Listening in the Dusk

by Celia Fremlin

  “I thought you were playing the Schubert piece just beautifully! Hetty told me you were a musician, but she never told me you were as good as that! Is it a grand you’ve got in there?”

  To her relief, his face brightened. He was even smiling, and he spoke eagerly: “How wonderful to have someone in this house at last who recognises something I’m playing!” he exclaimed. “All most people notice about my playing is whether it’s at some time when I’m not allowed to, like before nine in the morning or after ten at night. Not Hetty, of course; she’s a darling, she doesn’t mind when I play, or how loud, or anything. Except she likes it best when it’s a tune, she says, so that she can dance to it as she tidies round, if she happens to be in the mood. Apparently she can dance to the Moonlight Sonata, but alas, I’ve never seen her doing so. I’d love to see how it works out.”

  He laughed, and so did Alice, and a minute later she was in his room, picking her way across piles of music and miscellaneous garments towards the piano, whose virtues he was anxious to display.

  “Not a grand — I wish it was — but just listen to the tone! I fixed the new felts myself, the old ones were all rotted away to nothing, and it’s made all the difference. Listen!”

  He played a few bars of some piece with which Alice was unfamiliar, and the tone was indeed superb, though whether it was the new felts or the pianist himself who deserved credit for this, it was hard to say.

  “Lovely,” Alice approved. “You’ve got a smashing career ahead of you, I’d guess. Concert pianist, I presume? Though Hetty did say something about you being a composer as well?”

  He shrugged, grimaced wryly.

  “Pie-in-the-sky, I’m afraid. Or rather two pies, each one further out of reach than the other. Trouble is with me, I want everything. I used to think it was because I was young, and young people do have this idea that nothing is out of reach, you merely need to bash away till you get there. But it’s just the same now, I’m afraid. I’m thirty, you know, and I still want everything. Which is crazier, actually, with every passing year, because really I should have got somewhere by now, if I’m ever going to …”

  He paused, waiting with touching confidence for Alice to contradict this melancholy diagnosis; which of course she did, racking her brains for examples of famous musicians who had had their big breakthrough well after the age of thirty.

  “It’s not as if you were trying to be a pop-star,” she pointed out. “I imagine they do have to be practically in their teens still if they’re to hit the big time. But you are a serious musician with a serious career in prospect. Maturity can only be an asset.”

  He demurred, though obviously pleased by this confirmation of his own secret and ineradicable confidence in his own talent: that confidence without which no one ever gets anywhere, and Alice was glad to see that he possessed it.

  “Oh, well,” he said. “Never say die, and I suppose I never do. Meantime, I keep myself busy starving in a garret.”

  “I’m the one in the garret, actually,” Alice pointed out, “though I’ve no intention of starving there. I bought some sausages today.” And then, impulsively, “Why don’t you share them with me? I’ve got a whole pound, much too much for just me, and I’m going to fry them this evening. At least, I hope I am. If I can work out where I ‘fit in’ as Hetty puts it.”

  “Fit in with the cooking, you mean? Oh, you don’t want to worry about that. We all just muck in really — all except Dorrie that is — Miss Dorinda. She’s into Health, you see, and so we have to leave the kitchen clear for her to do her polyunsaturated this and thats. Or is it saturated? Anyway, it’s what sausages aren’t, I’m sure, so we’ll have to wait till she’s finished and safely back in her room.

  “Look, shall I make some coffee? I’m sorry it’s so bloody cold in here, but Hetty seems to have pinched my fire. To give to you, I daresay. She does that sort of thing: she must have reckoned that your need is greater than mine. But I’ve only got to go down and show her my poor blue fingers and my chattering teeth, and I’ll get it back, and then you’ll be the unlucky one. And so we go on.

  “However. Coffee. Let me move the debris off the armchair, and then you can sit down. Lucky me, I’ve got a gas-ring in here: how about you? No? Well, I might be able to rig you one up if we can find the fittings for it behind all that junk you’ve got up there. A bit of rubber tubing may be all we need. I’ll come up presently, if you like, and see what I can do …”

  No such fittings were revealed, but nevertheless Brian proved himself an invaluable assistant in all sorts of ways. He applied himself enthusiastically to stacking out of sight — more or less — the dauntingly heavy objects which had so far defeated Alice: the rusty refrigerator door, the old-fashioned mangle, and the various defunct television sets. An oblong monstrosity the size and weight of a cabin-trunk gave him pause for thought. It was, he assured her, an early tape-recorder. Forties vintage probably. “A museum-piece, really,” he opined, running his finger through the thick dust that obscured all marks of identification. “If only we knew someone who …”

  “But we don’t,” Alice hastily interposed, fearful lest some plan should come into being other than making the damn thing disappear as completely as possible behind or beneath other damn things. “I’m trying to make this place not be a museum, I want to live in it, see?” At which he shrugged good-naturedly and concurred, dragging the thing towards long oblivion in accordance with her wishes.

  He really was a singularly good-natured fellow. Too good-natured, perhaps, Alice mused, to be likely to succeed in “getting somewhere” in the fiercely competitive musical world. Not that she knew anything about this world, but it was common sense that a streak of ruthless determination, even of savagery, would be needed in the process of clawing one’s way up, however outstanding one’s talent. Savagery was certainly no part of Brian’s nature; on being ushered into Alice’s domain, and finding that his electric fire had not only found its way up here — as he had surmised — but had also, in the kindness of Hetty’s heart, been switched full on, all three bars, he had merely laughed.

  “She is a nice old stick, isn’t she?” he commented. “This ought to knock the damp for six, Alice, if anything could. This is a hell-hole for damp, you know, especially under the eaves. I tried keeping my old college notes up here, you know, in boxes. I’d been dragging them about with me for years, ever since my parents got divorced and ceased to provide a convenient dumping-ground. I fancied I’d be needing them — the notes I mean, not the parents — but I might just as well have let them go down the chute with the rest of the happy home, because when I came to look at them they were glued together with mould, right through. Mind you, I could have won a prize or two at art exhibitions, if I’d thought of it, because they were wonderful moulds, a kind of pink and green tracery, some like trees, some like diagrams in a medical book. Each page different, like a set of Rorschach blots. They’d have been a wow in the art world, ending up on television, probably, illustrating some grievance or other about Arts Council grants. Still, one can’t think of everything …”

  By the time darkness came down, the room had been transformed. Brian had dragged out the various bits of rolled-up carpet from their various hiding places, and unrolled them one by one for Alice’s inspection. Most of them were too worn and tattered to be worth considering, but one, of intricate Persian design, had only a couple of easily-mendable tears in it, and spread out over the bare boards alongside the divan, it gave a wonderful air of luxury to the room, a glow of pink and orange and copper which toned rather than clashed with the multi-coloured pinkish cretonne already covering the improvised sofa. The final and most useful task performed by Brian was the raising of the motor bike from its prone position, in which it took up a couple of square yards of precious floor-space, and up-ending it against one of the beams. Tossing aside the lace bed-cover with which Hetty had swathed its ugliness, Brian stood back to admire his handiwork.

  “You should never cover things up just
because they’re ugly,” he pronounced. “You should feature them, make something of them. Just as you should with your own failings and failures. Don’t hide them from the world. Stand forth boldly and say, ‘Here I am, the chap who fails at everything! The chap who gets doors slammed in his face by pretty girls, publishers, concert-promoters — the lot!’ Look, Alice, I’ve got an idea! Why don’t we paint the motor bike — scarlet, gold, blue — that sort of thing! Make it the central feature of your decor! We could start now. I’ve got the remains of some red paint downstairs, and we could buy the blue and the gold — just small tins — tomorrow. No, Monday, those sort of shops won’t be open on Sunday. Anyway, let’s get going with the red … just a sec.”

  In less than a minute he was back, with not only the tin of paint but a couple of relatively un-congealed paint brushes, and they set to work. The rims of the wheels scarlet, they thought, and the antler-like handlebars too. The hubs of the wheels should be gold, and so should its mysterious broken insides, with touches of deep blue here and there to add depth.

  “And significance, too,” Brian insisted. “You must go a bundle on significance, Alice, if you’re going to live in a place like this,” and with swift, deft strokes he set about outlining in scarlet the lopsided rim of the back wheel, while Alice, with a damp rag, prepared the front one for a similarly glorious new career.

  Chapter 8

  The sausage supper didn’t turn out quite as Alice had anticipated. Hetty had agreed without protest to her request to be allowed some time after seven-thirty to fry her sausages, but nevertheless seemed a little crestfallen at the proposal. The reason for this soon became clear. It happened that Hetty had, that very day, come into possession of a nice big bacon joint — a real butcher’s joint, with the bone still in, none of your boneless rubbish from the supermarket all done up in plastic. It had been simmering all afternoon with carrots, swedes and a couple of bay leaves, and it had occurred to Hetty that it would make a nice hot supper for everybody, it being such a cold, miserable sort of a night. Especially if she popped a few nice large potatoes into the oven, which it happened she had already done.

  It sounded most inviting; but what about the sausages? “Besides,” continued Alice, “I can’t keep sponging off you for meals. I had that delicious shepherd’s pie last night, remember.”

  Sponging? Oh no, that’s not how Hetty saw it at all. “It’s helping me out, really,” she explained. “I do like a cut off a nice big joint now and again, and how can I have it if I’m just cooking only for myself? I’d be finishing up cold meat day in and day out until my stomach turned. But I’ll tell you what, love, why don’t we be devils and have your sausages as well? Sausages and bacon — it doesn’t go too badly, does it? Sausage and bacon — bacon and sausage — you only have to say it out loud and you can hear how it kind of belongs, if you know what I mean. Our Brian, he’s going to be over the moon when I tell him we’re having both. He does enjoy his food, that boy does, it’s a pleasure to watch his knife and fork going. I only wish I could say the same of Mary; so picky that girl is, it’s not true! Still, I’ll try to get her to come down this evening; maybe if I tell her Brian’s coming too …”

  Clearly this inducement (if indeed it had been an inducement, which Alice doubted after witnessing the little scene on the landing this morning) had failed, for when the little party gathered round the large scrubbed kitchen table, Mary was conspicuous by her absence. In her place, however — much to Alice’s surprise, after all she had heard — was Miss Dorinda, the lady who liked everything just so, and who was supposed to enjoy special privileges each evening for cooking her own carefully-balanced meals. Alice had already met Miss Dorinda earlier in the evening — on the stairs, in fact, exactly as she’d envisaged it — and her first impression had indeed been of someone intimidatingly smart: bleached up-swept hair, a svelte and slender figure, and painfully high heels teetering round the ill-lit bend of the stairway. Not so ill-lit, however, as to obscure the cool thumbs-down glance which seemed to take in Alice from top to toe — from her no-bother hairstyle, that is, to her discreditably comfortable shoes.

  But now, seated directly under the glare of one of Hetty’s hundred-and-fifty-watt bulbs, Miss Dorinda seemed both smaller and less imposing. Lines of tiredness, clearly visible now under the make-up, softened the rigid pink-and-white perfection of her enamelled cheeks. Her eye-shadow was reassuringly smudged after its long day’s service in the salon, and even her slimness was somehow modified by the eager glint in her eyes as she watched the steaming slices of bacon sliding one after another from under Hetty’s expertly wielded knife. You felt, watching her, that here was somebody who should have been comfortably plump. “Inside every fat woman there is a thin one struggling to get out,” they say. Well, this one had got out, and here she was. Alas for the plump, comfortable one that had been left behind!

  “Good God! Dorrie!” exclaimed Brian, taking his place opposite her. “Whatever on earth are you doing among the carnivores? I thought you were supposed to be vegetarian?”

  “Well, yes, I am …” Miss Dorinda looked both confused and affronted, marshalling her arguments. “But … Well, this isn’t meat, exactly, is it? This is bacon …” and she reached out hungrily for the lavishly-filled plate that Hetty was passing her.

  “Of course it’s meat!” Brian insisted, ignoring Hetty’s protesting glances and shake of the head. “Whatever do you mean, it’s not meat? It’s meat from a pig. A pig is just as much an animal as a cow or a sheep is — and a lot more intelligent, actually. Do you know, a pig can work out how to lift a latch and open a gate? I remember, when I was a kid, the pig they had just up the lane from us, it used to —”

  “Hush, Brian, do hush!” Hetty could contain herself no longer. “You’re spoiling Miss Dorinda’s meal for her! I don’t think it’s nice, it’s not nice at all, to talk about pigs while we are eating bacon. Just get on with your food, Brian, and let us get on with ours.”

  “OK, OK,” Brian shrugged. “I don’t want to spoil Dorrie’s meal, I just want her to be logical. If she would only be logical, she would enjoy it more, not less, because she’d realise it was no more cruel to eat a pig than to eat a slice of bread. How many mice, and squirrels, and rabbits does she think have had to be killed in order to preserve for humans the grain which goes into bread? And muesli, too, and All-Bran — all those Health Foods she’s so —”

  “Brian! If you aren’t careful, I won’t invite you down any more. You know what I was planning for Sunday lunch? A nice roast chicken, with bread sauce, and roast potatoes, and sprouts. But of course I won’t be doing it now, not if it’s going to start all this argy bargy —”

  “Argy bargy about whether a chicken is a vegetable?” Brian was beginning; and it seemed to Alice that it was time someone changed the subject.

  “What a pity Mary couldn’t be here,” she said, rather at random. “I don’t know how she could resist all these delicious smells. I suppose she has a date this evening …”

  She was aware, as she spoke, of a slight tension to her left. Brian had paused in his eating, and with fork poised half-way to his mouth, was listening with painful intentness. She realised that she had tactlessly blundered from one awkward topic right into another.

  “A date? Not on your life!” declared Hetty, beginning to apply herself to the carving of second helpings. “That girl never has dates. I wish she did. It really worries me, you know, the way she stays up there evening after evening. Sometimes she doesn’t even have the light on. What does she do I wonder?”

  “Perhaps she has to go to bed early,” suggested Alice, trying to render innocuous this topic she had so inadvertently raised. “Perhaps her job …?”

  “And that’s another thing,” continued Hetty. “A job. She hasn’t got a job. Of course, I know it’s difficult these days, unemployment and that; but so far as I can see she’s not even looking for one. It makes me really unhappy, you know, the way that girl’s wasting her life. No dates. No pr
oper meals. And if I invite her down, like this evening, when I happen to have done a bit of cooking, what do I get? Such a look she gives me, like she wouldn’t demean herself. ‘Thank you, Mrs Harman’ she says, ‘but I’m not hungry.’ Kind of uppity, you know, as if not being hungry was the in-thing for top people, and the rest of us too uneducated to know it! It makes me really annoyed sometimes, I feel I want to put her in her place good and proper. But then again, I can’t help worrying — after all, she’s only young. There’s something wrong. I know there is. Something badly wrong. But what can I do? I can’t keep asking questions and interfering, can I? It’s not my business. Do you think she’s maybe got that illness they’ve been on about lately on TV — Anna-something?”

  “Anorexia?” supplied Alice. “Well, I suppose she might have. Though she’s a bit past the usual age, I should think — it’s more a thing with teenagers.” And then, in a vague attempt to reassure Brian, who was still sitting unwontedly tense and silent at her side: “Perhaps she eats more than you think she does? Like now — for all we know she might be out getting fish and chips at this very moment.”

  But Hetty shook her head. “I’d have noticed,” she asserted. “I’d have heard her. I’ve got so I listen for her, I’m that worried. Like I say, she stops in nearly all the time. Five weeks she’s been here, and never once has she gone out in the evening —”

  “And can you wonder?” here broke in Miss Dorinda, dabbing her lips delicately and laying down her fork. “I don’t go out in the evening either, not on my own. You hear of such dreadful things happening nowadays, the rapes and the muggings …”