The Slow Death of Maxwell Carrick

by Jan Harvey

  ‘Is that you?’

  I stepped forward like a schoolboy caught by a teacher smoking behind the cricket pavilion.

  ‘Oh, yes, Cécile,’ I said, stepping forward. ‘I am very sorry. I didn’t realise you were in there. I was looking for Grant.’ I moved into the library. The letter was gone and her hands were empty.

  ‘Perhaps you can help me?’ she said calmly. ‘I am looking for a book about the family history. George says there is one in here, but I cannot find it.’

  I stepped towards the shelves and placed my hands on a red leather bound book. Pulling it out, I handed it to her. Her fingers wrapped around it, encircling the spine.

  ‘The family dates back to the Huguenots. You’ll find it all in there and how you will fit in.’ I said the words unkindly and she knew it. She levelled her eyes at me. Those eyes, the clarity of them, the green overpowering the brown, feline.

  ‘I presume you are not pleased by our announcement last night,’ she said.

  ‘I would say I was very much taken by surprise.’ I edged towards a high-backed chair and perched on the arm. I lit a cigarette but I did not offer her one, the first and slightest way I had of not appeasing her. She noticed, I am sure, as I dragged deep and let a cloud of blue smoke come between us.

  ‘So, you are to be mistress of Lapston,’ I said, appearing calm whilst my heart beat against my chest like a bird’s wings against the confines of its cage. ‘Congratulations. It and George are both a good catch.’

  She was looking at the book. It was open, balanced on her long fingers. ‘Don’t worry, Carrick, you have lost the battle, but not the war.’

  I did not know to what she referred, but I could clearly see that she was laughing at me behind those cat’s eyes. I drew again on my cigarette.

  ‘You may think I don’t understand you, imagine I have not worked you out, but I have.’ I felt my jaw stiffen, working against me.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘You posed for me, lay naked before me, what will George make of that, I wonder?’ I thought for the split second that I had caught her off guard, that she had been hooked on my line, but she barely turned a hair.

  ‘He already knows,’ she said. She closed the book with a thud and walked towards me, my eyes level with her breasts. She was wearing a sheer blouse under the open cardigan, a thin sheer petticoat under that, her nipples hardened inside the soft rose printed fabric. I felt powerless before her.

  ‘I gave him the drawing last night after we slept together in his bed. I was naked before him, it seemed the perfect moment to give him a lasting memento of the woman he will make love to for the rest of his life.’

  I felt as if invisible strings were tied to my bones and that they were dragging me downwards to the polished oak floor, like Gulliver, overwhelmed by a thousand bonds.

  ‘Nothing to say, Carrick?’ I was silent, the bird breaking his wings inside me as it attempted to escape. ‘No, I thought not. You thought you were going to have me did you not? You believed we would be the ones making love, my naked body under yours?’

  She laughed, a dry sneer of a laugh. ‘You are mad, Carrick, mad, and if you think you have any chance with me then you most certainly are. You cannot deny it; you are sick and broken, a sad remnant of what you once were. It is an amour fou; you are insane. What do you think you could possibly offer me? Tell me.’

  I could not meet her eyes. The bird was weak but I could feel the wings still pounding against the bottom of the cage.

  ‘I will tell him.’ I was speaking in a low tone. I could feel the beating like a pulse, the frustrated beating, the guns, a volley of machine gunfire. I put my hands to my head, cupping my ears.

  ‘Tell him what?’

  ‘I saw you in Oxford, with another man.’

  ‘You were seeing things, Carrick, you are a sick and broken man, they all say it; you hear things, you see things all the time, don’t you? You are not really sane are you? Look at you now, hands over your ears, blocking me out.’

  ‘Grant!’

  ‘Grant is gone, Carrick.’ I looked up at her, hands even now over my ears, the beating, the repetitive beating pulse of the dying bird. ‘No one is interested in anything you have to say anymore. Look at you, and you thought I could be associated with you, it’s laughable. What chance does a sad wreck of a man like you have with anyone? Even Alice, poor desperate Alice.’

  George was calling, his voice cutting through the sounds in my head, the room was going black then grey, gunfire all around me. There was Collins, his body slumped to one side, the Kraut, steel knife in his hand coming for me. I reached out to touch Cécile’s blouse, pink roses swimming in and out of focus, my hand shaking.

  She was gone.

  It was George’s hand on my shoulder, the heavy reassurance of it strong and substantial, reliably there for me.

  ‘Come on now, old man. There now, Carrick.’ His voice was gentle and he was pressing my head to his side, drawing me into him, holding me up.

  She was gone.

  ‘George, you cannot…’ I said.

  ‘Come on, old boy, there’s a good chap.’

  ‘You must not. Dangerous.’

  ‘Not anymore, old boy, it’s all over now.’ He tightened his grip on my shoulder. ‘Come on now, you have nothing to fear, nothing to fear.’

  41

  ‘You have nothing to fear,’ said Rory, shaking his head and smiling. ‘He’s not here.’ I was hesitating before I stepped over the threshold of his house.

  ‘Where is he?’ I asked, trying not to look as relieved as I felt.

  ‘He’s having a sabbatical at bad boys boarding school.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. I’m going away tomorrow for a week or two so he’s gone to his trainer’s place while I’m away.’ I wondered if he could tell how much my heart sank at the news that he would not be here. It turned out he could because he said straightaway, ‘You look like you’re going to miss me?’

  I glanced at him for a second, endeavouring to give nothing away, but he was smiling. He knew.

  He had tea and biscuits ready in the lounge. The fireplace looked dreary without a fire and the glass at the other end was wind-whipped with smears of dirt across it. Everything looked so much colder and dirtier this time – what did I expect of a man living on his own with a big, hairy dog who liked to swim a lot? I took a seat on his sofa, the leather was old and worn under my touch and when I ran my hand across the surface, tiny bits of grit caught under my fingernails.

  ‘How’s Inca?’ he asked as he joined me, passing me a mug of steaming tea.

  ‘Oh she’s lovely, very well-behaved.’

  ‘Unlike certain other canines we could mention, eh?’

  ‘Where are you going?’ I asked, taking a sip of the hot tea.

  ‘Spain. I’m being asked to landscape a holiday village in Almeria. It’s where they filmed all the spaghetti westerns, apparently. So they tell me.’

  ‘Clint Eastwood?’

  ‘Yep, strange, isn’t it? Of course it might not be true. The manager I met there before told me Walt Disney was born in the next town up the coast, but I looked him up and it said he came from Chicago.’

  ‘I suspect it’s a way of attracting tourists.’

  ‘Martha, I’m sorry for what I said that time on the bench at Lapston. I should never have said it – it was impetuous of me and way out of order.’

  I turned to face him. ‘Please don’t apologise, I can’t tell you how much you boosted my ego. It’s just that, well, I love my husband. He’s an uncomplicated soul and he is grumpy, and I annoy him, but he’s my simple, grumpy irritated old man.’

  ‘How do you irritate him?’

  ‘Oh, in ways many and varied. I was a workaholic that irritated him, then I retired and I became mopey and that irritated him. Then I really got into the boo
k project and…’

  ‘Don’t tell me, that irritated him as well.’

  I nodded. ‘And I got told off for going to Lapston and not wearing a hard hat.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘Mind you, it is foolhardy, the house could have collapsed around our ears and who would have known we were there?’

  ‘Simon.’

  ‘Simon who?’

  ‘The guy who saw us, you remember.’

  ‘Oh Saint Simon of the High Morals,’ Rory said with a smile.

  I laughed. ‘He’s really lovely. Very kind. I made him scones.’

  ‘Lucky old Simon, I’ve never been offered a scone.’ Rory was pouting, mocking me, a shiver of excitement ran through me and I just hoped he couldn’t see it.

  ‘So what time are we seeing our Mr Fry?’ I asked, changing the subject.

  ‘As soon as we’ve had this – he said we could drop in any time to suit us.’

  I stretched out my legs so that the toes of my shoes touched the underside of his coffee table and lay back into the couch. ‘Isn’t there something absolutely lovely about the sound of running water?’

  ‘As long as I’m not in it I love it.’

  ‘Did your not being able to swim come from something in your past?’

  ‘I think so, I have vague memories of being in a swimming pool as a small child and not being able to get out. My mother was screaming. It was probably nothing, but when I go into water I just freeze, I can’t move.’

  ‘I was locked in my bedroom as a child. My father thought it was a good idea for some reason and then I was sick. I was only four and I couldn’t get out. I was lying against the back of the door, sobbing and covered in vomit. That’s why I’m hopeless around people who are ill,’ I told him.

  ‘We’re a right pair, aren’t we?’ He lifted his hand and took a strand of my hair and placed it behind my ear. I felt a calmness run through me from head to toe, a feeling I had not experienced for a very long time. I could have stayed there, with him, for the rest of my life.

  ‘Come on,’ I said reluctantly. ‘Let’s go and see Norman Fry.’

  42

  Collins was slumped over, his throat cut, blood trickling over the folds of his jacket. I could see his legs twitching, like the frog’s legs on the wire at school when we put a volt through them. Twitching, then stopping dead. Dead. My feet, the iron bar bearing down on them, the desert boots worn out, covered in Sicilian sand.

  The knife was a heavy steel, black, and at the edge of it a ragged line of silver. Then he was falling, crashing down on top of me, his face registering shock, his eyes wide open as the blood sprayed across my sand-coloured uniform, ketchup from the nursery, my mother’s face her eyes smiling, his weight crushing me, suffocating, his hair against my dry lips. He’s heavy and the knife is splicing my skin beneath my jacket, the torn cotton starting to seep with blood. My blood.

  ‘I am almost certain that it is brought on by stress,’ I heard Alice say softly. ‘He cannot help it. Yes, we asked him again and again to talk to someone, but he simply will not do it.’

  ‘Let me take a look.’

  It was the locum doctor, I’d never seen him before. Leaning over me, he pressed a cold stethoscope against my naked chest. He had large open pores on the end of his nose. The blankets were tightening across me, Mrs Hall was tucking me in, then there was a hand resting on my forehead. Cool.

  ‘Mouse?’

  ‘No, my love, it’s Mrs Hall, now don’t you worry at all. I’m here looking after you.’

  ‘George.’ My mouth was dry and she lifted my head letting me sip some water. The cold trickled down my throat, and then over my chin.

  She mopped my damp skin with a flannel. ‘Hush, rest now.’

  I tried to focus on her, slowly realising that she was not Cécile, then I turned my head to the side and slept.

  It was teatime before I emerged, the rain was driving down outside, hammering on the windows of the empty lounge, everywhere felt cold and still. I entered room after room looking for Alice, knowing that I sought comfort in her. For all at once, I knew she was my ally and so very important to me.

  ‘Excuse me, sir, may I help you?’ It was little Lizzie Fry, her maid’s cap crooked on her head. ‘Do you need anything?’

  ‘Oh, Lizzie, I was looking for Miss Alice.’

  ‘She’s gone, sir, back to the Auxiliary, left an hour ago.’

  My heart slumped. ‘Is Grant here?’

  ‘No, sir, he left this morning; Ogden took him to the station in the old trap.’

  ‘Has he gone on an errand?’

  ‘He’s left us, sir, returned to London, says he’s never coming back.’

  All at once I recalled the whispered conversation and Grant’s ghostly face in the half light of the hall.

  ‘And where are the others?’

  ‘They have gone to Stow, sir. I believe they are buying a ring for Madam.’

  There was a blackness in my head, a void where the memories should be.

  ‘I should like some tea, Lizzie, in the library.’

  She bobbed and said, ‘Very well, sir,’ looking absolutely out of her depth, her small face uncertain.

  In the library, I looked around for sight of the letter Cécile had been concealing, but nothing was disturbed. She had not put it in her pocket for I would have seen the outline of it. I was at a loss as I walked around and then it caught my eye, just a corner of the envelope, the stamp half hidden behind the mantle. The envelope had been inserted between the wall and wood in an effort to conceal it. I pressed my finger against the visible part of it, with a mind to easing it up and freeing it. It was clear that she had attempted to hide it, presuming that she could retrieve it later. As I pushed my finger against the wretched thing, it slipped away from me and dropped behind the wood. I crouched down and ran my fingers over the tiles that surrounded the hearth, it was somewhere behind them. I tried, knowing of course that I could do little to move the wooden mantle because it was stuck fast to the wall. The letter was gone.

  ‘Is everything all right, sir?’ It was Lizzie standing with a large tea tray, her eyes wide open watching me and wondering why I wanted to move the carved wooden fireplace.

  ‘It’s nothing to concern you. I dropped something behind the fireplace, it is not important.’

  ‘Madam Roussell and the major have just arrived back, Mr Carrick. Shall I tell them you are in the library, sir?’

  ‘Thank you, Lizzie,’ I said, taking a seat in the plaid wingback chair. I steepled my fingers and rested my chin on them whilst I thought matters through. I was quite resolved to tell George he was making a huge mistake.

  ‘Carrick, old man.’ He entered the room on his own, arm outstretched to me in a friendly greeting. I stood up and shook his hand, beckoning him to sit down.

  ‘I’m sorry about yesterday, George,’ I said. ‘I do feel much better today.’

  ‘Good, good,’ he said, lifting up the teapot and pouring himself a cup. I noticed Lizzie had set it for three. ‘I’m sure you will soon be over this. It does not do to give in to it forever.’

  I tilted my head, weighing the words up in my mind then I asked, ‘Have you bought the ring?’

  ‘What? Yes, Cécile wanted a new one. I offered Mother’s but she said Alice should have it, and of course I agreed.’

  ‘Of course she did,’ I said, taking a sip of my tea. George was oblivious to the sarcasm in my voice, placing his cup down on the saucer and leaning forward.

  ‘Thing is, old chap, one has to think to the future. These… episodes of yours, would it not be wise to address them sooner rather than later?’

  ‘I will, George,’ I replied, feeling more than a little embarrassed. I wanted to dwell on the subject of Cécile, but it occurred to me, all at once, that he was downplaying t
he extent of my problem and was even suggesting I could make myself better just by willing it to be so, if only that were the case. I studied his face then I realised he was waiting for me to continue. ‘They said at the hospital that it would take time, I have to be patient, need rest and all that.’

  ‘Yes, and this is all very well, but you see, life here at Lapston is about to change considerably. Cécile and I would very much like to embark on our new life together in peace and quiet, in other words, in private.’

  I found myself gawping at him as I realised what he was inferring.

  ‘Really? Is this Cécile’s idea, George?’

  ‘No, no, that is, if you think about it, it is simply what you would expect, old man. I’m not saying it has to be immediate.’

  ‘It cannot be immediate, George. I have heard from Peterson and he is coming home.’

  George raised an eyebrow, obviously miffed that I was unable to respond to his polite request at once.

  It was me who leaned in next. ‘George may I have a word with you?’

  ‘About what, Carrick?’

  ‘You and Cécile.’ He looked unsure and so, I thought unkindly, he should. ‘I am going to be honest, George, I think you are making an enormous mistake. I think you are being fooled.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘I am telling you this for your own good, as your oldest and truest friend, I don’t trust her.’ The poor fool, he looked absolutely dejected, his face fell. I was telling him what he already knew. ‘I am sorry,’ I added, to lessen the blow.

  ‘I find it very difficult to take this from you, Carrick,’ he said, shaking his head. I hoped the expression on my face would tell him that I felt for him, that I really did want to protect him, and indeed Lapston too, and in fact all that I held so dear. He raised his eyes to meet mine. ‘Do you really think I could rely on the judgment of someone who is mentally ill?’

  I felt as if he had slapped me. I leant back against the chair, astonished and completely lost for words.

  ‘George, that is hardly fair. I am talking about Cécile and the fact that she is not what she seems.’