23
Titus Thinks of the Past
AS TITUS AND Dog walked back to Ruth’s studio, he began to wonder if he should leave this part of his life now, before he could inflict pain on someone whom he already knew to be as vulnerable as his sister Fuchsia. Yet she had said come back, Titus, and he knew that she knew that he would go when he wanted to. Her armour was ready, but it might not be proof against the hurt when it came. Then Titus thought how arrogant it was to think that it was within his power to so dislocate a life, but from past experience he knew it to be true. He felt drawn to Ruth, already needed her, but he knew he would resist her attempt to possess him and his own willingness to be possessed.
I did promise her to return, he said to himself, thus fortifying his conscience, as he went up the steps to Ruth’s studio. He knew she must be home by the sound of coughing, and as he tapped at the door, Dog gave a little whine of delight.
Ruth opened the door in a paroxysm of coughing, with the half-smoked cigarette stuck to her bottom lip.
‘Oh, Titus, I’m so glad you came back. I wasn’t sure – and dear Dog too. Come in, I’ve got the stove going, and I’m doing some work. I got the paper – it’s handmade – it’s beautiful – look.’
‘Yes, Ruth, it looks beautiful and, in a strange way, so do you.’
‘Strangely beautiful, beautifully strange, pretty ugly, pretty pretty, plain ugly, purl and plain, a pearl of great worth, a rough diamond – thank you, Titus.’
‘Have you started your work yet?’
‘Well, I’ve got my paper, my pens, my reference books. I’m a little bit short of ideas but they’ll come. They must. I’ve already discarded all those,’ Ruth said, as she pointed to balls of paper, creased and crumpled and lying wherever she had thrown them in her dissatisfaction.
‘I don’t think I can help you.’
‘I feel better now that you’re here, Titus, and I think if you don’t mind I’ll get back to work now, but first of all tell me how you got on at Herbert’s.’
Titus told Ruth of his first venture into modelling, which seemed to consist mainly of sitting down, eating and drinking.
‘Oh, they’re so kind, those two,’ said Ruth. ‘I expect Herbert will take you to meet Mrs Sempleton-Grove later. But Titus . . . beware.’
‘I’ve met many rich women before, and there is a common denominator . . .’
‘Common?’
‘Well, uncommon, then, but all right, what shall I say? I’ve never met a rich woman who suffers from an inferiority complex, or who doesn’t feel that all she possesses is hers by some undefined right, including the right to possess her latest lover until she tires of him . . .’
‘I really want to get on now, Titus. I’m quite sure you’ll know what to do with Mrs Sempleton-Grove, so I shan’t worry. Are you staying, or going out?’
‘I thought I’d leave you in peace and look around to see what I can see. Do you want to come out, Dog?’
Dog had been lying near Ruth’s work table and he stood up as Titus spoke to him, but remained in the same place.
Titus said, ‘Well, I’m going now, aren’t you coming?’
Dog walked slowly to the door, as Titus opened it, but made no move to follow him. He acted as any host might behave to his guest and waited courteously until that guest had completely taken his leave, before closing the door, in this case, with a large soft paw.
When Titus left the studio he felt isolated, more lonely than was his wont. The walls of his heart had been breached. He had thought he was immune, a nature not subject to human feeling. But why? he asked himself. Because I am different. I belong to a past that I have rejected. I am a pariah. Why am I to exist without human contact? Why do I feel that I may inflict pain without retribution? Since Juno I have learned that there is something in me that can hurt but I have also been damaged by that waif, that being of gossamer, that ‘Thing’. The sprite, the cruel piece of nature, who taunted me has killed whatever tenderness I might have shared with another. My heart breaks when I think of Fuchsia, and the staunch, beautiful, ageing Juno. Ruth, too, is a woman who will give until she dies . . . So thought Titus as he wandered towards the river. It was the first time that he had been without Dog and he missed him. He walked on the dark pavements, not knowing where he was going; he let his footsteps guide him, down darkened roads, looking through lit windows at people unaware of those outside looking in, who were gathered in family groups, or couples in an embrace that only time could force apart.
He went in through one door, drawn by the sound of hilarity, the only explanation being drink. He was not a great drinker, but in the mood he was in, human company impelled him to push open the door.
The noise, and the fumes of drink and smoke, were enough to swamp his need for human contact, and he was backing out as a woman lurched forward and with a hoarse and vulgar hiccup clutched at his arm. ‘Oh, sorry, darling,’ she said, peering at him with eyes that saw nothing, they were so glazed. All Titus could see was the demarcation line where her raven hair changed from black to white.
‘You’re just in time,’ she said.
Titus said nothing as she propelled him into the room to a bar, where people were propped up in varying degrees of inebriation.
‘In time for what?’ asked Titus.
‘Well, tha’ depends, what you mean by time – eh, wha’? Wha’ abow a drink . . . eh? Tha’s wha’ ah meant – time to gi’ me a drink.’
Titus was in no mood for banter, for drinking, for compassion towards a middle-aged woman’s maudlin attentions, so that with a little of the money he had earned that afternoon he bought her a drink, and the haze of smoke was so thick, both in the bar and her brain, that he made his way out. His mood of introspection and lack of love for the human race was not accelerated by this little episode, but it was good for him to be alone and free from pursuit of any kind. In the back of his mind he suffered an ache of conscience for what he knew he was going to do to Ruth, yet he knew that he was powerless to prevent himself.
It was getting dark as he crossed the wide road that led to the embankment, and he made his way to the wall, where he stood listening to the lapping of the water, a sound that filled him with a nostalgia that had no reason, but for the melancholy with which it filled him. One or two barges drifted by in the darkness, and he felt out of his element and anxious, and as he heard the water his mind went back to the distant sounds and sights of a flood which, if it had not happened sooner, was to turn him from youth to manhood by the taking of a life so malignant that to him it was an act of benefaction. The ache of longing to see his sister Fuchsia was unbearable. He could not and never would be able to associate her with death, whose life had been so short and unfulfilled. In thinking of Fuchsia, his mind returned to the present, to Ruth, whose vulnerability was parallel to his sister’s. He turned and made his way back to the studio.
24
Moments of Serenity
AS TITUS WALKED back through the darkened streets, he longed to give something to Ruth, which would expiate the hurt that he knew he was going to inflict on her. But of material things there was nothing that she would wish for, even if he had the power or the money to buy them. I have only myself, and in my own eyes that is of doubtful value, we both know, he thought. He passed a house that was withdrawn from the road by a deep laurel hedge and a holly tree. Even in the gloom he could see it was loaded with bright berries. He stopped under the street lamp and cut a branch.
The leaves pricked his fingers as he carried it, and as he went up the steps to the studio he cradled it against his chest. He had to grope along the unlit corridor until he came to the door and, although there was no sound, there was a glimmer of light, so that he did not put his hand through the letterbox to withdraw the key, but tapped on it gently.