Jubilate

by Michael Arditti

  ‘Where are we going?’ he asks. ‘This is boring.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you rather we rehearsed – practised – outdoors, enjoying the weather? We can’t go back to the Acceuil since Gillian might hear.’ Nor can we go back to my hotel, since the mere idea of Richard lumbering about the room in which I made love to Gillian fills me with revulsion.

  ‘I don’t like kindergarten,’ he says, jumping down on to the path.

  ‘What?’

  ‘In the song. It’s a silly word.’

  ‘Oh, I see. Of course. But it’s a rhyme. “When you were only starting to go to kindergarten …”’

  ‘Why can’t it be farting?’

  ‘That wouldn’t be very nice. Remember it’s about Gillian.’

  ‘She farts.’

  ‘That’s enough now!’

  ‘She pretends it’s me but it’s not. Sometimes in bed …’ He puts his lips together and trumpets a fart.

  ‘It’s kindergarten, all right? We do it properly or not at all.’

  He doesn’t have to die. We could put him in a home: a private one with his own room and furniture. Money wouldn’t be an issue. According to Gillian, they did very well from the sale of the family firm. The key thing is to make her see that it would be for his benefit as much as for ours. He would be far happier among people like himself: look how quickly he bonded with Nigel! If all else fails, I could move in with them. We could build the husband equivalent of a granny flat, an annexe for him to live in with a carer. Gillian could keep an eye on them during the day.

  Since when did my fantasies become so functional?

  We arrive at the thicket where I interviewed Tadeusz. ‘How about here?’ I ask.

  ‘I don’t like trees.’

  ‘All trees or just this one?’

  ‘Trees with low-down branches. Branches should be up in the air.’

  ‘How about here then?’ As I lead him towards a silver birch, its slender trunk rising to a crest of dense foliage, I blot out the image of a falling branch inducing another haemorrhage.

  ‘Why are you shaking your head?’ Richard asks.

  ‘Am I?’ I reply, unaware that the image was so close to the surface. ‘Sometimes I try to push away a nasty idea that’s stuck.’

  ‘Me too.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Only it won’t always go.’

  As soon as we have settled on a spot, I run through the lyric, which he insists that he knows by heart. I am surprised to find him so alert, and wonder if he has made sense of it or simply learnt it by rote. I then run through the tune, assuring him that it will be easier when we have the guitar accompaniment.

  ‘Will we have to play it?’ he asks anxiously.

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll speak to one of the brancardiers.’

  We struggle to match the words to the tune and it is immediately clear that, for all his bravado, his knowledge of the song is limited to the first two lines, which he repeats again and again in the same self-congratulatory croak. He grows frustrated and fractious at my efforts to assist him, stumbling over every other word until I realise that the best I can hope is to sing the song alone, with him as a kind of echo. Trusting that he may fare better with the movement, I demonstrate a simple routine – falling on one knee at the end of a verse and throwing out my arms minstrel style – which I ask him to copy. His crude parody makes me despair of both his cloddishness and a tribute that risks descending into farce. Nevertheless I refuse to give up, even when he starts to rebel.

  ‘Singing to a baby’s stupid,’ he says, tugging at a creeper.

  ‘Not a baby, a woman. A woman you love who was once a baby.’

  ‘Gilly.’

  ‘If she’s the woman you love,’ I say, longing for a confession that might exonerate me.

  ‘Of course. I love her more than the whole world, more than all the stars in the sky.’

  ‘More than all the heartbeats in the history of mankind?’ I ask, horrified that she might have shared the thought with him.

  ‘What?’ he asks, with reassuring bemusement.

  ‘Just another way of saying the same thing.’

  ‘Why are you singing it,’ he asks abruptly, ‘if we’re singing to Gilly?’

  ‘I’m not. I’m here to help you. You wouldn’t want to sing on your own, would you?’

  ‘Yes … no … yes … no.’ He seems to be genuinely torn, as he rips the creeper from the trunk.

  ‘Hey, what’s the matter? Don’t worry. You’re doing fine.’ He slumps to the ground, head in hands, looking more lost than ever.

  ‘I try – I try so hard, but sometimes I do things wrong,’ he says, as if letting me into a secret. ‘Sometimes my head’s not right.’ A tear rolls down his cheek. ‘I used to be different once.’ He gazes up at me. ‘I used to be like you.’

  I crouch beside him, feeling a profound need to be on his level.

  ‘Do you remember those times?’

  ‘Of course. I’m not stupid.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean …’

  ‘Gilly shows me pictures and I remember the day we got married.’

  ‘She shows you that, does she?’ I try to squeeze the pain out of my voice.

  ‘We had a cake with three floors. Some was sent abroad.’

  ‘To your family?’

  ‘We had all my family. All Gilly’s family. All my friends. And my best friend, Jonathan.’

  ‘Your best man?’

  ‘That’s what I said! He made a speech. Everyone laughed, except Mother. Gilly can’t remember what it was. She should.’

  ‘Well, you can’t either.’

  ‘But she has the pictures. She won’t let me see him any more.’

  ‘Jonathan?’

  ‘She won’t let him take me out on our own.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  He gives me a sharp look. ‘Sometimes my head makes me do wrong things.’ He says it so plaintively that, despite knowing what those wrong things are, I cannot hate him.

  ‘You’re not the only bloke to do things wrong; it’s part of being a man: part of being a male that is, not part of being a human being,’ I add quickly, even though the distinction will be lost on him.

  A young couple walk past, hand-in-hand. Richard watches them with a glint in his eye. ‘Shall we meet some girls?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just you and me. Not Nigel.’

  ‘What girls? Where?’

  ‘In a bar,’ he says impatiently. ‘You’ve got some money.’

  Half of me wants to help him to whatever solace he can find; the other half wants to throttle him. ‘What about Gillian? Won’t she be upset?’

  ‘She’s always upset. But we won’t ask her.’ He chuckles uproariously, as if at a private joke.

  ‘We can’t today. We don’t have time. We have to go back to the Acceuil to sing at the concert … the party.’

  ‘She’s always telling me what to do. I used to be her boss, now she’s mine.’

  ‘Yes, you’ve said that already.’

  ‘Did I?’ His face darkens and he bangs his head against the trunk. My murderous fantasy returns to shame me and I wrench him away.

  ‘Don’t worry, mate. Everyone repeats things all the time.’

  ‘Do you?’ He looks at me hopefully. ‘All the time?’

  ‘Never stop. Come on!’ I stand and pull him up with me. ‘Don’t forget to go over your words again in your head,’ I say, leading him out of the thicket. ‘But don’t let anyone hear or it’ll spoil the surprise.’

  I deliver Richard back to the Acceuil in time for dinner, finding Gillian by the Jubilate nurses’ station, talking to Lucja and Sister Anne.

  ‘At last!’ she says. ‘I thought you’d kidnapped him.’

  ‘I’m not a kid!’ Richard says resentfully. Gillian ignores him.

  ‘Right now, is someone going to tell me what’s going on?’

  ‘Our lips are sealed,’ I reply. ‘Aren’t they, Rich?’ He shows his agreemen
t by pulling his lips over his teeth and muttering incoherently through them.

  ‘I’ll find out, I warn you. I always do,’ she says, in schoolmarmish tones that I find disturbingly sexy.

  ‘Remember, Rich, we men must stick together.’ He mumbles and mimes his assent, while the shadow passing over Gillian’s face makes me wish that I had chosen a less loaded phrase.

  ‘Well, now that you’ve set my husband against me,’ she says lightly, ‘do you have any other tricks up your sleeve?’

  ‘Up my sleeve. In my shirt. Wherever,’ I reply, with a smile that I trust will placate the nun while enticing her.

  ‘Right, Richard,’ she says, bundling him into the dining room. ‘Food! That is if you deign to open your mouth.’

  I return to the hotel, where the lingering fumes of sweat in the lift send me racing to the shower. I scrub and scour and brush and floss and dab and squirt, with an eye less to the farewell concert than the more intimate celebration with which I intend to follow it, before joining the crew in the bar, where I immediately order a round in a bid both to honour my promise to Jamie and to make up for my earlier absence. Sophie is glum, having failed to hear from Giles all day despite repeated texting, and Jamie’s ‘Give the guy a break – he might have been pissed and banged up in jail,’ is no help. She has nonetheless dressed for the party, with a spangly black top and plum velvet trousers. Jewel has put on a khaki cotton sweater with leather patches, which should bring back memories for Louisa, and a calf-length denim skirt with oversized buttons down the side. Jamie wears his usual plaid shirt and frayed jeans, along with a neckerchief pushed through a leather ring that makes him look like an aged and hirsute boy scout.

  We make our way to the Acceuil and up to the rudimentarily decorated dining room, which exudes the same strained cheer as a hospital ward at Christmas. Before the concert starts, I have to finalise two arrangements. First, I seek out Alan, the young brancardier who, having taken on the lion’s share of the guitar accompaniment at the services, is now moving into the secular field. I find him in the day room rehearsing ‘Danny Boy’ with Sheila Clunes, who lacks the brogue which alone might make its mawkishness palatable. I congratulate her with all the sincerity I can muster, although this clearly fails to compensate for my refusal to include her in the film.

  ‘I’m not talking to you,’ she says. ‘Where’s my pusher?’ Her shout brings a young handmaiden rushing down the corridor to wheel her away.

  ‘I know where I’d like to push her,’ I say to Alan, who looks shocked to hear such feelings, even in jest. ‘I wonder if you’d also play for Richard Patterson and me, well him really. I’m just helping him to serenade his wife. “You Must Have Been A Beautiful Baby.” Do you know it?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘It’s before your time. Before mine too,’ I add lamely, wondering what it is about his guileless gentleness that makes me so self-conscious. ‘I don’t have any music, I’m afraid.’

  ‘No problem, I only play by ear. You hum it and I’ll see if I can pick it up.’

  He proves remarkably adept, although I suspect that he may find himself floundering when he has to deal with Richard. ‘He can be a little erratic,’ I explain.

  ‘Try keeping time with Fiona! I bet you it’ll be fine. The concert’s just a bit of fun. Besides, everyone’s so tanked up on free wine they never notice when anything goes wrong. In fact they look forward to it.’

  ‘Great!’ I say gloomily. Envying his composure, I go in search of Sophie, whom I find perched on a laundry basket in the corridor, staring disconsolately at her phone. I resist any ‘watched pot’ analogy for fear of losing her goodwill, which I shall need if she is to be my emissary to Gillian.

  ‘You know I’ve become friendly with Gillian Patterson.’

  ‘Come on, Vincent, I’m not one of the nuns!’

  ‘No, of course not.’ Stung, I see why Giles might have taken the opportunity to stray. ‘I was wondering if you might ask her out after the show.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘On my behalf.’

  ‘You mean “my mate really fancies you”? Aren’t you old enough to do your own dirty work?’

  ‘That’s just it – I don’t want her to think it’s dirty. If I ask, she’ll assume it can only lead to one thing.’ Sophie snorts. ‘She’ll feel pressurised, compromised. That bloody conscience of hers will start working overtime.’

  ‘Whereas this way she’ll be able to kid herself!’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘What is this? High School Musical 3?’

  ‘It’s our last night here. I don’t want to waste it. Please.’

  ‘Whatever,’ she says wearily.

  ‘That’s great, Sophie – I owe you. Now I’d better check that Jamie and Jewel are on the case.’

  I join the crowd heading for the dining room, finding myself alongside Patricia and Maggie. ‘Let’s ask Mr O’Shaughnessy,’ Patricia says.

  ‘Ask me what, ladies?’ I reply, with a rush of alarm.

  ‘Did you know there are more churches per person in Trinidad and Tobago than anywhere else in the world?’

  ‘Strangely enough, that’s one statistic that seems to have passed me by.’

  ‘Mona swore to it. I told her: “It’s no wonder you people are always smiling.”’

  ‘And what did she say to that?’

  ‘She smiled.’

  Patricia and Maggie enter the dining room, avoiding the empty seats beside Gillian and Richard in their eagerness to sit at the front. I confer with Jamie and Jewel, agreeing that we will film any of our core interviewees who take part, with the strict exception of Richard. First up is Father Humphrey who, with his wheezy vowels and quivering chins, might pass for the compère at a workingman’s club. He starts by leading us in a decade of the rosary, neatly ensuring that even the lamest of his subsequent jokes is greeted with relief. He is followed by Sheila Clunes, who trills ‘Danny Boy’ to an ovation that owes more to tact than to taste; four young brancardiers, who camp up ‘Dancing Queen’ with a relish that is lost on the current audience; Frank, who grunts ‘How Much Is That Doggy in the Window?’; and Martin, who stammers ‘The Shadow of Your Smile’.

  The protracted pause after Martin’s song encourages me to move forward. Before summoning Richard to join me, I pay an impromptu tribute to the audience’s hospitality and trust. Conscious that I must now exhibit a similar trust – namely, that they will not yawn or gaze at their watches, let alone compare our version with a slicker one playing in their heads – I call on Richard, who leaps up like a newly promoted understudy. I glance at Gillian, whose face is a rictus of horror. Anxious to reassure her, I tell Alan to strum the opening chords. ‘Ready, Rich?’ I ask. He nods, remaining silent long after Alan has begun the first verse. He gradually relaxes and mouths the odd word. On the fifth line, I turn to find him staring me full in the face. I take his shoulder and twist him very slowly towards the front. His mumbling grows louder, although scarcely more coherent, until we come to the final couplet:

  ‘You must have been a beautiful baby

  ‘Cause baby look at you now.’

  As if aware that it is his last chance, he belts it out straight at Gillian, which emboldens me to do the same. To my relief, she is smiling broadly, having banished – or at any rate concealed – her fears. After milking the applause, Richard returns to his seat and I rejoin Jamie and Jewel, ignoring the ironic edge to their compliments.

  ‘I’ve got to hand it to you, chief,’ Jamie says. ‘Talk about covering all bases.’

  ‘I just wanted to help Richard thank his wife.’

  ‘That’s what I like about you, Vincent,’ Jewel says. ‘You’re all heart.’

  There is a further lull after our performance, not, I fear, because nobody feels confident to top it, but because of an unwitting duplication in the programme – too many doggies in the window – which requires all Father Humphrey’s diplomacy to resolve. His success is rewarded by a double act from Fiona a
nd Frank, which is even more mismatched than Richard’s and mine. After that Maggie, with unsuspected gusto, sings ‘I’m a Pink Toothbrush, You’re a Blue Toothbrush to Ken’, who looks as if he would rather suffer both halitosis and plaque. One of the nurses sings a nondescript love song, before Mona brings the show to a close with a stirring rendition of ‘Climb Every Mountain’.

  Louisa steps forward with her usual blend of diffidence and determination. ‘If I may have your attention a moment longer.’ The hubbub dies down. ‘First, I’d like to thank all the wonderful performers for the very best show I can remember.’

  ‘You say that every year,’ Brenda interjects.

  ‘It just gets better and better. Now we’ve one final duty – or I should say, pleasure – to perform. The raffle. Thanks to your generosity every ticket has been sold, which will enable us to offer two subsidised places to hospital pilgrims next year.’ This prompts the loudest applause of the night. ‘So, if I may call on Father Humphrey to do the honours.’

  ‘Got your tickets ready, Vincent?’ Sophie asks.

  ‘All five of them,’ I reply, ‘thanks for that!’

  ‘Sh-sh!’ Maggie shouts, clutching her stubs as reverently as a rosary.

  ‘Rien ne va plus,’ Father Humphrey calls out, as he plunges a pudgy hand into the bag. ‘Third prize – a 2 lb box of Belgian chocolates, courtesy of our sponsors, Harringtons of Stroud, goes to number 26.’

  ‘That’s mine. Mine!’ Sheila Clunes shrieks, pushing herself forward so fast that I half-expect the sixty-eighth miracle of Lourdes, with her leaping out of her wheelchair to tear the voucher from his hands.

  ‘If there is a God, He has a sense of humour,’ I whisper to Sophie, just as her mobile goes off.

  ‘Shit! Sorry.’ She slips out of the room.

  ‘Occupational hazard,’ Louisa says indulgently. ‘Well done, Sheila. Promise not to eat them all at once.’ A roar of laughter prompts her to bite her lip. ‘Now our second prize please, Father.’

  ‘Our second prize is … what is our second prize?’

  ‘A two-hour session with a beautician and stylist followed by a unique personalised portrait at a studio near you, courtesy of another of our sponsors, Cyril’s Photographic Galleries,’ Louisa reads out.