‘Yes.’
‘I’m sure she doesn’t know.’
That seemed to give him an obscure satisfaction. Irene had never liked the marriage, although it had taken Pat off their hands, providing him with the money he had never earned.
‘Did you realise’, I asked, ‘that we knew – before tonight?’
‘Never mind that.’ He wouldn’t answer, and left me curious. He might have picked it up in the air, for he was a perceptive man. But I thought it sounded as though he had been told. By whom? He was not intimate with his daughter-in-law. Bizarre as it seemed, it was more likely to be his son. Martin felt for his son the most tenacious kind of parental love. It was, Martin knew it all by heart, so did Margaret, so did Azik Schiff, so did Mr Marsh and old Winslow long before we did, the most one-sided of human affections, the one which lasts longest and for long periods gives more pain than joy. And yet, one-sided though such a relation as Martin’s and his son’s had to be, it took two to make a possessive love. With some sons it couldn’t endure; if it did endure, there had to be a signal – sometimes the call for help – the other way. Pat had cost his father disappointment and suffering: there had been quarrels, lies, deceits: but in the midst of it all there was, and still remained, a kind of communication, so that in trouble he went back, shameless and confiding, and gave Martin a new lease of hope.
The result was that Martin, who was usually as quick as any man to see the lie in life, who had an acute nose for danger, was talking that night as though I were the one to be reassured. He did it – I had heard him speak of his son in this tone before – with an air of apparent realism. Yes, there must be plenty of young men, mustn’t there, who think of amusing themselves elsewhere in the first year of marriage. No one was ever really honest about the sexual life. How many of us made fantasies year after year? There weren’t many who would confess their fantasies, or admit or face what their sexual life had been.
I didn’t interrupt him, but he could have guessed what I was thinking. Did he remember, earlier that year in our native town, how we had talked during the murder trial? Talked without cover or excuses, unlike tonight. There was a gap between fantasy and action, the psychiatric witnesses had been comfortably saying. It was a gap that only the psychopaths or those in clinical terms not responsible managed to cross. That made life more acceptable, pushed away the horrors into a corner of their own. Martin wouldn’t accept the consolation. It was too complacent for him, he had said, as we sat in the hotel bar, talking more intimately than we had ever done.
Now, Martin, swirling the whisky in his glass, looked across the study from his armchair to mine.
‘I agree,’ he said, as though with fair-mindedness, ‘not so many people act out their fantasies. But still, this business of his must be fairly common, mustn’t it? You know, I’m pretty sure that I could have done the same.’
Shortly afterwards, he made an effort to sound more fair-minded still.
‘Of course,’ he said, ‘we’ve got to face the fact that he might turn into a layabout.’
He used the objective word, his voice was sternly objective. Yet he was about as much so as Francis Getliffe complaining (with a glow of happiness concealed) that people said his son Leonard was a class better as a scientist than himself. Both of them liked to appear detached. It made Martin feel clear-minded, once he had suggested that the future might be bad. But he didn’t believe it. He was still thinking of his son as the child who had been winning, popular, anxious to make people happy – and capable of all brilliant things.
‘I thought they were getting on all right tonight, didn’t you?’ said Martin. ‘He’ll shake down when the baby is born, you know. It will make all the difference, you’ll see.’
He gave a smile which was open and quite unironic. Anyone who saw it wouldn’t have believed that he was a pessimistic man.
8: Sight of a New Life
THE New Year opened more serenely for Margaret and me than many in the past. True, each morning as the breakfast tray came in, she looked for letters from Maurice or Charles, just as one used to in a love affair, when letters counted more. And, as in a love affair, the fact that Charles was thousands of miles away sometimes seemed to slacken his hold on her. Distance, as much as time, did its own work. Reading one of Charles’ despatches, she was relieved that he was welclass="underline" but she was joyful when she heard from Maurice. Sometimes I wondered, if she and I could have had other children, whom she would have loved the most.
The flat was quiet, so many rooms empty, with us and the housekeeper living there alone. Mornings working in the study, afternoons in the drawing-room, the winter trees in the park below. Visits to Margaret’s father, back to the evening drink. Once out of the hospital, it was all serene, and there was nothing to disturb us. As for our acquaintances, we heard that Muriel was moving into Azik Schiff’s house to have her baby – Eaton Square, Azik laying on doctors and nurses, that suited him appropriately enough. Margaret kept up her visits to her, as soon as she was installed, which was towards the end of January, with the baby due in a couple of weeks.
About six o’clock one evening, the birth expected any day now, there was a ring at our hall door. As I opened it, Pat was standing on the threshold. There wasn’t likely to be a more uninvited guest. I knew there couldn’t be any news, for Margaret had not long returned from Eaton Square. He entered with his shameless smile, ingratiating and also defiant.
‘As a matter of fact, Uncle Lewis,’ he said, explaining himself, ‘I would rather like a word with Aunt Meg.’
He followed me into the drawing-room, where Margaret was sitting. She said good evening in a tone that he couldn’t have thought indulgent (it was the first time she had seen him since the Christmas dinner), but he went and kissed her cheek.
‘Do you mind’, he said, bright-faced, ‘if I help myself to a drink?’
He poured himself a whisky and soda, and then sat on a chair near to her.
‘Aunt Meg,’ he said, ‘I’ve come to ask you a favour.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I want you to let us call this child after you.’
For once Margaret was utterly astonished, her face wide open with surprise, and yes, for an instant, with pleasure.
Her first response was uncollected. ‘Why, you don’t know whether it’s going to be a girl.’
‘I’m sure it will be.’
‘You can’t be sure–’
‘I want a girl. I want to call it after you.’
His tone was masterful and wooing. Watching with a certain amusement from the other side of the room (I had not often seen anyone try this kind of blandishment on her), I saw her eyes sharpen.
‘Whose idea was this?’
‘Mine, of course, what do you think?’
Margaret’s voice was firm.
‘What does Muriel say?’
‘Oh, she’s in favour. You’d expect her to be in favour, wouldn’t you?’
‘I don’t know, she might be.’ Margaret hadn’t altered her expression. ‘But she hasn’t quite your reasons, after all.’
‘Oh come, Aunt Meg, I just want to show how much I feel for you–’ For the first time he was protesting – as though he had just recognised that he was no longer in control.
‘When did you think this up?’
‘A long time ago, months ago, you know how you think about names.’
‘How long ago did you hear that Muriel had told me?’
‘Oh that–’
‘You don’t like being unpopular, do you?’
‘Come on, Aunt Meg, you’re making too much of it.’
‘Am I?’
He threw his head back, spread his arms, gave a wide penitential grimace, and said: ‘You know what I’m like!’