In the living room, the windows were covered with lace curtains and framed by heavy, wine-colored drapes. There was an electric fire, two dressers displaying plates and books. His father slowly closed his newspaper above his crossed legs, then folded it in his lap, clearing his throat. Already there was the vague hesitation, the swirl of fear and goodwill.
He put the gift basket on the floor and kissed his mother on the cheek. “Mum,” he said, taking her hand, “this is Anita.”
Jokingly, he held the two women’s hands in his own, as if to join them in marriage. Beneath her coat, Anita wore a paisley minidress. Gold earrings hung just above the ridges of her collarbone and her eyes were outlined in black kohl. She seemed to grow taller and thinner as his mother appraised her.
“We had a lovely drive,” she finally said. “The countryside. You must enjoy living here.”
His mother led them farther into the living room. “Yes, it must make quite a change from London,” she said. “Though to us Cheltenham is rather a large town.”
On the television, there was a formation of Stuka bombers flying through gray banks of clouds. Then a fire brigade trained its hoses on a smoking building whose roof and upper windows were luminous white flashes in a grid of black.
“We’ve just got back from Rome,” said Brian. He was standing near his father’s chair now. His father was looking down at his newspaper as if he’d forgotten something important.
“You drove down from London, did you?” his father said.
Brian looked at the TV. “Yes. Nice drive. A little rain.”
“We’ve brought all sorts of things,” said Anita. “I think I could live for a month on all the things we have here.”
She had picked the basket off the floor and now they all looked at it in her hands. Its little pots and tins of food were obscured by the green cellophane, the basket’s handle crested with a dark green bow.
“Anita’s from Switzerland,” Brian said. “She’s been teaching me German, haven’t you?”
His mother handed his father a cup of tea on a saucer. Then she turned to Anita, whose hair was so much like Brian’s that they seemed to be impersonating each other. “Do you take yours with sugar?”
“Yes,” said Anita. “I’ll just go and put this in the kitchen, if that’s all right.”
She turned in a purposeful way, a robotic smile on her face, and walked out of the room. Brian sat down in a seat angled toward the window. Through the lace curtains, he could see the silent street outside. He could see the silhouette of the white limousine that was waiting for them. He was trying to remember how this had all played out in his mind beforehand — a couple of jokes, a little comic nervousness as his parents tried some caviar from the gift basket, holding up one of the little tins in curiosity to read the label.
He stared out the window of the limousine, his face rigid, watching the neighborhood pass by. There were ranks of iron fences, hedges whose leaves had turned a muddy brownish green. He held Anita’s hand absently, his wrist on the leather seat.
“They never told me their names,” she said.
“Lewis and Louisa. Very droll. They met at a jumble sale.”
“They never asked me any questions. Nothing.”
“They know everything they needed to know about you.”
“They were afraid, I think.”
“No. They weren’t afraid. They were glad that everything went the way they expected it to.”
She lit a cigarette. In her lap was a magazine she had brought over to amuse his parents but had never taken out of her purse. Inside it was a picture of Brian and her that could have been an advertisement for “Swinging London.” He was standing with his back to her, holding her hands behind his waist, turning to the camera with a faintly mischievous grin. She was falling away from him in a sudden fit of laughter, her mouth open to reveal a white ridge of teeth. They looked like twins, that’s what everyone said, Brian in a finely tailored suit, Anita’s long legs seeking purchase on the slick white floor.
She rested her head on his shoulder and took his arm. “Do you have anything left?” she said.
He looked at her from out of the corner of his eye. “No. That’s the worst part.”
But then he reached his fingers into his jacket pocket and smiled, pulling her closer with his other hand. When she caught his eye, sitting up a little, their life together came back in a sudden blur of color. On their last night in Rome, her friend had come back with them to the hotel and all three of them had ended up on the bed, kneeling and kissing and touching one another’s hair, laughing. Whatever they’d smoked had made the room brighter, outlined in a haze of yellow and violet. They were both smiling at him as they took off his clothes, admiring him as if he were their creation.
He handed her a canister and a tiny silver spoon. She leaned against him as she brought them carefully to her nose. Then she tilted her face up to his and he put his finger on the ridge of her cheekbone, staring into her upside-down eyes.
“I wish we were back in Rome,” he said.
“No. Someplace else.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know. Morocco. I’ve always wanted to go to Morocco.”
Their flat was in Earl’s Court. It was made of sooty red brick, with tall windows whose wooden frames were covered in flaking white paint. When they got back that night, Keith called them from his house on the Sussex coast. It had just been raided by the police. They’d found drugs everywhere — drugs on Mick and on their art dealer friend, Robert Fraser — and when they went upstairs, they’d found Mick’s girlfriend, Marianne, curled up in bed with no clothes on. They were all coming down from an LSD trip: a walk in the woods, an hour or so of wandering on the beach, looking at the stones and the remnants of the wooden piers. For the half hour that the police were there, it had never fully sunk in that the raid was real.
Keith’s voice was almost inaudible, more solemn than Anita had ever heard it. She hunched on the edge of the bed, shielding her eyes with the flat of her hand in an effort to concentrate.
“Are you all right?” she said.
“I’m fine. Surprisingly fine.”
“I’m sorry. We’re a little out of it. We’ve just been lying here, sort of strung out.”
“Well, whatever you’ve got left, you’d better chuck it. Brian’s going to be next.”
“You think so?”
“I don’t know. It wouldn’t surprise me.”
“Everything’s gone.”
“Well, just tell him to cool it. You know how he is. That’s the last thing we need.”
“I’ll tell him.”
“I’ve got to hang round here for a while. Are you all right?”
“Yes, I’m fine. Are you?”
“I’m not too worried right now. I’ll see you as soon as I can.”
She hung up the phone. Then she closed her eyes, inexplicably lonely.
“They were busted,” she said.
“Who?”
“Everyone. Keith, Mick, Marianne, Robert. Keith is out on bail.”
He stood up from the bed. The air in the room, clouded by candle smoke, moved in circular waves.
“They would have come by now if they were going to come, don’t you think?” she said.
“I don’t know.”
He felt dizzy and sluggish at the same time. He looked at the Moroccan rugs on the floor, the religious icons, the pop-art painting of a 7UP ad on the far wall. His sinuses burned and his mouth was dry, but he knew that they were down now to just booze.
“What did Keith say?” he asked.
“He said he was all right. He seemed calm.”
He went over to the window and pushed aside the curtain. His heart pumped in a strange, disjointed rhythm, and he closed his eyes and then opened them until it stopped.