The Playroom

by Frances Fyfield

  ‘Mrs Pearson,’ she said, picking things up and putting them down, ‘Mr Harrison suggested I have a word . . .’

  ‘What’s the matter with him, cat got his tongue?’ She ignored that. Harrison is a man of few words.

  ‘About next door,’ she said firmly. I remembered the red flag on the railings, remembered at the same time that the silence with our neighbours would soon have to be breached. David Allendale’s birthday party. Social obligation, some time soon.

  She cleared her throat. ‘Mrs Pearson, have you seen Jeanetta? I mean, anywhere? Only I got to wondering if Mrs Allendale had been in to see you. When we was busy, that is. Recently, I mean. Some evening, perhaps? Maybe said how she was.’ The voice trailed away. She knows very well that no one comes into this house without her knowledge, noted by her eagle eye and their dimensions measured. Or lack of dimensions, in Katherine’s case.

  ‘No, not either of them.’ (Not as far as I know: the days are so blurred.) ‘Oh, yes, I have. No, wait a minute. I’ve seen her going out, both of them. And him coming in. With Jeremy. Yes I’ve seen them all. I think.’

  She sagged with relief. ‘Are you sure, the little girl, I mean, Jeanetta?’ standing there, doggedly persistent in the face of indifferent replies.

  ‘No, not completely sure. Why the hell does it matter?’

  ‘I’m worried about her,’ said Mrs Harrison, limp before bursting forth again. ‘I mean, very worried. Nothing. Not a word. She’s just gone. You can’t keep a child in a street like this and make it invisible. S’posing she’s sick or something? I’ve knocked and said I’ll take her out and he says she’s out already, thank you, but why don’t I ever see her go? Don’t even ask me to babysit like they used. You’d have thought . . .’

  ‘You mustn’t spy on them. They’re none of our business. Can’t you see they’re probably keeping out of the way because of that business with the necklace?’ I was stuffing a toy inside Mark’s kit with all my strengh. She flapped her hands, running short of words, looking anguished, opening her mouth but not speaking. Then Mark sidled into the room, peeped from behind her back. I could sense in him a desire to be gone, wanting these few days with his father as a woman might crave diamonds or a lover, impatient desire written all over him, and so hurtful it took away my breath, but I could see I had not devoted enough to him to warrant anything more. But all the same, the harshness of the ache made me angry with him. In retrospect, I was at my worst.

  ‘I seen her,’ he said. ‘Me and Sammy saw.’

  ‘Who?’ All so irrelevant I’d forgotten already, Katherine, Jeanetta, indifferent to both, my eyes on my son. ‘Where?’ said Mrs Harrison, pouncing on him, holding his shoulders. This annoyed me more. Unhand my son who does not touch me, afraid I might spoil his treat. He twisted, shrugged her off, sure indication of something shameful. They had secrets, those two.

  ‘In the garden,’ he muttered finally. ‘Dreaming.’

  Mrs H took him by the arms again: he was frightened, but I didn’t know why, her yelling and I didn’t know why either. ‘What do you mean, dreaming? And how did you see? When? You been poking in their garden, have you? How d’you get in? I’ve told you not to climb that wall at the end, it isn’t safe . . .’

  I said, yes, yes, automatically. She glared at me and we both waited for Mark. Watched him put on his best mulish and defensive face like his father, thinking of the imminence of Daddy and wanting to avoid trouble.

  ‘Sitting on the steps. Their steps. You can just see, only just, from the bottom. I was looking for puss, she’s been sick again. I put my head through the fence thing.’ He meant the trellis with the half-dead creeper.

  ‘Talk to her?’ Mrs Harrison barked. ‘What’s she look like then?’

  He kicked the floor, pawing the carpet with his feet, sulking and anxious. ‘She was dreaming,’ he repeated. ‘She didn’t take any notice when I shouted at her. Sitting on those steps what go up to their kitchen, I think.’

  ‘Which go up to their kitchen,’ I said.

  The interruption made him hurry. Mrs Harrison added hers, angry. ‘Was she playing then, was she? What was she doing? And how long since?’

  He wrinkled his forehead. ‘Oh, a day or two. Or three or four, I don’t know, don’t look at me like that . . . Oh, when’s Daddy coming? All right then, I shouted at her, hallo or something, but she wouldn’t listen or didn’t hear, didn’t want to. I thought she was being snotty. Just sitting there in the sun, on the steps, wearing this funny long dress all over. Singing. Only for a minute. Then her daddy came out and she stopped and I went aways. He doesn’t like peoples in his garden. Or looking at him.’

  ‘Sounds perfectly fine,’ I said crossly. ‘Dressing up again. Always was fond of other people’s clothes, that girl.’ He shook his head, wanting to say something more, not daring.

  ‘Mrs Pearson,’ said our Mrs Harrison, sizing up to me like a fighter with her fists clenched. ‘Mrs Pearson . . . ma’am, the reason I’m mentioning this is ’cos Samantha saw Jeanetta, last week, I think, she doesn’t really know, you know how vague she is. These scamps,’ she gestured to Mark, who blushed, ‘have been trying to get in next door. Their own garden not good enough, see. Only Sam says Jeanetta was poorly. Not like she was, you know, not fat any more. Says she was as thin as a lizard. Like a little rat. It’s no good, Mrs Pearson, you’ve just got to go and ask what’s happened to her. I can’t: I’ve tried. Something’s gone wrong. You’ve got to go. When will you go?’

  Well, things never go wrong singly, do they? It was the tone of the order in her voice which hit that large part of me already primed with a sort of grief, anger, disappointment, Mark, Sebastian, sleepless nights of new recrimination, and terrible dawns. I had nothing left, not even the authority of the mistress of the house, standing there, receiving commands while I listen to these blatant and alarmist exaggerations. Blood rose in my face: she stepped away from me, spontaneous regret, and into that tiny vacuum of silence, the doorbell rang. Mark dashed past us both, hurling himself downstairs, yelling, ‘Daddy, Daddy, Daddy,’ leaving me and the rebellious servant, both with a hand on the half-closed case. My son would have gone naked with his father, and that was all I knew. I regretted it while almost understanding in one fell moment, greater than other regrets, blotting out anything more. Had I wept in her arms, Mrs Harrison might have liked me, but I did not, could not. Instead I followed downstairs, found Mark struggling with the door like a demented animal, only partially calmed by Harrison, who opened with the butler’s dignity, a smile on his face.

  I never saw it before, only dreamed it now in the wake of the dawns, the love Sebastian inspires in anyone else. Without counting the days since he left, I know how long they have been, how rudderless the household, how genuine that great grin of pleasure on Harrison’s face. I never knew, I never knew, and ignorance was bliss in the old arrogance of never caring. They all adore him. He was framed in the doorway, a handsome man for all that, whose life I have left as a blank, never asking what he did with it or wanted to do. Apart from keep me in the style I could afford, cater for my carelessness and stay away when the drunken going was rough. He did not come in: I mounted the stairs, becoming the servant, to fetch the incomplete bag belonging to the son, carried it down with me, handed them over to one another as if neither had ever been mine, smiling, smiling, smiling. Not in front of the children. No weeping please. Nothing, but wishing well. Seeing my failures. Furious, impotent, sadder than age, weak at the knees. Smiling. Have fun, Oh, when are you coming back? I don’t suppose, no, no, never mind. ‘What was it?’ he asked, Sebastian speaking, holding Mark by the hand. I kicked the carpet on the floor, the same way Mark kicks carpet to hide embarrassment. ‘We . . . ell nothing. The Allendales’ party . . . will you be back?’ He has a memory for dates which is like an instinct, the same, I remember, as the instinct which never wanted to hurt. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Not long, is it? Perhaps we’ll go?’ ‘Please,’ I said. ‘We’ll be back, won’t we?’ Mark lo
oked up. ‘I suppose so.’ He took his turn at kicking the carpet. ‘Don’t do that, Mark,’ I said, wishing I had not spoken. ‘All right. See you.’

  I can’t remember who closed the door.

  There was worse, of course. There is always worse whenever you think you’ve hit the bottom. Such as Samantha flying downstairs in her nightie, a ghost with a red and angry face. A mistake perhaps to keep the fleeting visit of her father such a secret: I was consulted on the subject, could not remember. Think I said we could do without both the jealousy or excitement. Thinking her turn would come, if I thought at all. We might as well not have bothered: the decision was not good. Democracy applies to children too. ‘Was Daddy,’ she shrieked. ‘Daddy. I heard him, I did, I did, I did . . .’

  ‘Come on, sweetheart: back to bed. Late,’ said Mrs Harrison grimly. Samantha turned to me. She is like me in so many ways while Mark resembles his father. Samantha has none of their mildness, a will of iron and a fog-horn voice.

  ‘You didn’t tell me. Was Daddy, it was . . .’ No one denied it. ‘. . . You didn’t tell me. You never said he was coming here. I want Daddy. Daddy, Daddy, Daddy . . .’

  ‘All right, all right,’ I moved to touch her, watched her leap away from my infection. ‘Why?’ she wailed. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because . . .’

  ‘I hate you, Mummy. Piggy, piggy cow. Bastard, bottoms.’ Oh where do they get the words? She stood there trembling, the little face contorted with tears of fury, the whole of her concentrated on producing the worst insult she could summons, the most hurtful thing she could imagine.

  ‘Fat legs!’ finally spat from her. ‘Big bums. Stupid ole witch. Hate you.’

  Laughable, yes, this pocket-battleship rage, comic in any other set of eyes but mine. She fled upstairs, unnerved by her own hysteria, sobbing. Even without energy, I should have followed, but the stiff upper lip was well in place, not selfishness exactly, only guilt. So instead, Mrs Harrison went after her and knew she would be the most welcome.

  Drink, drink, drink. Not in the kitchen, Harrisons have eyes, melting into the back of their bloody heads when they go downstairs, X-ray eyes like antennae. Confused: now what exactly do I want, bottles hugged to bosom, still clanking up the stairs. Tonic for the gin supply hidden in the study desk. Somewhere, long after ten o’clock, I was aware of Harrison’s deferential knock at the door. And did not answer. Even later, the pinging of the phone. The servants, using the line downstairs, running my house. I went to sleep in the chair. Finally, in the dawn, I cried. For the mess I had made.

  Please help me, please. I want to do better: I have learned so much too quickly and I did not see. There is nothing more salutary than being left alone. More than anything else, I want all those children back. So I can start again.

  CHAPTER 17

  ‘I don’t believe you. You’ve lost your mind to do such a thing . . . How did you do such a thing?’

  ‘Easy enough. Don’t know really. But it won’t last, I shouldn’t worry. He more or less said so, and I agreed. Besides, it simply isn’t practical. Fun though.’ At the moment, Monica did not look entirely sure. Jenny thought she looked more dispirited than illuminated. The whole effect was disappointing.

  ‘Practical? Never mind practical, it isn’t fair either,’ she spluttered. ‘In fact, completely unfair. How would you feel, oh, sorry, I forgot you sort of know how it feels, but poor Katherine. You shouldn’t, not to a friend. For Christ’s sake we were all going to their party next week: I won’t know where to put my face.’

  ‘You won’t know? What about me?’

  ‘If you go,’ said Jenny rudely, ‘that’ll be your problem. Mess on your own doorstep and then you have to clean up. Or at least sidestep. Colin will notice. You can’t go.’

  ‘Yes I shall go and no, he won’t notice. Don’t be such a prig for God’s sake. Besides you’re forgetting she messed first. Ogling my husband as if men were newly invented . . .’

  ‘But she didn’t, Monica, not exactly. I’m sorry, but I thought it was the other way round.’

  ‘I don’t care which way round it started. He still got a chest full of lipstick, cigarettes crunched in his back pocket, grass bits in the turn-ups of his trendy trousers. Loves the great outdoors, but you don’t collect that kind of litter without an element of participation. Don’t pity Katherine. Not the first time. Past master at the game. Mistress, I mean.’ The voice was suddenly vicious.

  ‘Oh I don’t think so, surely not. She’d be too . . .’

  ‘Well, he told me so himself, David, I mean. David told me lots and lots about Katherine. She’s a slut. Paternity of one child seriously in doubt. Always the quiet ones, isn’t it?’ They were sitting in Jenny’s garden. Monica drew on her cigarette and threw away the end so the lit stub glowed for a full minute on the lawn. Jenny was silent. None of this equated with her own experience of a sheltered life and she was not sure quite what she believed. On several occasions in a long acquaintance, Monica had been careless with the truth, creating exaggerations. Jenny bracketed this last news along with similar examples of the same syndrome and refrained from comment. Katherine had been weighing on her conscience, lightly but unaccountably, and although she would have liked some scandal to prove Katherine was horrid and absolve herself from that niggling guilt, Monica’s revelations were not providing any such reassurance. Rather the opposite, and, on the underside of disgust at the bad behaviour of a friend, there was a prurient curiosity yearning to be satisfied. Hardly a moral question, but what did he do, she wanted to know: exactly how did he get you into bed or on to the floor, feet first or what? And what did he do next? Give me the details, please, without me having to ask. Instead, she sidestepped.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ she said slowly. ‘Not quite, anyway. You spent the whole afternoon at their house, but where the hell were the rest of them, such as Katherine and the kids?’

  Monica stretched and yawned. Jenny caught a whiff of fresh perfume from one exposed underarm, was embarrassed. Did people wash after such adulterous assignations? She supposed they did.

  ‘Katherine was out. Always out whenever she can, gym or some such self-indulgent thing, such as spending the hard-earned cash: how awful, our conservatory might go to pay for her clothes. Probably creating or preserving the body beautiful. I wonder why he liked mine? No real comparison, is there?’ She made an attempt to laugh which was far from the usual full-bellied sound. ‘Anyway, Jeremy, the boy, he’d been left at some playschool David’s found, sort of trial run for the afternoon, and Jeanetta wasn’t there. Empty house. Perfect.’ She paused, reached for the wine on the table between them, frowned. ‘Well, he said it was an empty house. No disturbances, no knocks, no tradesmen at the door, but when we were upstairs, in his studio place – no, not their bedroom, he didn’t suggest it and I couldn’t have done it – I kept feeling as if someone was there.’

  ‘Ghosts. Or conscience,’ Jenny snorted. ‘Serve you right.’ Monica shrugged. ‘Probably. There were sounds from the attic, or at least I think it was the attic. Above the studio, something like a mouse or a cat creeping round. I mentioned it and he laughed at me, said it was nothing if not birds in the roof-space. The rooms above us were always empty. We’ll go and look if you like, he said, but I said no. I didn’t want to creep around her house more than I needed. I’m not quite a natural for this game, you see.’ She shivered and reached for the multicoloured cardigan on the back of her chair.

  ‘Monica,’ said Jenny, ‘tell me something . . . Is he . . . Is he a fantastic lover? Is that what it is?’

  Monica fiddled with the buttons on the dreamcoat. She could not have worn such a comfortable garment to any meeting with David because she knew he would never have liked it. Too bright and fussy. Looking for these small compensations, she paused, considering the question.

  ‘Yes, he is as a matter of fact. Very strong, very dominant . . . All male. Doesn’t ask, but knows what to do. Knows where everything is. If you see what I mean.’ Jenny saw perfect
ly well.

  ‘And is it worth it? On that account?’

  ‘No,’ said Monica, hugging her arms to her chest and fingering a small bruise below the sleeve of the dreamcoat. ‘No, I don’t really think it is.’ She turned to Jenny, her face flushed. ‘Which is why we’ve all got to go to this party and you’ve got to help me. There’s only a few others; we’ve got to go. It’s quite all right, Jenny darling, the whole little escapade has finished. If I don’t finish it, he will. He loves his life and he loves Katherine, you see. Loves everything in his house too much to risk a thing. So we’ll go on, all of us, just as we did before, as if nothing ever happened. Like real grownups.’ Her eyes were shining, tears or determination Jenny could not tell in her own sensation of acute relief. She felt inclined to keep the conversation neutral.

  ‘In that case, I’ll do what I was going to do anyway. Because I was a bit worried about her. Have the kids over to play with ours one weekend. This weekend. Give Katherine a break.’

  Sympathy for Katherine was still not what Monica wanted to hear. ‘Count me out. You can try, though. I seem to remember him saying Jeanetta was going to stay with her granny. Or she’s already gone. If you want to be useful, you’d better check first. I think we need another bottle of wine.’

  His footsteps came upstairs soon after midnight. He was trotting noisily on the last, uncarpeted flight, his leather mules clicking on the wood. ‘When I’ve made a sitting room up here,’ he had once told her, ‘I want green carpet up these steps, with brass stair-rods to catch the light and show off the wood. Nice.’ He had looked at the stairs with the satisfaction he reserved for new territory waiting to be tamed. ‘There’s a fortune in attics,’ he had added. ‘All that space, hidden away.’

  Hidden away in the attic room at the back for over twenty hours, Katherine had stopped counting time since late afternoon. Pieces of her watch lay on the floor from her efforts to concentrate her mind and hands by taking the thing apart with the aid of a hair-slide and a nail which had worked up from the floorboards. Destroying any knowledge of time seemed important. He had showed her in there with her one plastic bowl and a thin blanket: the bowl smelled in the corner and the blanket was damp with sweat, although she had only covered herself briefly since the night before. That was in the afternoon, when she tried to smother the sounds she had heard from the room below.