by Fay Weldon
“If there’s anything I can do,” Abbie said. The last of the plums had been dropping on to the roof of Alexandra’s car.
“I’m serious about the plum tree,” said Alexandra. “It ought to go. It brings bad luck.”
“But the blossom is so pretty,” said Abbie, “and the Japanese students like to draw it.”
“Even so,” said Alexandra. “Get rid of it.”
Abbie nodded.
“There is something else you can do for me,” said Alexandra, and explained.
Abbie wailed.
“But I can’t, Alexandra. I would if I could, but I don’t have the time. How can I cope with a small child as well as everything else?”
“By buying jam from the shop instead of making it yourself; that kind of thing,” said Alexandra. “By giving up your domestic affectations, because that’s all they are. This is a world of convenience foods and microwaves.”
Abbie whimpered.
“Sascha will be at full-time nursery school,” Alexandra comforted her.
“You’ll have Sundays and Mondays off while I’m home. Only five days a week till the end of the Doll’s House run. Then I’m home full time. Until the next part comes along.”
“But Sascha’s a handful, everyone knows!”
“He’ll remind you of Ned,” said Alexandra.
“Oh don’t, don’t!” There were tears in Abbie’s eyes. “Please!”
“But I won’t tell Arthur that,” said Alexandra. She had lost ten pounds in the last week. Her eyes were larger than usual.
“It’s blackmail,” said Abbie.
“I prefer to call it expiation,” said Alexandra.
“Okay, okay, okay,” said Abbie. “All right, I will.”
On the way home in the car Alexandra felt the familiar state of suspension descending; the landscape passed to either side as in a dream, not quite real. She was being propelled over water with a swift, smooth, silent motion, as clouds in a speeded-up film, towards the silent shore where Ned had disappeared: she was still in the light but the edge of the fog was near. Too near. She pulled into the nearest turnoff. She wanted to stay alive. Well, she supposed that was an advance. She slept a little. Woke. Worst fears, Leah had said. Expiation, she herself had said. Cows were being driven down the road: they were passing the car. It was in their way. They barged into its sides with their gaunt brown hairy flanks; concave where they ought to be convex; their monstrous udders swung from side to side, banged against their legs. Hormone supplements made the udders gigantic, stretched to bursting: they were on their way to be milked. Machines would do it—would offer relief—pull and relax, pull and relax. Heavy breath from black rubber nostrils patched the car windows with moist droplets. Huge red-veined brown eyes stared at her, not unkindly, but with a dreadful resigned and female melancholy. Our troubles are worse than yours.
These days farmers would just run the bull with the herd, not keep him trampling, macho and furious, tethered in the yard. In a field with sixty cows the bull is placid, properly serviced, properly servicing. Sex for all keeps everyone quiet. Perhaps that had been Ned’s notion.
The attacks of non-affect, of suspension, came less frequently and lasted for a shorter time than they had a week ago. Nor was the blocking-out of experience so intense. A boy with a dog followed up behind the herd: his task to drive the cows to the milking sheds, lucky old them. Woollen cap, muddy boots, old shirt, ancient trousers: long greasy hair, a sweet face. She even recognised him: Kevin Crump. She’d done some work five years back with the school drama class. Kevin had been its bright star. A good singing voice; a good stage presence, though always trouble with his lines. Now this. At least he had a job. She wound down the window.
“You okay, Mrs. Ludd?” He was concerned for her.
“Sleepy, that’s all,” she said. “I took a bit of shut-eye. Dangerous to keep driving.”
He nodded. He found an old piece of paper in a pocket, a ballpoint pen. He handed them to her through the window.
“Could I have your autograph?” he asked, tentatively. “Now you’re famous?”
“Sure.” She signed her name: the Biro was on the brink of running out.
Ludd didn’t seem to belong to her any more; it was appropriate that the word came faintly and she had to write over the two d’s to make them legible. A mess. But so were his cows; not that it was his fault. So was she a mess, and it probably was her fault. “Thanks.” He was hugely pleased, and passed on.
Worst fears. The curse of Leah.
Jenny Linden’s importance: Abbie’s unimportance. Alexandra had acknowledged that herself, without thinking. That it wasn’t sex, it was love. That Ned loved Jenny Linden. That at the sudden sound of Jenny Linden’s voice Ned’s soul would lurch. That when she came through a door his heart would lift. She could make him happy just by existing. That Ned would lie to and deceive Alexandra not because it turned him on sexually—that had been Jenny Linden’s interpretation, as she squirmed and wriggled and tried to hurt, and Alexandra had accepted it too easily, as the least hurtful of all options—but simply because Ned wanted to see Jenny, longed to see Jenny, had to see her, hear her, touch her, be with her. Because he hurt so when he was apart from her. That the hurt left when he was with her. That he had taken Alexandra to Jenny Linden’s house only because he couldn’t get rid of Alexandra and he had to see Jenny Linden, be with Jenny Linden, so the hurt would stop. And because in the light of this love she, Alexandra, counted as nothing. That Ned had loved Jenny Linden.
Worst fears.
That in the belief that a woman had to be beautiful, and sensuous, and witty, and wonderful, in order to trigger real love, erotic love, the kind of emotional drama that ran through to the heart of the universe, the hot line to the source of life itself, the in-love kind, Alexandra had been wrong. More, she had shown herself to be vain, and foolish, and shallow, and Ned had noticed. Not that his noticing had anything to do with it. You did not love necessarily where you admired: or cease to love when admiration failed. Love came and went; it was there or it wasn’t. The blessing of the gods, and their curse.
Worst fears.
Jenny had not pursued, Ned had pursued. Ned had broken Dave and Jenny’s marriage; Dave was right. Jenny was a child, easily influenced; Ned’s victim. Ned in love. Now Ned was gone, Jenny was back with Dave.
Worst fears.
Best hopes? There were none. Start by saying Ned had fallen out of love with Jenny Linden: end by saying but that instead of turning back to Alexandra, Ned had invited Abbie into his bed.
Alexandra started the car and drove back to The Cottage. On the way Mr. Lightfoot’s Private Ambulance passed, travelling swiftly in the other direction. No doubt it had Ned’s body in it, with any luck neatly contained in a coffin (oak, current, £480), on the way to town for tomorrow’s funeral and cremation. The coffin would pick up a proper hearse at the other end: black, grand and glossy, but under-powered. A twenty-mile journey by hearse when you were dead made you a source of traffic hold-ups, especially up hills, and was discouraged by the police.
30
THE DAY OF THE funeral dawned bright and clear. Abbie drove Vilna down. They had patched up their quarrel, at Alexandra’s insistence. Vilna wore a smart black suit with self-coloured braiding and a deep, scooped neckline. She wore a crimson gauze scarf to veil her bosom. “It isn’t modesty, darling,” she said. “My tits are getting scraggy, like my neck. They must only show in candlelight. I have had to do without my special beauty treatment for so long. It is tragic.”
“What is your special beauty treatment?” asked Abbie. Arthur was travelling down separately in the School’s mini-bus, dropping two students off at the station on the way. Fond as he was of Vilna, Arthur said, he would find her a difficult companion on the way to a funeral. Her self-preoccupation would be troublesome, when they were meant to be thinking about Ned. So if Abbie didn’t mind? Abbie didn’t mind.
“Semen,” said Vilna. “Semen is the best beauty treatmen
t of all. Essence of male. I have been deprived of it for so long. I am falling to pieces. Wrinkles are appearing. What can I do? My mother spies on me. Clive pays her to, I know he does. It is a very bitter thing; one’s own mother to keep one prisoner.”
It was true, Abbie thought, that lately Vilna had seemed to age. Haggard was beginning to turn into gaunt; smooth olive skin to papery grey. And Maria always pottered about in the background, scarcely letting Vilna out of her sight.
“Only another six months, Vilna,” she said, “and Clive will be home.”
“Supposing he’s forgotten how to do it?” demanded Vilna. “Or has become a homosexual? That happens to men in prison. What then?”
“I expect you could sue,” said Abbie, “for loss of looks.”
Abbie concentrated on her driving. She was wearing Vilna’s navy blue with the hem tacked up. It would do. She could see herself in the driving mirror: shiny, wavy hair; bright eyes; agreeably healthy freckles. She was pleased with what she saw.
“You’re looking good,” said Vilna. “Hadn’t you noticed? Extra special essence of dying man. Very rare.”
Abbie’s hands tightened on the wheel. She always drove carefully, both hands where they should be—10 o’clock and 2 o’clock, and no handover-hand on a sharp turn.
“Only a joke,” said Vilna. “You English have no sense of humour. What can one do but laugh?”
Abbie didn’t reply and they drove to the funeral in silence, broken only by Vilna’s directions as she followed the map drawn and distributed by Hamish; it was not noticeably to scale, in spite of Hamish’s reputation for precision.
“Jenny told me everything,” said Vilna, as they turned into the crematorium gates. “Now she is back with her husband, she is glad that Ned died on you and not on her.”
“Jenny is a hopeless witness,” said Abbie eventually, “about everything.” It was going to be a popular funeral. Most of the parking spaces were already gone, and they were half an hour early.
“She is,” said Vilna, “and of course I shall say so to anyone who asks. I shall say that Jenny is too full of emotion to tell fact from fiction. That’s what I will say. Friendship is important, no? Even in this hopeless land? And we are friends, you and I, are we not?”
Abbie could see that this was going to have to be the case from now on. There could be no cutting Vilna; Vilna would have to be asked to the Hunt Ball—for which she, Abbie, more or less controlled the invitation list. Where she, Abbie, went—to a private view at a morgue, to a Private View at an art show, to a charity performance in the local Stately Home, to lunch at the Priory with the monks—Vilna would have to come along. She would be accepted into society, however local, however boring. That was to be Vilna’s price for secrecy, for helping to deny all to Arthur, just as looking after Sascha was the price Alexandra would charge. Abbie laid her hand on Vilna’s knee. It was not so high or unendurable a price. “We’re friends,” she said. “Of course we are.”
Crowds gathered outside the chapel. Friends, relatives, hangers-on, the invited and the uninvited. The press were there: sudden flashes from unseen cameras; tiny tape recorders in hiding hands. Unobtrusive. “We do not wish to intrude into private grief—but—” Theatre people, publishers, agents; the Preservation of Ancient Rights, Ancient Roads, Ancient Graveyards Committee people, charity people—Ned’s work on the Performing Arts panel: Ibsen people, Norwegian people. A man in his time can play many parts. People whom Ned had savaged in reviews; crocodile tear people. Music people; ancient instrument people. Inland Revenue people, incognito. Antique dealers, junk dealers. Actors of both sexes. All sexes. People from the Central Hospital for Venereal Diseases (Ned had organised a charity show). The chapel filled. There was no room inside for more. The doors were closed once the coffin was in. Loudspeakers were quickly rigged for those outside. The service was broadcast to the air, to the trees, to the circling birds, to other mourners altogether. “For All the Saints,” “Lord of the Dance.” An extract from The Master Builder. Hamish had decided well. Short speeches from friends.
Then “Sailing By” as the coffin slipped in between the parted curtains, into the flaming furnace which by implication waited, but in fact did not. The actual burning of corpses was done in two sessions a week; but of course one body at a time, to keep the ashes separate. So it was claimed. No one, by tradition, believed it. Otherwise the weight of the ashes was too heavy a burden for the bereaved to bear.
“Sailing By”—a liquid, silly tune, played every half-past midnight as the national radio station closed down, and had been since the beginning of radio time. An apology for silence, a sweetly soporific melody to rock you to sleep, to drive out thoughts of revolution, to drown protest with nostalgia. As common as the cinema organ is common: second-rate as any plagiarism must be second-rate, a sound to induce a groan in a musician and a sigh in the sentimental. Alexandra’s choice. Hamish had begged her: at least some intervention, some contribution, please! You were his wife: don’t leave all this to me, his brother. There was some consternation amongst the guests, a giggle or two, nervous: but the tune had its merits, the association soothed. Cremations were always like this. They lacked the solemnity of a graveside burial. There was always something tacky, mass-market, about them. But it was a good funeral, everyone agreed. And a memorial service still to come. Alexandra? Where was Alexandra? The press wanted to know. “Over there,” her friends said, pointing. “Over there.” But she wasn’t.
Jenny Linden was there, dressed in scarlet (as Leah advised), weeping and wailing, copiously, next to the aisle in the front pew. Leah was there, dressed in pure white; a thinner version of Jenny. Dave Linden was present; his wife had insisted. But he stayed outside the chapel.
Abbie was there, and Vilna, and Arthur. Dr. Moebius was there, and of course Hamish. Daisy Longriff was there, crying softly and leaning on colleagues from the theatre. Dressed in black from tip to toe; stretch fabric over her beautiful bosom, vinyl elsewhere. The press took many photographs. Daisy posed all over the place; before, after and even during the ceremony.
The postman was there. He was wearing Ned’s shoes, beautifully polished.
So was Mr. Quatrop there, and Mr. and Mrs. Paddle from the stationer’s shop.
Chrissie was there, and Hamish embraced her.
Those who knew this or that glanced at one another, raised an eyebrow, or looked carefully away, and were pleased enough that Alexandra wasn’t there: the whole event was embarrassing enough without the burden of her presence.
Irene wasn’t there. Theresa wasn’t there.
All kinds of others weren’t there. The world went on. Alexandra, concerned with its continued turning, was in London seeing the Casting Director about the possibility of playing opposite Michael Douglas in his new film. He offered her the part, but she felt she had to decline. She couldn’t take her child to Hollywood, not at such a juncture in his life. Her home and her life were here in England. But it was nice to be asked.
On the evening of the day after Alexandra missed Ned’s funeral, she went to see Daisy Longriff in A Doll’s House. She needed diversion. And she wanted her part back.
She supposed that Ned still maintained a corporeal presence on this earth. His body now lay on some other slab or trolley, still waiting for the furnace. The open season for viewing was over; that was all that had changed. No one would bother to keep the beret on over his split skull. Should his eyes fly open, no one would cover them. Appearances need no longer be preserved. With every day that passed he would, she felt, mind less. Nor would she know when the body was consumed by fire and turned to ashes. It scarcely mattered. Ned had left it long ago, in any case, was still trudging up the mountainside, through the grim forest. She suspected that without her blessing he would trudge forever. Serve him right for not looking back.
Alexandra arrived at the theatre at seven o’clock. Performances started at eight, instead of 7:45. Alexandra had missed only eight performances. In her absence management had been
busy. There was someone new at the Box Office—a bad-tempered, middle-aged woman with a fleshy face and permed hair—who made her pay for her ticket, saying, “Alexandra who?” and flicking through envelopes in order to be able to say in triumph, “Nothing here,” deaf to Alexandra’s protests that there wouldn’t be anyway. It was true that Alexandra had arrived at the theatre without warning, but she took the unpleasantness as a bad omen. She had planned another four weeks’ absence, which would give herself and Sascha time to settle to a life without Ned. But if you could be so forgotten in eight days, forcibly retired to the country as a “serious” actor—in other words worthy, dull and about to be given an OBE—what could not happen in four weeks?
There were already new red stickers plastered over the original tasteful stickers, which had been, all agreed, unspeakably dreary in classic greys, blacks and duns. “Daisy Longriff now as Nora,” and fresh quotes from critics, “Daisy Longriff’s Tarantella—the sexiest lead in town” now hid “Alexandra Ludd’s Nora—a searing performance” and “A Nora to remember, moving and powerful.”
Alexandra went back to the Box Office and asked what the advance bookings were like, but the woman with the permed hair did not seem to hear. I don’t exist, thought Alexandra. Ned has taken me with him. Propelled on his penis, flying through the air, both of us dissolved into nothingness. It was strange that his prick seemed the only substantial thing of either of them which remained: that piece of flesh and muscle, that original source of warmth, still had enough power to transport her. Another pun, she thought, and fainted.
Sam the front-of-house manager helped her up and took her to his office. He had straight yellow hair and round glasses: he was a dead ringer for David Hockney.
“Oh,” said the woman from the Box Office. “Alexandra Ludd. Why didn’t you say?”
Sam seemed put out that Alexandra had not been to Ned’s funeral. He was sure she would regret it.
