Such Men Are Dangerous

by Stephen Benatar

  “No, I think I’ll let Dawn tell you about that.”

  “Her miracle, is it?”

  “She’ll do it more justice. Besides, you’re right, she’s the person who actually saw it. Well, she and Mickey, I should say.”

  “In that case, what about this tour you promised, while the light’s still good?”

  It was not an extensive tour. Graeme took pictures of both St Matthew’s and the vicarage. Geraldine had hoped to meet the vicar in the process but Simon was spending the afternoon in Lincoln and since Mrs Madison had earlier informed Dawn (whose husband had suggested Simon might feel flattered to hear of Janice’s engagement) that she always grabbed the chance to accompany him and thereby shop at Sainsbury’s, there was no one to photograph outside the vicarage…other than Josh, who had already been photographed outside the church. At four o’clock they went to High Ridge and met the two boys. There Graeme posed them together in front of the building and then shot them surrounded by several of their classmates. Geraldine afterwards spoke to a few of these. She was impressed, yet vaguely worried, by the fact that nobody appeared to know anything about what had happened to the Heaths last Wednesday. One of the younger girls asked shyly if they were making a commercial for some wonder spot-remover and there was a good deal of giggling and speculation until the headmaster himself came out, attracted by the growing crowd. But even Mr Dane told Geraldine he had no idea of anything newsworthy, nationally newsworthy, having befallen any of his pupils.

  “Bar the spots?”

  “Yes, that was strange, very strange indeed, but hardly worth the notice of Fleet Street I’d have thought.”

  He looked at her expectantly and was clearly disappointed by her reticence, no matter how politely she made conversation.

  “But if you’d be so kind as to let me talk to you tomorrow, Mr Dane, after you’ve had time to read the Chronicle; and if perhaps I could meet some members of your staff…?”

  Then seeing that Graeme had by this time got everything he needed, she excused herself tactfully and joined him and the three others for the brief ride back to Tiffany’s, where Graeme wanted shots of the boys taken at the scene of their encounter.

  After she’d looked around for salient details, she moved back a short way, to stand next to Josh. “Was that the school where you used to teach?” she inquired.

  “No.” He seemed to hesitate before telling her which that had been.

  She asked him why he hadn’t spoken to Mr Dane.

  He shrugged. “Some deep, subconscious resistance to authority, maybe?”

  It hadn’t looked all that subconscious, though. “Must make it hard on open evenings.”

  “Oh, when your children are as bright as mine you don’t need to attend those things.” He didn’t add that Dawn went to them unfailingly.

  “I’ll tell you what amazes me: that they could have kept all this so utterly secret for the past five days! They must be quite remarkable.”

  “They are. And if they hadn’t been, why do you think this angel would have chosen them?”

  “My goodness,” she said.

  “What?”

  “Could the confirmed atheist be undergoing a change of heart?”

  “Good God, no.” He gave his swift, attractive grin. “I’m afraid my mind was on something else.”

  “Ah.”

  When the two of them were sitting in the car again, a little ahead of the others, who were choosing ice creams for themselves, he asked, “How long will you be staying? Or don’t you know yet?”

  “Well, at least until tomorrow. Graeme goes back this evening.”

  “The Royal’s a good place. It’s just on that corner, if you look through the rear window. Beyond the petrol station.”

  As she screwed round, instead of moving his body away to give her room, he appeared to bring it slightly towards her. The contact wasn’t much, yet she was suddenly aware of a tension between them that was sensual and electric. She quickly drew back. And when she spoke again she was relieved to hear her voice sound normal.

  “Tell me, Josh. Why did the boys look so surprised to see us just now and what did Billy mean when he told you he thought Mr Madison had asked for a few days of…something or other…and you cut him off and said there’d been a change of policy?”

  “Simon Madison’s the vicar.”

  “I know that.”

  “Did I say a change of policy?”

  She smiled. “I got the impression you might be trying to keep something from me.”

  “It can’t have been important. If I remember I’ll let you know.”

  She nodded, reflectively: now formulating a suspicion she hadn’t consciously admitted until then.

  Could she trust him?

  The boys returned soon after. This time Michael sat at the front while William squeezed in next to his father at the back. Graeme had gone into the Scunthorpe Evening Telegraph, whose office was hardly twenty yards from the parked car, and asked for any photographs they might have of the vicar of St Mathew’s. He came back carrying a Manila envelope.

  Then they drove down West Street, to the block of flats where the Heaths lived.

  There, Josh ran upstairs to prepare his wife for the arrival of the press. She flustered easily, he said; he’d thought it better not to give her any warning. And when the others followed him up after the agreed five minutes she was clearly far from happy. Yet, equally clearly, she responded well to Graeme, a fact Geraldine found less surprising then than later, and by the time he’d taken a dozen photos and said he must depart she was pressing him to stay for at least a cup of tea. Though he declined with lazy Aussie charm, and a promise he’d take her up on it the next time he hit Scunthorpe, Geraldine of course accepted.

  “Not,” she murmured sweetly, stooping at the nearside window, “that I rate even as a consolation prize, you great smooth layabout from Bondi Beach!”

  “Jericho, stop griping, will you? Can’t you see you’re well in with the trumpet player?”

  “Trumpet player?”

  “And the walls came tumbling down!”

  “Now there, as a matter of fact, you do find an example of a man with sex appeal.”

  “Well, you know the place they say you’ll often get the best story?”

  Back upstairs, she joined a mildly relapsed Dawn in the kitchen, where, while tea was being prepared, the talk was fleetingly of Graeme, then of the angel, finally of Mr Apsbury. Elderly vicars, it seemed, could make Dawn forget both about secret troubles and large young Australians and even perhaps about messengers from heaven; and to begin with Geraldine viewed such a fast-returning interest in church life as nothing more than sublimation—until she realized she was doing this and rebuked herself for indulging in not merely an anti-feminist but, maybe worse, a stereotypical way of thinking.

  She fought, too, against forming glib judgments on the angel story: it was very plain the boys believed in what they’d told her. And the business of the almost disfiguring acne…what was one to make of that? She’d been shown a snapshot, obviously a recent one. (Had borrowed it, as well.) She thought that Geoff would have to come up with some pretty solid medical opinion in the face of such evidence (ha, ha!) as indeed, knowing him, she supposed there was little doubt he would.

  But, from one moment to the next…She would stake her career on it Dawn was neither lying nor even consciously exaggerating. So what was the answer? Josh Heath, out for fame and fortune, taking a crash course in hypnotism? The notion made her smile. Yet leaving aside such tempting possibilities, what were you left with? A miracle? Two miracles? A message?

  Thank God though, she reflected, she had only to report, not interpret.

  And, as to that, she did her reporting from outside the general post office. It took her fifteen minutes to dictate the story. Luckily it was a good line and so for once she didn’t have to enunciate like Sybil Thorndike. But, all the same, this evening she tried extra hard to eliminate all chance of ambiguity. For, if the copy-taker
’s reaction was any real guide, people were going to be sufficiently incredulous anyhow.

  24

  Dawn Heath had insisted on her having tea with them: an omelette and chips, with bread and jam and homemade cake. They were a nice family, Geraldine thought. Although the boys didn’t say much, they were attentive and polite, and if an angel were going to appear to any teenage lads, why not to them? They joined in their mother’s speculations on the nature of the publicity to come and what the reactions of the world were most likely to be. What they ought to be, at any rate: Dawn furnished lengthy quotations complete with chapter and verse and rather warm, velvety cheeks. The quote which seemed to give her the most comfort, however, since she came back to it three times, was not in fact from the Bible. God moves in a mysterious way his wonders to perform. Her second favourite was more orthodox: All things work together for good to them that love God. Geraldine noticed that on the five or six occasions Dawn looked at her husband and then appeared to falter again, one or other of these statements almost visibly restored her confidence. Only Josh himself remained apart from all of this: not silent but not serious. Geraldine became impatient of his comments. Once he even winked at her over the top of William’s head. She felt prissily shocked and pretended she hadn’t seen.

  But then he also seemed apart from the other main topic of conversation: the engagement of their daughter to a young man from Sheffield who was ‘really nice’ according to Dawn, ‘ace’ according to Michael and ‘okay’ according to his brother. “She’s a very lucky girl and so are we, Josh, aren’t we, we’re extremely blest! (Of course, Donald is, too, Miss Coe; I think I can say that, even if I do happen to be her mum!) Yes, praise the Lord, if we do half as well with the sweethearts these two eventually bring home (and indeed I know we will: every bit as well) then at least we’ll never have much to complain about in that direction. Not that I’m inferring we should complain at all, ever, about anything…Oh, pay no attention to him, Miss Coe: those faces he’s always pulling: you can never get him to show that he’s in tune with the rest of us, it’s really easier not to try.” Geraldine made no answer but she could see that over four years’ unemployment might have affected him far less positively than he’d acknowledged; and she felt she knew him no better now than after his telephone call eight hours ago.

  After tea, though, she was given a further opportunity to put this right.

  “Miss Coe’s going to be stopping at the Royal,” he announced. “I’ll walk her up there.”

  “Oh, no,” she said, “you mustn’t bother.”

  “Can I come, too?” asked Michael.

  “May,” said his father, adding firmly, “No—you’ve got your homework.”

  “I noticed a mistake that Mum made earlier.” The boy smiled ingratiatingly.

  “Nothing to the mistake she made about fifteen years ago.”

  “You mean, when marrying you?”

  “Then that would really turn you into one, wouldn’t it?”

  “No.” He shook his head happily. “Only Janice and Billy. Not me.”

  “All right: that round to you. But if you’re going to turn into a self-satisfied little stoolie you needn’t reckon you don’t also qualify. Besides…”

  “What?”

  “Angels don’t have dealings with informers. At least, I certainly wouldn’t trust one that did.”

  Geraldine couldn’t be sure how much of this was staged for her benefit. The good parent syndrome: here you see more of a friend than a father! Then again she felt irritated with herself. In all probability it had contained an element of showmanship but if she hadn’t been there she thought that it could still have taken place.

  They walked through a shopping precinct towards the High Street, Josh carrying her small suitcase, and at the first crossroad he took her arm although there wasn’t any traffic. She became increasingly certain that within the next half-hour he was going to make a pass at her. What was less certain was whether she would mind.

  “I noticed that, back there, we Heaths all talked exclusively about ourselves. Nobody seemed much interested in hearing about the life and times of Miss Geraldine Coe, girl correspondent.”

  “Not true,” she answered. “Your wife asked me a number of things while we were doing the washing up. Your sons were with us, too, and seemingly interested.” She suspected that Josh might have been getting rid of his (not very heavy) six o’clock shadow at the time and splashing on, a little too liberally, more of that cheap aftershave.

  “All the same,” he said, “it’s now my turn. Tell me, Miss Coe, are you happy in your work?”

  “Yes, thank you. Mostly.”

  “Career woman?”

  “Certainly. Any reason why not?”

  “You wouldn’t give it up, then, if the right man came along?”

  “The right man wouldn’t expect me to.”

  “Then the right man wouldn’t want children?”

  “Perhaps I’m unnatural. At the moment, to me, children don’t seem all that necessary.”

  “Good.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. A lot of women are pressured into feeling they ought to have children. It’s nice to see you’re different.”

  “Well, I think I shan’t really know how different I am until the situation arises, if it ever does.”

  “Oh, come off it. You know that you’re attractive.”

  “That isn’t quite the compliment you think.”

  They arrived at the hotel. The receptionist had difficulty in finding her a room. Geraldine signed the register. Josh suggested they should have a drink at the bar. “I can’t stay here too long,” he added, on seeing her hesitate.

  This struck Geraldine as pathetic. “All right. On the Chronicle.”

  “Very much on the Chronicle. By the way, when do I get my cheque?”

  “I was going to give it to you in the morning or at any rate before I left. I can make it out now if you like.”

  “No, when you go. A nice little parting gift. Something to remember you by.” He didn’t ask about the sum involved.

  He ordered a gin-and-It for her, a whisky for himself. Doubles.

  They sat in comfortable armchairs in comfortable surroundings. The place was fairly empty.

  “Why aren’t you married, then, by the age of…thirty? Thirty-one?”

  “As though marriage were definitely the be-all and end-all?”

  “Isn’t it?”

  “Well, you tell me, then. Is it?”

  “A good one.”

  But she didn’t wish to hear about his marriage problems. “And, damn you, you’re an unflatteringly good judge of age.”

  “You don’t need to damn me. I’m sure I’m damned already.”

  “That isn’t what you were saying in the coffee bar.”

  “Damn what I was saying in the coffee bar.” They laughed.

  “But in that case hadn’t you better do something about it? You can’t go round feeling you’re damned…whatever that expression may mean to an unbeliever.”

  “Two lost souls on the highway of life,” he said grandiloquently. He thought he might have heard it in a song.

  “Why two?”

  “Because I wouldn’t even mind being damned if I were in the right company.”

  He smiled.

  “Come to that, I wouldn’t even mind being saved if I were in the right company.”

  “There’s one thing. Nobody could call you a fussy man.”

  “But…”

  “But…?”

  “I do like a little bit of butter to my bread!”

  “Of course! How could I forget?”

  “I think you’re meant to say, ‘There, there!’”

  “No. That’s the wife’s job. It was the Queen who said, ‘There, there!’”

  “It was also the dairymaid.”

  “I suppose I should be thankful it wasn’t the cow.”

  They both remembered at the same moment. The cow
had said it. It was a good moment.

  His whisky was finished quickly. He went to fetch another. “Charge it to me,” Geraldine called across.

  “I have!”

  He returned to his chair.

  “You know, when you picked me up on the be-all and end-all, I wasn’t thinking of it only from the woman’s point of view.”

  “In that case, perhaps you’re not as lost as you believe you are. Or, actually, as I believed you were when you said it.”

  “Friends?”

  She nodded. “Friends.” They raised their glasses to the concept.

  “No, I’m not lost at all.” He was very much a creature of moods, or contradictions. “I know where I’m going.”

  “In search of butter.”

  “It’s just that…well, the dear knows who’s going with me.”

  “I know who’s going with me,” she said. “Or, anyway, I hope I do. You see, there is in fact somebody I’d like to marry. But there’s a snag.”

  “He has a wife already.”

  “End of sad and very ordinary story.”

  “It must be me.”

  “Except, as I say, I hope it’s not the end.”

  “Again you missed your cue.”

  “Oh?”

  “Is he happy with his wife, this man of yours?”

  “Do you really suppose that if he were—?”

  “No, of course not. Sorry. Wasn’t thinking.”

  “They live in the same house,” she said, “but apparently don’t talk. Or hardly ever. Only when it’s unavoidable.”

  “My God! Then why don’t they divorce?”

  “He says they will…when the children have left school. The younger one is fifteen.”

  “Another three years?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Another three years.”

  “And in the meantime how often do you see him?”

  “Two or three evenings a week. He stays quite late.”

  “And don’t you worry he may be taking you for a ride? A wife at home who cooks his food and washes his clothes and knows his funny little ways. Respectability. And a sophisticated and intelligent girlfriend who looks the way you do and possesses her own flat…”