Household Ghosts

by James Kennaway

  ‘My dear, it isn’t I who needs sympathy. It’s you. There.’ He smiled, put an arm round her shoulder, and kissed her cheek. She dropped her eyes. Pink’s stomach seemed to grow bigger. He almost stood on tiptoe, and he stammered slightly as he said:

  ‘Come on, my loves. Blame it on Pink. Old Pink started it.’

  ‘Not true,’ Stephen said, depressed again, and Pink was irritated. He took it out on the plates and glasses which he clattered about as he said:

  ‘Damn it all, chum.’

  ‘Pink,’ Mary said softly, and Stephen’s voice rode over hers as it so often did.

  ‘I’m afraid I am a bit of a cold sponge at—’

  ‘Darling!’

  But Stephen went on. ‘A fact’s a fact, for heaven’s sake.’

  Pink said, as nicely as he could, ‘Okay, chumbo, but don’t let’s go on about it at a farmers’ hop.’

  ‘True.’

  Mary had sat down on a bench at the side of the room. She looked straight in front of her, over the desks, towards the panels covered with carved initials, and the long cords falling down from the small, high windows. She said to Stephen:

  ‘Nobody is as ruthless with himself as you are. I don’t know whether to admire it or—’

  ‘Shudder,’ he said, in the icy tone of someone who not only has the courage to admit to others that he is no good in bed, but braver still, to confess it to himself.

  ‘No.’ She was angry for a second, as she looked up at him. ‘Not shudder – I never felt that.’

  Pink took a couple of steps backwards. Stephen ran his finger round the rim of his glass. He said very calmly:

  ‘Tell me, does your friend David know the situation?’

  ‘No,’ she answered sharply. ‘Of course he doesn’t. You know he doesn’t. Unless you’ve unburdened yourself to him.’ She drank a little of her whisky.

  ‘That’s hardly likely,’ he said and at once, in a low voice, she replied:

  ‘I’m not so bloody sure.’

  ‘Bab – Ba – Bambinos!’ Pink moved softly forward, but Mary kept her head away from him. She was looking firmly at the glass in her hand.

  ‘He’s not my friend, anyway, I told you.’

  ‘Darling,’ Stephen said, ‘I trust you implicitly.’

  Mary looked at Pink, not Stephen, but Pink also turned away.

  Stephen swallowed and still talking of marriage and of bed, he went on:

  ‘Whatever happened, I could hardly blame you when the fault is so patently mine.’

  But Mary, perhaps to his surprise, did not rush to deny this. She remained perfectly still, and silent. Pink, putting one foot in front of the other, walked carefully up the line of one of the floor-boards, and then the gym doors opened, and Young Conservatives came flooding in saying, ‘Really, Charles? But I thought there was a pile to be made in broilers’ and other more ornate and surprising Young Conservative things, like ‘I said, “Jack, I careth not for thee.”’

  THREE

  WITH AN ASTONISHING lack of hard evidence, the mind-benders insist that the dreams we forget are the important ones. But at least we can each prove to ourselves that the letters which we never send are the revealing ones. And for months, in a corner of a bench in David Dow’s laboratory in the Medical Research Council building in Mill Hill there lay scores of these; letters which went back over all the scenes with Mary; letters of love, of protest, of explanation and angry letters too. Some spread themselves so far as to become something beyond a letter, striking out from specific apology to woolly confession. Some were addressed privately and passionately to Mary, others seemed to be directed to nobody, prepared carefully and laboriously for the waste-paper basket.

  The first letters, some no more than torn scraps of paper, are written in a spidery hand, corrected and recorrected, advancing painfully, inch by inch, as if reluctant to reach the kernel of their relationship. At the end, the handwriting grows bolder and grammar itself seems to oblige and bend to the material. These last pages will be quoted, but the first ones, laboriously pursuing minute events in Classroom IV and the gym, matter too.

  The first does not directly concern Mary and David, but David’s observation of Mary at work that night; Mary as she was then but is no longer; Mary, oblique and hysterical. She played for David that evening, involving herself at first neither with poor Pink nor with Stephen but with the steadiest member of the Ferguson family, Flora Macdonald, the huge Nanny, housekeeper, nurse and rock.

  Mary, Mary, cousin as you are now, you’ve told me [David writes] that I looked that night, in my white tie and tails, like a mixture between a second-class pugilist and Deacon Brodie on the prowl, just because I watched silently the performance that you put on for me and forgot to speak to your friends who you, remember, called harmless and I called kind. And though I write always, other, countless, unpostable and unposted letters only to be forgiven, in this one scene at least, it was you who behaved badly. Promise.

  Just reconsider it. Forget all the talk to your Conservative friends, at me; forget the loudness of your voice. Forget the brassy laugh, and that comment, advertising yourself, as you filled your glass, about yourself but put, horribly, in the third person, ‘Well, her father was a card-cheat and her mother was a drunk … Ha-ha-ha!’ – Suggestions, incidentally, which you had denied with such a show of passion in London only a week previously that you successfully reduced a cocktail party to embarrassed silence.

  Remember only poor Macdonald coming in – poor, huge, gloomy, loving Macdonald who you had told me not once but many times was (your phrase) ‘a guardian angel in your life, not a Nanny but a foster-mother’. I always remember her, perhaps the one person who comes out of the story with credit, as she looked that night, in a dress that was more like a toga. I imagine her now as six foot four but perhaps she was shorter than that. It was as if all the expression in her features had been swept back with the gold-grey hair to that big bun at the back of her neck. She had huge, chicken-killing hands and feet made for plough. Yet she was gentle.

  If I had not known by then the extraordinary amount of alcohol you were capable of holding I would have sworn that you must be drunk to be so cruel. I may not have all poor Macdonald’s lines right, but it was the look on her face that mattered. On the other hand I have, as you can judge for yourself, an unerring memory for Mary lines. Proof? You greeted her, as she loomed through the door, mauve dress and square fur cape, by turning more than half away from her, addressing one of your girl-friends who was (please note) on my side of the room, ‘Lerwick’s answer to Cassandra. Whistler’s maiden aunt.’ This announcement, needless to say, was made in a voice loud enough not only for me to hear but for poor Macdonald to hear, as well.

  ‘Can I speak to you, Mary?’ I think she said, at the door, and with a whirling turn and a kind of enthusiastic rush of innocence, you grasped both of her hands and said:

  ‘Yes, darling Macdonald,’ and I saw the ‘darling’ make its mark on wary Macdonald’s face. What invited ‘darling’ now, after twenty years without?

  I could have told her. I was flattered, I confess.

  ‘Darling Macdonald, do come and have a proper drink – you’ve been doing marvels through there, I know.’

  ‘Heavens,’ one of your dairy-minded friends gave you away, ‘from all the darlings and that I thought it must be a man coming through the door.’

  ‘Goodness, don’t look so grim,’ you were now saying irritably to Macdonald, as if suddenly you had changed your mind and never wanted to see her again, then even as I watched, you changed back and stretching out your hands to her again said, ‘Dear, lovely Macdonald, Rock of Gibraltar only much prettier and nicer really – you are so M. I.5. It can’t be all that bad.’

  ‘A word in your ear, Mary.’ One step forward. She approached the erratic animal.

  ‘Oh, don’t be so silly,’ quietly from you. With your nail you picked at the Cairngorm brooch which she had clasped in her dress, then stopped yourself with a flic
k of the hand – a hand which you hated, so you told me; but you left it flat on Macdonald’s shoulder for everybody to see.

  You said to her, ‘If it’s so embarrassing you can tell me in a whisper,’ and encouraged by a titter round about (and not my laughter, I assure you) you said, not exactly to Macdonald, ‘Well, it’s not a children’s party any more. Not Mr Reed’s dancing class and bow to your partners. Pink and I have grown up on you.’ Then directly to her face, ‘I won’t be shocked.’ And to the brooch, quietly, but oh, so audibly, ‘Has your sweetheart jilted you?’

  God, she was patient. If I’d been her I would have slapped your face.

  She said, wearily, ‘Don’t get so excited, Mary dear. I know the mood.’

  ‘Well, what on earth have you come to say?’

  Macdonald looked round then, nodded good evening to somebody, before she asked, ‘D’you not think it’s time you went back to your father, next door? You know what he is. He won’t move away from the table at all.’

  ‘Haven’t you been there, for heaven’s sake?’ A pause. A sly glance to your yes-friends, with your eyes right round to the sides. Then you add, ‘You and your sweetheart, I mean?’

  Don’t you blush to read this? Wasn’t it obvious to you then? Surely everybody in the room must have seen what you were up to, attacking and teasing Macdonald while you kept me within earshot. I see you now, as you were at that moment, circling round like a brightly coloured bird, flapping a wing, fluttering the feathers in your tail.

  Poor Macdonald bit her lip. She must have known how dangerous it was to mention her boy-friend’s name. But she took the plunge, while you waited, ready to strike. She did not say Captain Gordon, but stuck to his Christian name.

  ‘Jack and I have held the fort for over an hour now.’

  Saying Jack she used his short ‘a’; what you and Pink used to call his ‘immaculate Edinburgh and Bombay’. I wonder if she did so as a sort of dare. But you didn’t fail. You got another titter for your echo. ‘Jack? Captain Jack Gordon? M.C., R.A.M.C.?’

  Imperviously, Macdonald frankly confessed:

  ‘It’s the gay Gordons. That’s Jack’s favourite,’ and you, pure bitch, threw back your head and laughted, then quickly, like a school-girl, clasped a hand over your mouth (fingers long and straight of that hand you hate so much) and said:

  ‘Oh God, I’m sure I shouldn’t laugh.’

  It is difficult to keep up with you at this point. At once you followed with the short a’s again, mimicking (not very well) poor Captain Jack Gordon.

  ‘Tripping the light fantastic?’ you asked and then swung round to your brother who, give him his due, was not enjoying this very much.

  ‘Pink, darling, do say “Light fantastic Saturday, Jack.” Do it properly. In Jack’s voice.’

  He was then gasping for air, trying to warn you what you already knew, that Macdonald, with great dignity, was leaving the room.

  Then, by golly, you covered. I don’t say it was for my sake alone, but certainly for my sake as well. Sweetly and desperately, ‘No, Macdonald, don’t be so silly, don’t take on so. Macdonald dear.’

  Rushed after her. Caught her in the corridor and held her, not in front of all the guests but in front of some. In front of me, by the way. Held her again by the arms and looked imploringly at the big solemn face.

  ‘So it was silly, on your part,’ Macdonald said. ‘I’d say you’ve got no reason to be unkind about Jack.’

  A big shake of your head. A wag from side to side.

  ‘It was just a joke.’

  ‘What’s the joke?’

  You shrugged at that, but still clung to her arms. The alarmed spoilt child; contrite, insecure, cunning. ‘Just ridiculous. I’ve said I’m sorry.’

  ‘What’s ridiculous, Mary? Are we too old, is that it?’

  ‘No.’ She had you there. ‘Don’t look like that, Macdonald. Don’t ask questions.’

  ‘Is it that he’s small and I’m big?’ [In my mind’s eye, just as Macdonald has gained stature, I remember Captain Jack Gordon as only two feet tall.]

  ‘No!’ You looked a little afraid. ‘No honestly, please forget it. You must forgive me. Otherwise it’ll ruin my evening. I promise it will.’ You were pinching her arms, now.

  ‘Are you coming through then?’

  ‘This minute.’

  ‘Okay, toots,’ she said, forgiving. You stood on tiptoe and kissed her. Then dropped on your heels again and leant against the wall pushing both the flat of your hands and that red hair, cousin, against the glossy surface. Frock? Short and pink. Legs? Well set apart. If you doubt me, cousin, it is for a good reason; remembering you are ashamed. But it is true enough. I’ll give you another echo to prove it to you. But in proving, I give myself away: my own shame. There’s not a moment of Classroom IV which escapes me, I’ve lived it so often again.

  That farmer, of course, is the echo – the one who wandered down the corridor at just that moment. The big round moon-faced one in the brown suit who was so proud of his tenor voice. As you stood and watched Macdonald go, presenting me with the perfect sideface, he came by, insisting to his friends:

  ‘I’ve got the technique I have … Semi-trained.’ Something like that. ‘When I was just a treble my singing teacher said – she said I’d a most remarkable voice. So she said.’

  You looked at your shoes as you came into the classroom again. You were ashamed even then, cousin. If not from your own heart then at least from the look on my face you reckoned you had over-played and you were very quiet as the Young Conservatives drained out. You leant your backside against one of the desks and stared at your tumbler, whirling the whisky round and round. I tried very hard, I confess, but you wouldn’t look at me.

  You weren’t at all happy at being left behind with me, then. Not after you’d over-played.

  Voices and gestures:—

  Stephen, in your ear, ‘Best if you follow us through, darling. We’d better not delay.’ He had both a dark look and a bright smile for me.

  You were clasping the bridge of your nose as if your head ached.

  ‘No,’ holding your hand out to your husband, and for the first time, daring a look at me. ‘I’ll come through now.’

  After that it’s only voices for me. I turned to the blackboard then. There were only the three voices: yours, Pink’s and Stephen’s. The others were mere murmurs of complaint against taxation, echoing down the corridor.

  Stephen’s voice, without confidence: ‘Give David another drink. No please do.’

  A shifting of feet, a glass thumped on a table, then Stephen’s voice again. This time bright and cheerful.

  ‘Please do. One for all the good work he did with you on the flags and streamers next door. He helped decorate, didn’t he?’

  Stephen’s voice again. ‘You entertain him, darling.’

  Then yours, sharp and clipped: ‘Very well. We’ll follow you through.’

  Last of all, Captain Jack Gordon, R.A.M.C. (Indian Army), precisely, but it came, I assume, from poor Pink.

  ‘Yes. Yes. “A bit of the light fantastic, Saturday.”’

  Then Pink in his own voice: ‘Oyez, oyez. You can ring those bloody bells.’

  FOUR

  AS MARY REACHED for the bottle of Gloag’s she knocked over one of the fluted glasses and she only just saved it from falling to the floor. David watched her with dark and tender eyes as she picked it up and reached for the bottle again. He walked away from the blackboard to the far wall and played with one of the thin cords hanging from the tiny area of window which could be opened. The cord was low enough for the master to adjust, but high enough to prevent boys from hanging themselves without difficulty.

  Mary said, ‘I was told to give you a drink,’ and when she drew in a breath it made a small wavering noise.

  ‘Why did you stay?’ he asked.

  ‘Because my husband asked me to.’

  She looked up at him. She was pale now, and not at her prettiest. When the colour ran f
rom her cheeks her skin sometimes looked almost green. The effect had something to do with the tiny freckles.

  She rested her hands on the table, behind her back. ‘David, I do want to speak to you about yesterday.’

  ‘No, that’s really a wrong one—’ he said, coming round to her, flicking his fingers and thumbs.

  ‘Please, I’d like to explain.’

  ‘Explain nothing. Forget what happened.’ But as he laid a hand on her skin just where the neck curves into the shoulder she walked away and she said a little hysterically:

  ‘No, please don’t touch me.’

  ‘Oh no,’ he said, again snapping his fingers with irritation. ‘This is snakes and ladders. Each time one has to begin at base.’

  ‘If you really want to know, I feel I never really want to be touched again. It’s all so complicated. But that’s what I do feel.’

  He had turned right away from her and going back to the window and the cord he said, very quietly:

  ‘Please, miss. Don’t tempt me by telling more lies. You’re really on form tonight.’

  At once she said, ‘You mean about Macdonald? You don’t know it but I was being kind. He’s a dreadful little man. Her boy-friend, I mean. Jack Gordon. He’s half her height.’

  He simply shook his head, refusing the excuse and at once on a debby note which sounded almost an octave higher she said:

  ‘I absolutely confess it, I was rather tough … But Macdonald understands. It’s just that I’m fearfully jealous I suppose. I’m that sort of person and I’ve always been bitchy about Macdonald’s friends. It shows how much I love her, don’t you see? Poor old cow. Anyway, I didn’t tell any lies about her or anybody else …’

  He quoted her own words, ‘“My mother was a drunk.”’

  ‘Oh, that was just a joke.’

  ‘It’s something you weren’t so prepared to joke about in London.’

  She answered quietly, ‘No, of course not. Here everybody knows. I mean they know it’s not true. That’s why I can afford to joke.’