Harnessing Peacocks

by Mary Wesley

  ‘Julian.’

  ‘All I ask is what his father does. No need to say “Julian” in that tone of voice.’

  ‘Silas’ mother is very beautiful.’ Michael’s voice gave its first pubertal crack.

  ‘Beautiful, is she? Hah! A beautiful endangered species. She must have been something before she was a cook.’ With the doggedness of intoxication Julian worried his prey.

  ‘My mother is a Hermaphrodite,’ said Silas proudly, ‘and you are disgusting.’ He flung his wine in Julian’s face, stood up, threw down his napkin and left the cottage.

  Twenty-one

  LOOKING AT THE CLOCK on the dashboard, Mungo noted the lateness of the hour. Too late now to find a bed for the night. He had been driving at random, angry and frustrated since leaving Louisa’s house. My dreams have fallen about my ears, he thought morosely. Where the hell am I? He had been travelling fast along unknown roads; the petrol gauge was dangerously low. ‘That’s all I need,’ Mungo muttered, driving slowly now, on the lookout for a signpost.

  Presently he came to one which said ‘Salisbury 5 miles’. There would surely be an all-night garage. He nursed the car, glancing at the gauge which arrowed the red line. It seemed an age before he was on the outskirts of the city, passing one closed petrol station after another. Soon he was in the one-way system designed by clever councillors to entrap tourists. Close to the centre the engine sighed to a halt. Mungo drew into the kerb. He was tired, fed up and far from home. He got out of the car, locked it and started to walk. Rounding a corner he sighted a bay window in a small Georgian house, a white front door with a fanlight above it, a highly polished dolphin knocker. Light shone through the fanlight. Above the bay window the words ‘Rory Grant, Hatter.’ If only I had a brick to hurl through the bloody window. Mungo used the knocker—bang, bang, bang.

  ‘Hang on, I’m coming. What’s the—’ Rory opened the door. ‘Oh, it’s you.’ He recoiled.

  Mungo shouldered past his cousin. ‘I’ve run out of petrol.’

  ‘Come in, then.’ Rory looked at Mungo anxiously. ‘I may have—a—’

  ‘Have you got anything to drink? I’m done in.’

  ‘—can in the garage. Yes, of course. Coffee? Whisky? Come into the—’ but Mungo was already in the kitchen and slumped at the table.

  ‘You are up early,’ he said in a surly voice.

  ‘I haven’t been to bed, I was too—’

  ‘Upset. Me too. I’ve been driving in circles.’

  ‘Here’s some—’ Rory produced a bottle of whisky, poured half a glass and pushed it across the table towards Mungo, then helped himself. Mungo drank, eyeing his cousin, who looked rather ahead of him in the drinking stakes.

  ‘You drunk?’ he asked.

  ‘Not yet. Would you like some soup?’

  ‘Oh, God,’ said Mungo. ‘Soup.’

  ‘You look hungry.’ Rory busied himself finding bread, butter, heating soup.

  ‘I haven’t come to stay.’ Mungo put down his glass with an aggressive clunk.

  ‘Of course not.’ Rory pushed a bowl of soup towards his cousin, handed him a spoon. ‘We can hate each other better when we’ve eaten.’

  Mungo ate his soup, buttered his bread. ‘Got any cheese?’

  ‘Yes, I, yes I have.’ Rory got up, lurched to the larder, came back with Stilton in ajar. Mungo dug with his knife with vicious jabs, disgusting Rory at the combination of soup and cheese.

  ‘She is an absolute bloody bitch. I was going to marry her. I am going to marry her. This come from Fortnums?’

  ‘So am I,’ said Rory, pushing his soup plate from him with a jerk. ‘Yes, it does.’

  ‘I was first, I have first go,’ Mungo growled.

  ‘You are married to Alison.’ Rory peered sagely at Mungo. ‘While you get, while—er—start again. While you get shot of horrible Alison I will marry Hebe. Me first.’

  ‘Don’t call my wife horrible,’ Mungo roared.

  ‘There we go,’ Rory let out a crow of laughter. ‘Horrible Alison and,’ he shot a glittering look at Mungo, ‘you have two horrible little boys.’

  ‘True.’ Mungo spooned soup. It was delicious, revivifying, probably also Fortnums. Bachelors could afford such luxuries.

  ‘Got to think of them.’ Rory was uplifted by whisky.

  ‘Can’t bear to. Never have children,’ Mungo advised Rory. ‘Millstones, total millstones.’ He stared at Rory. ‘What she see in you? You are such a funny shape.’

  ‘Okay in bed,’ Rory answered cockily, ‘and she, oh Mungo, she is so, so, so—’ Tears began to gather.

  ‘So marvellous,’ said Mungo, moved too. ‘So soft, so warm. Not a bit flabby. So tender, just the right weight. I could eat her.’

  ‘You talk as though she was a prime steak,’ cried Rory, indignant, lachrymose.

  ‘I shall if I want to, she’s my mistress.’ Mungo tried to whip his rage into fresh life.

  ‘We are just members of her Syndicate.’

  ‘Her what?’ He glared at Rory.

  ‘Syndicate. That’s what she calls it.’

  ‘Oh, holy Jesus Christ, oh, the cow, what an absolute cow!’ Mungo yelled.

  Rory, leaning across the table, slapped his cousin. ‘I have wanted to do that for years, ever since—’

  ‘When?’ Mungo stared at his young relation with interest.

  ‘You said I looked like the White Rabbit.’

  ‘Only your expression. I don’t think it’s going to bleed, is it?’ He fingered his nose.

  ‘I fear not. More whisky?’

  ‘Why not? We’d better finish the bottle or it will feel lonely.’ Mungo pushed his glass towards the bottle. Rory poured, squinting.

  Mungo felt an improbable stirring of friendship.

  ‘What shall we do?’ Rory cried, sensing an ally.

  ‘If you knew that girl as well as I do you would say what will Hebe do,’ said Mungo gloomily. ‘Any more soup? It’s good, what is it?’

  ‘Game. She made it. We found grouse at the fishmongers. Aunt Louisa gave me a thermosful to bring home.’ Rory poured the remains of the soup into Mungo’s plate.

  ‘We should not be drinking whisky with this. Haven’t you any claret?’ asked Mungo aggressively.

  ‘Oh, God.’ Rory got up and disappeared through a doorway. Mungo listened to his uncertain steps on stone stairs and vague mutterings in the cellar below. He reappeared carrying a bottle. ‘I was saving it for, saving it for—’

  ‘Hebe.’ Mungo took the bottle, rummaged in a drawer and found a corkscrew, uncorked the bottle. ‘I would like to strangle her.’ He set the bottle on the table between them.

  Rory looked appalled. ‘What has she done to deserve that?’

  ‘Cheated.’

  ‘No, no, she is absolutely—’

  ‘Fair,’ Mungo grunted. ‘Why don’t you finish your bloody sentences?’ He snatched at the bottle and sloshed the wine into his empty whisky glass.

  ‘That’s what Hebe says. Oh Hebe, oh hell.’ Rory helped himself to wine. ‘It hasn’t had time to—’

  ‘Breathe.’ Mungo was morose. They sat in gloom, sharing something akin to comradeship.

  ‘How long?’ asked Rory.

  ‘Six years,’ said Mungo. ‘Six years. Six weeks a year for six years. Three lots of two weeks, always when it suited her. I’ve a service flat in London she comes to. I take her to the theatre, to bloody highbrow films, to exhibitions. I let her shop. She sends me to my office or my club when she gets bored, we play backgammon.’

  ‘You make her sound like a feminist virago.’

  ‘She’s a pimpless tart, a soloist. I tried to instal her in a flat of her own, but no, she wouldn’t hear of it, too bloody independent. For six years I’ve been trying to find out where she lives. D’you know, if I want to get in touch with her I have to write to a fucking little shop in Earls Court which forwards her letters.’

  ‘Won’t they—’

  ‘Clam up. It’s a Pakistani family, they just laugh.�
��

  ‘Where did you—er where—’

  ‘Meet her? In my mother’s kitchen. She goes and cooks when the housekeeper is on holiday. Alison’s arrangement, can you beat it?’

  ‘Your mother, Aunt Lucy—great chum of Aunt—’

  ‘Louisa’s. Yes.’

  ‘Does your mother, does Aunt—’

  ‘Neither of them know,’ Mungo was perversely proud, ‘where she lives.’

  ‘It can’t be true.’

  ‘It bloody is true,’ said Mungo, adding, ‘I hope.’

  The cousins sat drinking the chilly claret, their soup plates pushed aside. Mungo dug his knife into the jar of Stilton, fishing out crumbs of cheese which he conveyed thoughtfully to his mouth. Rory, too depressed to protest, decided to put the remains of the cheese on his bird table. He did not fancy Mungo’s spittle.

  ‘What arrangement have you got?’ Mungo asked in a threatening tone.

  ‘I shall take her to Aunt Calypso’s cottage in the wood when the cherries are in flower.’ Rory was not prepared to admit there was as yet no arrangement. ‘Of course she’s very happy—er—happy—’

  ‘Happy?’ Knife loaded with Stilton halfway to his mouth, Mungo repeated, ‘Happy?’

  ‘Happy here.’ Bravely Rory spoke. He watched his cousin, ready to spring out of reach should he attack.

  ‘She’s expensive.’ Mungo put the cheese into his mouth. ‘She costs.’

  ‘I can afford her—I—’

  ‘Rich bachelor.’ Mungo was contemptuous, also envious. ‘I suspected you of poofery.’

  ‘Must be a drain on your resources, what with Alison and the boys,’ said Rory nastily, ‘quite a—’

  ‘I dress some of it up as expenses.’

  ‘What a good idea. I could say she—’

  ‘What?’ Mungo was instantly alert.

  ‘Models my hats.’ Both men began to laugh. Rory refilled the glasses.

  ‘Do you know who the other members of the Syndicate are?’ Mungo enunciated carefully.

  Rory said, ‘No, I can’t bear—’

  ‘Nor can I. Doesn’t bear thinking of.’ Mungo dropped his knife on the table with a clatter. ‘What say we keep her in the family?’

  ‘Share her?’ Rory was startled.

  ‘Yes. Let’s go and put it to her. You half, me half, fair do’s, eh?’ Suddenly he felt friendly towards this young cousin with his hare’s eyes. ‘And when the boys grow up they can join the Syndicate. Put their names down now as you do for Eton. Brilliant. That’s what we’ll do.’

  ‘Disgusting!’ shouted Rory.

  ‘Do you think so?’ Mungo was still amiable. ‘I thought family Syndicate—er—like Rothschilds or something, junior partners, Marks and Sparks.’

  ‘Certainly not,’ said Rory, shocked.

  ‘Okay, just you and me then.’

  ‘I am going to marry her,’ said Rory, enunciating carefully.

  ‘Not that again. Listen, if there is one thing I know about Hebe it is that she won’t marry us.’

  ‘Not you, perhaps.’

  ‘Nor you.’

  ‘Then why did you say—’

  ‘What one wants and what one gets are totally different things,’ said Mungo philosophically.

  ‘Ah me.’ Rory picked up the bottle. ‘Empty.’

  ‘Tell you what.’ Mungo stood up and began lurching round the kitchen. ‘Tell you what, we had better go back and have a confrontation.’

  ‘At Aunt Louisa’s? What for?’

  ‘Clear the air,’ said Mungo. ‘What’s the time?’

  ‘Five o’clock.’

  ‘Better shave first.’ Mungo started towards the stairs. ‘Have a bath.’ He seized the banisters. ‘This your bedroom?’ He had reached the landing, rocking up the stairs.

  ‘Yes—er—’

  ‘Your bed? Where you and Hebe?’

  ‘Yes, we—’ Rory followed his cousin.

  ‘What say we have a nap first?’ Mungo caught Rory’s arm and they fell together on to the bed.

  ‘I say—’ Rory felt he did not know what he wanted to say. He felt dizzy.

  ‘Just a nap, then bath, shave, go together to fix the bloody Syndicate, fix Hebe. Lie still, can’t you.’ Mungo kicked off his shoes.

  ‘I don’t like being in bed with you.’ Rory sniffed, hoping for a faint reminder of Hebe on the pillow then, remembering he had changed the sheets, felt desolate. It was horrible having his great lump of a cousin sprawling on his bed. It was also impossible to sit up, get off the bed, stand up. Rory surrendered to exhaustion, alcohol and Mungo’s bullying.

  As Mungo began to snore Rory reviewed his dreams. He had seen himself wandering with Hebe through the wood, the cherries in flower, at their feet bluebells and late primroses, early pink campion, birds singing their spring chorus, the sun would slant through tender leaves of oak, beech, ash, in the depth of the wood the cuckoo—Oh God, the cuckoo! He turned away from Mungo, away from the light now streaming in from the world outside. How could he defeat Mungo, what arguments could be used? Alison, Ian, Alistair, seemed to carry no weight. Would the sentence so often used by his parents to thwart him—‘What would the family say?’—be of the slightest use?

  Twenty-two

  ON THE WAY FROM the heliport Silas rehearsed what he would say to his mother. He carried Hebe’s Guernsey sweater. He pulled up the hood of his parka, shielding his face from cars passing along the road who might recognise him, stop, offer him a lift, ask with kindly curiosity whether he had a good time sailing. On the beach the high-tide mark was a line of weed wrenched from the seabed by the storm. Along this children ran shouting to each other as they gathered driftwood into a pyre, building a bonfire which would burn with blue flames from the lumps of coagulated oil. To the debris they would add refuse—plastic containers which would explode in the heat, adding a tinge of risk to their pleasure. People would complain about the smoke which would drift inland to sully their nylon curtains. Silas watched. Many times he had collected driftwood, taking armfuls home to burn in the sitting-room fire. He felt a sharp desire to join the girls and boys. Then he saw Giles was with them. He did not at all want to see Giles.

  His thoughts reverting to Hebe, Silas recited to himself: ‘It was marvellous. They have asked me to come again. I am home early because Mrs Reeves’ father is ill. They are all going back. They sent you all sorts of messages—the food was very good—my clothes were just right—I’m afraid I spilled something on your Guernsey. We sailed round Bishop’s Rock lighthouse—no, not dangerous at all, it was thrilling—I liked the other boys—a terrific family—it was brilliant.’ A load of cock, he told himself. Cock was an expression fancied by Alistair. She will know it’s cock when she smells the sick on her jersey. What am I to say? he asked himself for the hundredth time. Perhaps she will take it for granted the visit was okay, just as she believes what I tell her about school. About the only thing I’ve got from the Scillies is to use the word ‘cock’ and the seals and the adder and the colour of the sea. Should he ‘lose’ Hebe’s jersey, drop it over the sea wall? Then she would not smell the vomit. No good. He remembered that she had paid a lot for the jersey and justified herself by saying, ‘You will be able to wear it, it will come in useful when you’ve grown a bit.’ God, how he hated the thing. And what was he to say about his duffle bag, how to explain its loss? Silas urged himself on. She would be so pleased to see him she would forget to ask questions. She never questioned him much, that was one of the marvellous things about her. Silas broke into a run.

  Swinging round the corner, starting the stiff climb up the dark brick street, he forced his pace, his spirits rising. Soon he would be with Hebe. She would look as she looked on the station platform when he arrived back from school, eyes large, wearing a rather mad expression. She would hug him, he would put his arms round her, lay his head against her chest, they would laugh with relief at being together. It would be all right, Silas told himself, nearly there. He ran, arriving on the doorstep in a rush of j
oy.

  The door was locked.

  Silas was stunned. Peering from the window Trip, opening her mouth in a silent mew, showed her needle teeth and pink palate. Silas ran round to the back of the house. The back door was also locked. He rattled the handle. Trip came out through the cat-flap and wound herself purring round his legs, nudging him, turning in and out so that her whole body, including her tail, was part of the caress. Silas picked her up and held her close to his face. He remembered. He was to have been three weeks in the islands. She had said she would do a job in Wiltshire for a fortnight while he was gone. Silas sat down on the wet doorstep. He had guessed when Hebe told him about the job that she was only going because he was robbing her of a chunk of his holidays. He had blocked the knowledge. He had wanted to go to the Scillies. He had not cared. He had known perfectly well she was only filling in the time because he would not be there. Holding the cat against his face Silas wept; the addition of guilt to the shame and mortification he was suffering was too much. His eyes streamed, his nose trickled, he disgusted the cat, who jumped away, going back into the house through the cat-flap. Silas put his head between his knees and sobbed. He decided to throw himself over the cliff and have done with it.

  ‘Can I be of any help?’

  Silas saw feet, legs in jeans, tweed jacket over a dark sweater, above that a face he had not seen before. He struggled to his feet. He was cold and stiff from squatting on the doorstep. The man wore an old felt hat, rain dripped from its brim. ‘Who are you?’ he asked and was ashamed of his tearful voice.

  ‘Name is Jim Huxtable,’ said the stranger. ‘Rather wanted to see the girl who lives here.’

  ‘She’s not here.’ Silas started to cry again. He was cold, tired, hungry, wet. He wished the man would go away. He wanted to die. Failing that, he wanted his mother.

  ‘And you are shut out?’

  ‘She’s away.’

  ‘Who has the key?’

  ‘Terry or Hannah or Amy but I—’

  ‘Don’t want to ask them.’

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Who feeds the cat?’

  ‘Terry or Hannah.’

  ‘When will she be back, your mother?’ What a bedraggled child.