by Annie Murray
He hesitated. She had. He could see it. She read his hesitation right.
‘But why’s that wrong? I’m not doing anything so bad! I cook his dinner every night. I do everything . . . I’ve always had a lot of energy, see – for a whole lot of things.’ She looked across the kitchen, a dull expression in her eyes. ‘More than him, I suppose.’
George struggled for words. He saw Alan’s confusion, hurt, his fear, even if there was no rational reason for it. For a second he tried to picture himself if Win had branched out suddenly, made even some small change. It was hard to imagine. Would he have quaked and raged like Alan?
‘He wants me to be just like his mother,’ Vera said bitterly. ‘Creeping about, waiting on everyone hand and foot, husband, three sons. She’s a skivvy to them. Not one thought in her head that doesn’t belong to them. And the thing is, it’s not as if it’s made her nice or anything. She’s a bad-tempered old . . .’ She shook her head, then stared ahead of her. ‘There’s that song – I heard it on the tranny again yesterday. Times they are a-changing. They are, aren’t they? And I want them to. I don’t want to be like old Ethel Day. Am I wrong just to want something else except fetching and carrying and . . . And pastry?’
George pulled out a chair from the table and sat down. He looked up at her.
‘You’re a very able woman, Vera. I don’t see how it’s wrong to use your head when you’ve got one. But old Alan – I s’pose he thinks you’re going off somewhere where he can’t keep up with you.’
Tears ran down Vera’s face again. She wiped them with the handkerchief. ‘I know. I do know, Mr Baxter.’
‘Look,’ George said. ‘Go and get him. Both of you, knock off early. It’s nearly time to shut up anyway.’
Vera didn’t move. ‘He wants me to go back so that everything’s exactly as it was before. I’m worried what will happen if I don’t.’
Should he be telling her to obey her man, he wondered? Do anything he wanted – wasn’t that the required advice? But it wouldn’t seem to come out of his mouth.
The kettle was working itself up to the boil. He got up to turn it off.
‘I don’t know what’ll happen either.’ He turned to her with a shrug. In a gentle voice he said, ‘But take him home now, eh?’
4.
There was a storm in the small hours of Sunday morning and when George woke from what felt like no sleep at all, everything outside looked washed fresh. It was not only the slams of thunder that had kept him awake; it was his own thoughts. He had writhed this way and that, catching the sheet round his neck and generally getting in a mess.
Sylvia was due to come tomorrow – today now. Having not seen her for a few days, she seemed to him, in the dark night hours, distant and strange. He was filled with cold doubt, as if she was something alien that he had grafted on to his life which might make him grow wrongly. At the same time, the thought of her attentive eyes, her luscious shape and his own aching need for physical connection wound him into a state of such nervous expectation that he had even less hope of getting back to sleep.
Shouldering through these misgivings and fantasies was his unease about Vera. First thing on Saturday she had telephoned the shop.
‘I’m just calling to say that I’d like to take the half-day off today, if that’s all right.’ She sounded dreadfully subdued.
‘Yes of course, Vera, quite all right,’ he said, while his mind stumbled through grim possibilities. Was Vera hiding at home because Alan had blacked her eye? Should he be asking if she was all right? Before he could assemble any words of concern, she concluded, ‘Thanks, Mr Baxter. I’ll see you on Monday.’ Which was at least reassuring.
Alan came into work, kept his head down, avoided meeting George’s eye and got on with it. All afternoon, after shutting up shop, George tended the garden. He hoed up the potatoes, weeded between onions and broad beans and tied up a few sprays of pink Albertine rose. He worried. Then he sat out at the back and worried more. He was not used to misery among his staff and it was not what he wanted. Strictly speaking it was private, a marital thing between the two of them, yet he could not escape the feeling that it was his fault. His encouraging Vera into more involvement had upset the balance of things, as if to the Days their marriage had suddenly become a foreign land.
He sat in a deckchair staring at the tumbling pink and white screen of roses, a silver tankard of beer in one hand, the other stroking Monty’s ears. Again he considered how he would have felt if Win had wanted more independence. Would he have felt wronged? He had to own that he might have done, if he had had a sense of being neglected. But then, Vera had already been working anyway, that was nothing new. It wasn’t work as such that seemed to bother Alan, but Vera’s growing confidence, her authority. As if a man necessarily shrank when a woman grew. On top of that, he had been made a fool of in front of the other men. Despite his inclination to share male fellow feeling, George found he thought less of Alan for this. Let alone the business of the pies. It seemed small-minded, selfish.
Unable to make sense of it all, he stretched in his chair, then ruffled the dog’s fur.
‘Lock up your women, Monty,’ he said. ‘Or they start getting ideas.’
Monty tilted his head to look at him as he spoke, as if he might be giving the advice serious consideration.
He took Monty out as the bells were ringing for the morning service and met Eunice MacLean coming out of her house clad in a long, pale mackintosh, bound for Holy Communion.
‘Quite a storm last night,’ she commented, eyeing the puddles in the gutter and stooping to give Monty a pat.
‘It certainly kept me awake,’ he agreed. ‘Cleared the air a bit too.’
‘Are you keeping all right, Mr Baxter?’ Her tone was formal, as ever, but held a genuine note of concern. For a moment George had an impulse to pour out to her all his concerns about Vera, to canvass her opinion. But he reined himself in. Vera would be most offended and he’d make Miss MacLean late for church. What would she know anyway, a confirmed spinster like her?
‘I’m very well, thank you.’ He allowed Monty to drag him onwards.
‘Perhaps we might have a cup of tea together soon?’ She spoke tentatively.
‘Yes – marvellous. Tea, or something.’ He was receding along the street. ‘Not today though.’ Lord, he didn’t need her turning up when Sylvia was here. ‘I’ve got a visitor coming. But soon?’
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Delighted. Goodbye now.’
He picked Sylvia up at two o’clock. As soon as he saw her there waiting, as ever, near the corner, his doubts of the night slipped away. Look at her, he thought, taking in the sight of her in a sugar-pink frock, her dark hair piled high. His blood surged. She was marvellous! A smile spread across his face and as he drove up to her she smiled and waved as well.
He leapt out of the car and kissed her cheek, opening the door. ‘I wondered if today might be a good time to come in and meet your mother – and sister?’ he asked. He didn’t really want this encounter now, but felt it proper that such a meeting should happen sometime soon.
‘Oh, maybe not today,’ Sylvia said, settling in the front seat. Getting in beside her he enjoyed the sight of her thighs occupying the seat, knees peeping from the hem of the dress. Her nails were now a cheery crimson. ‘Ma’s having a sleep and Jean’s worn out. She cooked the dinner today – we take it in turns.’
‘How nice,’ he said, pulling away from the kerb. ‘What did you have?’
‘Oh, you know – a bit of beef.’
He had expected something more elaborate, the exercise of cooking it having apparently had such an overwhelming effect on Sylvia’s sister. But he was not sorry to be driving straight home. The afternoon was very warm, but with a breeze flickering light through the leaves. On the way back, as they chatted gently, she told him about the man who had come into the garage and lost his temper over a problem with one of his tyres and come close to punching her boss.
‘Mr Green went so red in
the face I thought his head was going to fly off!’ she giggled and George laughed, genuinely tickled. ‘People get ever so het up about their cars.’
He tried to think of things to tell her. Not about Vera and Alan, he decided. That felt a tender spot and too close. But they passed the end of Lady Byngh’s drive on the way home and he told her he had had to visit there.
‘Up there?’ Sylvia peered at the shrouded entrance. ‘Ooh, that looks rather creepy. Lady Byngh, though. I say.’ He had known this would impress her. ‘Ooh, is it really posh? I bet she’s got some lovely things.’
‘Not any more. She’s the one who was burgled.’
‘Really? Oh yes! Have they caught them yet?’ Sylvia was all agog.
‘No. I expect they will though. They took quite a bit of loot.’
Sylvia settled herself in the seat with a wriggle of pleasure. ‘You’re such an interesting man, George. Always something to tell me. I’ve been looking forward to today all week – to seeing your house and everything.’
‘Yes,’ he flashed her a gratified smile, warmed by her flattery. ‘Me too – very much.’
‘I can keep the dog out of your way,’ he said, as they stepped inside, to her exclamations of how big it was, how lovely – oh what pretty roses! – and to the sound of Monty’s bark.
‘Don’t you worry, George dear,’ she said, sounding so game that he warmed to her further. It would be hard to feel fully enthusiastic about someone who could never get on with his dog. ‘This is your house and he lives here. I’m sure we’ll get used to each other. And look –’ From her bag she pulled another little box of sweets.
‘Look what I’ve got for you, poochy,’ she said, waving them in front of Monty’s nose. Instantly she had his rapt attention. ‘Can I give him some?’
‘Well, one, perhaps,’ George was saying as Sylvia ripped open the packet. She threw down a handful of allsorts and Monty golloped them all up, unable to believe his luck. He gazed up at her, still swallowing, black saliva oozing round his jowls.
‘There – he’ll be your friend for life now,’ George said. ‘But maybe one at a time would be enough.’
‘Oh you’re a nice boy, aren’t you?’ Sylvia said, giving the impression of someone trying very hard against opposing instincts, stroking Monty’s head with the tips of her fingers while removing the rest of herself as far away as possible from his slobbery assault. ‘Here – there’s another one for you.’
George felt mildly annoyed. The odd sweet now and then was one thing . . . ‘That’s enough, Monty, settle down,’ he commanded. ‘I’ll put him back in the kitchen now – he’ll soon settle.’
When he returned, Sylvia was standing at the door of the showroom. He had explained the set-up to her.
‘Oh George . . .’ She turned her head, seeming awed. She had a slender neck and he repressed an urge to seize hold of her and kiss the pale nape and soft spiral of hair that rested on it. ‘It’s so lovely.’
She stepped inside, looking round her with an intense concentration while he watched from the doorway. Her hand caressed the complex patterns of a walnut bureau; she picked up a silver salver, well polished by Vera, or possibly Sharon. She exclaimed over a trio of English enamelled scent bottles, each exquisitely patterned.
‘So pretty,’ she murmured, and he could hear a hunger in her tone. He was touched, at that moment, by her appreciation of such beautiful, finely made things. Perhaps, he thought, only realizing then that this had been something that had previously seemed lacking in her, perhaps she had a fine, artistic soul after all?
Turning amid the array of splendour around her, she let out a loud laugh. ‘Look at that!’
She was standing in front of a table that George had bought only that week from a house out at Kingston Bagpuize, though the pleasure had been diluted by the elegant woman who felt forced to sell it, weeping as he handed her a cheque. ‘Needs must,’ she said through a lace handkerchief. ‘But I can hardly bear the thought of it leaving the house.’
It was a Regency table of slender Pembroke design with drop leaves, made of mahogany but, more unusually, banded at the edges with brown and black coromandel, a wood similar to ebony. It was a beautifully proportioned piece and he was just appreciating Sylvia’s eye, when she added, ‘It looks just like your dog!’
The remark jarred him, though seeing the four sabre legs which met in a low central pedestal, giving the table a crouched look, the flaps down at each side like long ears and the two brass drawer handles like eyes staring back at them, he could see her point.
‘Oh, yes, I see!’ He chose to laugh, with an inner feeling of deflation.
‘How much will you sell that for then?’ She was animated now, searching out the price labels tied to drawer handles and table legs. She found the one on the Regency table and looked up at him, startled. ‘Three hundred and fifty pounds! For that totty little table! How much did you pay for it?’
‘Er, something approaching three hundred, I believe,’ he said, trying to sound less awkward than he felt. Even though he was a businessman and used to talking prices, he was embarrassed by her fervent interest in the money side of things. How well she would get on with Lewis Barker, he thought, before pushing this ignoble thought from his mind.
‘Shall we go to the back and make some coffee?’ he suggested.
‘So you make fifty pounds then?’ She was undeterred, still holding the price ticket. ‘Just on that?’ She laughed. ‘No wonder you drive such a nice car, George!’
‘Ah, well. No guarantee until the cheque is signed.’
She wandered the room again, involved, abstracted from him. He watched with increasing discomfort, wanting to get her out of here, to distract her from her eager interest in the prices, which felt to him vulgar and uncomfortable. Sylvia had wandered to the window. Without turning to look at him she said, ‘You said you had another showroom – is that it, over there?’
She explored the barn with the same absorbed attention. After, he showed her the other rooms on the ground floor of the house. In his office he had slipped the photograph of Win into the desk drawer, to avoid both Sylvia’s questions about it and the mild sense of reproach he imagined coming from the portrait itself. He did not show her upstairs; the bedroom with its wide, expectant bed.
In the kitchen he booted Monty out into the garden and made coffee, still feeling jarred by Sylvia’s frank materialism, which opened up a distance between them, at least for him. But as he was filling the cups, she moved close to him, seeking out his eyes, inviting intimacy.
‘George? We haven’t had a little kiss yet, have we?’
Heart revving up, he stopped messing about with cups and teaspoons and turned to her. Embracing her, the fleshy force of her pressed close to him, he breathed in the scent of her perfume and his mood softened. Standing on tiptoe, she reached up to kiss him, with a verve that sent a transfusion of desire through him. After a moment she drew back and looked up at him with wide eyes.
‘It’s lovely here. And you’re so nice. I do feel so lucky to have met you, George.’
He was made tender by the sweetness of her words. Poor girl, he thought, it didn’t sound as if she had had much of an upbringing. Even though ‘Darling David’ must have been comfortably off, he knew that it was easily possible to be dazzled, as he had once been, by the beautiful, expensive items that he sold. It was not a world everyone was used to. He was rather charmed by the idea that he might be the one to dazzle her. He smiled down at her.
‘Oh, I’m the lucky one,’ he said. ‘Meeting such a lovely girl.’ He flattered her with ‘girl’. Through various means, asking about the age gap with her sister, and when Jean was born and so on, he had pinned Sylvia down to being forty-two years old. There were women who had children at that age, weren’t there?
Holding her, for a moment he was filled with weariness. He was used to being married, not to all this. He did not know how to conduct a chase, the ins and outs and pacing of it all. Especially at their age. Was it
too soon to expect her to be generous and yielding enough to come upstairs with him? If only he could just remove all other obstacles and lead her up there, now.
Sylvia snuggled close in his arms again. He could feel the press of her breasts against him. Kissing her, he began to surrender to the forceful sensations of arousal, the longing building in him. She stepped back.
‘We’d better have our coffee now, hadn’t we?’ she said with a demure sweetness. She adjusted the strap on her left shoulder, under her blouse. ‘Or it’ll go cold.’ She gazed at him in apparent adoration. ‘Ooh, you are lovely.’
They sat out on the lawn, under the shade of one of the apple trees in the hot, soporific afternoon. Monty dozed on the grass between their chairs.
‘I love the way your roses all match,’ she giggled. ‘Yellow at the front, pink at the back – so pretty! I love roses.’
‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘They are rather . . .’ He trailed off. How to begin on the passion he felt for this beauty? For a moment he considered telling her about the rose at the window, his six-year-old consolation. But it did not feel right. And Sylvia was soon off, chattering away.
He could not help noticing, again, her preoccupation with how much things cost. She told him about the holiday to France that her mother’s neighbours had been on, about the settee they had recently had delivered, about the price of clothing.
‘I mean you’re much better off paying the fare to go into Reading if you want to buy something nice. You can go to Heelas then – such a lovely shop. And it’s so much more pricey where we are. I bought Mum a new slip last week and when I went into town I saw it for half a crown less – I mean, half a crown!’
George’s mind wandered to the inviting coolness of the room upstairs, the white sheets . . . When Sylvia raised her hands for a moment in a stretch above her head, her magnificent frontage lifting, he imagined her stretched on his bed, her arms flung out . . . It was so hot. However much he tried to distract himself, in his state of half-arousal his clothes felt confining. He was filled with a claustrophobic sense of needing to move, to break through the stifling atmosphere. He was speaking, listening; especially listening. He was in control of himself, but with the itch, the need so close on him, it would only have taken a moment of contact to trigger him.
