by Weldon, Fay
And as to Hilda’s madness, it at least enabled her, in whatever form it had happened to take – rats, or stars or anti-static – to function as a man might do, to earn the respect of her peers and get to the opera of an evening. And I do not believe, had she been a man, that her lack of rationality would have been so easily interpreted as madness, paranoia. If it was madness, it served her very well, as obsessional interests – company, religion, country, politics – serve men well, to relieve them of the more exacting chores of family and domestic relationships.
Do you know, I am beginning to feel better.
20
Letters from Willy pursued Praxis for a time – accusing, pleading, threatening, reasoning; but the truth was alas evident – he did not really want her back so much as he was reluctant to commit himself to marrying Carla. Praxis feared that his determination to have Mary rose from his belief that so long as he had her his tenure of the house was secure.
But Mary wanted to go back.
‘Even if I don’t?’ asked Praxis, hurt.
‘You could always come and visit me,’ offered Mary, kindly, and Colleen remarked on what a well balanced and secure child Mary was. Michael, as sometimes happened, had been taken into hospital with a particularly severe attack of asthma and Colleen now welcomed Praxis’ presence: apart from anything else she was so pregnant as not to wish to be left alone. There was no telephone in the house, and the neighbours were out at work all day, and unhelpful by night. Michael’s job was in jeopardy, too, and Colleen tended to ‘brood’, as she put it, if left alone.
‘I have my seven-plus reading test next week,’ said Mary, ‘I can’t miss that.’
‘You know how well you can read,’ said Praxis. ‘Does it matter what other people think of you?’
‘Yes,’ replied Mary. She was an orderly child with an untroubled gaze and a sternly practical nature. Sometimes Mary would confound her by hugging her and assuring her that she loved her, with a straightforwardness of which Praxis herself was scarcely capable. Mary meant to be a doctor: she had been determined on it since she was five years old. When Mary was six she asked Willy if she could have a microscope for Christmas. Willy had provided one, albeit second-hand. Mary took more of an interest in his work than did Praxis, and he appreciated it and was happy to show his appreciation. To all practical purposes, Willy and Mary were father and daughter: he a rather clinical and remote father, if concerned and interested; she a dutiful child, and likewise. They seldom touched each other: for some reason Praxis felt nervous when they did. Mary knew something of the circumstances of her birth, and would proudly point to the rubbled bomb site on the esplanade – later to house a ten-storey office block, but in her childhood still uncleared – say to her friends ‘that’s where I was born’. Her father, Praxis let it be vaguely known, had been an American serviceman briefly married to her mother before being killed in action, and Mary was shrewd enough – as perceptive children can be – not to pursue this particular story in detail. She had a sense of destiny.
‘I wonder what I was saved for!’ she’d ask.
Mary went back to live with Willy, and took her seven-plus reading test, in which of course she excelled. Willy married Carla. Carla looked after Mary, 109 Holden Road, Willy, her job in the canteen, and visited Lucy on Sundays. When Praxis stopped crying, she felt quite sorry for Carla.
In the meantime Colleen had her baby. It happened, as is the manner of these things, on the same day that Michael, still in hospital, lost his job. He had been too often absent, and too long-faced when present, for comfort. A letter came through the post as Colleen set off for hospital. She had a daughter, with a good deal of reddish curly hair and a stoical face, who reminded Praxis of Colleen when young, a player of hockey, and a weeper merely by night, and not by day and night, as she now was. Colleen’s mother came to visit her in hospital and lamented the past, and never once made a helpful contribution to the present, let alone the future. Colleen’s father brought an arrangement of flowers by his mistress: wired winter bulbs stuck in green foam moss. Praxis got a job filing in an office, and stayed on in Michael and Colleen’s flat, to look after Michael while Colleen was in hospital, for Michael was discharged in the afternoon of the same day in which Colleen was admitted.
Michael and Praxis behaved towards each other with careful, self-conscious, and distant civility – those being the days when members of the opposite sex, if left alone together, were expected instantly to fornicate. Both lay awake at night, on different sides of the wall, envisaging the comfort and possibilities of sexual congress with the other, but both, happily, were loyal to Colleen.
Michael went to Australia House and investigated the possibilities of emigrating, and within the month, he, Colleen and the baby were gone, leaving Praxis with a five year lease on the flat, some furniture it would cost more to move than to replace, a single cold water tap, and her future before her.
On the first Sunday in every month Praxis went to Brighton, to visit Mary, and was made barely welcome by Willy, and rather more welcome by Carla. Praxis would help Carla with the Sunday lunch and chat to Mary. At twelve Willy would emerge from his study – for so he and Carla now referred to it – look at his watch and say – ‘Well, you’ll be down to the Raffles now, I suppose,’ and Praxis would grit her teeth and smile and say nothing. ‘Don’t you miss it?’ he’d ask presently, and Praxis still would say nothing; but there was a look of wounded desperation in his eyes which made her all but forgive him for his disgraceful behaviour. She had, after all, betrayed him sexually, and most dreadfully; it turned out that one of her more distasteful occasional clients had been a junior of Willy’s at work.
Once, when Carla was out getting coal for the Aga, Willy tried to force her back against the wall, in the corridor, against the door of the old darkroom under the stairs, and though part of her did, insanely enough, miss the rapid coupling which had been part of her life for so long she pushed him away, for Carla’s sake.
‘I still love you,’ he said, insistently. ‘I still want you.’
‘You should bring the coal in, not leave it to Carla.’
‘It’s all she’s fit for,’ he said, bitterly. ‘You should never have left.’
‘Then make me more welcome when I come here.’
‘Why should I? You’re a tart and a whore. You’re mad, like your mother and sister.’
But he could not hurt any more. When she cried it was because the past had changed and the present had failed her; and she had no hope of the future, not for the loss or love of Willy. Rather, she enjoyed the power she had over him. He had become the one person towards whom she could be liberally unpleasant, without risking the loss of his love.
She had been wrong about Phillip and Willy. It was Phillip who loved what he had, however disagreeable it tasted: it was Willy who loved what was out of reach. Carla, she was gratified to see, was these days dressed in matted brown.
In the afternoon of those once-a-month Sundays she would visit her mother.
‘Are you the same one as comes the other days?’ asked her mother, slightly puzzled. ‘She looks smaller than you, or perhaps you’ve grown.’ When Praxis murmured an unintelligible answer she seemed satisfied enough.
‘See,’ the sister said, proudly, ‘how much better she is. I really think one of these days you’ll be able to take her home.’
Sister had short straight dark hair, an almost mannish face, and a scar running round her chin. Flying glass, from the look of it. On one of her visits Praxis raised the question with her mother of selling Holden Road, more in speculation than anything else, but Lucy’s vague eyes instantly focused, with a distressing intensity, and she shook her head violently from side to side and trembled all over her body, so that Praxis had to call sister who sedated and soothed her patient kindly.
‘What did you say to her?’ sister asked, crossly, when it was done. She had been called from tea to deal with the situation.
‘But that’s her home,’ said sist
er. ‘You can’t sell her home, over her head. It’s all she has.’
‘After all the struggle she had,’ said sister. ‘Two little girls and no support, and those dreadful solicitors!’
Sister seemed to know as much about it as anyone.
‘We have little chats, you know,’ said sister. ‘Before bedtime medication, when the morning doses have all but worn off, your mother can be quite talkative.’
‘We have so many deserted wives in here,’ said sister, ‘it’s surprising. Or wives committed by their husbands. It quite puts you off marriage.’ She laughed gaily.
The world pities you, thought Praxis, for a spinster, and so you pity yourself. All you’re fit for, they think, and you think, is to look after others. Since you have no helpless children of your own, you must look after helpless adults. A good woman, they say, pityingly: what a tragedy about the scar. I am a good woman, you persuade yourself, through your grave, lonely nights preferring to be safe than sorry.
I would rather be sorry a hundred times, thought Praxis than safe.
Well, I am, aren’t I? Very sorry and not at all safe.
‘It’s better for your mother not to have visitors at all,’ said sister sharply, ‘than visitors that upset her. I never have this trouble with the other girl who comes. Is she a relative too?’
‘Carla? She’s a relative, of a kind.’
‘That’s the trouble, these days,’ said sister. ‘There’s a great deal of vagueness in family relationships, and far too much loose living.’
She spoke in general terms, but with too knowing and rebuking a look for Praxis’ comfort. Perhaps she had a brother who frequented the Raffles? Praxis left before visiting hour was over: her mother kissed her on both her cheeks, which was unusual, and brought sudden tears to Praxis’ eyes.
‘Don’t fret,’ said her mother, astonishingly. ‘You’ll be all right.’
As she left the hospital grounds, Praxis felt her face set into an expression which was recognisably Hilda’s, and had to carefully arrange its lineaments. To suspect her mother of being perfectly sane, if very cunning, was in itself madness. Sane people did not prefer mental asylums and sedation to the real world.
Praxis went to visit Elaine; she was behind the counter arranging jars of barley sugar and mint humbugs.
‘Why did you go off like that, so suddenly?’ enquired Elaine. ‘All the fun went out of it. I hardly ever go down to the Raffles any more. Derek got in another girl but she wasn’t a nice type at all. And I got beaten up by some madman and ended up in Brighton General with my ear half bitten off. But it’s an ill wind. I’m going steady with one of the young doctors there. I must say,’ she added, speculatively, ‘it did all teach you a thing or two. Of the kind you wouldn’t read in books.’
Praxis supposed that it had. She had not learned the arts of seduction: that required the projection of an erotic fantasy; the suggested offering of something beyond the power of any human being to offer to another: but she had learned the techniques of arousal, and culmination, and re-arousal. For what it was worth.
‘Well,’ she said vaguely, ‘you live and learn.’ She remembered Elaine as a little girl, her braid of embossed bars almost as long as Hilda’s, and here she was, arranging sweets, back where she started.
‘I hope it works out with the doctor,’ she said.
‘That elderly man with the soft voice was back looking for you,’ said Elaine. ‘I told him you’d gone up to London suddenly and he seemed quite put out.’
‘Did he go back with you?’
‘No. I offered but he didn’t seem to want to. I was sorry. He was rather nice. A real gentleman, for a change. Was he a Jew? He had that kind of nose.’
‘A descendant of King David,’ said Praxis, ‘I seem to remember.’
‘They all have to be something. I wouldn’t mind being Jewish. You could go to Israel and fight Arabs and really start something. Build a new country.’
‘New countries are in your mind,’ said Praxis.
‘They have to be, if you’re a woman,’ said Elaine. ‘Personally, I’d rather carry a gun,’ and she went on arranging a tray of penny sweets for the children – bubble-gum, raspberry chews, all-day suckers – an ordinary-looking young woman with a plaster on her ear and a shop to run.
‘Now you have really left Willy and done the sensible thing about Mary,’ said Irma, who was quite helpful now her spare room was not in danger, and Praxis had stopped showing signs of tears, ‘we must start doing something with you.’
She took Praxis to the hairdresser and had her hair cut short and dyed blonde, at considerable expense to Praxis; and sold her, at half-price, which Praxis suspected was a great deal more than it was worth, a collection of clothes Irma no longer needed, mostly in bright reds, yellows and green. Praxis stared at herself in Irma’s mirror. She looked rather like a doll: blank and characterless, if pretty. She had a memory of herself on a beach, as a small child, and of a photograph; but the memory closed in – it was painful. She did not pursue it.
‘It’s all a matter of presentation,’ said Irma.
Phillip came home from work and framed Praxis between the square of his two hands.
‘Portrait of a transformation,’ he said.
‘I’m not sure about it,’ said Praxis.
‘Neither am I,’ said Phillip, ‘but if that’s what Irma wants, that’s what Irma has.’
Irma sighed loudly and left the room. It seemed to Praxis that whenever Phillip walked into a room Irma walked out of it. Phillip had lost his boyish look. Praxis found him slightly formidable. He still smiled sweetly but his smile now hid something, and she did not know what it was. Irma seemed perpetually angry with him, that much she knew: but Phillip seemed not to notice it. Praxis could see that this in itself was singular unkindness. She began to feel easier in his presence, perceiving that Irma was more his victim than he hers.
Praxis applied for a job in a Research Department of the BBC and failed to get it, in as much as she had no qualifications. She was however offered a job on the reception desk because she was blonde, pretty, sensible and had an easy manner – a combination of qualities rarely found, or so the Appointment Board said, in the same woman.
She quite enjoyed it. She sat on a stool at a high desk which somebody else dusted and polished. Cups of coffee appeared at regular intervals, and she did not even have to wash the cup. She had nothing to do but make, all day, a series of minor decisions, which gave her no difficulty, but seemed to exhaust and agitate the two other girls who sat alongside her. Ring this person, ring that one, keep this one waiting, let another one through: ignore the bombastic, who were usually unimportant: succour the modest and retiring who frequently were not: apologise, empathise, organise. Compared to dealing with 109 Holden Road, Willy, Mary and the Raffles Esplanade Dive, it was nothing. Her fingernails grew long: she painted them: had her dark hair roots seen to frequently, and was made Reception Desk Supervisor.
Well, thought Praxis, it isn’t what I meant, but it isn’t bad. She went to parties, unescorted, and slept with the occasional guest, or even host, but it came to nothing.
‘Of course it comes to nothing,’ said Irma, irritably, ‘you shouldn’t lead them on.’
‘I can’t be bothered,’ said Praxis. ‘I am way, way beyond cuddling on doorsteps.’
‘I don’t know where it will all end,’ said Irma, ‘I’m sure. Do be careful of VD.’
Phillip was promoted: one of the elderly twins died of bronchitis and pneumonia – the roof was leaking; Irma either refused to have it mended, or Phillip forgot, Praxis could not be sure which, and Irma certainly claimed the former – and the other twin, Irma hoped, could not long survive. Already he was pining. Then she would be able to have the attic floor converted to a proper nursery wing, and see even less of the two children, by name Victoria and Jason. Or so she said.
Now that Praxis had tales to tell of the great and famous, and ate her sandwiches and drank her shandy in the BBC bar, Irma occa
sionally asked her to dinner, to sit opposite a spare man.
‘You have to be especially nice to this one,’ said Irma, on the telephone to the reception desk. ‘He’s the product manager on a new soup mix and it’s going to be a big account for Phillip. Wear a low dress, for heaven’s sake.’
‘What do you mean by especially nice?’
‘You know,’ said Irma. ‘He’s down here in London all by himself, and not even married. I wish I didn’t have to live like this; it’s all so sordid. I wish Phillip was Nobel Prize material, and not commercial. As it is, I have to do the best I can.’
‘You don’t, you know,’ said Praxis. ‘He’s only in advertising to keep you in nannies. And it can’t help to have you despising him every step of the way.’
‘You wait till you’re married,’ said Irma, and rang off.
She dialled through again, almost immediately, to Praxis’ great inconvenience.
‘Except I don’t think anyone ever is going to marry you. You’re much too sharp.’
‘Irma, I have to go. The Director General is in Reception and his taxi hasn’t turned up.’
‘Now I’m married,’ said Irma, ‘I can be as sharp as I like. It’s lovely. I speak the truth; you can’t think what a treat it is. But you can’t afford to.’
‘Irma, I’m working.’
‘What a treat!’ said Irma, ‘I wish I was.’ And rang off.
Within three months Praxis was married and within four she was pregnant. Married to and pregnant by (there’s posh for you, cried Irma, one and the same man and all!) the product manager of the soup mix form, for whom she had worn, on Irma’s instructions, a low-cut dress. His name was Ivor, he was the only son of a county surveyor in the Midlands, had been to grammar school and business school, and was at the age of thirty on the middle rungs of a company ladder, doing well and pleased with himself. He was handsome; his hair short and dark, his brown eyes wide and bright, his mouth shrewd, wide and narrow, and his teeth very regular and very white. He was broad-shouldered, narrow hipped and well-suited. His shirt was very white, his tie conventionally and carefully knotted, his shoes polished, and his voice quiet and confident. One day, he knew, he would be Chairman of the Board. He found Phillip and Irma, as he confided to Praxis, bohemian and exciting. He had been pleased by their invitation to dinner. He wore his boldest tie for the occasion. He was nervous of Praxis’ cleavage, and kept his eyes firmly on her face for most of the meal. She would see his eyes drift downwards and then jerk upwards again, as if horrified at their own behaviour. He talked to her about capital costs, investment and the wage-price spiral, and seemed astonished when she understood what he was talking about. He told her about marketing policy, of what happened when a new food product was launched: how the product – in his case a noodle soup – would at first contain quality ingredients, while the market established itself: how then the cost – in other words the quality – of the ingredients would be reduced until minimum costs and maximum sales met on the graph he kept in his office.
