Moonlight
Page 13
So this was Conrad on the evening of 20 January 1907, when he attended a dinner party at the home of a certain Baron Kalchberg. Amongst the gathering he spotted Gina von Reininghaus, a woman whom Conrad had met seven years earlier at the Kalchebrg’s Trieste home. Later they found themselves seated beside one another at dinner. Gina would later recall that Conrad spent the whole evening talking about his late wife. After dinner, Gina played the piano accompanying Captain Franz Putz, a gifted singer and, as it happened, Conrad’s aide-de-camp. Gina and Putz had such fun that she invited him to visit her at her house. Loyally, Putz asked if he might also bring his boss.
So began a routine where, every sixth day, Conrad would visit Gina at her home at Opergasse 8, next to the Vienna Opera. Two months later, at the end of a visit to Gina, Conrad declared in a private moment that he had ‘only one thought: that you should become my wife.’
There was only one problem with this suggestion. Gina was already married – to wealthy industrialist Hans von Reininghaus.
When Gina recovered from the shock, she told Conrad that such a thing was out of the question. At twenty-eight, she was barely half his age. As well as that, she had six children by her husband, the youngest of whom was barely a year old.
Not to be put off by this, Conrad asked her again in May, saying that if she turned him down, he would never ask again. She did, saying that she couldn’t leave her children, but this didn’t deter Conrad. As we have seen, he believed in the doctrine of the offensive – relentless attacks with no concern for the moral or emotional casualties. For her part, Gina told him how her marriage to Hans had become loveless and how she hoped that, one day, he would agree to a divorce.
Gina would eventually get her divorce and she and Conrad would end up marrying in 1915. Long before that, though, she had become his mistress. With Gina, Conrad was like a lovesick schoolboy. When they were apart, he would write her letters every day. In a personal book that he called the Diary of My Woes, he wrote much longer entries in the form of letters, never mailed and dripping with unrequited love. In short, when Conrad should have been thinking about his job as head of Austria’s Army, he was instead mooning over Gina.
And so, as his lovesick commander in chief gloomily relays the news of the Austrian Army’s readiness – or lack of it – Berchtold knows that the Germans are not going to be pleased about this. But it can’t be helped. The plan now is to deliver the ultimatum to the Serbs on July 23rd with a forty-eight hour deadline, expiring on the 25th.
Even though it is only Tuesday, Henry asks Mary to lunch and she accepts. Once they are seated and have ordered, he tells her that last night he told Clara he wanted a divorce. Mary looks into his eyes and for several moments Henry can see the uncertainty there. Can she believe him? She isn’t sure. She begins to ask questions. How did Clara react? Did she cry? What about the children? What’s going to happen next? And most importantly of all, when is it going to happen?
Henry has prepared well for all of this. He didn’t sleep very well last night, and during his waking hours he imagined in great detail what it would have been like if he had told Clara that he wanted a divorce. Henry can see that Mary’s questions stem from a combination of several different factors. Partly, just like a policeman, she wants to verify that his story is true. She is looking for inconsistencies; she wants to see if he slips up. But Henry’s picture of the tormented scene with Clara is quite perfect, ending as it does with, ‘I think it must have been about four o’clock. I was exhausted from talking and from her crying. I just had to go to bed.’ And in response to the unspoken question that hangs in the air after this statement, Henry adds, ‘She didn’t go to bed. She was asleep on the couch when I got up.’
Several times, as Henry unfolds his story, Mary reaches across and takes his hand and squeezes it. She says things like, ‘How awful’ or ‘It must have been a nightmare for you.’ After one of these interjections, Henry manages to slip in that he and Clara won’t be saying anything to the children about any of this until ‘at least after their summer holiday in August.’ He sees a momentary wave of displeasure cross Mary’s face as he says this, but she knows better than to say anything. Henry was ready for her if she had and was intending to snap angrily at her, saying something like, ‘Have you no pity – not even for the children?’ In the event, this little piece of drama proves unnecessary.
Apart from checking his story, Henry thinks he can also detect both satisfaction and pity in Mary’s demeanour; satisfaction in that she has been the victor in this contest for Henry and pity for Clara. In fact, Mary actually says, ‘The poor woman’ or ‘The poor thing’ a number of times.
When Henry feels that they have spent sufficiently long on this, he suddenly checks the time and announces that he must be getting back. He had decided earlier that he wouldn’t give Mary any time to respond. Rather, he would let her mull it over at her leisure. And this she seems to do because, before he goes home, she asks him if he could stay up in town on Thursday night, the day after tomorrow. Henry is delighted at such a quick turnaround, as he sees it, and agrees on the spot. But he is also surprised to find that he has the faintest sensation of wishing that she hadn’t come back to him at all and that he had just gone home to Clara and the children.
Chapter 27
Wednesday 15 July 1914
In France, a row has broken out about the state of preparedness of the French team. In the senate, Charles Humbert, senator for the Meuse, has declared that in spite of the vast and increasing sums being spent on the army – the heavy artillery, the forts on the Eastern frontier, the stores of war materiel, boots, uniforms, shells, as well as the transport, bridges and wireless equipment – it is very much inferior to that of Germany. Monsieur Humbert claims that when the German wireless station at Metz is transmitting, the French station at Verdun goes on the blink. But it’s the issue of the boots that really makes the headlines. Humbert claims that the French Army doesn’t have enough boots and that soldiers will be going into action with one pair of boots and a single spare boot.
The Minister for War, while accepting the substance of the charges, insists that rapid progress is being made to remedy these deficiencies. Large sums have already been spent on reinforcing the field artillery and the machine gun sections. With regard to fortress artillery, there are plans to replace the older model guns with two hundred 115-millimetre guns by the end of 1915 or the beginning of 1916. Also by the end of 1915, the stock of shells will have been trebled. By the end of 1917, it is intended that two hundred howitzers will have strengthened the artillery. As for heavy field artillery, the older types of guns are being modernised and new types are being manufactured or are undergoing trials. New wireless installations are on order for the frontier forts.
Also today, at 11:30 in the morning, Raymond Poincaré, the French manager and his Prime Minister leave the Gare du Nord for Dunkirk on the presidential train. The plan is to, early the following morning, board the battleship France to travel to Russia. The visit has been arranged for quite some time but now, with the situation that has been unfolding since Sarajevo, it has added urgency. The purpose of the visit is simple: Poincaré wants to make sure his ally will stand fast whatever Austria does.
Late that night Henry wakes up intensely annoyed. He had gone to bed early so as to get a good night’s sleep and be ready for not much sleep with Mary on Thursday night. But now, with the alarm clock reading just after midnight, he is wide awake. Clara is asleep beside him, her blonde hair scattered on the pillow, back to him, the bedclothes pulled protectively up around her shoulder. Henry is awake because he has just thought of something else that could upset the whole apple cart.
When he went to bed, all was right with the world. He had been in good form, played with the girls for a while until Clara took them off to get them ready for bed. He had kissed her goodnight and was in bed by ten. Before he drifted off, his survey of his life seemed quite satisfactory. The situation with Mary was stabilised until after the summ
er. It would be September before she might start to become annoying again, with her talk of his leaving Clara. Maybe then Henry would have to end it all, but in the meantime there were two months of enjoyment and pleasure to look forward to. Clara and the girls were looking forward to the holiday and were busily and excitedly making preparations. The little world that revolved around him – at least, this was the way he saw it – was just as it should be. But the thing that has woken him up, that actually has him sweating, is that it has suddenly occurred to him that Mary could become – by accident or by design – pregnant.
Up until now, this has been an issue of no concern to Henry. Essentially he assumed that Mary was taking care of it. And despite the fact that they have done some extraordinarily intimate things, this is not something that Henry feels he could ask her about. He would be too embarrassed. Yes, he has had his face in places that he would have thought no woman would allow, but no, this is not a subject he could ever imagine himself discussing with Mary. And he realises now that this has been a big mistake and that he is going to have to. Because she could be pregnant at this very minute. This was the thought that catapulted him from sleep, with the phrase, ‘I might want to have your child’ ringing in his brain.
Now it has to be said that that Henry has absolutely no rational reason for thinking that Mary might be pregnant. It isn’t that she has said something about a missed period, for example – or anything at all. But he is suddenly overwhelmed by the question, ‘What if she became pregnant?’ Or worse still, what if she pretended to be pregnant to try and snare him? He believes she would be quite capable of doing this. Mary could not be described as a weak woman, some kind of wilting violet. Henry has a sense – from her lovemaking, if from nothing else – that when Mary sets her mind on something, she will go all out to achieve it. So what if she did suddenly announce she was pregnant? Henry needs to make it clear to her what would happen if she ever did. And he needs to do it quickly.
Chapter 28
Thursday 16 July 1914
Finally Thursday arrives. Clara has been racking her brains to work out how she will be able to make sandwiches for her lunch with James. Either the girls or Mrs Parsons will see. And even if she manages to somehow find a way to do it without their being aware, there is still the problem of taking a package of sandwiches out of the house without them seeing it. In the end she decides she won’t be able to make any – she will have to buy them. This bothers her greatly. Firstly, she feels guilty about spending some of the housekeeping money – some of Henry’s hard-earned money – on lunch with … well, another man. She quickly puts that idea out of her head. But there is also the fact – and in her mind, this is really the more significant reason – she wanted the sandwiches to be made with her own hands. She wanted to show him what she was capable of, her skills in the kitchen – even with something as simple as a sandwich. But in the end, she accepts that it is not to be and that that will just have to wait for another time.
At first she doesn’t see James when she arrives, and for several seconds she feels her world crumbling. She is on the brink of tears. But then she sees him walking towards her and waving. It just turns out that their usual seat was taken and he has found the next one along. Clara heaves a huge sigh of relief.
‘So how is everything in Europe today?’ she asks as she sits down, placing the paper bag containing the sandwiches and drinks on the bench.
‘Oh, more of the same. The Austrians are huffing and puffing against Serbia. The Germans are pretending they’re not really interested in the revelations about the state of the French Army. I assume you saw that?’
Clara nods even though it’s not true. For the last few days, she has been unable to concentrate on anything, except the thought of her lunch today. Every time she sat down to read a paper or a book, she found that the words made no sense to her. Eventually she gave up trying.
‘And in Paris,’ James concludes. ‘The Socialists are suggesting that if there was a general strike there couldn’t be any war since nobody would turn up.’
He folds the paper and puts it down.
‘Actually, not a bad idea that. Not sure it would work in practice but a good idea nonetheless. Now, what have we here?’
Clara began to unwrap the sandwiches.
‘Ham and mustard – as you ordered,’ she says, looking into his eyes.
He smiles.
‘I’m afraid I didn’t get a chance to make them myself, so I bought them.’
‘They look delicious.’
They begin to eat and, almost immediately, Clara finds that an awkward silence has descended between them. James seems to be waiting for her to continue the conversation. But the only thing she can think of to say is the question she has been dying to ask ever since last Thursday.
‘I’ve been thinking all week about your wife – what you told me about being divorced,’ she says, gazing out at the water, crowded with birds. ‘Can I ask – I hope you don’t mind – please tell me if it’s none of my business. How did you decide? How did you know when you couldn’t go on?’
There is no response and Clara wonders whether she has gone too far. One of the things she likes about James is that conversation is so easy between them, but has she been too impertinent in raising this now? Suddenly alarmed, she turns, an apology starting to form on her lips. She is fearful now that this might be the end of it all and that is something she really could not bear.
He lowers his sandwich and places it back on the open brown paper in which it came. Then he turns to face her.
‘Like all couples, we loved each other – initially, at least. But as I found out, she was angry at her father – for what I never found out, though I had my suspicions. The result was that rather, than take it out on him, she took it out on me.’
‘How?’ asks Clara, puzzled. ‘How did she do that?’
‘The anger she should have directed at him she directed at me. From her point of view he was an impossible target, I was an easy one. And so our relationship became like a war with a battle followed by a period of calm followed by another battle. One day I woke up and found that I had been dreaming about the Hundred Years’ War. It wasn’t that I had a particular interest in that period. I had learned about it at school but other than that—’
He shrugs.
‘But then I remember I was on the way to work. I had come out of the Tube and was walking down Whitehall when it came back to me. The Hundred Years’ War. I thought, Yes, that’s what my marriage will be.’
He smiled faintly.
‘That was the moment. That was the moment when I knew. I told her the same night that I wanted a divorce.’
‘Was it awful?’
‘It’s not for the faint hearted,’ he says. ‘It was easier because we didn’t have any children. If we had, I don’t think I’d have had the courage to go through with it.’
‘How long were you married?’
‘Four years. And now, this year, divorced four.’
There is a pause and then he asks, ‘Why are you asking me this?’
It is the question that she probably knew was coming. She is relieved and terrified at the same time. She takes a deep breath.
‘Because I’m really unhappy in my marriage. And you’re the only person I know, the only person I’ve ever met, who has had a divorce. I suppose I wanted to find out about it.’
There, she has said it.
‘It would not be easy,’ he says.
Afterwards, many times afterwards, Clara will replay this conversation in her head. She will come to appreciate – though it will take quite some time – the significance of how James responded to her question. ‘It would not be easy.’ The implication, of course, being that she had already decided to go through with it. And a further implication that he approved of her course of action. And further implications still that he would support her and help her. And most importantly of all, that he would be waiting for her at the end. In short, he wanted her to do this.
‘It’s far easier for a man than for a woman. You would have to have grounds – adultery, cruelty, something like that. You would have to prove it.’
‘Am I correct in saying that any property I had before the marriage would be mine after a divorce?’
‘You are well informed.’
‘We have an encyclopaedia at home.’
‘Ah. I’m no lawyer, but yes, I believe that is the case. Your children – they’re young, I assume.’
She detects a faint compliment in the question. She nods.
‘Six and fifteen months.’
He winces.
‘I believe you would be entitled to custody of your children. But depending on how your husband reacted, it could be a fearful battle. I’m hardly one to advise about divorce but it could be a long and cruel road if you chose to go down it.’
‘Longer and more cruel than the one I am on at the moment?’
She too has put down her sandwich and her hands lie in her lap. Now he reaches across and lays his hand gently on hers.
‘Only you can answer that, my dear friend.’
Clara suddenly feels that she needs to be by herself.
‘I should probably go,’ she says, standing up.
‘I didn’t mean to upset you,’ he says, looking alarmed.