Love and the Art of War

by Dinah Lee Küng

  ‘My daughter might have mentioned it in passing.’

  ‘Yeah. I don’t think that was about a shirt, Jane. Men can get irrational when they feel their nest has been invaded—even the nice, decent types.’ Dan gripped her by the shoulders. ‘Trust me on this one. I’ve been in Joe’s shoes, and let’s just say I wasn’t at my best.’

  She chained the door behind Dan. Lorraine’s DVD player could be heard still going upstairs and Jane applauded her mother for not walking in for a snooping nightcap.

  Well, she had certainly done her homework this week! She’d followed Baldwin’s Stratagem Twenty. She’d taken Sammie’s two bits advising her to stop being the passive do-nothing. Joe was seething, suspicious, and wrong-footed but all the lobs in the world wouldn’t confuse a solid net-player like Dan.

  Sure enough, the waters were muddier, but with the rough and wonderful sensation of Dan’s kiss still on her lips, did she feel like recapturing the old fish, even if she could?

  Chapter Twenty-one, Jin Chan Tuo Ke

  (Shed Your Skin like a Golden Cicada)

  Six libraries in Brent were shut down that week over protesters’ demonstrations. Even Alan Bennett’s summary of the council decision as ‘child abuse’ couldn’t stop the Cameronian tumbrils from rolling across the cobblestones.

  Innocent of their luck to still have a library, the Rhyme-Timers followed Chris into the corner for yet another rendition of Who Moved My Cheese? (Jane couldn’t get Chris to give up wildly mismatching readers and books but the kids seemed happy enough with a self-help book on managing change) while Jane reviewed renovation proposals with the Library Authority’s visiting architect.

  Mr Gumble, a short, balding man, unrolled his blueprints across the issue desk with the self-importance of an imperial emissary. Soon it was clear that Mr Gumble had his own tale to tell Jane, along the lines of Who Stole My Library.

  ‘This big surface will go to make space for extending the computer bank—you’ll get the very latest computers, of course—and we can probably squeeze in another printer station over here.’ The architect tugged at the mandarin collar of his black wool tunic. He peered at Jane through very round spectacles with thick black rims. He was a Wind and the Willows character, Mole in specs.

  ‘Then where will the borrowers—?’

  ‘No, no, Ms Gilchrist. Customers. The Secretary of State for Culture insists we call them customers. Think Waterstones, film centres, or coffee bars. It’s all part of the new library philosophy based on retailing principles.’

  ‘If you remove this central desk, where do our readers check out their books?’

  ‘We’re replacing the desk with a prefab pod. Your customers will access their materials at the pod stationed over here, to free up the entrance. Makes it more welcoming. Removes the social barriers. A big desk puts people off.’

  ‘But you’re using that social barrier right now to spread out your blueprints. A lot of our borrowers—’

  ‘Customers, Ms Gilchrist, customers.’

  ‘They’re elderly. This whole block is full of them. This is where they leave their shopping and let me watch their handbags while they explore the shelves. We put their books to one side, over here. They want to see me when they come in. They want to know who’s on duty. Sometimes, Mr Gumble, all they want is to rest in that chair and enjoy a bit of a chat. I might be the only person they talk to that day.’

  ‘Well, I’m afraid there’s no changing the pod. It’s part of a job lot.’

  Mr Gumble bent towards Jane, as if to suggest they tunnel down for safety together. ‘If you’re quick, you might hang about when the moving team comes and ask them to bung the desk in the back room until after the reopening ceremony. Then sneak it out again. But I’ve got to allocate you the pod.’

  ‘Excuse me, Mr Gumble, only one pod? Surely we get two?’ Jane tilted her head towards Chris.

  He peered at his inventory sheet. ‘Oh, I see. I do see. He’s staff, too? Dear me. Well,’ Mr Gumble knocked over Chris’s placard lettered, Kidnapping! School shootings! Organ transplants! Read Jodi Picoult now—before it happens to you! He propped it back up. ‘We’ll be giving you wall display cabinets, too.’

  ‘I don’t want display cabinets. This isn’t a shopping mall! Who should I talk to?’

  ‘I wouldn’t peek over the trenches right now. The government is forcing the councils into huge budget cuts and they’re closing more than a hundred libraries—your older branches are a soft target if you don’t keep up.’ He whispered, ‘Some libraries are entirely volunteer-run now or going self-service. I’ve seen one in Yorkshire where all that was left was a shelf of paperbacks in the village local, next to the toilets.’

  ‘Trained librarians replaced by machines and bartenders.’ Jane shook her head.

  ‘I know what you mean, Ms Gilchrist. The Big Society makes me feel littler than ever, but perhaps that’s just me.’

  Mr Gumble acted friendly, as friendly as the guy announcing the invasion of the monstrous Triffids in John Wyndham’s story. Desks replaced by pods, skilled professionals by machines? Could a machine guide a child to Noel Streatfield?

  Worse, who was marked out for redundancy? Chris was better with teens and younger adults, but his short story workshop for seniors had never been repeated. Jane was adept with the elderly, but if they were ‘customers,’ they had a very short shelf life compared to Rhyme-Timers.

  She watched the happy litter of five-year-olds listening to Chris. Her mobile rang. She left Mr Gumble with his measuring tape and sought privacy in the foyer. She braced herself for Joe’s voice—angry, disapproving, or conciliatory.

  It wasn’t Joe, but Bella trilling, ‘Jane, is that you?’ Her vowels sank their rounded fangs into Jane’s neck through the cordless air.

  Bella sounded breathy, even for someone who’d built a career ventilating over ripe aubergines: ‘Jane, please, please, please don’t ring off. I must be the absolutely last person you want to speak to but we really must chat, you know, to clear the air.’

  Jane held the speaker away from her scorched ear.

  ‘Jane? Are you still there? Jane?’

  ‘You want to chat? Bella. Do you equate stealing someone’s mate with borrowing a recipe?’

  ‘How droll. I’m so glad you haven’t lost your sense of humour. But Jane, I’m not calling for myself. I wouldn’t dare. I’m calling for someone we both care so much about.’

  ‘Sammie. I’m dealing with that. Dr Landis isn’t worried, if we keep her on track.’

  ‘Well, no. Of course I care about Sammie, care terribly, I always have, and this horrible eating business, well, I know you must be absolutely frantic. I’ll loop back to you on that later. No, I was referring to Joe, actually.’

  Jane managed a hoot of derision. ‘What makes you think I care about Joe?’

  ‘He’s absolutely beside himself. Was up all night. Drinking straight from the bottle. I found him passed out in the Jacuzzi. Does he normally go on binges, or is it just Sammie and Lorraine who over-imbibe? Darling, is this a family hobby?’

  So poor old Joe had come untethered by the sight of Dan embracing Jane. Or as Baldwin might put it—he’d been muddied. It was laughable—wasn’t Jane the one who was supposed to be beside herself? In Sammie’s defence, if not yet her own, she felt stronger every week that passed without her chugging down some insecticide, or trying the head-in-oven routine. For all the beauty of The Bell Jar, Jane had outdistanced Sylvia Plath for resilience off the page.

  ‘Jane, you still there? Joe says he doesn’t feel well enough to come to work today, and we’re schedded to do the New Russian Cuisine tomorrow and we can’t get the jellied borsch with Oestra—’

  ‘Well, that’s too bad but he’s got an assistant director. Or he can collect his sleeping tablets while I’m at work. Or just tell your guest to serve up some polonium pancakes.’

  ‘Jane, how can you crack jokes? He can’t go fall apart on me, he can’t!’

  Actually,’ Be
lla adopted a superior tone, ‘Actually, this is about Sammie after all. Sammie needs stability. We’ve got to sort things out for Sammie’s sake. How long do you expect her to live with us? Weekends work better for me when I have time to spend with her. I’d like to go back to weekends.’

  That was a deft dodge, dragging Sammie back into it.

  ‘Yes, Bella. We must work it out, sooner or later—’

  ‘Tom Aiken’s new place—? This week?’

  ‘Top floor, Harvey Nichols.’ Jane was damned if she’d let Bella surround herself with gourmet toadies. ‘I’ll book us for my birthday, as usual, in my name, of course, to avoid any fuss. Maybe by then, Joe will be himself again.’

  ‘Your birthday? That’s in January! Forget that old birthday tradition. We’ve got to sort this all out sooner than that. I’m on my knees now.’

  ‘I’m too busy, Bella.’ (Feeding Bulgakov, restacking Hellers and Chevaliers, studying for Baldwin’s exam, helping Lorraine hang up her smalls to dry.)

  ‘Oh, pul-ease. You can’t possibly be that busy. Well, I just hope there won’t be more nights like last night. Sammie can’t afford her father having a complete breakdown.’

  Jane held her ground, like an insect evading the predator’s detection by standing stock still.

  Bella backed off from outright defeat. ‘So! Fine. Fine! We’ll do lunch in January. It’s marvellous of you to be so adult about it, Jane. I assumed I’d have to appeal to your better self.’

  ‘Don’t worry, Bella. Some of us only have one self.’

  Jane had surpassed herself, and before she lost her courage or wit, she ended the call and collapsed in the wobbly chair next to the big desk just like one of her palsied ‘customers’. She felt as shaken as the Second Mrs de Winter receiving a cheery tinkle from the late Rebecca.

  January gave her weeks to arm herself for the Harvey Nichols battlefield. Agreeing to meet Bella looked like she was accepting Joe’s defection—when she was not. As Sammie said, why be a passive victim seeking succour from a pile of books on the bedside table? Whatever happened to the Lotus of Revenge? If Baldwin was right, fighting without fighting was the only strategy no one prepared for: If everyone was geared up for hysterics and self-pity, Jane would armour herself in indifferent dignity until she was ready to strike.

  For once, Jane was doing her homework ahead of time. Friday night, they’d be discussing Stratagem Twenty-two. When you’re in danger of being defeated and your only chance is to escape and regroup, create an illusion. While the enemy’s attention is focused on this artifice, remove your men, leaving behind only the facade of your presence.

  The point of the cicada gambit was to give the appearance of no change whatsoever, total inaction, the original pose, the Loser Jane trapped in her librarian’s knit trousers with the elasticized waistband, left as bait. The new Jane was going to escape Bella’s counterattacks undetected.

  Bella mustn’t ferret out Jane’s determination to lure Joe back or so much as buy a new blowdryer on discount. She must lie like a cicada skin while the refortified Jane scuttled off with Dan to exploit Joe’s jealousy.

  It struck Jane like a Chinese gong that Bella could not have rung her out of concern for Joe. Bella had practically grovelled, and grovelling signalled need. Need was always Bella’s Achilles Heel. Bella had never done anything that wasn’t self-serving. Years ago, this trait had amused Joe and Jane observing Bella donate her slim paycheque to a charity only because it was sponsored by a talk show host she hoped to snare. Bella’s flaky narcissism had now matured into something canny in its ability to disarm and paralyze. Bella hadn’t lost a wink over Joe.

  No, Bella sought only things important to Bella—but what? It had to do with Dan, of course. Bella wanted to judge for herself how Dan’s love might clear Jane from the field, might signal that the appearance of Dan on the scene permitted—what?

  What did Bella want that she didn’t already have?

  It was a worrying question and the sooner answered, the better. But the fact that Bella needed something still unnamed repositioned Jane’s psychic forces. She actually looked forward to that January lunch, to donning her dowdiest cicada skin to fade into the background of the bleached tranquillity of the all-white dining room at Harvey Nichols. She would evoke nothing but pity from Bella Triumphant.

  She intoned to the library’s bathroom mirror. ‘The ideal general is patient. The ideal general is inscrutable. She waits for the enemy to give her the opportunity to win. Thank you, Sun Tzu.’

  Her mobile rang again. ‘Mum. Can I come home? Bella makes me run all these errands after school. Do her home filing. Fetch her coffee, dry-cleaning, even her shampoo. She says I’m her little godsend.’

  ‘Exactly the opposite of what she just told me. And besides, Godsending is Rachel’s job.’

  ‘Rachel’s twisted her ankle on a pair of heels like stilts. Do I have to do all this shit for her? I’ve got homework every night. One minute she won’t leave me alone, then as soon as she’s got her bloody shampoo, she acts like she doesn’t want me around the flat.’

  ‘Oh, darling, she’s still devoted to you in her sick, twisted way. What do you mean, she doesn’t want you alone in the flat?’

  ‘I didn’t say alone.’ Sammie paused, ‘Dad’s here, sleeping it off.’

  Jane sniggered, ‘She’s afraid to leave you alone with your own father?’

  There was a revelatory intake of breath. ‘Mum, that’s it! That is weird. That’s why she keeps calling me. She’s afraid to leave me alone with my own father. Like she’s jealous?’

  So Bella not only wanted something from Jane, she feared something in Sammie.

  ‘Sammie, you promised Grandma and me to hold the fort. Stay there, take care of Dad when he wakes up, give him a cup of tea, aspirin or Alka Selzer. He needs you.’

  ‘Yes, Mum. But I’d rather move back home. I’ve got an exam in probability on Tuesday.’

  ‘Sammie, you can do both.’

  Jane came back from the library to find her mother fussing in front of her dressing table mirror on to which she’d taped three photos of Princess Alexandra of Kent.

  ‘Darling! Guess what! We’ve got a part!’

  So many years had passed since Jane had last heard that ringing announcement, she felt thrown back against the wall of time.

  Lorraine’s story tumbled out between powder-puffing, hair-pinning, and chin-taping. StJohn’s nephew’s school friend—who did something or other at Buckingham Palace—had bungled one of his first royal bookings—well, it all came down to some impossible conflict of scheduling, so ‘The upshot, my darling, is that to save his little hide, he needs an experienced double for Princess Alexandra at the Factory for the Blind in Bermondsey. If I can pull it off, the Palace won’t find out, and the little twerp won’t lose his job.’

  ‘That’s not a part, Lorraine,’ Jane said. ‘Is it even legal?’

  ‘Well, it’s a performance.’

  ‘For blind pensioners—?’

  ‘Well, that’s the genius of it. This way Her Royal Highness can do the other engagement and no one’s the wiser. All I have to do is give an award, shake a few paws, say Thenk you awfully and head home. Now this is her, in this photo.’

  Already Lorraine’s jaw was hardening to a convincing royal clench and her soul was devoted to outdoing Helen Mirren. ‘You know, I really spent too much time going after mature leads. I missed my calling as a character actress.’

  Still her most reliable coach, Jane checked her mother’s reflection in the mirror. ‘You’re still moving your mouth. And don’t look down your nose so much that you turn cross-eyed. Thank God you don’t have to do Princess Michael. How tall is Alexandra?’

  Lorraine sighed, ‘Jane, you never really understood acting. One can act royal, one can act superior, and one can act tall.’

  Oh, dear, that was familiar too, that sensation of exclusion back into the wings. How often had she detected her mother’s disappointment emanating like toxic radiati
on from behind the chummy actress-y facade? If Jane had changed over these last weeks of Baldwin’s coaching, her mother still saw only the old cicada helper.

  Jane scoffed, ‘Why doesn’t the Princess just send them a singing telegram? Would the Royal One set the table in costume, please, while I reheat the tamale pie?’

  ‘Of course, darling. Oh, I’m so excited!’ Lorraine set out the trusty Hirschfeld place mats. ‘StJohn has promised there’ll be someone’s arm to hang on to right up to the presentation and then over to my seat for the home band.’ Lorraine tested her royal wave, side to side. It was amusing to see Mrs Ogilvie’s face shining out from under Lorraine’s own shaggy blonde waves.

  ‘Can’t the organizers see?’

  ‘I hope they’ve been warned.’

  ‘And there’ll be a bathroom nearby, just in case—’

  ‘Her Very Own, in case I have a little emergency.’

  Lorraine had worked up quite an appetite and after pie and salad, finished off a bag of microwaved popcorn. She was brimming with plans for getting the voice into character, blocking out the stage moves, and testing the hair and costume.

  Sunday broke grey and quiet. Jane went upstairs with Lorraine’s morning tea. Exhausted by a late night of studying old Edward Fox videos, Lorraine lay snoring in her satin pyjamas with the piped lapels, some putty attempt at a regal nose still stuck on. Even in sleep, the old woman clutched the duvet’s edge for fear of rolling off her mattress and breaking a hip.

  Jane gazed down at the beloved face. It was actually good to see Lorraine in character—truly her mother again—getting ready for one last hurrah. Long ago, the backstage child had learned to recognize her mother beneath any combination of false eyelashes, greasepaint tans, rubber wattles, ill-fitting wigs, artificial wrinkles, and padded bosoms. Onstage or off, in costume or dressing gown, she remained Lorraine to her daughter. Jane’s years of silent vows she would grow up to be Anybody-But-Lorraine were wearing on. With the passing of time, both pity and patience had polished down the daughter’s resentments.