I went out to Eel Brook Common and walked along the path where Barbara had said she’d knocked Troy out with the Minervois. There was no broken glass. The cleaners had already been and would have swept it up. There were some dark stains on the paving that might have been wine or blood or both but I couldn’t be sure. I was disgusted with myself for doubting Barbara but the uncertainty persisted. I recalled what I’d learned about the tango, how the partners have to trust each other, have to be completely tuned in to each other. I remembered our bodies touching all last night and her vulnerable nakedness in my shirt, remembered how it felt to hold her in that beginners’ class: there wasn’t trust but there was openness and a willingness to explore possibilities. If Barbara and I could become really good tango dancers, what might not develop? but I didn’t want to be in a crowd of learners again. Maybe if we went for private tuition?
She didn’t turn up that evening so I phoned her.
‘Barbara,’ I said, ‘it’s me.’
‘Hi,’ she said. ‘I was just about to go out.’
‘Oh.’ Go out where? With whom? Mustn’t ask. ‘I thought we might try some private tango tuition.’
‘What for?’
‘So we could concentrate on getting beyond the beginners’ stage.’
‘Why?’ She didn’t sound like the woman who’d slept next to me last night.
‘I think it would feel good to tango well, don’t you?’
‘What does it cost?’ As if she’d never smothered me with kisses and thrown up in my bathroom.
‘Forty pounds an hour.’
‘I can’t spend twenty pounds on a tango lesson.’
‘No, no, this is my treat.’
‘I don’t want you to spend forty pounds on a lesson for us either.’ Her voice was tapping its foot, eager to put down the phone.
‘Why not?’ I said. ‘It’s no big deal, it’s less than dinner for two at any decent restaurant.’
‘It’s not the same thing and you know it. Listen, I have to go.’
I could hear in her voice that I wasn’t going to see her for a while. Was mine the sensitivity of a natural loser? I had an upcoming workshop to do at Morley College so I moved my mind to that and made my Barbara thoughts wait until I could give them my full attention. Of course they kept hammering on the door but I told myself I’d have to get used to that.
4 Bertha Strunk
I wasn’t surprised when Brian Adderley turned up at the Lichtheim studio for a check-up; that was a regular thing with their clients. Sometimes I used to wonder what I’d say when I saw him again. The time we’d spent together wasn’t the kind of thing you forget, and lying in bed beside Troy I’d find myself remembering nights with Brian.
So there he was. He looked very well and very prosperous. Not that he was fashionably dressed — he was as scruffy as ever — but he looked as if he could buy anything without asking the price first. ‘You look to be in good shape,’ he said, and kissed me on the cheeks.
‘So do you,’ I said, and after Karl did the check-up Brian and I went to The Blue Posts and sank a couple of pints. ‘I still owe you some Dubai money,’ he said.
‘No, you don’t. I didn’t mind posing for the paintings but I really couldn’t square it with Artemisia if I took money for it.’
‘You’ve got fancy scruples,’ he said.
‘Everybody draws the line somewhere, I think.’
‘Even I. Would you believe that since you left I haven’t been with any other woman?’
‘No, I wouldn’t.’
‘All right, I didn’t actually go cold turkey but it was like being alone. Can you believe that?’
‘Almost. At least it’s a nice compliment.’
‘So are you with anyone now?’
‘I’m married but I’m not with my husband any more.’
‘Why not?’
‘One beating was enough.’
‘How could you marry a man stupid enough to beat you?’
‘I’m not very clever myself. You may have noticed.’
‘You’ve got someone else?’
‘Sort of. It’s too soon to say.’
‘Who is he?’
‘No one you know. He’s a writer.’
‘What’s his name?’
‘Phil Ockerman.’
‘The guy who wrote Hope of a Tree?’
‘Have you read it?’
‘Yes, and it was real crap. He uses words well enough but it was really just a put-together thing trying to pass for a novel. Have you read it?’
‘No. How are things between you and your wife?’
‘We’re divorced. She’s got the house and the kids and a lot of money and I’ve moved here. I’ve got a house in Cheyne Walk.’
‘You must have struck it rich.’
‘Von Augenblick doesn’t only have contacts in Dubai, he’s got the whole Middle East pretty well covered, and Judith & Co. go down a bomb with his clientele.’
We were quiet for a while, then a white-haired woman nearby leaned our way and said, ‘Actually, Hope of a Tree had quite a few good things in it. You can’t expect strong plots from Ockerman, his novels are mainly character-driven.’ Her face might not have been beautiful when she was young but looked very classy now and there was something in her voice — it was low and husky — that made me think she must have had an exciting past and a lot of lovers. I’d noticed her when she came in; she was taller than I and had a long slim black velvet bag slung from her shoulder. It knocked against the table when she sat down and it didn’t sound like an umbrella. She saw me looking at it and slid it partly out of the bag. It was a baseball bat. I thought of The Rainmaker and I couldn’t help smiling. Sometimes it’s nothing but baseball bats. A sign?
‘A Louisville Slugger,’ she said. ‘His name is Irv.’
‘“His”, not “Its”,’ said Brian. ‘Has that bat got a history?’
‘It has,’ she said. ‘But you wouldn’t believe it. I wouldn’t have believed it myself if I didn’t know that form and emptiness are the same.’
‘Not a lot of people know that,’ Brian said. ‘What’re you drinking? You need a refill.’
‘Directors,’ she said. ‘But just a half please. Vodka used to be my tipple but the ravages of time forced me to switch to beer, and even that puts me to sleep if I’m not careful.’
Brian went to the bar and got refills for all of us, then he said to the woman with the baseball bat, ‘Tell us the story, please. I’m Brian Adderley. This is Bertha Strunk.’
‘Hi,’ she said. ‘My name is Grace Kowalski. The bat is named after a friend who’s no longer with us. Some years back he and I and a few others were involved in some very strange goings-on. Do you believe in ghosts?’
‘Yes,’ said Brian.
‘Sometimes,’ I said.
‘I hang out with more ghosts than I do with live people,’ said Grace.
‘That’s part of getting old, I guess,’ said Brian.
‘It sure is,’ said Grace. ‘Do you believe in vampires?’
‘Metaphorically or literally?’ said Brian.
‘The kind that actually suck blood,’ said Grace.
‘Not yet,’ said Brian.
‘Likewise,’ I said.
‘Just asking,’ said Grace.
‘Do you?’ I said.
‘Takes all kinds,’ said Grace. ‘What do you do?’ she asked me.
‘I paint eyeballs for artificial eyes,’ I said.
‘And you?’ she said to Brian.
‘I’m a painter,’ he said. ‘Pictures on canvas. Are you retired?’
‘Not yet,’ said Grace. ‘I make jewellery and I sell it in my shop, All That Glisters, just up the street.’