by David Fraser
‘Sorry I’m a bit late.’
He could not look up at first, his heart was thumping so hard he needed a second for self-collection. There was no doubt of it. He rose stiffly to his feet. She was wearing a light grey dress, bare arms, a red belt, red handbag. Eyes as he remembered, mouth as he remembered. Voice a little deeper than he remembered, although it had always been deep, full-throated.
‘I did not believe you would come.’
‘Well, I don’t suppose I should have, should I?’ said Marcia. ‘But here I am.’
‘I was distressed to hear about your brother. Truly distressed.’
It had taken about ten minutes to cover the preliminaries, set up transmission posts, establish communication. Ten minutes, with the heart of each beating fast.
‘It’s been ghastly. We were very close.’
‘I know that.’
‘Poor, darling old Ant,’ she blinked back tears. ‘Of course, you know he was once in love with Anna Langenbach? With the woman you wanted to marry, Toni!’
Toni looked at his plate, unsmiling, and then looked up, looked Marcia full in the face.
‘Yes, I did want that. It was a piece of selfish foolishness. I thought you and I had no future.’
‘Well, I suppose we didn’t really. And Anna had a pretty good future!’
‘Everything seemed possible. She was attractive, we got on. And yes, of course I was influenced by the fact that she was a woman – let’s say a woman of property. Does one say that?’
‘It has a nice, old-fashioned ring. And you were a nice, old-fashioned boy, weren’t you!’
Toni didn’t smile.
‘For two reasons it was criminal folly. First, because I didn’t in the least love her, delightful, lovely woman though she was. Second because I loved you.’
Marcia nibbled at a Noisette d’agneau with little appetite. Toni continued, almost inaudibly –
‘Yes, I loved you. But I didn’t reckon, at the time, that I loved you so much that nothing else could ever be a substitute for it. I thought I might – how would you put it? – get you out of my system. By the means of an elegant, charming, desirable alternative.’
‘And couldn’t you?’
‘You know I couldn’t.’
‘I minded, Toni.’
He sighed.
‘Anna soon made me stop my nonsense as far as she was concerned. She would never have cared a rap for me. And at heart, of course, I felt nothing, nothing of any real depth for her. I just wanted a wife – a decorative, desirable, prosperous wife. With you it was different.’
‘And so?’
‘And so, you see, you stayed in my system. For long, long years of solitude, fear, hunger, despair, you stayed in my system. I don’t like that expression. Is it correct?’
‘I’m not sure it is, Toni, dear. One gets someone out of one’s system, but, odd though it seems, I’m not sure one gets someone in.’
‘So what’s the right expression?’
Marcia ignored this. Remembering, cloudy-eyed, she said –
‘You said to me, “We should thank God for what we’ve had together and not expect anything from the future.’ You were pushing me away, Toni. I was an embarrassment. And you wanted to pursue Anna unembarrassed.’
‘Marcia –’
‘Didn’t you, Toni?’
Toni gazed at her with a steadiness very different from the dancing vivacity which his eyes had held in the old days when they encountered the eyes of a woman.
‘Yes. You are right.’
Marcia smiled gratefully.
‘I’m so glad to hear you say that, Toni.’
He was puzzled. ‘How – glad?’
‘Because, you see, it’s honest. There’s no love without honesty, Toni. To feel something really, is so burning, so important that it just can’t exist with lies or double talk. One can’t use that word, love, except with total, total –’
‘Surrender,’ suggested Toni, almost inaudibly. Astonishingly, he found tears were pricking at his eyelids.
‘Well, sincerity, anyway. At least I can’t. But not everybody’s capable of it. Perhaps they’re happier if they aren’t.’
Toni was silent.
‘It hurt never to hear from you, Toni, to have Kaspar von Arzfeld read aloud from a letter to him – and never a word to me. To hear you mentioned – Oh Toni! I can feel it still! Of course I knew you had made the break. But I can feel it still.’
Toni bowed his head.
Marcia said – ‘Anthony. Anna Langenbach.’
‘Ah, yes. I have heard the stories. She protected him, an escaped prisoner of war. That was very dangerous and she paid for it, poor, beautiful Anna. They were lovers, I suppose?’
‘Yes, they were.’
‘I hope he was worthy of her, I expect he was, your poor brother. If he was like you he must have been worthy of her.’
‘I don’t know about that. But I know they loved each other deeply. It’s an extraordinary story. Anthony escaped from a Prisoner of War Camp with Robert. With my husband.’
‘Robert. Your husband.’
‘Did I tell you, when we met in July, how Ant got stranded and how Robert got back to England?’
‘No. And I do not in the least wish to hear about it.’
Marcia avoided his eye.
‘How long are you in England this time, Toni?’
‘That depends. Marcia, do you love your husband?’
She looked at him. He looked at her seriously, sternly, without affectation. It was a different face from that she remembered. She was suddenly aware of nobody else in the room. There appeared to be silence all around them, empty tables, the rest of the world withdrawn to a respectful distance having for the moment no part to play. There was just Toni, the other side of his untasted Escalope de veau Marsala, his eyes holding hers. Marcia found that both her hands were on the table cloth and were touching both of his.
‘Oh Toni,’ said Marcia, ‘no, I don’t. Not the least little bit.’
‘Is it possible, Toni, that a feeling like this can last between two people who don’t see each other for fifteen years? It’s a dream isn’t it?
‘Yes, it is possible. No, it is not a dream. Have I shocked you with the suddenness of this? I’ve been thinking of it, of you, every hour since we met in July, you know.’
‘No. No shock.’
‘You understand that I mean it – more than anything, ever?’
‘Yes. I think I do. I think I believe you. I will let you have my answer tomorrow. I won’t keep you waiting. I won’t leave you in doubt.’
‘I am forty-nine, Marcia. And you know what happened to thirteen of my years.’
‘I’m forty. And you know what happened to some of mine.’
‘Marcia, once in the war they came to me with hints about you, about the undesirability of an officer of my position being involved with an English girl. I explained to them that I probably wouldn’t see you again, so they let me alone. I denied you, Marcia. The cock crew for me. Imagine!’
‘I’m imagining.’
‘I have deserved nothing. But still I ask you to believe me now.’
‘Perhaps I do.’
‘Marcia, do you remember –’
‘Smell of apples, Toni, in a bedroom in that little Gasthof near Arzfeld. Large, ancient fourposter bed. Hard, ancient mattress.’
‘Vienna. That winter of 1939. Marcia, you wore a cossack hat, a fur hat, long boots. I had never seen such a sparkle as there was in your eyes, standing in the snow, laughing.’
‘It was my first real laughter since Werner was killed. You brought me to life again. I was living a half-life. Werner was gone, your kind Rudberg cousins treated me as if I was a convalescent, I knew I’d been an idiot to stay in Austria, an enemy alien, God knew what would happen. Then you happened.’
‘You were lovely, adorable, you touched my heart as no other woman had. I didn’t like that. I liked being free, selfish, untied. You stole my freedom though I didn�
��t realize it at the time. You’re a thief. I’ve never regained my freedom, Marcia. But now I don’t want to.’
‘You said to me, Toni, “When you laugh, it’s like water rippling over stones in the sunlight.” Do you remember saying that? It wasn’t very good but I was touched that you were attempting poetic expression, touched by the effort! Do you remember?’
‘Yes. It was actually at Arzfeld, a hot day, the woods green, cool and inviting. You wore a yellow dress. Your neck and arms were pale brown against it.
‘I so longed for the hours to pass, for the evening.’
‘So did I.’
‘If we … Your father would, I suppose, be upset. These things disturb the pattern of family life, make it uncomfortable. I’ve never met him but I know you love him. I understand that aspect.’
‘How patient, how objective you are, Count Rudberg! Where’s that impetuosity I recall?’
‘Still there. But I prefer to say these things than to wait for you to say them.’
‘My father’s a darling. He’s been shattered – utterly shattered – by Ant’s, by Anthony’s –’ she looked away for a moment.
‘I certainly don’t wish to hurt him. But if I were to become happy he’d be happy himself. He’d mutter a little at first. He’s conventional, principled. His own marriage was very happy. But by now he doesn’t feel affection for Robert although he respects him, he’s sad we’re like we are. And he’s disappointed not to have grandchildren, I know that.’
‘Ah –’
‘I’m forty, Toni. Forty-one next birthday.’
They laughed at each other.
‘Do you remember –’
‘Polite conversation at Arzfeld –’
‘You explaining you were there because your friend Captain Berckheim had a sister nearby and had persuaded you to spend a few days in the neighbourhood, to see the country! Did Berckheim actually exist?’
‘Certainly he existed. And his sister. They had their uses. Berckheim made my presence less obviously deliberate, when all I wanted was to see you.’
‘What happened to Berckheim?’
‘Killed on the Leningrad front.’
‘They were terrible days, Toni. Terrible, exciting days. But I look back, too, to so much sweetness. Like an enchanting melody, seductive, almost forgotten, suddenly heard again. And there’s been such discordance since – in my own life, I mean.’
‘Do you remember –’
‘Does the cause for which you fought bother you, Toni?’
‘Does it bother you, Marcia?’
‘A bit, yes. One knew so little at the time. Frido, of course. Whispers, frowns, shakings of the head by dear old conservatives like Kaspar von Arzfeld. But now one reads – Awful!’
‘Yes, of course. Well, I’ll be honest with you, I wasn’t bothered about that, I didn’t concern myself with politics, I thought the Nazis were a loud, vulgar lot but they had a lot of popular support and you need popular support in a war.’
‘Which they had started.’
‘I suppose so. I didn’t think of that much, either. I was a soldier. It was a challenge. I frankly enjoyed it. Most people in most countries prefer to think their Government has an overwhelming case once a war starts, isn’t that so?’
‘I dare say. But didn’t you know of dreadful things being done – on the Eastern Front, I’m not talking about the camps –’
‘Yes. I did. But there were so many beastly things going on there, such horrors being suffered as well as inflicted that I didn’t fuss too much. I wasn’t personally involved, you see. And I had a job to do, I was incredibly busy: and pretty busy just keeping alive, a lot of the time.’
He saw her eyes still clouded and touched her arm with the tips of his fingers.
‘It wasn’t good, Marcia, I know that. Not good at all, any of it. Maybe a price will go on being paid for a long time. I think I’ve paid my share of that price. Don’t you?’
‘My God, Toni, the things people have done to each other in our time!’
‘And are likely to continue to do, Marcia. By other names, to other sorts of people, in different uniforms, uttering different cries.’
Toni could not, Marcia thought, have expressed this sombre reflection in the old days except in a light, sardonic tone, with a smile and a shrug and a call, nevertheless, to love and forget. Now there was nothing of mockery behind the sad, ordinary words. He sounded not bitter but sorrowful.
‘I suppose we’re survivors, aren’t we, Toni?’
‘Perhaps we are. Natural survivors. More wine?’
‘Yes please. Sooner or later I’ll have to think what to do with Bargate, you know. My home. Now Anthony’s gone, it will come to me – unless Father turns me from his door for ever. Which he won’t. I mean which he wouldn’t.’
‘I see.’
Marcia giggled.
‘Oh Toni – if I agree to – to what you want, and I’ve not said I will, just think, you’ll have your wish, you’ll be what you schemed to be, married to a woman of property.’
‘Will he be utterly destroyed?’
‘Robert? No, I don’t think so. He’ll be impatient that I could be so foolish. He’s a nice man, really – intolerant but nice. For a long time I used to tell myself awful things about him. I used to pretend that he had all sorts of unpleasant characteristics. Then I realized that it’s silly – and dishonest – to persuade yourself someone is awful just because you don’t love them. It’s not a crime, to be unloved. The crime was mine, to marry him.’
Marcia was graver than at any time in the last hour. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘the crime was mine. But I don’t think I can go on paying the penalty for ever. I’m not sure, but I don’t think so.’
‘Yet his pride – his pride as a man, that will be hit hard, won’t it?’
‘He doesn’t feel in that sort of way. Perhaps I’d have cared for him more if he did. He’s reasonable, impatient, articulate. He was in love with me, whatever that meant. Even at the beginning it didn’t mean much. Not what I’d call a consuming flame! An obsession, perhaps. He wanted me badly. He disapproved of me. He wanted to possess and reform an object of which he disapproved. Which he, nevertheless, desired.’
‘He sounds very different from me.’
‘He is. But he used to be amusing, attractive once. And intelligent. Anthony and he were devoted to each other when they were younger, and he could always make me laugh. Still – Toni, I’ve not said I’ll do it yet. I’ve not taken the decision. And what do you really want – that I get a divorce? Marry you?’
‘Exactly. Exactly that.’
‘You’re a Catholic. Doesn’t that complicate things?’
‘Yes. There will be complications. We shall master them. I know perfectly well that you are meant to be with me always. It is God’s will, I am sure of it.’
‘It doesn’t sound exactly orthodox if I may say so.’
‘I am not exactly orthodox. But I spent thirteen years in a Russian prison and even I, selfish, frivolous, undeserving Rudberg, have thought about such things. And believe.’
Marcia sighed. She said,
‘I’m not ruthless enough – perhaps I’m not ruthless enough for happiness. At sudden moments I remember how delightful Robert could be – can be: how kind and helpful he was to me when I was in trouble. I’ve said he won’t be destroyed – he won’t! But I don’t want to undervalue him, run him down. It’s just that we aren’t making each other happy and I don’t think we ever can. Love’s gone, Toni. On my side it was never there. Wicked of me – but should one live with a mistake like that, or give two people another chance?’
Long ago, Toni would have listened to this with calculating approval. He would have said to himself complacently that the woman was coming round easily, that, like all women, she was making a last effort at squaring the circle, having it both ways, easing her conscience: but that ‘all would be well’, he’d have his way. Now he recognized that he didn’t feel in the least like that. He found hims
elf loving Marcia the more for what he thought was genuine consideration. Yes, this Robert whom he did not know was a man, a person, he was not evil, he was not cruel, he was not nobody. He deserved decency. Toni knew he could not express this in a way to convince. Marcia no doubt remembered only the old Rudberg, determined to flatter, nod, sigh, smile, have his way with a girl. He took her hand and said,
‘I understand you perfectly. You are right to feel as you do. I could not love you if you felt otherwise.’
Marcia looked at him with some surprise. Then it was her turn again to feel tears forcing their way to her eyes.
‘So. You will answer me tomorrow!’
‘Within twenty-four hours. Just a little thinking to be done. No confidences. No confessions. No girlish heart-to-hearts, no asking of advice. Just a little hard thinking.’ ‘Even praying,’ Marcia nearly added, but she was not sure.
‘Twenty-four hours is one thousand four hundred and forty minutes. You have already used the first. I shall think of you in each of them, willing you, willing you, willing you to reach the answer I desire. More than anything, ever. And I love you.’ They were standing on the pavement. Marcia sang softly –
‘Ich liebe dich,
So wie du mich –’
‘Ah, if you meant that –’
She laughed. ‘Goodbye, Toni. No, don’t touch me. Stay here. I’ll tell you my answer tomorrow. I’ll leave you now.’
As long ago, he whispered,
‘I am very, very loving of you, Marcia.’
‘No, Toni, that’s still not entirely right.’ There was a catch in her voice. She walked away, very fast. As Toni turned back into the restaurant to settle accounts, murmur thanks, collect his hat, he felt a humble, magical assurance that he need not unduly doubt what her answer would be.
A Note on the Author
Born the son of Brigadier, The Honourable William Fraser (1890-1964) DSO MC, David Fraser was educated at Eton College and Christ Church College, Oxford. He left school to enlist at earliest opportunity after the Second World War begun, and joined his father's regiment, the Grenadier Guards in 1940, serving for much of the War with the Guards Armoured Division, later in North West Europe, ending the war in the rank of Major.
