The Question

by Jane Asher

  She made the tea automatically, hardly glancing at the plastic jar of tea bags, the carton of milk or the bowl of sugar as her hands found what they needed by feel, programmed by years of having made these same movements in the same way day after day to be able to judge precisely and unconsciously the distance from kettle to cup, spoon to bowl and carton back to fridge. While her body moved calmly and routinely, her mind was flying, darting back and forth over days, looks, months, expressions, smiles, phrases, excuses, years, laughs, absences – anything that might now be possibly construed as a clue. Some memories and images came back relentlessly over and over again: the times she had rung the flat and had no answer; the smile he gave her every time he drove off to London; messages from the office to say he couldn’t get back to the country as expected; his voice blowing a kiss down the phone at the end of his regular evening call. The pictures in her head were crescendoing to a visual scream of unbearable misery that battered on her mind’s eye from within. She picked up the mug and took a gulp of scalding tea that burnt her mouth and shocked her into a moment’s respite from the mental cacophony.

  But, like a red ant crawling over a stretched white sheet, a single, relentless image crept into the stillness and clarity of her emptied mind. Hair. Red hair. Long red hair curling over a receiver.

  Ruth’s hair.

  Chapter Two

  That Monday morning George didn’t get his walk after all. Eleanor shut the puzzled black Labrador in the kitchen, grabbed her bag from the hall table, locked the front door and drove the Range Rover down the A3 towards London. She had no idea what she would do when she got there, realising after just a few miles that the potentially perfect excuse of the yellow curtain material was lying neatly folded on her desk in the study.

  ‘Idiot!’ she shouted out loud at herself, then, ‘Idiot!’ again at the very thought that she should need an excuse at all; she, the wronged woman, as she was now convinced she was: the innocent.

  ‘He’s the one who needs the excuse. Bastard!’

  She turned on the radio and listened for a few seconds to the Classic FM jingle played on a harp, wondering, in spite of herself, how many versions of the miniature theme existed, and whether the composer could possibly receive royalties every time it was played.

  ‘No, of course not. They must have done a sort of allin deal.’

  She smiled to herself at her own absurdity, then suddenly frowned and, feeling an uncomfortable tightness in her throat and a fullness behind her eyes, knew she was in danger of starting to cry. She slowed the car down and looked for somewhere to stop.

  In the lay-by she switched off the engine and looked out of the window at the cows in the field next to her, their tails flicking away the flies as they grazed, moving slowly across the ground as they tugged at the grass, lifting their heads occasionally to stare around them as their mouths worked at it, jaws sliding sideways in continuous motion. Eleanor felt a deep sadness as she watched them. Had she failed John? What was it he had needed from her that she hadn’t been able to give; that the red-haired Ruth had supplied instead?

  ‘Sex, I suppose,’ she muttered out loud. ‘Middle-age crisis; male menopause, or whatever they call it. But what do I have to go on? Why do I feel so sure something’s wrong? What do I really know? And I must stop talking to myself – I’ve got to think.’

  She stopped and felt herself calm a little. She didn’t like the way her usual ordered, logical intelligence had deserted her, and began to think through the evidence that had prompted the horrible certainty of John’s unfaithfulness. She tried to remember a previous occasion when she had felt like this, but couldn’t. The feeling was utterly alien. In all the years of marriage, through periods of intense irritation with each other, through the times of boredom, of friendship, of comfortable familiarity, she had never once had the slightest suspicion that he might be having an affair. It seemed to her all at once pathetic that she hadn’t. With newspapers packed every day with stories of desertion, divorce and infidelity she couldn’t think now how she had ever felt secure. Even the bastions of her upbringing had deserted her over the past decade: the sleazy goings-on of Tory MPs had become regular reading in the once safely staid pages of her Daily Telegraph.

  A string of attractive, available secretaries and PAs from John’s years at the office paraded in front of her mind’s eye. She saw them all in bed with him – first individually, then in a romping, orgiastic group.

  The vision filled her with a terrible, furious, nervous energy, and she hurled herself onto the steering wheel and turned the key violently in the lock, holding it pushed as far forward as it would go while the starter motor churned loudly and impatiently. A smell of hot oil reminded her to relax her grip, and the key sprang back in the ignition and the engine purred into life. She released the handbrake and pulled out of the lay-by, hardly glancing in the wing mirror as she did so.

  By the time she pulled into a meter bay opposite the office in Portland Place she was calmer. As she reached for the door handle she paused and glanced at her watch, then sat back into the seat again. Why see Ruth before she had to? The idea of a meeting with her was agony: both the possibilities of confronting her with what she knew – or thought she knew – or of avoiding the issue and behaving as normal seemed utterly impossible. In another five minutes or so Ruth would leave the office for lunch as she always did, and Eleanor could talk to John on his own. Quite what she would say, she hadn’t begun to consider. She just knew she had to look at him; to search the face of the man she had thought she’d known for so many years and who now felt like a stranger. This man who was ‘carrying on’ with his beautiful red-haired secretary was a figure from a novel or television programme; not the familiar, boring, comforting, predictable husband of thirty years.

  She watched as, a few minutes later, Ruth’s tall, slim figure stepped through the black-painted double doors of the large house and moved down the pillared stone steps. A lightweight beige raincoat was pulled in tightly round her waist, and as she glanced up at the sky, wrinkling her nose in disapproval at the small specks of rain, Eleanor was dismayed to take in the unlined, pale, but prettily freckled skin and clear, shadowless eyes, seeing the attractive face quite differently now that it belonged to a rival rather than a friend. Ruth turned in Eleanor’s direction to reach over one shoulder for her leather knapsack, and Eleanor made to sink down in her seat. Realising even as she did so that the Range Rover was as identifiable as she was herself, she sat up again and stared straight at the young girl, daring her to raise her eyes; ready to tackle whatever greeting might be given, prepared to rage inwardly at the attitude of friendly innocence she felt sure would be assumed. But Ruth pulled a tiny telescoped umbrella out of the bag and, without glancing towards the car, began to unfurl and extend it as she turned away again and walked northwards along the wet pavement. Once she was out of sight, Eleanor stepped from the car and crossed the road, ignoring the sprinkling of fine rain that marked her coat and spotted her shoes.

  ‘Darling – I’ll be with you in a minute. Ruth’s at lunch, but I’ll get Judith to fetch you a cup of tea – or do you want coffee?’

  Eleanor couldn’t rescue herself from the lurch of shock she felt in the pit of her stomach at hearing Ruth’s name in John’s mouth in time to answer before his head had disappeared again from around the door of the office. She had looked up just in time to catch the briefest glimpse of a dark red, striped tie at his neck, and it was all she could do to stop herself leaping up from her chair and following him. She tried to pull herself together enough to call for coffee in as normal a voice as she could muster, but he was shouting to her from the corridor before she could manage more than an intake of breath.

  ‘Do you want to see Martin? Ruth said you were bringing something to show him.’

  It was hopeless. The second mention of her name had hit her in the stomach again, and she felt once more the dangerous threat of tears and decided to keep her mouth shut. She knew John wouldn’t wait for a
reply – much of the time his questions were thrown out rhetorically in any case, and she was well used to being ignored when replying to them, particularly in the context of the office. If she didn’t answer, he would just stride on in whichever direction he had been going before he had diverted from his route long enough to cast a quick greeting at her where she sat in the luxurious outer office. She had tried to search his face in the couple of seconds it had been in front of her; anxious to catch traces of the new person she was now dealing with. It was disconcerting to find him looking the same as ever, and again she felt a flash of panic and guilt at the assumption she had made and at the guilty verdict that she had so quickly imposed on him on a single piece of evidence.

  She took a well-worn gilt compact out of her handbag and began to powder her nose and cheeks, trying hard to ignore the contrast that the picture of her face in the tiny mirror made with the image of the upturned face of the young girl squinting into the rain that she had seen a few minutes before.

  ‘Thank you, Judith.’

  The tea was put down on the coffee table in front of her. She looked up, suddenly anxious that something in the tone of her voice had given her away; half expecting to see curiosity or sympathy on Judith’s face, but meeting only her usual expression of bland indifference.

  ‘Mr Hamilton says he won’t be long. Anything else I can get you, Mrs Hamilton? Did you want to see Mr Havers?’

  ‘No, for goodness’ sake, why does everyone think I want to see Martin? And I did ask for coffee, Judith.’

  ‘Sorry, Mrs Hamilton, I thought Mr Hamilton said tea. And I thought Ruth said you were coming in to see Mr Havers.’

  Eleanor knew that Judith was right and that the slight tone of resentment in her voice was completely justified, but that didn’t prevent it from annoying her. How dare she come back at her like that? What gave her the right to—

  ‘Did you want me to change it for coffee?’

  ‘No, no, leave it now. Leave it. Tea’s fine.’

  She looked at Judith’s large, tightly skirted bottom and hips as she walked away from her and felt a wash of sweaty dread break over her. Could she be another one? Now she no longer knew John, he could be capable of anything. But he hated fat women; he had always said so. But even as she thought it she knew that ‘always’ had no meaning now: the man who had ‘always’ didn’t exist.

  She looked around the office at the large modern watercolours, cream sofas and glass coffee table and tried to identify something else that was badgering for her attention at the back of her mind. It took a few seconds to identify it: she was hungry. Her usual routine of toast and marmalade first thing, followed by morning coffee and biscuits an hour or so later to the accompaniment of Woman’s Hour, had been abandoned in the morning’s upheaval, and it was only now that she realised she had eaten nothing since a small supper over fifteen hours before.

  Eleanor was solidly built; shaped in a way that had changed little since spreading into a traditionally English pear-shaped middle age in her mid-forties. Her intake of food had varied little over the years: although she sensed that the energy she expended was a little less every month that passed, she did nothing to adjust the amount of fuel that sustained it, secretly a little mocking of those of her friends who had joined in the general drift towards diet and exercise. Gyms and aerobic classes were for those younger than she, and were even to be looked down on for encouraging an unhealthy awareness of one’s own physical condition. Missing a meal was not something to be taken lightly, and even in her present emotional state, the demands of routine were pressing and unavoidable.

  She considered calling Judith again and asking her to send out for a sandwich, or to bring her a plate of biscuits from the office kitchen, but suddenly seeing again in her mind’s eye the meeting with John that was inevitable if she stayed, she decided to use her hunger as an excuse to herself to go, and quickly picked up her coat and bag and left.

  She turned the car round and drove down one of the side roads towards Marylebone High Street, thoughts of the quiches and rolls she knew would be in the window of her favourite coffee shop juggling for position with an image of Ruth’s slim frame balanced on one hip on a corner of her desk as she nibbled at a crispbread or sipped at some mineral water.

  ‘Coffee and a Danish pastry, please.’

  ‘Cappuccino, espresso or filter?’

  It had taken an enormous effort on Eleanor’s part to bring her voice into a semblance of normality long enough for her to give the order, and the strain made her dizzy. To have it countered with a question fired back at her so quickly took her by surprise.

  As the young waitress gazed down at her, Eleanor opened her mouth to try to answer but suddenly stopped; hit by a terrible uncertainty. The choice of coffee seemed suddenly impossible. How could she make a decision if she didn’t know who she was? She found herself stuttering and panic-stricken: unable to reply or even look the girl in the eye. The waitress’s obvious embarrassment just made it worse, and it was a relief when she muttered something about coming back in a moment and, putting a menu down onto the polished wood surface of the table, moved away towards another customer.

  Eleanor took stock. It was so extraordinary for her to be out of control like this. It was new, and it frightened her. Yes she suspected her husband of having an affair, but surely she could deal with this as logically and calmly as she always had with problems? Why did she feel so completely incapable? Even her physical surroundings seemed to be all at once abandoning the rules: the marble floor tilted away from her into the shadows; the walls looked warped and soft; the table sloped and buckled. She rested her forehead on the palm of her hand for a moment and closed her eyes. In the relative calm of the pink world of her inner eyelids she could see more clearly, and suddenly understood. Not only was John not the man she thought she had known: she herself wasn’t the same woman, either. Her position in an ordered, comfortable, middle-class world was turned upside down, and by living with a man who had been lying to her for – how long? – she had unwittingly colluded in a nonsensical pretence. For so long she had read in magazines of women resenting their position as ‘somebody’s wife’ and had always thought their worries childish and irrelevant: now she could see – could feel – what they meant. If she wasn’t the happily married woman she had thought she was for so long she seemed to be nothing.

  By the time the waitress returned she was able to order, and after downing the cappuccino and chicken sandwich that arrived within minutes, she felt fortified and more resolved. Sensing suddenly what she must do, she paid the bill and went back to the car, smiling slightly in her newfound sense of purpose and direction.

  She swivelled the driver’s mirror down towards her until she could see herself clearly and reached into her bag for a comb, pulling through the dampened but still glossy-looking brown curls until they were arranged to her satisfaction, pleasantly surprised to see that her makeup had survived the ravages of emotional upheaval and that, once a quick swipe of lipstick had been applied to her mouth, she was in reasonable shape to tackle the next stage of this extraordinary day. As she moved the car smoothly out of the meter bay and made her way towards the flat in Nottingham Place she felt almost excited. The sense of terrible anticipation that she had had since the morning’s discovery had taken on an aspect of nervous energy that was almost sexual in its physical attack on her. A sensation that was somewhere between a desperate need to urinate and a thrill of excitement fluttered between her legs, and she squeezed her thighs together as she drove to try and contain it.

  The only meter she could find was in Paddington Street, but as the rain had stopped the five-minute walk to the flat didn’t seem too daunting, and the thought of the fresh air was good. She would install herself comfortably in the sitting room and await John’s return in the evening; by the time he arrived she would have planned her assault on him carefully enough to prevent his wriggling out of it; she would be ready to counter any excuse he might have with a crystal-clear, l
ogical comeback. Her step was purposeful and almost confident. A clarity and overwhelming need to know everything had taken over from the blind panic.

  Eleanor walked with her upper body thrust forward from the hips as if her head were more eager to reach its destination than her feet, but the look of assurance it gave her on this occasion belied her inner struggles: to the onlooker the tall, middle-aged woman in sturdy shoes and Burberry raincoat striding quickly along the shiny London pavements appeared to have not a care in the world.

  But that stride was to be stopped in its tracks by something so startling and yet so obvious that, even as she stood transfixed in horror, she wondered at herself for not having foreseen it. From where she watched, twenty yards or so away on the other side of the road, she was able to see quite clearly the attractive, neatly belted girl with red hair, carrying a bulging supermarket bag in one hand, approach the large dark red brick block of flats and turn into the entrance. How stupid she was! Where else did she think they would have met, for goodness’ sake? What had she imagined – a quick fling on the sofa in the office? A willing body pressed back onto the desktop, skirt pushed up; knickers pulled down? Secret kisses stolen by the photocopier?

  Eleanor could feel the calm clarity of the last few minutes evaporating even as her mind scrolled relentlessly through the horrifying images; images that, intolerable as they were, she knew now were less terrible than the reality must have been. As she saw Ruth’s figure receding into the gloom of the flat’s main entranceway they were superseded by images more tranquil, more domestic and far, far more hurtful. Ruth cooking an amusing little Italian meal in the tiny kitchen of John’s pied-à-terre; John creeping up behind her, sliding his arms round her waist and kissing the nape of her neck in a clichéd movie version of cosy domesticity. Eleanor stirred herself and made to cross the road before she had to let them move into the bedroom and onto the white-framed Heal’s bed she had chosen with such care. Some things were not to be looked at – at least not for now. Anger drove her in through the front door of the flat and towards the confrontation she now felt was inevitable – and even to be welcomed.