by David Nobbs
Charlotte met his gaze, defiantly.
‘Well, that’s it. That’s it. That’s your precious little daughter.’
All the care Helen and I took within thirty miles of the house, within thirty miles of Guildford, within thirty miles of all the places that might trap us, and we got caught out in bloody Porthcawl.
James looked round. The last mourners were drifting away, and the last mourners for the next funeral were drifting in. Soon they would be alone, in the sunshine.
‘I ought to go,’ he said. ‘I have a houseful of mourners to contend with. My fucking friends, Charlotte, and their fucking friends. Oh, God, I don’t want to go. I don’t want to leave you now I’ve found you. I won’t go. Let’s go and have a drink. Who cares about them? I’m one cool dude, after all.’
He met Chuck’s eyes and they almost shared a smile.
‘You gotta go,’ said Chuck. ‘We’ll see you again, now we’ve seen you, won’t we, Charlie?’
Charlotte nodded.
‘OK. But …’ Should he say it? He wanted to, but did he mean it? He had to say it, and say it now, for fear that later he wouldn’t mean it.
‘Would you consider coming to live with me?’
They looked at him in astonishment.
‘Both of you, of course.’
They looked speechless.
‘Don’t answer. It’s far too soon.’
‘Are you serious?’ asked Chuck.
‘Utterly. I wouldn’t ask it otherwise. My offer. My promise. No questions about Chuck’s past. No questions about Charlotte’s missing years. No snide remarks about tattoos or rings through noses. You can eat with me when you want or on your own when you want or not at all though I don’t recommend it.’ He gave them a stern look. A serious tone entered his voice. ‘Now. Your promise. Well, two promises. The first is for both of you. No drugs in the house at all. I know what drugs do. I don’t want you to have any anywhere. I probably can’t stop you outside but I can in the house, and, believe me, I will. Break that rule, and you’re out. The second rule is for you only, Chuck.’
James looked very stern. Chuck looked slightly anxious.
‘What’s coming?’
‘Never call her Charlie. Her name’s Charlotte. She’s a beautiful girl. She’s my beautiful daughter, and she has a beautiful name.’ He had hoped to finish the sentence without emotion, as a cool dude would, but his voice gasped into tears, and he turned away, sobbing.
As he walked away, he raised one hand in farewell. He didn’t turn round.
He walked briskly, glad of the exercise, the physical activity releasing at least some of his tension. He couldn’t believe what he had just offered. Not that he regretted it. He was shaken as he thought of how his life might be disrupted. Shaken but not frightened. He felt that he would be able to rise to the challenge. He felt a little flicker of optimism again, a feeling that he was going to be able to make a new start, a feeling that he might at last, rather late in the day, be able to fulfil the full obligations of fatherhood.
He had passed through the gates of the crematorium now. A taxi passed him, and he didn’t hail it. Another one was coming. He didn’t hail that one either. He didn’t want to go to the wake. He didn’t think he could face all those people today.
He had to. Whoever heard of a widower not attending his wife’s wake? His three great worries had been about his eulogy, about Helen and about Charlotte. He had nothing left to fear.
All over the house people would be wondering where he was. And they were all his friends, there to comfort him, there to share what at last he had recognised as his grief.
He looked round for a taxi, but now, when he needed one, there were none to be seen. He began to feel desperate. He began to want to run. He began to break out into a sweat. He needed to get home.
At last a taxi appeared.
At the house, only two people noticed that he wasn’t there. Dwight Schenkman the Third wanted to drown him in long sentences of sympathy and admiration. Marcia wanted to offer him her body without actually saying so. But otherwise, those crowded into the living room might have thought he was among those who had slid inexorably into the kitchen, as certain people always do at gatherings, there to linger in what they thought of as the heartbeat of the house. And the people in the kitchen, grabbing the canapés before anyone else, might have thought he was among those spilling out into the elegant little garden. The caterers were dispensing drinks and canapés very efficiently, people were huddling among their own kind. Some of them would continue to huddle, others, as the drink began to ease their tension, would start to circulate and introduce themselves to people they didn’t know. Everything was exactly as it would have been if James had arrived.
The man who today was not wearing a white linen suit was listening as Gordon Tollington described in every detail the tasting menu at the Fat Duck. He omitted no herb, he ignored no spice. His listener felt so full just listening that he waved away the offer of a smoked salmon blini. But he was listening with only half his mind. The other half was busy trying to remember where he had seen a particular woman before. She was middle-aged, vaguely shabbily dressed, shapeless and charmless rather than ugly. He felt that she had the aura of a woman who had never gone to bed with a man. She was in among the Harcourts standing at the far end of the narrow garden, beside a statue of Pan that Deborah had been unable to resist in Winchester, and she was staring at him, which was disturbing. He really did feel vaguely alarmed, and all the more worried because the feeling was so vague. He associated her with an unappetising smell of overcooked meat. The remembered or imagined smell of the meat was all the more unpleasant when compared with the delights still being described so eloquently by Gordon Tollington.
It was when she turned to smile at somebody – insincerely, it seemed to him – that he saw her double chin and remembered. When he had last seen it there had been a splodge of tiramisu upon it, in a hotel restaurant near Diss. He had noticed what a sloppy eater she was. He disliked sloppy eaters.
She was walking towards him. She had a strange smile on her face. There was no humour in the smile. He felt a stab of fear.
‘Excuse me, Gordon,’ he said. ‘Fantastic, amazing stuff, beautifully described, I almost feel as if I don’t need to go there now, but I just have to speak to this lady. Sorry about this, I’ll catch you later, I’d love to hear about the puddings.’
‘No problem. They’re worth hearing about, I can assure you.’
He turned away from Gordon and faced the woman. He felt an irrational dislike of her, her slightly plump face, her baggy body. This feeling made him uneasy. He was a civilised man, a quietly generous man. He didn’t have irrational dislikes.
‘It is, isn’t it?’ she asked.
‘It is what?’
‘You are … him.’
He wasn’t going to make it easy for her.
‘Well, yes, I’m me, if that’s what you mean.’
Nothing pleasant could come out of this.
‘No, I mean, it’s you. You are who I think you are.’
‘Madam, how can I have any idea who you think I am?’
‘You’re the man I saw in that hotel, near Diss.’
‘I was in a hotel near Diss, yes, and I remember you now. You had a blob of tiramisu on your chin.’
She flushed slightly.
‘Oh, dear,’ she said. ‘I was …’ A strange expression flitted across her face like the shadow of a bird. ‘I was lunching with my friend.’
She spoke the word ‘friend’ rather coyly, and he realised that he had been wrong in thinking that her bitterness was in part because she had never been to bed with a man. It was because she had never been to bed with a woman.
‘I had the impression you were waiting for somebody,’ she said.
‘Oh?’
‘I wondered if it could have been a woman.’
‘Don’t you think that’s my business?’
‘Well, I just wondered if it might have been Deborah
. It was on the road close to the hotel, and on that very morning, that she had her crash. It occurred to me, when I heard about the accident, that you might have been waiting for her. But then, although I thought I recognised you, I couldn’t place you. Then today it all clicked. We met at Felicity and Dominic’s twentieth wedding anniversary party, in Guildford.’
He didn’t remember, but he decided to pretend that he did.
‘Yes. I didn’t like you then either.’
Unwise, he thought, as he walked abruptly away from her.
But it isn’t always possible to be wise.
James didn’t enter the house by the front door. He didn’t want anyone to witness his late arrival. He scurried along the path on the eastern side of the house, and drifted into the garden, hoping that he would look as if he had just drifted out of the house. He appeared to have been successful, and was soon mingling with the throng. At least forty people were standing around among the ferns and grasses and statues, most drinking wine, one or two beer, a few tea or coffee. Two smart young ladies were taking round trays of canapés. Already, the buzz of conversation was such that it was hard to believe that this was a funeral wake. The reception was going well. It was everything he had hoped it would be. Because he had missed that first half-hour – the thawing solemnity, the cautious return to some kind of normality after the service – its aura of good cheer stabbed him in the heart.
Dwight Schenkman the Third had spotted his late arrival, and now he and Claire tacked through the throng to greet him.
‘James, I have to say this to you,’ said Dwight. ‘You probably won’t welcome it. You English tend to shrink from praise, and you think we Americans overdo it.’
‘Not at all. Not at all.’
‘But I have to say it. You’ll have to take it on the chin. I have realised, these last few difficult days, what a man of integrity you are.’
‘Thank you, Dwight.’
‘We have to be going in a minute.’
Hurrah!
‘Oh, I’m sorry to hear that.’
‘A man of rare integrity, James. I have so admired your commitment to your people in Bridgend and Kilmarnock.’
‘Thank you.’
‘I hope with all my heart that you will be able to come up with evidence that will enable me to pursue a policy which will give you gratification in this matter.’
Was he right to detect an underlying threat there? Was he right to find significance in the fact that Dwight had said ‘your people’ and not ‘our people’?
‘I hope so too.’
‘But enough of Globpack. Today is all about Deborah. We are going to miss her so much, James.’
‘So much.’
‘But we know that our grief, painful though it is, is but a trivial thing compared to the immensity of your grief. I want you to know that we are with you all the way, James.’
‘All the way.’
‘Thank you.’
James endured Dwight’s global handshake, and rather enjoyed being allowed to place a soft kiss on each of Claire’s lovely soft cheeks, and then they were gone, and he began to move to the edge of the garden in order to take a deep breath, as if he was an otter breaking the surface to take a gulp, and there was Marcia steaming down on him. His mother’s phrase, There’s no peace for the wicked, came to him and he thought, Oh, God. Mum. I mustn’t neglect her.
But Marcia was first in the roll of duty.
‘Hello, Marcia, you look very glamorous.’
No!!
‘Thank you. I took ages working out what to wear. I don’t have much dress sense.’
Don’t draw attention to it.
‘Nonsense.’
‘I tried to look, as I know you wanted, not too drab and glum.’
‘You’ve succeeded.’
‘Without looking tarty.’
Sadly, you could never do that.
‘And I know of course I’ll see you in the office during the rest of my month’s notice.’
Oh, God.
‘But, James, I want to say, when all this has … well, you know … but … in time … when you’ve … you know … because, I mean, at first you’ll be … you know … devastated. I mean, I remember how I felt when Ronald died … and he was only a hamster … what I’m saying is … you know where I live, you have my number, I’ll be there.’
‘At the end of the phone?’
‘Exactly.’
‘Thank you, Marcia. Thank you very much. How’s the … how’s Willy the Wombat coming on?’
‘He’s coming along pretty well. I’m getting lots of ideas. I thought he might be employed by the UN to save the world from a great crisis. Or he might lead all the animals in London Zoo in a big revolution type of thing. He might have amazing powers and get called Superwombat. I mean, I haven’t really got going on it yet. I think early on an author has to explore all the parameters.’
‘Great. That sounds wonderful. I can see you holding court in the Ivy in years to come.’
‘Do you mean that?’
He realised, to his amazement, that he did. Who could tell? He felt a wave of true affection for this sunburnt, shapeless young woman. He felt an urge to say something really affectionate, something to give her hope. He resisted it.
‘Well, keep at it,’ he said. ‘I must go and find my mum, Marcia. Duty calls.’
He kissed her on both cheeks.
James didn’t know it, but his long day’s journey towards his mum was going to be interrupted by several more encounters.
He felt that he had seen her before. You wouldn’t have described her as beautiful. The word ‘pretty’ wouldn’t have come instantly to mind. Attractive? Yes, well, very definitely if one thought of it as opposed to unattractive, but even then, while she was attractive, you wouldn’t necessarily have described her as such. When he thought about her, later that evening, after she had gone, James found himself using a very odd word. She was complete.
She was talking to a couple of the Glebeland girls, just in the garden, but close to the back door, and he remembered where he had seen her – in the photograph of all the Glebeland girls that he had found. He would have to pass her to enter the house to find Mum. Their eyes met for just a moment, it was nothing dramatic, just a brief connection. She turned away from the other two girls, and he suddenly knew who she was. She was Grace Farsley, the girl who got away, went to Rangoon or somewhere, married a tea planter or something equally Victorian, was never seen again. Deborah had lost all contact with her, had regretted it often, had asked the other girls about her, some of the other girls hadn’t liked her, had thought her stand-offish, Deborah had thought only that she was reserved, Deborah had really liked her, and Deborah had almost never been wrong about people (except Constance Thrabnot, but we needn’t go into that).
‘It’s good to meet you. Deborah often spoke of you.’
‘Really?’
‘She wondered what had happened to you. She longed to see you again.’
‘Well, I’m amazed. Well, that’s … well, it’s nice, in a way, but it’s also rather awful. Because now I feel so sad that I never will. I haven’t been back in England that long, and I had no way of contacting her either. And then on Saturday I saw the announcement of her death in the paper. I was devastated. I was very close to her once. So of course I felt that I must come.’
‘I’m glad you did.’
‘I thought you were wonderful today, James. Yes, yes, I can see it on your face. You’re ashamed you couldn’t see it through. Honestly, James, when that vicar’s voice has faded into oblivion, I’ll still remember the true emotion of that moment.’
‘Yes, Grace, I’ll agree there. It was true.’
‘I think Deborah was very lucky.’
Oh, Grace, Grace, did you have to say that? Oh, the burden of my secret.
‘So you … um … didn’t you … this sounds terribly Somerset Maugham … marry a tea planter and go to Rangoon?’
‘I married a surveyor and went to Pe
nang. The humidity turned the surveyor sour and he became cruel to me. That was a bit Somerset Maugham.’
‘You didn’t keep up with the Glebeland girls?’
‘For a while. I liked them, but there was a problem. I hated Glebeland, and they all loved it. Well, it’s nice to meet you.’
She shook his hand and turned back to the girls, but it didn’t seem like a rebuff.
He walked along the corridor that led into the house from the garden, just as Mike came out of the living room. There they were, face to face. He hadn’t even noticed Mike in the church. In fact, so much had been going on in his emotional life that he had completely forgotten about Mike and his hardening suspicions. But now, coming face to face with him so unexpectedly, he was utterly shocked. He was shocked to see him looking smart, wearing a jacket and tie, his hair neatly brushed and almost certainly washed. He was shocked at his certainty that, respectable though Mike looked now, he was a murderer. He came out in goose pimples all over his skin, and he flinched instinctively.
And Mike saw him flinch.
Mike stood stock-still. He looked at James in astonishment. Their eyes couldn’t avoid each other’s, and there wasn’t time for the eyes to hide their messages.
‘You know!’ breathed Mike in startled amazement.
‘I do now,’ said James in a low voice, trying not to sound grim.
Just five words, and nothing would ever be the same between them again. Mike came towards him, and it was all James could do to avoid flinching again. But Mike walked straight past him, out to the garden. James leant against the wall of the corridor, momentarily too weak to stand unaided. For a moment he thought he would pass out, then he knew that he wouldn’t. His heart was slowing down. He became capable of movement again.
He went out into the garden, searching for Mike, though not knowing what he intended to say if he found him.
But Mike was nowhere to be seen.
It took him a while to pull himself together. It took a while before he felt capable of plunging back among his guests. He walked tentatively, almost shyly, into his own living room.
