The Benefits of Passion

by Catherine Fox

  ‘Why not?’

  Isobel, who was sitting in front of them, turned round and hissed, ‘Honestly, Edward! Are you going to barge about like a mad bull when you’re a curate? You can’t demand to know other people’s intimate health problems.’

  Edward flushed. ‘OK, OK. I’m just worried about her.’

  ‘I’m all right,’ repeated Annie.

  Edward opened his mouth but was quelled by a look from Isobel. Tubby entered in his robes and they all got to their feet.

  ‘“Almighty God, to whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hidden, cleanse the thoughts of our hearts . . .”’ Oh, God, undo it all for me! Annie wanted to cry. They came to the confession. ‘“We are truly sorry and repent of all our sins.”’ But ‘sorry’ was not enough. Even if God forgave her all that was past, the past could not be undone.

  ‘“. . . pardon and deliver you from all your sins,”’ Tubby was saying. From the sin but not the consequences. Let there be some way out, she pleaded. Don’t make me go through this. But she knew what the answer would be: This is the way, walk in it.

  CHAPTER 21

  Annie went through the next few days like a sleepwalker. The staff were marvellous. She could almost hear Tubby saying to them all, I must stress that this is primarily a pastoral matter. Nobody blamed her. Why didn’t they, when she was so very much to blame? Would she feel absolved if somebody bawled her out? Perhaps they all thought her situation was punishment enough. Some mornings as she hung retching over her washbasin she felt they were right.

  All she could do was survive. The staff were treating her like some kind of victim or refugee, steering her gently in this direction and that. She went obediently to see Pauline. Tubby arranged for her to visit a Franciscan brother later in the week. Then the Principal summoned her. Annie went up to her office full of dread. Dr Pollock was a tall formidable Scotswoman renowned throughout the university for cracking down on student misdemeanours; but instead of getting the universally feared Pollocking, Annie was treated to brisk sympathy and practical advice.

  The following day she went back to her GP. ‘Ho hum,’ said Dr Buchanan. ‘Bad luck.’

  She talked to Annie for a while, then sent her on to the practice midwife who began the process of filling in forms. Mother’s medical history. Annie racked her brains and tried to answer the questions. Although Mrs Brown muttered darkly about her health she seldom gave details. After a while the midwife paused. ‘Mother’s medical details,’ she said gently. ‘That means you. You’re the mother.’

  I am the mother, Annie repeated to herself. I am the mother. She tried to believe that there really was a child growing inside her and that it wasn’t all some ludicrous mistake. One night she dreamt she had given birth, but nobody was sure whether it was a baby or an egg and bacon flan. The Principal had to cut into it with a knife to find out. ‘It’s all right, my dear,’ she said. ‘It’s a flan.’

  All the time she ached for Will. He phoned one evening.

  ‘Annie, I feel I’ve abandoned you. Come and see me. What about Saturday afternoon?’ She agreed, mostly out of fear that if she said no he would come to find her in Coverdale. Their conversation was full of awkward pauses. When they finally hung up she was crying yet again. She could no longer get straight in her mind the reasons why they had split up. Surely this was the time to talk about serious commitment, now that she was pregnant. But he hadn’t raised the subject. Money, a place to stay, moral support – that was all he had offered. All? It was a lot. He hadn’t flung her out, for goodness sake. She couldn’t complain. Ted raised an eyebrow and said nothing when she reasoned like this.

  Finals results came out. The hot news in Coverdale was that Ingram had somehow missed getting a first. It had been very, very close, Ingram explained. But then, it always was. Annie smirked. At last, the ultimate place name for Ingram: ‘Upper Second.’ She shared this thought with Ted, who read her the latest poetic offering from his daughters: ‘In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure Dominican decree . . .’ Annie laughed till she wept at the words ‘A dandelion with a dum-dum bullet in a vitamin once I saw. It was an Abyssinian maisonette . . .’ He read on steadfastly to the bitter end: ‘For he on hooch hath fed, and drunk the millipedes of paraldehyde.’

  Ted devised many little methods of cheering her up, and she loved him for it, but the days seemed endless. Her novel was the only place where she was still in control, where the sun shone when she wanted it to, where months could pass in a flash and acts of fornication could be crossed out and forgotten. She needed Barney and Isabella as never before, yet as she sat down to write they slid from her grasp.

  *

  The train trundled west across Northumberland. Annie was struggling to calm herself after her encounter with Edward, who had insisted on driving her to the station.

  ‘Look, Annie,’ he began as he parked the car, ‘I dare say it’s some boring old gynae problem you don’t want to talk about, but at least reassure me it’s nothing serious. I mean, it’s not . . . you know . . .’

  He thinks I’ve got cancer, she thought. ‘No, oh, no.’ It wasn’t fair to let him worry like this. Besides, he would have to know at some point. Her fingers twisted round one another. ‘It’s just that I’m, um, pregnant.’

  ‘You can’t be!’ There was almost relief in his tone, as though she were a naive girl who thought you caught babies from dirty toilet seats, and he could soon put her straight about that.

  ‘Well, I’m afraid I am.’

  ‘But you haven’t got a boyfriend!’ She saw him relinquish his faint hope that she was joking. ‘Annie! You can’t be. Who – but – when – I bloody well hope he’s doing the decent thing!’ She hung her head. ‘Annie! Don’t tell me he’s married?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then he should damn well do his duty. Listen, you don’t just get girls into trouble and leave them to get on with it! Who is he? Come on.’

  ‘I’m not telling you.’

  ‘Hah! I know him, then. He’s in college.’

  ‘No. That is, I’m not telling you,’ she corrected herself hastily. Damn damn damn. There was a long pause.

  ‘I’ll bloody kill him. It’s William, isn’t it?’

  ‘I’m not telling you.’

  ‘It is! The little shit.’ Annie clamped her hands over her ears. ‘Right. We’re going over there NOW.’ He started the engine.

  ‘But I’ve got to see this monk. Stop, Edward!’

  Annie winced at the memory of Edward roaring and swearing in such a confined space. She had only managed to calm him down by the shameful tactic of clutching her stomach and moaning. The fear that she might miscarry on the front seat of his car did the trick. She was ashamed of herself, but how else could she have extracted promises of good behaviour from him? He had gone very quiet. Perhaps dangerously so. Ought she to warn Will? She was seeing him the next day. That would be soon enough.

  She watched the hedgerows out of the train window. They were creamy with may blossom. The wind feathered across the barley. She wished she were happy enough to enjoy the sight. But you always hated him! Edward had protested. She knew he was saying to himself in amazement, I thought it was me she was keen on. Was that the kind of unsavoury detail she would have to confess to this monk? Brother Gabriel, as he was improbably called.

  The train pulled into the station and she got out. He was supposed to be meeting her. The phrase ‘stately pleasure Dominican’ flashed unhelpfully across her mind as she walked towards the footbridge. She looked up the steps and saw a slight robed figure standing in the sunlight. He was shielding his eyes and looking down, like an archangel scanning the four corners of the earth. His red-gold hair sprang from his head like a fiery halo. She decided his name was right. He came swiftly down the steps to meet her.

  ‘Hello, Annie. I’m Brother Gabriel.’

  They shook hands and he held her gaze with searching blue eyes. She tried to think of something to say as they walked to t
he car. Sunlight dappled down through the trees and went flickering across his brown habit. Her Nonconformist background had left her unable to cope with monasticism. She battled with hysterical mirth as he backed out the car and narrowly missed a passing Labrador. Wouldn’t it be terribly bad form for a Franciscan to run over a dog? They managed a few exchanges about her journey and the weather. At last they were going down a long, wooded drive to the Friary.

  ‘St Francis and St Clare pray for us,’ requested a polite notice in the entrance. Annie averted her gaze in Protestant squeamishness.

  ‘Let’s get some coffee and find a place to talk,’ said Gabriel. Another brother paused as he mopped the floor and smiled at her. He was built like a nightclub bouncer and had a pink apron tied over his habit. Annie grappled with mirth again. The sound of a microwave beeping in a distant kitchen caused her another spasm. It was the incongruity – habits, microwaves, crew-cut bouncer, pink pinny.

  They went with their coffee into a small room. The box of tissues on the little table made Annie rebel inwardly. She hated Tubby for sending her here.

  ‘Why don’t you tell me all about it?’ Gabriel asked after a while.

  It seemed rude not to respond. She began to mumble. He listened intently. Suddenly it seemed like a relief to pour it all out to a stranger. She told him about her doubts and frustrations at Coverdale and about her affair with Will. She suppressed another wild surge of hilarity at the idea of talking about sex to a celibate monk. His eyes never wavered from her face. When she finished her jaws felt tight and her teeth almost chattered as though she’d just given a lengthy performance of some kind. Gabriel looked down at his hands and carefully and deliberately fitted the fingers together like two halves of a puzzle.

  ‘It’s a complete disaster,’ Annie concluded.

  ‘Tell me about your mother,’ he said unexpectedly.

  ‘My mother? Well,’ she began. Then she stopped, finding herself confronting a closed door. The cupboard under the stairs full of useless broken things. Gabriel waited. How had he known to ask this? ‘My mother,’ she began again. Her voice trembled and out rushed all the misery of her horrible childhood. She groped for the tissue box and wept as she told him.

  ‘Annie,’ he said in the end, ‘it seems to me that your whole life is governed by the fear of giving offence.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘It shouldn’t be like that.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, sensing anger vibrating in the air. For a second she seemed to see it sparking from his fingertips and wild hair.

  ‘What about you? You’re offending yourself every minute of your life.’

  He’s right, she thought. Why can’t I be more like Isabella?

  ‘Who’s Isabella?’ he asked curiously.

  She jumped and stared at him. I must have said it out loud. ‘Um . . . nobody, really. Just a character in a book. Something I’m writing. It’s nothing.’

  ‘Tell me about her.’ She obeyed, still watching him warily, not quite able to dismiss the idea that he had secret access to the Book of Life.

  ‘I think I like her,’ he said. They sat a while in silence, then Annie’s stomach gave a horrible lurch.

  ‘I’m going to be sick!’

  He leapt up. ‘This way!’

  They sprinted through the house until Annie was overcome by the sound of slapping sandals and flapping habit. Her nausea deserted her.

  ‘No, I’m not.’ They skidded to a halt and she giggled helplessly in the silent corridor.

  He smiled. ‘Well, what about some fresh air?’

  He led her out into the garden. A small statue of St Francis lurked in the rockery like a garden gnome. They wandered along wooded paths until they came upon a large painted crucifix in a clearing. Tacky, said Damn’s voice.

  ‘Not my cup of tea, either,’ remarked Gabriel.

  ‘There’s no . . . well, passion,’ she ventured.

  ‘Come and see this.’ He took her back to the house. She smelt fish cooking, then as they approached the chapel, the ravishing smell of incense.

  They went in. Annie stood awkwardly while Gabriel genuflected. Behind the altar was a large window, which looked out over a gently sloping lawn to the sweep of wooded hills. A flock of pigeons rose into the blue.

  ‘Look,’ said Gabriel.

  Above the altar was another crucifix, the figure on it twisted in agony.

  Annie cried out in shock. ‘I’m afraid I was brought up to disapprove of crucifixes,’ she explained. ‘The resurrection was supposed to be the thing.’

  ‘Ah, but this is the victory,’ said Gabriel, still looking up at it. ‘The point of suffering and defeat. That’s where he conquered. It’s shot through with resurrection light.’

  Annie looked again at the strong figure as it writhed up against the pain, head flung back in agony. Or was it triumph?

  ‘Maybe your “complete disaster” will turn out to be the thing which sets you free, Annie.’

  That’s a bit pat, she thought.

  ‘If your aim in life was not to offend, you’ve failed. Spectacularly.’ She flinched. ‘You can give up trying to please everyone now and please yourself instead.’

  ‘But aren’t we supposed to try to please God?’

  ‘He might be pleased to see you happy.’ A bell started to chime. ‘Will you stay for the Eucharist?’

  As the train carried her away the whole thing began to feel unreal. She thought about the Samaritan woman at the well. I know how she felt. Come see a man who told me all that I ever did. Did Gabriel have genuine telepathic powers, or was he just a very shrewd judge of character? Perhaps the two weren’t so far apart. ‘Your “complete disaster” will turn out to be the thing that sets you free.’ If only it would. If only she could stop cowering the whole time and dare to stand up straight.

  That evening she went with her friends to the cinema. Edward had somehow broken his hand rowing and didn’t feel like coming. Annie feared she had mortally offended him and his injured hand was just an excuse. Still, the film was enjoyable, exactly the kind of escapist comedy she needed. And it had Sebastian Penn in it, who was ‘such a good actor’, as Isobel could be heard remarking to Muriel as they walked home. Good actor be buggered, Isabella might have said. Have him oiled and tied to my bed at once. There was something about him that reminded Annie of Will. The smile, perhaps.

  When she rang Will’s doorbell the following afternoon she reminded herself of her resolve to be less cowardly. Would she ever stop being terrified of him? He opened the door.

  ‘Your face!’ she cried out. Black eye, row of stitches under the eyebrow.

  ‘You told Edward, then,’ he said.

  CHAPTER 22

  ‘Oh, no! But he promised!’ wailed Annie. ‘Will, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah. Forget it. Coffee?’

  She followed him to the kitchen wringing her hands. ‘I made him promise! Are you all right?’

  ‘Yeah. A few stitches, a night in hospital.’

  ‘In hospital! Why?’

  ‘Concussion. They keep you in for observation. I’m fine.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Stop bloody apologizing. You’re not responsible for Edward’s actions. He’s been longing to punch me for about fifteen years. You gave him the perfect excuse. Did he break his hand?’

  ‘How did you know?’

  He grinned. ‘Newton’s third law of motion, honey child.’

  She tried feebly to resurrect her failed O level physics. He made her some coffee and they went through to his oatmeal sitting room.

  ‘So how are you doing, Annie?’

  ‘Fine.’ The smell of coffee reached her. ‘Actually, I’m not,’ she said boldly. ‘I feel wretched and sick and tired. And I keep crying all the time. Why’s pregnancy so lousy?’

  ‘The unassumed is the unredeemed,’ he replied. ‘Our Lord didn’t assume a woman’s body, therefore female sexuality and childbirth are unredeemed. Or, medically speaking, it’s your hor
mones, dear.’

  Just for a second she was glad Edward had hit him.

  ‘Have you told your parents?’ he asked.

  ‘No. I thought I might write to them.’

  He nodded. ‘Term ends on Wednesday, right? Where will you go?’

  ‘I . . . I’m not sure. Ted and Penny have said I can go and stay with them, but . . .’

  They fell silent. Annie tried to sip her coffee but gagged instead. She put the mug down.

  Will was frowning. ‘Look, wouldn’t it be simpler all round if you moved in here, Annie? Until you know what you want to do. I’ve got two spare bedrooms.’

  ‘Oh! But everyone . . . It would look . . .’

  ‘It’s a bit late to worry what it looks like. What have you got to lose?’ She remembered Gabriel’s words. Will reached out and took her hand. ‘Sweetheart, I’m worried about you.’ Her heart bumped at this unprecedented tenderness. ‘I’m worried you’re going to be lonely and miserable and short of cash but too scared to ask me for help. And I bet you’ll feel you’re imposing on Ted, won’t you?’

  She was forced to admit he was right. ‘But I’d feel I was imposing on you.’

  ‘I’m the bastard who landed you in it, for Christ’s sake. Let me help.’

  ‘Um . . .’

  ‘Or am I impossible to live with?’

  ‘Oh, no. It’s not that. It’s –’

  ‘Give it a try, then. Please, Annie. I’d feel a lot happier.’

  ‘Well, maybe I could.’

  ‘Good. I’ll collect you on Wednesday afternoon.’

  ‘What if you meet Edward?’

  ‘I’m not scared of Edward.’ He caught her expression. ‘I’m not! You bloody cheeky woman. How’s Libby, by the way?’

  ‘In the doghouse,’ muttered Annie, with a blush.

  He laughed. ‘You’re not by any chance expecting me to do the decent thing?’

  ‘Of course not,’ she said, flustered. ‘Don’t be silly.’

  ‘Well, excuse me,’ he drawled. ‘Only asking.’

  On the train home she went over this exchange. She couldn’t decide if there had been a serious proposal lurking there and she had offended him. No – he’d told her he didn’t believe in marriage. But why did he want her to live with him? On balance she decided it must be his sense of duty. She pondered the awkward ambiguity of living in her ex-lover’s spare bedroom. Oh, why had she agreed? How on earth was she going to explain or justify it? Her thoughts turned to the college staff. Her friends. Edward. He would be outraged. She felt suddenly hot. After a moment she wondered if she was angry. Yes, she was. Bloody angry.