We All Fall Down

by Rosemary Friedman

  Doctor Gurney went back to his own flat before going down to the café.

  “Did you tell her?” Mary said. She was sitting in the kitchen beside Jonathon’s high-chair, feeding him from a bowl.

  Doctor Gurney nodded.

  “What did she say?”

  “She cried.”

  “So would anyone.”

  “We weep for ourselves,” Doctor Gurney said. “That’s all we’re capable of.”

  “I feel sorry for the old girl, silly as she is.”

  “What about Arthur?”

  “For Arthur? What can one feel?”

  “What can one feel?” Doctor Gurney said, and kissed his wife and son on their heads.

  Vera was nearly at the end of the High Street. They had given her a terrible shampoo at Maison Barbara, and the girl had let water run down her neck. Her hair had been crimped and pinned until it was almost unrecognisable as her own. On any other day but this she would have been furious, indignant, hurrying home to comb it out, to make herself look normal. She was not hurrying. Her hair seemed unimportant. She did not care.

  Two men were standing outside the Estate Agents’ office.

  “Vera!”

  “Arthur!” she said. “I thought you were at the café.”

  “I was. I took half an hour off because Mr Parker here had something interesting to show me. You remember I told you about buying a cottage here for weekends? Well, the very thing has just cropped up. I knew you’d be coming past about this time so I waited for you. It’s a bungalow really; I’ve just been to see it. It’s pinkwashed with a blue-tiled roof, three bedrooms, gets the sun all day, centrally heated, beautifully built; I’m quite excited. Mr Parker has the key; we can go and see it again straight away. I know you’ll love it. There’s a properly fitted kitchen; it’s only been built about a year, and do you know what I like best?”

  “No,” Vera said.

  “There’s a greenhouse in the garden with a grapevine. Very young, of course, isn’t it, Mr Parker?”

  Mr Parker nodded. “Naturally, Mr Dexter.” He looked at Vera. “In five years from now,” he said, “Mr Dexter will have some of the finest grapes in Whitecliffs.”

  “In five years?” Vera said.

  “Five to seven.”

  “Sounds good, doesn’t it?” Arthur said.

  Vera looked at him. “It sounds very good indeed.”

  On the beach, Vanessa and Cliff sat glumly side by side throwing stones into the water.

  “I knew there was something wrong,” Cliff said, “from your letter. That’s why I came down to see what was going on.”

  “There’s nothing wrong,” Vanessa said unconvincingly and for the umpteenth time.

  “Of course there is. You haven’t even kissed me yet.”

  “There hasn’t exactly been the opportunity.” Vanessa had been standing at the fancy-goods window soon after lunch when someone had asked if they had any ‘pretty girls’ for sale. She had looked up to find Cliff leaning against the counter. She had managed a smile and glanced quickly towards Howard. He was busy serving ice-cream.

  “I came down to see how you were,” Cliff said. “I’ve been missing you.”

  “I’m fine,” Vanessa said. She had forgotten how young he looked.

  “I have to go back tonight. I came down on the bike. Can you get away for a bit?”

  “I don’t think so. We’re one short. I wrote to you about Victor.”

  “Yes, you wrote about Victor all right. I’m sorry. I would have liked to see him, but I don’t think there will be time.”

  “Have you had any lunch?”

  “Yes, on the road. I didn’t come for lunch, Van. I came to see you. You’re looking prettier than ever.”

  She sold a bucket and a tin of bubbles to a small boy. Cliff disappeared. In a moment he was back again fiddling with the windmills on the counter.

  “Your father says it’s all right. They can manage without you.”

  “All right then,” Vanessa said unenthusiastically. “I’ll be with you in a second.”

  She had forgotten that Cliff was so tall. Tall and thin. His hands, strong-looking and the only part of him that was sun-tanned, seemed to be stuck on at the end of his gangling arms. They walked across the beach in between sand-castles and over people’s legs and bodies, and beach bags, and rivers dug by the children, and jumped over the breakwater. There was a stretch of beach with not many people because it was rocky, and they sat down. Neither of them said anything for a moment, but the silence was awkward and then they both started talking together.

  “Carry on,” Cliff said.

  “I was only going to ask how the Anatomy’s going,” Vanessa said.

  “Fine. Just fine. What have you been doing?”

  Vanessa told him. She told him about Whitecliffs and about Victor and about Honey and Basil and Elisabeth, and about Louise and her mother, and about the Gurneys.

  “Who was the chap serving the ice-cream?” Cliff said.

  “That was Howard. I forgot about him.”

  She felt Cliff looking at her. “You’ve changed, Van. I shouldn’t have let you come.”

  “I didn’t want to come, did I?”

  “No.”

  They drew meaningless pictures on the sand with bits of stick. They talked about what Cliff had been doing in London, about his friends, his work, his exams. Vanessa thought about Howard.

  “Do you realise, Cliff,” she said, “that the sea will still be here just the same, doing exactly the same as it is now, thousands of years after we’re dead?”

  Cliff laughed at her serious tones. “I wouldn’t worry about that,” he said. “Besides, I’m too busy worrying about my Anatomy. The quicker I get through that the quicker I can carry on and we can get married.”

  She had said nothing, and that was when they had started throwing stones into the water.

  Vanessa watched Cliff’s stones scudding across the surface and out to sea and her own plop dully, a few yards only, into the water.

  “I suppose I might have guessed really,” Cliff said, squinting into the sun at a stone he had thrown.

  “Guessed what?”

  “That it was all up.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Us.” He waited for Vanessa to contradict him, but she was silent. He stood up dusting the sand from his clothes. “I might as well be getting back. There’s no point driving back in the dark for…nothing.”

  Vanessa flung her last stone and stood up beside him.

  “I’ll see you off.”

  Cliff’s motor-bike was parked along the top promenade among the gleaming rows of cars waiting warmly in the sun for their owners who had gone down to the beach. They walked to it in silence. From the saddle-bag Cliff took a thick pullover and a pair of goggles.

  “It gets quite chilly when you’re going along,” he said.

  Vanessa watched him struggling clumsily into it as men do. He wound his college scarf round his neck and straddled the bike.

  “Well, Van…?”

  She watched him manoeuvre the bike out into the road. The sun was shining through his hair and outlining the bones on his face. He trod hard on the starter, then again. The engine burst into sound then throbbed steadily in the warm air. Cliff was looking at her, waiting. For the first time she met his gaze unfalteringly. She said nothing but gathering her skirt round her slid on to the passenger seat behind him. He made no comment but throttled up and, looking both ways, spluttered off along the sea road.

  Vanessa leaned her head against his back. “I’ve been such a fool,” she said, but didn’t know if he could hear.

  Cliff turned his head half sideways.

  “Where are we going?” he yelled.

  Vanessa put both arms round his neck. “Up the mountain,” she said, “together.”

  Twenty-five

  On Saturday evening while Louise, in her flat downstairs, was sitting before the mirror preparing herself to meet Harry at the ‘Landscape�
��, Vera and Arthur were relaxing in their sitting-room, after an early supper, with cups of coffee, discussing their cottage. It was a rather one-sided discussion. Arthur, who had the details before him on a typed sheet from the Estate Agents, was enthusing about its charm, its modernity, its southerly aspect. Vera was saying yes and no at appropriate moments and watching him. She was thinking. But she was not thinking about the polished boards throughout, the modern floor heating, or the waste disposal unit in the kitchen; nor indeed was she thinking about ‘Castellamare’, the cottage upon which Arthur had already paid a deposit, at all. Vera was thinking about herself. About herself and Arthur. The remarks he was making about the immersion heater, the double windows, the tiled roof, were going over her head. She scarcely heard them. She was looking at her husband and she was thinking that it was probably the first time in twenty-odd years that she had done so; properly that was. She had, of course, been aware of him. Aware of him as the years went gently by, losing his hair from where it had grown abundantly round his forehead as Vic’s did, losing the slim figure which had been his as a young man, growing stouter and, or so it seemed, shorter. She remembered when he had lost the four teeth in the front which were now replaced with a small plate, but when had the firm line that had been his jaw disappeared? When had his hands grown middle-aged, his hair turned completely grey? She could not remember. Surprisingly, suddenly and startlingly, in the little sitting-room of the flat at Whitecliffs, Vera Dexter decided that she loved her husband. Or was it that she had just grown used to him, as one grew used to a home, a pet one was fond of, a favourite coat, and did not want to lose him? He was still talking enthusiastically about the cottage. When they were first married, she remembered, they used to talk about nothing. When was it that they had become silent in each other’s company unless there was ‘something’ to discuss? Their home, or furnishings, or help for it; their children and their problems which varied through the years from suspected measles to examination worries and what to Vera and Arthur were undesirable friendships; Arthur’s business, prospering or, in years that were not so good, a little shaky; Vera’s health; holiday plans; new cars; new maids; new acquaintances. When there was something to talk about they talked. When there wasn’t Arthur buried himself behind a newspaper or they watched the television or asked people in for bridge and made busy, happy noises. Vera shut her eyes and tried to imagine how it would be without Arthur. She couldn’t. Arthur had always been there. There had always been Arthur to make the arrangements, deal with people and problems, pay the bills, cope with the children when they got extraordinary, extravagant ideas. She admitted to herself what she had never troubled to think about because it had not been necessary. Arthur had been a good husband. A thought suddenly occurred to her which with new found courage she picked up and examined. There was no doubt that Arthur had been a good husband; had she been a good wife? If her conscience was capable of blushing it was blushing now. There was no doubt about the answer to her question, the answer was no. True she had made a home for him, a nice home, a smoothly run, luxurious home, entertained friends, brought up Victor and Vanessa, but what had she done for Arthur, for Arthur himself? Had she loved him, cherished him, been a companion to him through the years? She knew she had not. They were strangers. She had no idea what he thought about, nor when he was thinking it. And what of the other thing? The thing that for many years now they had not discussed, and which long, long ago Arthur had ceased to ask for. There was only one answer to the question she had put to herself; there could be only one. She had not been a good wife. A housekeeper, yes. A wife, no. Even now, when Doctor Gurney had given Arthur so little time to live, what was she worrying about? Not that Arthur was ill and must suffer, suffer most probably until he would be glad to die, but she was worrying about herself, what she would do without him, when for eighteen years, since the twins were born, Arthur had had to do without her. These thoughts did not come easily to Vera who was unaccustomed to self-analysis, nor did they come altogether suddenly. They had started as a vague awareness on the afternoon that she had taken Vanessa’s place at ‘Le Casse-Croûte’ while Vanessa went to Walmer with Howard.

  She had taken over the tea-urn as they thought that would be easiest for her, and from her place, standing on the wooden slats behind the long counter, she had been able to watch Arthur. It was a new and different Arthur, an Arthur she did not know. Mrs Boil, the washer-up, said: “Isn’t ’e lovely Mrs Dexter the way ’e talks to the kiddies and asks after me veins reglar and sees I don’t stop on me feet too long?” And Charlie, the old man who slowly and arthritically kept the tables wiped and the floor swept in the garden, pointed a knotted finger towards her husband and said: “Your husband and me have a grand talk every morning over a cuppa. Course I was born and bred round these parts and a good many changes I’ve seen, but these days not everyone wants to listen…” And Arthur himself. With his sleeves rolled up, he smiled, laughed, chivvied the customers, patted the children on the head. Vera was amazed. It was a side of him she had never seen, didn’t know existed. Arthur in charge. At home, of course, she was always in charge. She said where they were going, what they were doing, who they were entertaining, or what they were to buy, how much it would cost. Arthur either agreed or disagreed, in which case they had an argument which she usually won. Perhaps if she had visited him more at his office she might have seen this other, this different Arthur, but he had never encouraged it, and for her part she had never wanted particularly to go. “Mr Dexter, should we take some more cornets out of stock? They’re going awfully fast.” “Mr Dexter, this lady has lost her deposit token.” “Mr Dexter, can you make up a ‘Casse-Croûte’ Sundae? I’ve all these trays to do.” A ‘Casse-Croûte’ Sundae! Arthur! And there he was happily in the kitchen fiddling around with ice-cream and nuts and burnt almonds and chocolate sauce, when at home she didn’t remember the last time he had been in the kitchen, had never even, as far as she could remember, made himself a cup of tea. But then, of course, she hadn’t wanted him to. When they had staff it wasn’t necessary, nor was it his place, and when they hadn’t Vera preferred to do it herself or with Vanessa. Her kitchen at home was formicaed and chromiumed down to the last detail, shiningly surgical, and she didn’t want Arthur blundering about and leaving saucepans not washed up and tea-leaves and drips on the silvery draining-board. But more than she was surprised at the domestic things he was capable of doing, she was surprised at his happiness. Arthur was smiling, laughing, sparkling almost. At home he sat behind his newspaper and grunted, or sat behind his cards and called. Sometimes he talked tersely into the telephone, answered the children’s questions in monosyllables, agreed gruffly to something Vera had suggested. Usually he was silent, unless they had friends round in which case he discussed the news or the stock market until it was time for bridge. Watching him, Vera could not believe that this was Arthur with whom she had lived for so many years. She watched him cheerfully empty the bucket of drips from under the tea-urn, slap Basil on the back at some funny remark made by a customer, put his arm round Honey. She had seen a stranger, a laughable, lovable stranger. That was the night of Victor’s accident, the night they had rushed so apprehensively to the hospital, the night Mary Gurney had made tea for them all on their return. Two days later, when they had heard the true story of what Victor had been doing in ‘Le Casse-Croûte’ so late at night, Vera and Arthur had come closer together than they had been for years. They had just got into bed. Vera said:

  “It’s so terrible, Arthur. One doesn’t realise the children are old enough to…well, you know…and with some frightful girl he picked up on the beach… I would never have believed it of Victor.”

  “We know nothing of what’s going on in their minds. They act a little play; a sort of façade for our benefit. We don’t really know them at all, Victor and Vanessa.”

  “Perhaps we haven’t tried to know them.”

  “Don’t let’s delude ourselves, Vera; we never will. Eighteen cannot talk to middle age.
It’s a different language. You can make a guess, of course, but by the time you get to our age you’ve forgotten all the clues.”

  “We aren’t all that old, Arthur.”

  “I feel we are. That was until we came to Whitecliffs. What is it they say about ill winds? If poor Willie hadn’t died I would never have come here. I would have stayed at home, the office by ten, home by six, Saturday morning in bed, drinks on Sunday, the same old routine and barely knowing I was alive. Look at me now. Face in the sun every morning, telling the time by the tide… I feel almost like a young man.”

  “But you want to get home?”

  “I do, Vera, yes. But it’ll be different now. I’ve broken away long enough to get a sense of proportion about things. It’s not such a bad business, mine, and I really enjoy it. I’d just got stuck in this treadmill thing, and forgotten there was anything else in life.”

  “Such as?”

  “Well, six-five specials, bath buns, buckets and spades.”

  “They don’t seem all that important to me.”

  “They’re more important than you think, Vera. You probably won’t admit it, but I think that being down here has done you good as well. You seem more relaxed, easier…you even have some colour in your face…and I don’t mean Elizabeth Arden.”

  “What about our poor little Victor? If we hadn’t come here…”

  “Are you trying to tell me that what happened to Victor is my fault?”

  “No, Arthur. But…”

  “I believe you are. It’s unfair, Vera. You know I’d give anything not to have had this happen to Victor. It won’t be very pleasant for him – scarred and with the sight of only one eye. Sometimes I think you regard me as a sort of machine useful only for handing out the money. You forget that I have feelings, although you did your best to stifle them years ago. When I think of Victor I could cry. It’s taken away any heart I had for anything. Does that surprise you? I’m not a stone, you know. I don’t only eat and sleep and work. I have feelings…not that you’ve ever considered them. Do you think I would have wanted to come to Whitecliffs if I’d known this was going to happen to Victor? I know that if we hadn’t come it mightn’t have happened, but then if it hadn’t been for Willie dying we mightn’t have come…you can’t foresee these things. It hardly makes me feel any better about Victor, though, to know that you’re really holding me to blame.”