We All Fall Down

by Rosemary Friedman

  “Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely. Basil, are you all right?”

  Basil stood up. His arms, his shoulders, his back, were stiff. He flexed his muscles and groaned. “Elisabeth, darling, I’m more all right than I have ever been. At least I think so.” He bent to the floor and sorted through the dozen typewritten sheets that lay at all angles on the carpet. He put them in order and handed them to Elisabeth.

  “Tell me quickly,” he said. “I have to know.”

  Elisabeth put down the handbag which matched her dress and, taking the sheets of paper, sat down on the bed. Basil left the room. He couldn’t bear to watch. He wandered round the sitting-room, his stomach hollow with excitement; he stared out of the window, his hands in his pockets, imagining Elisabeth reading what he had written. He felt sick. He waited five minutes, ten. He was aware of the shirt sticking to his back. He tried not to think. When it became unbearable he went back into the bedroom. She was still reading, but after a moment she lowered the sheets to her lap and looked at him. He tried to read her face.

  “Don’t keep me waiting, Elisabeth. I can’t stand it.”

  “You must know, Basil. It’s wonderful. Like poetry almost; but powerful. How did it happen?”

  “I suppose it was because I stopped trying.”

  “Can you keep it up for a whole book?”

  “As I feel now I could keep it up for six books. It’s all there in my head. Can you go to the café again this afternoon?”

  “I could. But I’m not going to. I’m not going to let you overdo it, sitting there hour after hour, like you used to, until you’re stale. You can go to the café this afternoon and forget about this,” she rustled the paper, “until tomorrow morning.”

  “But Elisabeth…”

  “Don’t ‘but Elisabeth’ me. I’m not going to let you get into a state again.” She stood up and put her arms around him. “I’m very proud of you. You’re capable of great things.”

  “If I am it’s because of you.”

  “Basil?” She leaned away from him.

  “Mm?”

  “I take back what I said yesterday. I believe you do love me.”

  “I always have.”

  “Perhaps. You were afraid to show it though.”

  “Elisabeth, I’m hungry. What’s for lunch?”

  “Trout.”

  Basil laughed and held her very close. “I don’t care. This time I’m going to have it.”

  Arthur said to Doctor Gurney, whom he had invited in for a drink:

  “Sorry to trouble you on holiday, as it were, but I think I shall have to have some more sleeping tablets. I thought those days were past but since Victor… I seem to lie awake practically all night. I’d been feeling so much better down here, relaxed… I suppose I’m what you’d call the worrying type.”

  Doctor Gurney smiled. “That’s about it. At home you were worrying about business, now it’s Victor. Before very long you’ll be lying awake because ‘Le Casse-Croûte’ isn’t taking as much as it should be, although it’s only a sideline.”

  “You needn’t have fears about that,” Arthur said. “I’ve decided to pack up. That’s why I asked you here, and Basil and Howard. I seem to have lost interest since Victor’s accident. I was only looking at myself this morning and wondering what on earth I was doing, standing there in a beach café selling refreshments to men and women in shorts and bathing suits, when I don’t care a damn if they have their tea or coffee or not, or if they like it or not, or if they have to queue for it or not. I suddenly thought of my office in town and my business – a good business, all said and done – and my samples of toys, and felt terribly homesick. I want to pack up at the end of August, by which time Victor should be well enough to be moved. If I hadn’t had this stupid idea of coming to Whitecliffs he wouldn’t be where he is now.”

  “It was because of Mr Boothroyd, remember.”

  “Yes. Poor Willie. The shock must have sent me off balance. What’s happened to Victor has brought me to my senses again. I suppose I was happier than I realised; it was, after all, my life. I can’t wait to get back.”

  “Don’t forget that being at Whitecliffs has been beneficial to you in many ways. You admit yourself you feel better, more relaxed, until the last few days, of course. I’ve an idea.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Have you ever thought of a cottage here? A small place for weekends. You could combine both worlds then. It seems the ideal solution.”

  “Not a bad idea. I’ll mention it to Vera. There is just one other thing, although I don’t really like to trouble you. I’ve a pain in my stomach, quite severe at times. Here.” Arthur pointed.

  “How long have you had it?”

  “Well, for the past week or two. I’d been intending to mention it to you, but Victor put it out of my head.”

  “Eating well?” Doctor Gurney said.

  Arthur said: “It’s odd you should ask. Actually I don’t seem to want much down here. I don’t know whether it’s the air… I seem to have one or two mouthfuls and feel full up.” He put his hand in the waistband of his trousers: “I seem to have lost a bit of weight, too. I suppose I could do with it.”

  “Look,” Doctor Gurney said. “Hop into the bedroom and take your things off and I’ll have a look at you before Basil and Howard come.”

  “All right,” Arthur said. “By the way, don’t say anything about this to Vera. She has enough to worry about with Victor. She gets very excited.”

  Arthur said: “I’m sorry about the café and backing out on you all as it were. I just feel I can’t carry on any longer. I thought we’d just keep going until the end of August. It gets pretty slack after then anyway.”

  “Don’t worry about us,” Basil said. He and Howard were leaning against the mantelpiece with their drinks.

  Howard said: “So you’re getting back again on your treadmill?”

  “I suppose I am,” Arthur said. “And I must admit I’m quite looking forward to it. At first I was so happy, with Whitecliffs, with the café, the easy life, but somehow it’s all gone sour. In the morning I wish I were going to work, the work I know; I’ve done it for thirty years, after all; and in the evenings, such long evenings they seem, I find myself longing for a bit of company, a game of bridge, the odd theatre even. Quite suddenly this isn’t enough. It isn’t somehow me. I’m not a young man, remember, and one develops habits… I suppose I’m too old, too set in my ways for change. You see, I thought…”

  “It’s quite all right,” Howard said. “We understand.”

  “I shall take it much more easy. I’ve learned that. Doctor Gurney here suggested something very sensible, a weekend cottage: I think that fits the bill, the best of both worlds, as it were…

  “What will you both do? You’re very welcome to stay on in the flats if you wish. That’s the least I can do. The block is mine so you don’t have to worry about that.”

  Howard looked at Basil. “Well?” he said, “you’re the original treadmill boy. Have you had enough?”

  Basil looked into his glass and swirled the whisky round gently.

  “I believe the treadmills are figments of our imagination,” he said. “I think we are all free to choose, to make our own decisions, if we only realised.”

  “Rather a volte face, isn’t it, old boy? What’s happened?”

  “Several things. Personal things. I have to thank Mr Dexter for setting the ball rolling, and if he doesn’t mind I’d like to stay on for a bit. I like it here. What about you, Howard? Back to the grind?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think you can dismiss the treadmill theory quite like that. I believe we are to a certain extent, the helpless playthings of forces greater than ourselves. You may believe that you are making your own free decisions, but how do you know they are not decisions you were intended, in the scheme of things, to make anyway?”

  “I don’t,” Basil said. “I’m playing it by ear from now on. I’ve been worrying about things fo
r the past ten years, and it hasn’t got me anywhere.”

  “You cannot dismiss it as simply as that,” Howard said. “For the moment I have no desire to go back to town and spend the rest of my life struggling to achieve something I know perfectly well I shall never now achieve.”

  “Isn’t that rather defeatist?” Basil said. “I mean, if you think like that we may all of us just not bother at all. After all, we all know that all our struggles and endeavours and successes must end, ultimately, in only one way, whoever we are. It would be a bit silly if we all just packed up. What do you think, Mr Dexter?”

  “I’m sorry,” Arthur said. “I wasn’t really concentrating. I was thinking about Victor. You must forgive me. What will happen, Howard, if they find his attackers?”

  “I’m sure they will,” Howard said. “The girl, Petal, will give them away eventually, without a doubt. They’ll be charged with causing grievous bodily harm and may get anything from three months’ to three years’ imprisonment.”

  “I wish I was the Judge,” Arthur said. “I’d make them sorry.”

  “What is it makes them capable of such acts?” Basil said.

  Howard put down his glass. “I don’t know. Sometimes I think we make too many excuses today; bad homes, unsettled homes, unsettled times, lack of family life, love and care. Of course, these environmental considerations may be something to do with it, but once the offenders hear about them they begin to feel sorry for themselves, and we may even be helping them to believe themselves incapable of any other behaviour.”

  “We’re back to free will,” Basil said. “Are you saying that we are what we are despite our parentage, upbringing, environment and all that? That there is no original sin?”

  “As I said,” Howard said, “I still have a very open mind about it all.”

  Arthur said: “I believe the mistake we make is to discuss all this too much. I think perhaps it would be better if we just got on with our work. That’s what I shall do as soon as I get home. I’m going to ask Vera to make some tea for you chaps. Or would you rather have another whisky?”

  Howard, Basil and Doctor Gurney all held out their glasses.

  Getting undressed, Doctor Gurney said to his wife: “How do you feel about going back, Mary?”

  “I shall be glad. It’s been very nice here, but I feel a bit of a fraud. We were doing something useful at home.”

  “You complained enough about the bells and phone and the useless foreign helps and the disturbed nights and the stupidity of some of the patients.”

  “I know. I suppose I was overtired. It’s a nice life though. Apart from being useful it’s never boring, is it? I mean we never have time to work ourselves up into neuroses over things, do we?”

  “I’m glad you feel that way about it. I shall be glad to get back. We shall just have to organise ourselves better. What are you smiling at?”

  “You.”

  “Why? Apart from the fact that I have no trousers on?”

  “Because we’re always saying we must organise ourselves better, but in our business I don’t think it’s possible. There isn’t the help available today; people cannot be expected to be ill in prescribed hours, and four children need quite a bit of looking after.”

  “You’re absolutely right. We have to face it. Are you willing to go back on those terms?”

  “Yes. What about you?”

  “Completely. Mary?”

  “Yes?”

  “I shouldn’t be at all surprised if Arthur Dexter had a carcinoma of the stomach. I’m having him investigated tomorrow.”

  “No!”

  “Yes. Ironical, isn’t it? He came down here because he was scared of dropping dead from a coronary thrombosis.”

  “It just shows you,” Mary said, getting into bed.

  “What?”

  “You can’t run away, can you?”

  Doctor Gurney turned out the light. “No,” he said, “I don’t think you can.”

  Twenty-three

  Vanessa sat on the floor in Howard’s flat listening to Chopin. She was wearing a full, pink, pleated terylene skirt and a sleeveless pink jumper, and she was thinking. She was thinking that she would be happy to spend her whole life just as she was now, with Howard sitting behind her where she could not see him but was very much aware of his presence, and among the things that were Howard: his pipe and books, his journals and his stack of records. She hadn’t seen very much of him since the night they had found Victor at ‘Le Casse-Croûte’; they had exchanged the odd word at the café, met at her father’s flat, but when there were always people there, and smiled to each other on the stairs. She was ashamed and yet not ashamed that she had engineered the situation she was now in. Since the night, one she would always remember because of its horrible ending, that Howard had taken her to the ‘Landscape’, although he had been very kind and gentle to her when they talked, the conversation had been on a strictly impersonal level, and he had not asked her to come out with him again. She had been content to wait, sure that as time went by he would feel the same about her as she did about him. Each day as she stood near to him in ‘Le Casse-Croûte’ she had said a little prayer. When her father had started talking about packing up, leaving Whitecliffs and going home, she had decided that it was necessary to do more than pray. That morning in the café she had told Howard she was going to see Victor after dinner and asked him if he would like to come with her. “I’m sure Victor would like to see you,” she said.

  “I didn’t think he was allowed visitors, apart from the family,” Howard said.

  “From today. Just one at a time. I thought you might like to go first, before the others.”

  “Indeed I will,” Howard said. “I’ll call for you after dinner.”

  It had been as simple as that.

  Victor said: “Ah, my two heroes!” when he saw them coming towards his bed, and when they’d sat down on the chairs the nurse provided, he said, “The police have just phoned through. They’ve rounded up my boy-friends. Petal squeaked.”

  “Aren’t you glad, Vic?” Vanessa said.

  “I don’t care much either way. I’m a one-eyed monster for life, and that’s that. What will happen to them, Howard?”

  “Imprisonment, I presume.”

  “Petal, too?”

  “Not if she can convince the jury she had nothing to do with it, was completely ignorant of what they had in mind.”

  Victor smiled. “Petal wouldn’t like it in jug.”

  “I doubt if that consideration would sway the jury.”

  Victor said: “I haven’t thanked you, Howard, for saving my miserable life. I’d shake your hand if I could. It’s jolly awkward without hands, you know; you’d be surprised.”

  Howard said: “It was just fortunate that we happened to be around at the right moment.”

  “That’s putting it mildly. Although what you two were doing on the beach at that time of night I shudder to think.”

  Vanessa blushed. “She’s quite pretty when she blushes, isn’t she, Howard?” Victor said.

  “Shut up, Vic,” Vanessa said. She could feel her cheeks burning.

  “I hope you’re going to ask me to be best man if I don’t look too grotesque and frighten all the bridesmaids.”

  Vanessa couldn’t look at Howard. “You know we’re going home as soon as you’re fit,” she said to Victor.

  “Suits me. I shall have plenty to remember Whitecliffs by.”

  “Do you still hurt?”

  “A little. There’s a bod in the end bed in a really bad way though…”

  After ten minutes a nurse told them they had to go. They said goodbye to Victor, and Howard moved off towards the doors.

  “Van!” Victor whispered.

  She turned back to the bed. “Well?”

  “Sorry about that. It looked as if it was in the bag. You’re dead nuts keen on him, aren’t you?”

  Vanessa nodded.

  “Good luck. Although I must say Cliff’s more your type.”


  She went to join Howard who was waiting for her by the door.

  There was a brisk wind blowing in from the sea, and it was too cold to walk. When Howard said: “I was going to listen to some records, would you care to join me?” Vanessa said, “Yes.” Had he not asked her she would have asked herself. As far as Howard was concerned she had no pride left. She watched him select a pipe and light it, search through his stack of records, move about the room heavily, purposefully. They discussed Victor, some interesting cases Howard had had, Whitecliffs and the café. After that they were silent, listening to the crystal trills of a Chopin nocturne. Vanessa, sitting on the floor, had the feeling that if nothing was said tonight it would never be said. She swallowed, felt herself start to tremble, then said: “You know I’m in love with you, don’t you, Howard?”

  There was silence for a long moment, nothing but a melody in a minor key haunting the room. Vanessa was afraid to turn round, then Howard said: “It did occur to me.”

  It’s up to him now, Vanessa thought. I’ve said it. I can’t sink any lower. Perhaps I was stupid, terribly stupid, but I’ve said it now. She waited. Behind her she heard Howard get up and turn off the record-player. The quiet seemed to have weight and body.

  Howard sat down in the armchair opposite the one against which she was leaning. She stared straight ahead, not daring to look at him.

  “Vanessa, do you know how old I am?”

  “I suppose about forty.”

  “Forty-three. More than twice your age and old enough to be your father.”

  Vanessa waited. She was conscious of her own breathing.

  Howard said: “When you are in your prime I shall be an old man.”

  Vanessa turned her head towards him slowly, daring to hope.

  “Does that mean…?”

  “It doesn’t mean anything really.”

  “I thought…perhaps…”

  Howard leaned forward and looked at her. “Vanessa,” he said, and his voice was gentle, “it would be so easy for me to be in love with you. You’re so pretty, sweet, young…”

  “A child, you mean,” Vanessa said indignantly looking up to face him then sitting back on her heels. “But I’m not, Howard, I’m not…”