The Piper's Tune

by Jessica Stirling

  ‘Yes, yes, yes, we’ve heard all that before,’ Winn interrupted. ‘But nothing you have to say is going to help my brother get his wife back.’

  ‘Might I be pointing out, Arthur,’ Kay said, ‘that it wasn’t you who brought Forbes here. It was Pappy, rest his soul, and he wouldn’t have let any of this happen if he’d still been alive.’

  ‘I don’t see how Pappy could have prevented it,’ Arthur said, ‘any more than I could have prevented it. I mean to say, Pappy couldn’t stop you, you and your sister, running off with your lovers thirty-odd years ago.’

  ‘I knew, I knew it would come down to that,’ Kay screeched. ‘You still blame me for what happened to your wife, don’t you?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Kay,’ Arthur said. ‘I am merely drawing an analogy. If you pause to consider…’

  ‘Pause to consider what?’ Kay said. ‘Whatever I did was done for poor Helen. She was dying, and we all knew it. Everyone, it seems, except you. Besides, I didn’t abandon husband and children to sneak off with some sailor.’

  ‘She did not sneak off with anyone,’ Eleanor said.

  ‘Oh, no?’ Blossom said. ‘Then who was that in the taxi-cab, I ask you? Lord bleedin’ Nelson?’

  ‘I think,’ Arthur said, ‘we are drifting from the point.’

  ‘Point? What point is that?’ Kay said. ‘The point that you’re going to make money out of us by using this tragedy to your own advantage.’

  Eleanor leaped in. ‘How dare you say that.’

  ‘Shut that woman up, Arthur.’

  ‘Eleanor has every right to speak her mind,’ Arthur said.

  ‘She’s a housekeeper, that’s all she is, a servant.’

  ‘And what, tell me, are you, Winifred?’ Arthur said.

  ‘I’m – I’m your niece. I’m Forbes’s sister.’

  ‘How dare you even suggest that Mr Arthur is at all interested in money at a time like this,’ Eleanor waded in. ‘The matter to be decided has nothing whatsoever to do with money.’

  ‘Hasn’t it?’ said Blossom. ‘What does it have to do with, then?’

  ‘A baby. A child.’ Eleanor glanced at her master who nodded agreement. ‘All this jawing about what’s going to happen to the house, what’s going to become of you, and not a thought about the poor girl who’s carrying his baby.’

  ‘Hasn’t been proved. Hasn’t been proved,’ Winn shrilled. ‘Only got her word for it and none of us has seen her yet. She’ll have to be put on the spot before we decide anything, won’t she, Mam?’

  ‘She will, she will,’ Kay agreed, but mutedly.

  ‘Do you think it’s not his baby?’ Arthur said.

  ‘Look at him,’ said Eleanor. ‘Not a word of denial out of him.’

  ‘Forbes,’ Blossom instructed her brother, ‘say something.’

  He peered at them from under half-closed lids, surveyed them as if they were strangers or, at best, merchants in the metal market with whom he was forced to negotiate against his will. He stirred leadenly, hoisted himself up and reached for the whisky glass that was balanced on the piano stool. He swirled the liquid in the glass, drank it in a swallow and pushed himself out of the chair.

  ‘I’m going to bed,’ he said.

  ‘You can’t,’ Winn told him.

  ‘I damned well can,’ said Forbes.

  ‘You can’t, not with nothing settled yet,’ said Blossom.

  ‘It isn’t up to us right now,’ Forbes said. ‘It’s up to Lindsay. Whatever you might think of her, she isn’t daft. She’ll make up her own mind what she wants to do. Once we find that out, we can start again.’

  ‘Surely you’re not going to allow her to call the tune,’ said Blossom.

  ‘He does not have much choice,’ said Eleanor.

  ‘Mam, are you going to let her talk about our Forbes like that?’

  Kay shook her head. ‘Unfortunately, girls, she’s right. It isn’t up to us to make the next move. It’s up to her, to Lindsay.’

  ‘What if she wants a’ – Winn’s voice dropped – ‘a divorce?’

  ‘Who could blame her?’ Eleanor Runciman said.

  ‘If she wants a divorce,’ Arthur said, ‘then you will have to leave my house. It wouldn’t be proper for you to stay here during court proceedings. I mean, I couldn’t possibly condone that course of action.’

  ‘Or,’ Kay said, ‘you could sell Forbes the house.’

  ‘I could,’ Arthur said. ‘I may.’

  ‘Forbes, what do you have to say for yourself?’ Blossom asked.

  ‘I told you, I’m going to my bed.’

  ‘Wait,’ Eleanor said. ‘There is one thing we have to decide tonight.’

  ‘And what might that be, dear?’ said Arthur.

  ‘Who’s going to take care of Sylvie Calder in the meantime?’

  ‘Her father, surely,’ Blossom said. ‘She’s his responsibility.’

  ‘No,’ Forbes said. ‘She’s my responsibility.’ He opened the parlour door and leaned against it, resting brow and shoulder against the woodwork. ‘Sylvie will not be a problem. I’ll take care of Sylvie.’

  ‘You will?’ said Winn.

  ‘But how?’ said Blossom.

  ‘In the best way I know how,’ Forbes said and with a final nod, weary but unrepentant, took himself off to bed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  For Ever and a Day

  The search for orders and the laying down of several new keels had continued while the Snark had been under construction and during the long delay before her trials. On that Friday morning in August the yard was buzzing. Big saws carving up timber for new cradles, hammermen rapping on the hull of a torpedo-boat destroyer, caulkers pitching the deck of a high-powered diesel launch slated to go into service with the coastguard in mid-September; the air dry, dry and faintly sulphurous with the threat of thunder.

  George Crush was seated in the upstairs lavatory in the general office block when, not long after half past eight, he heard shouting in the corridor and, lowering his newspaper, identified Tom Calder’s unmistakable baritone raised not just in enquiry but in anger.

  ‘Where is he? Where is the little bastard?’

  For a moment George wondered what he might have done that would rouse the wrath of such a patient man and, leaning forward, hastily checked the bolt on the inside of the lavatory door.

  ‘Forbes, Forbes. I know you’re here. It’s no use hiding.’

  ‘Oooooow!’ George whistled softly. ‘That’s the way of it, is it?’ and immediately began fumbling with his trousers and braces.

  Behind the pebble-glass door of his office at the corridor’s end, Forbes also heard Tom’s shout but, unlike George, he wasn’t mystified. He had known that Calder would come for him sooner or later and as he had no wish to have his mother and sisters around when the confrontation occurred, had left Brunswick Park early that morning, without a word to anyone. There had been no sign of Gowry and the Vauxhall was locked in the garage behind the house so Forbes had walked downhill through the oppressive and unnatural heat.

  He had purchased a mug of tea and a sausage sandwich from a stall at the corner of Scott Street and, like a beggar or a waif, had breakfasted standing up. He had had no sleep at all but, all things considered, felt well enough, apart from a slight headache. He was calm, that was the main thing. He might have lost control of the situation temporarily but he was confident that Lindsay would come crawling back to him once Sylvie was out of the way. He had drunk a second cup of tea and then, with the headache waning, had walked on to Aydon Road and had gone directly upstairs to his office to await the inevitable.

  The pebble-glass door crashed open.

  ‘I’m not hiding, Tom,’ Forbes said.

  * * *

  It had not been Tom’s intention to lose his temper. He could not recall the last time it had happened. Even when Dorothy had brazenly confessed her sins he had experienced only helpless inferiority and had tried to be understanding and reasonable. Rationality had always been h
is downfall. It was not until he had kissed Ewan and Cissie goodbye that blind red rage overwhelmed him.

  The coppery sky, dry heat, the metallic taste of smoke compressed by thunderheads had, it seemed, contrived to release him from self-lacerating passivity.

  ‘Where is she, Forbes? I want to know where she is.’

  ‘Ask Arthur.’

  ‘I’ve asked Arthur. I spoke to Arthur on the telephone not ten minutes ago. He doesn’t know where she is.’

  ‘She went off with her sailor, with Paget.’

  ‘I don’t mean your wife, damn it. I mean my daughter.’

  ‘Why should I tell you where Sylvie is? You abandoned her.’

  ‘That,’ Tom said, ‘is it.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’ Forbes said. ‘Have her back? Take her over? Incorporate her into your wonderful new family, her and the baby? Don’t be bloody ridiculous. She hates you. She would die before she’d let you take charge.’

  ‘Then why did she come to my house, not yours?’

  ‘Vengeance,’ Forbes said, shrugging. ‘Malice. How the hell do I know what goes on in Sylvie’s head? She’s muddled. No, she’s cracked. Deranged. Sure and she even believed I’d marry her if she just managed to get herself knocked up. Which she did, of course, which she did.’

  ‘She came to me for help.’

  ‘She came to your house only to make trouble,’ Forbes said, ‘otherwise she’d still be there. Am I not right?’

  ‘Are you going to marry her?’

  Forbes laughed. ‘Don’t tell me she got it from you? I always thought she got it from her mother – her crazy streak, I mean. Marry her, marry Sylvie? Jesus, Tom, you’re as daft as she is if you think I’m going to sacrifice my career and my family just to marry your daughter.’

  ‘What happened to Albert?’

  ‘Nothing. He got paid. He still gets paid.’

  ‘Where is she, damn it? Where have you put her?’

  Forbes shook his head. ‘It’s too late to saddle the white charger, Tom. Too late to gallop to the rescue. Anyhow, I’ll fix it.’

  ‘Fix it? Fix what?’

  ‘Everything,’ Forbes said. ‘Lindsay, too.’

  ‘How,’ Tom said, thickly, ‘are you going to fix it?’

  ‘Sylvie?’ Forbes said. ‘Buy her off. Money’s all she’s after, all she’s ever been after. I think that’s why we hit it off so well. Right now, with a kiddie on the way, other daft ideas may be rattling around in her head, but she’ll see reason quickly enough when there’s an offer on the table. And if she won’t see reason then Albert certainly will.’

  ‘And Lindsay, how will you fix it with Lindsay?’

  ‘I don’t have to,’ Forbes said. ‘Lindsay will come back of her own accord once she thinks she’s taught me a lesson.’

  Tom nodded too. He hitched a trouser-leg, seated himself on the edge of the desk and folded his arms. He regarded Forbes benignly – rational, reasonable and apparently relieved that his young partner had everything under control.

  ‘I see,’ Tom said. ‘I see.’

  * * *

  Pressed to the wall by the pebble-glass door, ear cocked, George Crush was puzzled by the sudden silence. He knew that Forbes had a mistress, of course – Forbes had been unable to resist bragging about her – but he itched for more information about Calder’s daughter, and prissy Lindsay Franklin and her sailorman lover. He hugged himself with anticipation, delighted that the Franklins’ close-knit family was unravelling at last.

  A moment later he was diving for cover as the pebble-glass door of the office exploded in a shower of glass and young Forbes McCulloch, like some dumb drag-weight, was left hanging in the broken frame.

  Before George could right himself, Forbes was yanked back through the splintered space. He reappeared almost at once as Tom Calder hurled him against the door for a second time.

  ‘Where is she, Forbes?’ Tom was shouting. ‘What the hell have you done with her, you bastard?’

  George had no inclination to rush to Forbes’s aid or pit himself against Calder. He scrambled to get to his feet but then the door whanged open and more chips of broken glass showered over him and he elected instead to crawl into the nearest corner, hug his knees to his chest and make himself too small to be noticed. He winced as Forbes landed on the boards in front of him, winced again when Tom Calder followed, pouncing out of the light like some great cat or gigantic stick insect.

  Blood trickled from Forbes’s nose and he was too winded to retaliate or even defend himself properly. Down the corridor doors were swinging open, heads appearing: Martin Franklin, Ross, Johnny too. Tom ignored them and continued to beat Forbes about the face with an unclenched fist.

  ‘Where – is – she – Forbes? Tell – me – where – she – is.’

  He knelt and pinned Forbes to the floor.

  ‘Where’s my daughter? What have you done to her?’

  To George’s horror Forbes spat into Tom Calder’s face.

  ‘Sod off!’ Forbes said, squinting through pain. ‘I’m telling you nothing. You’ll get nothing out of me.’ Then almost with an air of detachment Tom grabbed Forbes by the shoulders and began to beat his head rhythmically upon the floorboards, intent, it seemed, on killing him.

  ‘Where – is – she? Where – is – she? Where…’

  ‘I know where she is,’ George croaked.

  * * *

  Starched white linen tablecloths, heavy silver services and waiters who seemed to glide about on oiled castors lent the breakfast-room in the Central Hotel a certain tranquillity in spite of bustling activity in the wings.

  Breakfast for two at a corner table was a novelty that restored Lindsay’s spirits and, for a time at least, reduced her guilt about leaving her children. Gradually she yielded to Geoffrey’s reassuring voice and gentlemanly good manners. He was effortlessly pleasant and appeared to have all the time in the world to devote to her. Different, so different from Forbes. He asked how well she had slept, how she felt. He even offered to take her back to Brunswick Park if she had changed her mind.

  Lindsay shook her head. ‘It wasn’t just a gesture, Geoffrey.’

  ‘No, I didn’t think it was,’ he said. ‘You will go back at some point, though, will you not?’

  ‘To see the children, yes.’

  ‘And your husband?’

  ‘I don’t much care if I never see Forbes again.’

  ‘Did you have no clue that he was seeing another woman?’

  ‘None.’

  ‘It must have been a frightful shock.’

  ‘Oddly,’ Lindsay said, ‘I think I rather expected it, though not that he had taken up with Tom Calder’s daughter.’

  ‘I gather it began some time ago.’

  ‘Years ago apparently, before Forbes and I were even married.’

  ‘Perhaps it wasn’t entirely a coincidence,’ Geoffrey suggested.

  Lindsay had eaten porridge, kippers, a little scrambled egg and several slices of crisp toast spread with fresh butter and marmalade, washed down with black coffee. She was pleasantly full and her guilt had diminished and she felt more clear-eyed and clear-headed than she had done in months. The illicit pleasure of being with Geoffrey was stimulating. She watched him light a cigarette, watched smoke curl from the matchstick, saw him inhale, shake out the match and place it gently in an ashtray. He exhaled and smiled at her through the dispersing smoke.

  She had dressed with care, had arranged her hair, touched her face with powder, her lips with rouge: enough, just enough, to let him know that she did not take him for granted.

  ‘Not a coincidence: what do you mean?’ Lindsay said.

  ‘If your husband had a choice – which apparently he had – he chose you over this other girl. Doesn’t that indicate something other than coincidence?’

  ‘Geoffrey, don’t tell me you’re arguing Forbes’s case for him?’

  ‘I wouldn’t dare,’ said Geoffrey. ‘It’s a fair question, though.’

  �
��It’s not a comedy of manners, Geoffrey, not a matter of misplaced affections or mistaken identities. The girl’s pregnant.’ Lindsay paused. ‘Are you asking if Forbes loved me more than he loved her? The answer’s remarkably simple: I had money and poor Sylvie Calder did not. I had sound family connections and Sylvie Calder had none. Even so, she obviously offered him something that I could not and that’s why he took up with her without a thought for me or how it would affect our marriage.’

  ‘He didn’t choose to marry the girl, however.’

  ‘Of course he didn’t.’

  ‘And he will not marry her now?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are you sure, Lindsay?’

  ‘Absolutely sure.’

  Geoffrey blew smoke, wafted it away from her with the flat of his hand. His cuffs, Lindsay noticed, were fastened with silver links rubbed to a fine patina that all but obliterated the monogram. She wondered if the links had once belonged to his father and provided a connection with home, if they were symbols of the sailor’s life, the traveller’s life where everything had to be compact and functional, nothing superfluous. Would she ever attain that degree of intimacy with him, she wondered, become so necessary that he would not leave her behind no matter how far he travelled?

  ‘Did the fact that Forbes was your cousin make any difference?’

  ‘None.’ Lindsay did not resent his inquisitiveness. ‘Forbes had lived all his life in Ireland. We were strangers when we first met, old enough by then to…’ She experienced a twinge of suspicion, then of surprise. ‘Geoffrey, are you asking why I chose to marry him?’

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘My grandfather threw us together.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s good enough,’ Geoffrey said mildly.

  Now she understood: he was probing, gently probing to discover if she still loved Forbes, if all those fine confused feelings had really been swept away or if some spark of attraction still remained between them. How could she answer him? How could she tell him that she had been driven by a physical desire that had transcended common sense and that had even survived the tedium of courtship. How could she possibly admit that she still took pleasure in Forbes’s love-making? How could she separate sex from love in a way that Geoffrey would understand, would not misconstrue? She wanted Geoffrey’s arms about her but she did not feel for him the clamouring ache, the infuriating and insistent demand of the blood that Forbes had once roused in her and perhaps still did.