by Angela Huth
William bowed his head, avoiding her eye. He was moved by Bonnie’s confession, surely not the sort of thing she would mention casually to anyone. Musicians rarely spoke of the effects of their music. It was an impossible subject, prone to pretentiousness. But then maybe he was out of date in this respect, as in so may others. Maybe the young generation all liked to discuss the internal experiences inspired by their playing. He himself would find that difficult, embarrassing. But tonight, in his state of joy brought about by Bonnie’s proximity, Bonnie’s confidences, he felt he should make some sort of effort to return the honour, try to explain his own feelings.
‘I don’t see pictures,’ he said, kneading his fingers, ‘though I shall enjoy thinking of those cows in the future. A very merry image.’ He paused struggling. ‘What happens to me is that I know whether a certain piece of music is … upstairs or downstairs. I can’t begin to describe this well, but if it’s an upstairs piece then I’m lifted to … some sort of life-enhancing place that restores the spirit, gives strength, joy, whatever. If it’s a downstairs piece, then I’m consumed in a sort of darkness: a serious place full of mysterious resonances, sounds echoing in some sort of invisible ocean, as in Beethoven’s late quartets. I can sometimes feel myself gasping for breath, but always know I’ll be saved by the last bar.’ He paused. ‘Do you know at all what I mean?’ His eyes met Bonnie’s as he cursed himself. He’d gone way beyond the bounds of propriety. He must have sounded like the pretentious old bore he had always hoped to avoid. But as she nodded, still angelically serious, he found himself adding one last thing. ‘The strange thing is, a piece doesn’t have to be melancholy to be downstairs. The Moonlight Sonata, for instance, is full of light for me. I was very puzzled when I first realised it was an upstairs piece …’ He trailed off, stricken with the remorse of one who has confessed a long-held secret.
Bonnie nodded. ‘I understand,’ she said.
William was desperate to break the spell, now: dismiss all he had said as if it was of no importance. Get her to join in scoffing at his fantasies, thus diminishing them.
‘Understanding can be the quickest way to an old man’s heart,’ he said, and allowed himself briefly to pat her knee. It worked. Bonnie giggled.
‘You’re not that old,’ she said.
‘No,’ agreed William. With any luck she had forgotten the details of everything else he said. But with luck she would also remember they had shared a moment of soul-baring that would bind them, on one level, for ever. William watched the barman pulling the grill across the counter. ‘Shall I quickly get you another brandy?’
‘No thanks. It’s time for bed.’ She pushed her empty glass towards the middle of the low table between them, but made no movement to get up. William finished his own drink. There was no more to say. Three lights were switched out, leaving them in the murky pink of a bad sunset. William closed his eyes, wanting to stay with Bonnie in the hideous bar for ever.
‘How are you liking it, the Quartet, to date?’
‘I’m loving it. You must have guessed that. Playing with you three is something beyond my wildest dreams.’ William opened his eyes, saw she was smiling. ‘It’s like those people who say that playing tennis with people who are better than them makes them play better. I don’t know if it’s true, but I sort of feel that.’
‘You play beautifully.’
‘Thanks. I’ve a long way to go.’
‘Of course. We all have.–You don’t mind that in a quartet there’s no star? The fact that abnegation of sole glory is essential? The excellence of the whole is what a quartet is all about …’
‘I’ve always known that, of course. I’ve never wanted to be a solo star. I’ve always thought that team effort, when it succeeds, must be much more satisfying than success on your own, with no one to share the highs or lows.’
‘Rather an unusual way of thinking, that, in these star-obsessed days.’
Bonnie smiled.
‘Well I just want to play for years and years with the three of you, learning from you.’
Touched by these sentiments, William spoke in a voice scarcely above a whisper.
‘Well, dear Bonnie, I don’t know if we’ll manage to do anything for you, but you’ve certainly inspired us with a new vigour.’
‘Really?’
‘Really.’
‘Golly …’
They got up from their chairs. In the lift, a cube of salmon-pink light, William gazed on Bonnie’s reflection in the dirty mirror. He saw the absolute impossibility, after their conversation, of suggesting anything so crude as a nightcap in his room. She had signalled her closeness, but by doing so they had gone too far down some other track for him now to switch to lecherous old man. Any untoward gesture was unthinkable. The time to ravish her would be at the moment of offering her his life–a time he must now work towards with all speed, for some small hope had definitely been indicated. In the passage leading to their rooms they hesitated for one moment on the stormy carpet of maroons and blues, then Bonnie reached up and kissed William on the cheek.
‘Sleep well,’ she said. ‘You look tired.’
Then she hurried down the passage, jangling the key of her room. William knew all the players were on the same floor, but in which rooms? In all the hurry of arrival he had not noticed. Where was Grant?
The question did not bother William unduly that night. He was convinced that some step in the right direction had been taken. If he could exert patience, tact, sympathy, then his feelings for the exquisite Bonnie would surely not go unrequited.
A man elated by his anticipation, he got quickly into the narrow bed, pulled up the economy sheets, bounced his head on the rubber pillow. He thought of Bonnie’s Pastoral cows, of the depths of the invisible oceans she had understood, and her kind peanuts, which could be powdered and added to curry.
Then he slept.
5
‘How was your night?’ asked William.
‘Not at all bad.’
‘Good.’
‘And yours?’
‘So so. Woke up at three, but probably for only half an hour.’
‘Oh dear.’
The Handles’ questioning of each other’s nights was a daily ritual that took place while Grace boiled the kettle and William sat waiting for his tea. There was a competitive edge to these enquiries. Over the years each had learnt that there was sometimes an element of exaggeration in both their own and each other’s answers. But each one took care never to describe a night so miserable that it would stretch the other’s credulity. In some rhythmic way they were almost equally winners and losers–the winner, curiously, being the one who had missed most sleep. He or she was the one most to be pitied, and yet admired. Due to these morning exchanges they were as well acquainted with the other’s nights as they were with the other’s days, and to have started the day without an exchange of nocturnal news would have been inconceivable.
Once it was over, they fell into their normal silent breakfast. This morning, two days after William had returned from Manchester (his previous lack of sleep having been compensated for by two rather shamingly good nights), the scarcely enjoyed silence was interrupted by a tap on the kitchen window. Grace and William looked up: Lucien.
Grace moved quickly to the sink, leant across it to open the window. The moment she had been dreading for so long had arrived.
Lucien stuck his head through the window.
‘Got a job,’ he said, grinning. His shoulders were shirred with a dust of snow. Grace had only seen grey sky outside: she hadn’t realised it was snowing again. William, she thought: driving. The double anxiety rattled her heart. ‘You here, then?’ Lucien looked at William who, feeling accused of being in his own house, halted a piece of toast mid-flight to his mouth. ‘I’m early Sorry. But it’s good news.’
‘You’d better come in.’
Grace unlocked the back door. She could not bear to witness what Lucien would choose to do next. She moved back to shut the window, snapping
off the blast of cold air that had intruded so quickly. When she turned round again Lucien was sitting, apparently at ease, opposite William.
‘Coffee?’ asked Grace, carefully. She had to convey much in a single word. In the tone of her voice she must indicate to William her disapprobation of this visit, and to Lucien her apologies for not being alone.
‘Bit early for coffee. I’ll share your pot of tea if that’s all right.’ He nodded at William, who refrained from any reaction. ‘So, William: how’s things? How’s the new girl, Bonnie?’
In William’s indignation, the flight of his toast was again delayed. His shoulders tightened. What was he up to, this repulsive oaf, reading his mind?
‘Fine, thanks.’
William had no intention of benefiting the unattractive lout who his wife, in her misguided charity, had befriended, with a more expansive answer. He also had no intention, for Grace’s sake, of showing his horror at the situation.
‘Good, good. I heard she was doing well.’
William snatched at his toast, and this time caught it. He doubted Lucien had heard any such thing. Grace was unlikely ever to have discussed Bonnie, or anything concerning William, with this brutish young man.
‘She’s doing fine,’ he repeated, hoping, by understatement, to goad a little. Grace returned to the table, pot of tea refilled, and a mug for Lucien.
‘I don’t usually have this one, do I?’ With a fist made clumsy by grumpiness he picked up the mug. It had come from a petrol station, a free gift William had acquired through months of careful hoarding of tokens. Grace remembered the day he had brought it home in some triumph. Lucien’s turn to goad, thought William. But if it was Lucien’s intention to let the husband know he had a regular mug in this kitchen, and all that that implied, he was not going to be drawn.
‘Nor you do,’ said Grace mildly. Nonetheless, she filled it with tea. This was another necessary double message: she was bound to convey a show of strength to William, pouring tea into a mug Lucien disapproved of; to Lucien, the acknowledgement that he was the regular user of another mug, but things had shifted this morning. She sat down, face tight, corners of her mouth twitching. Darling Ace, she’s put on her mouse face, thought William.
There was a triple-edged silence that none but Lucien enjoyed. William, hurrying through the last of his toast, was determined to avoid any show of interest in Lucien’s news. Grace inwardly prayed that news could be kept until William left.
When at last he got up to go, Grace rose too.
‘Back in a minute,’ she said to Lucien, and followed William into the hall.
‘I need a hammer,’ William said.
‘A hammer? What, to bash–?’
William smiled very slightly, but friendly.
‘Something upstairs.’
Grace took a hammer from a drawer in the hall table. Had it not been so tense a beginning to the day, she might have reflected how strange it was that after so many years William still did not know where certain contents of the house were kept. When she turned to hand it to him she found him standing on the bottom stair. Thus, he was several inches taller than her, looked down on her. This was all very peculiar.
‘My Ace,’ he said, ‘I’ve been thinking: surely it’s my turn to cook dinner?’
‘Cook dinner?’ For a moment Grace thought her husband had taken leave of his senses. He had not offered to cook anything for years. The oddness of the morning was increasing.
‘Thought you might enjoy it for once … Have a night off.’
‘Whatever’s brought this about?’
‘Who can say?’ William wondered how a man can carry on so normally when there is murder in his heart. ‘Things just occur to one out of the blue, sometimes, don’t they? Good ideas. I suddenly rather fancied the challenge of a curry.’
‘A curry? Would you know what to do?’
‘I’ve some idea. I’ll pick up a few things on the way to the rehearsal. We’re having a long session today, so as to have a day off tomorrow.’ (A clear day before the funeral was imperative. There were amorphous thoughts in the back of William’s mind concerning a flurry of funeral directors, ambulances, doctors.) ‘Rufus has to go to his dentist in Birmingham.–I’ll be back soon after tea.’
‘Very well. I’ll look forward to it, my evening off. I may take a drink to the bath while you struggle: what a thought.’ Grace gave William a grateful smile as he moved further upstairs.
The smile vanished on her return to the kitchen. Lucien had made himself toast, finished the marmalade, and was banging at The Times, crumpling it in a manner which would infuriate William, neatest of readers. His look, as Grace entered, was almost as if he was the host, she a guest in her own kitchen. Irritation rose in Grace, as earlier it had in William.
‘You shouldn’t have come so early,’ she said.
‘Sorry, couldn’t help it. The news got me out of bed early.–We are in a dither this morning, aren’t we? Shall I go?’
‘William doesn’t like guests for breakfast.’
‘So he made quite clear. Anyway, I won’t be around so much, now I’m working, you’ll be relieved to hear–’
‘Don’t be so silly.’ Despite herself, Grace sounded apologetic.
‘This job’s two days a week.’
Grace sat down. As soon as Lucien had finished his news, she would ask him to leave She dreaded the thought of his still being around when William came down, and she had no idea what time William–engaged in some mysterious task with the hammer -intended to leave.
‘So what is it?’
‘A centre for the homeless. Helping out.’
‘That’s marvellous.’
‘Yuh. I mean, I can identify with them, can’t I? Sort of job’ll suit me down to the ground.’
‘I’m not sure I can see you identifying with them that much,’ Grace said cautiously. ‘I mean, you’re not exactly homeless, living in a large comfortable house.’
Lucien sniffed.
‘A roof over your head doesn’t mean much when you’re totally excluded, does it?’ He clenched his fist, punched his temples hard enough to hurt. ‘You don’t know what it’s like, you with your comfortable bloody life, husband and money and that. You can’t imagine what it’s like not to have a single woman in the world who gives a toss for you. Sometimes the unfairness turns into such a rage I just want to blow the whole bloody scene up. Destroy. Put an end to it all.–I can see from your face you don’t know what I’m on about. Suppose I can’t expect someone from the privileged classes to understand someone from the underbelly of this crap world.’
Grace had no wish to enter this conversation now. She wanted to make sandwiches for William’s lunch, get on with her own work. She merely shook her head.
‘I can see you’re wanting me out,’ Lucien went on. ‘Even you, Grace. I went and chose a bad time, didn’t I?’
Grace looked at him, alarmed, not knowing what to say. She could see the building of one of his worst rages. But then, suddenly as it had come, it dissolved. The bones of his face softened. He gave her one of his most beguiling smiles.
‘Don’t worry, I’m not going to be awkward. I know you don’t want me to go really. It’s just him upstairs making you jumpy, aren’t I right?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘Anyways, Tuesdays and Thursdays I’ll be catching an early train, so you’ll miss me then. You’ll find the three mornings I come very precious, you’ll see.’ He grinned again, joking. Got up. ‘Thanks for the breakfast, as per usual.’
Grace went with him to the door, worried that something in her careful demeanour had hurried him this much. She could afford to delay him just a moment longer, assure him there was no need to dash away.
‘What about the promise that I can meet your mother?’ she asked.
‘Lobelia?’ Lucien, about to open the back door, changed his mind. He leant against it instead. ‘Never in your wildest imaginings could you guess what she did last night.’
G
race allowed a pause. When it pressed too long, their eyes locked. She knew she would have to give in.
‘What was that?’
‘Tell you some other time … But, yes, OK–if you still want to, fine by me. You’ll meet her. She’s curious about you, too, you know. Before Christmas, I promise.’
‘I look forward to that,’ said Grace.
‘Bye, then. You’re really pleased about the job?’
‘Really pleased, of course. Good luck.’
Whether Grace’s pleasure came mostly from the anticipation of relief at the thought of two mornings off, or for Lucien’s sake, she could not be sure. She approached the fridge, trying to rid her mind of anything beyond William’s sandwiches.
*
Upstairs in his room, William was finding the task of crushing peanuts harder than he imagined. There were no clear spaces on the desk or table, and impatience fired by guilt made him incapable of bothering to move anything. He settled for the floor. Here, he erected a worktop of two telephone directories, which (cunning thought) would absorb the noise of the hammering. He then opened the two small packets of peanuts (enough to kill an elephant if it had an allergy, he reckoned) and began to bash.
Almost at once he realised his mistake. The peanuts flew all over the place, chipped a little, but not the fine fragments he had intended. He should have left them in the bags. These he picked up and decided the splits could easily be mended with Sellotape, and the peanuts returned. He crawled to the desk, ruffled through the chaos of papers to where he thought the Sellotape might be. His hands, he noticed, were trembling. The tallest peak of manuscripts tottered and fell. Others followed. William sat back on his haunches in a mire of a million musical notes, crotchets glaring at him, crescendos warning him. But at least he held the bent, fluff-bound Sellotape. There was difficulty, then, in applying it to the torn bags, such was the unsteadiness of his hands. But at last the extraordinary task was accomplished. William sensed a kind of molten achievement rising within him, and began to scrabble about the carpet picking up far-flung peanuts.
