could tell he was rather shocked. ‘Well, the only thing that might operate in my favour is a spell of heavy rain but a cloudless day is forecast. Before the final match everyone converges on the top lawn for wine-cup and what’s rather unattractively called a finger buffet. I feel obliged to join in as much as I can, which means consuming huge amounts of sausage rolls and clapping like billy-o. Fleur always sneaks off and I don’t blame her. But I feel that for both of us to duck out would look … well, snobbish, I suppose.’

  ‘You want me to make a cake?’

  ‘Heavens, no. There are ladies aplenty to provide scones and sausage rolls and whatnot.’

  ‘You want me to come and be nice to people and hand the scones round?’

  ‘Rather more than that, I’m afraid. The Ladyfield team is one short. I was wondering if you’d be angelic and stand in for the fellow who’s most inconsiderately having a wisdom tooth out.’