Authors: Alan Hunter
‘It would need to be your sort of music.’
‘It’s Mozart, the
Clarinet Concerto
. Then you look down across the river. That’s when it changes into Strauss.’
‘So you’ll be living here.’
‘Till we find a house.’
‘Then you’ll get to know about Regency villas,’ I said dryly. ‘How the floors sink and the ceilings crack and the draughts get past those sash windows.’
Earle made a face. ‘It isn’t like that. Verna has had it all fixed. And anyway we’ll be in town most of the week. I shall keep on my flat in Notting Hill.’
‘But here is where you’ll be settling. In Blockford.’
‘Sure. In a house as like this one as I can get.’ He checked for a moment, then wriggled his shoulders. ‘Let’s stop gassing and join the people.’
W
E WENT IN.
Mrs Mackenzie came out into the hall to greet us. I would not have recognized her as the smooth-cheeked West Country girl who had married Colin just before the war. I remembered her as plump, but now she was slim, a point underlined by a costly black dress, and hair which I remembered as bushy and faintly auburn now was dark brown and elaborately styled. The girl had become a sophisticated woman. She wore heavy but perfectly managed make-up. It did not quite conceal the fine seaming of her features which doubtless was a legacy of her years in Rhodesia. She took my hand.
‘George – at last! You’ve changed, but I think I would have remembered you. Colin had your photograph hanging in his office, but it got lost when we came back to England.’
‘I wrote to you when I heard of his death.’
‘I don’t think we can have received your letter. But it was all so confused about then, I didn’t really know what was happening.’
‘It must have been a shock.’
‘I was prostrate. Alex and Anne were both in England. Fortunately we had some good friends out there who saw me through and took care of everything.’
She touched a handkerchief to her eye, though taking care not to smudge her make-up. She smiled bravely for my approval. I felt that now we could dismiss Colin.
‘May I call you Verna?’
‘Oh, please do. I hate my friends to be formal.’
‘This must be a busy time for you.’
‘Come and meet the children. Earle, I’ll let you pour the drinks.’
She led us into the lounge. Alex Mackenzie rose from a chair to be introduced. He was a young man of solid build with dark hair and eyes, in whose features I could find no trace of his father. For that matter he was unlike his mother too, but I assumed it was from her side that he got his looks: there was a suggestion of Devonshire in his bold, oval face with its firm, dimpled chin and strongly marked brows. He had been to Oxford and it showed in his speech. His manner was polite rather than cordial; but he took my hand with a pleasant smile and a friendly degree of pressure.
‘Where is Anne?’ his mother asked.
‘She slipped out to the study to phone.’
‘Wouldn’t she just! Who was she phoning?’
Alex gave a disclaiming shrug.
‘My daughter is a sad girl,’ Mrs Mackenzie sighed. ‘Oh, I know you won’t agree, Earle. You’ve been dazzled. But just you wait. Your eyes will be opened after Saturday.’
‘Then I surely will close them again,’ Earle smiled, offering her a drink from a silver salver. ‘It’s no use your knocking her now, Verna. The damage is done. You have a son-in-law.’
Mrs Mackenzie took her drink but her expression betrayed displeasure. I found myself wondering if she was less than delighted with the prospect of Earle’s marrying her daughter. Canada is still a long way from Blockford, and Earle might well change his plan of settling in England. He was young; the adventure of exile has a habit of wearing thin when long indulged in. I looked at Alex, who was smiling faintly, as though he remembered something that amused him: I sensed that there had been family discussions. I wondered which side Alex was on.
But then Anne entered and at once I was in a presence that truly recalled Colin. Nobody who had known the father could be in doubt about the daughter. She had his fair hair and his blue eyes and his purely Scottish cast of feature, with high and slightly prominent cheekbones and a hint of freckles about the nose. She had too his long-limbed frame and his easy, light carriage; but more than this: she had his shy haughtiness that I knew would dissolve into a roguish smile. It did; it was almost a shock. I might have been shaking hands with the young Colin. I could even hear, very faintly limned, a ghost of his brogue in her soft, well-educated voice.
‘So you are the friend Daddy used to talk about.’
I nodded, still taken aback.
‘He said that you were an intuitive with a marked capacity for thought.’
I chuckled. I could hear him saying it.
‘Would you say he was right?’
‘Of course. He was a Scot.’
‘You had better qualify that as a compliment.’
‘How can one qualify an ultimate?’
‘Yes,’ she nodded. ‘I
think
Daddy was right.’
‘George is a lulu,’ Earle put in. ‘You had better watch what you say to him, honey. He’s the trained brain from Mindsville.’
Anne flashed him a look that I couldn’t interpret; it was a look with energy but of equivocal content. Then she took the drink from the salver he was still holding and impulsively touched it to mine.
‘To auld lang syne.’
‘That’s my girl,’ Earle said.
‘Well, now we are introduced,’ Mrs Mackenzie said brightly. ‘Do drink up. We must go in to dinner, because I promised to let the help leave early.’
T
HE DINNER WAS
simple but excellent and accompanied by a suitable choice of wine. We ate in a room in the front of the house with windows that faced the lawn and the river. The windows were open. From the shrubberies outside came the evensong of the birds. From the river we could hear now and then the dip and clunk of passing oars. It was very relaxing. I wished that Colin could have been there to enjoy that affluent haven. I would have liked to learn some more about his death but it was not a subject that I could introduce and our conversation was naturally channelled toward the happy event on Saturday. It was, I found, to be a quiet affair at the local Registry Office. This was not Verna’s choice, nor even Earle’s, but had been insisted on by Anne. A few friends had been invited from the BBC, where Anne too had worked for a while, a few Blockford acquaintances, mostly Verna’s, and Verna’s mother, who was travelling up from Axminster. And now, of course, myself, who fitted into no category, except that in a curious way I could feel them regarding me as, in some sort, the absent Colin’s representative. So I asked a natural question.
‘Won’t any of Colin’s people be coming?’
From the short silence that followed I understood that I had put my foot in it. Alex answered me.
‘They live rather far off to invite to an informal occasion.’
‘In Scotland?’
Alex smiled politely. ‘Sutherland. It takes two days to get here.’
‘Scots don’t mind travelling in a good cause.’
‘We thought it was a bit much to expect.’
‘So in fact we didn’t invite them,’ Anne said tartly. ‘After all, we did want it to be a quiet wedding.’
I glanced at Verna: Verna was frowning. ‘All right, you may as well know,’ she said. ‘I’ve never hit it off with Colin’s people, that’s why they haven’t been invited.’ Nervously she twisted one of her rings. ‘I forgot to write to them about Colin. I didn’t mean to, but there was so much to do, it wasn’t as though it happened in England.’
I ghosted a shrug. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Oh, there’s no reason to make a mystery of it. But the truth is that we’ve had no contact with them since I came back to England. Not that I saw much of them before. I went on a visit once with Colin. They didn’t approve of me. The children have been up there, but not since the row after Colin’s death.’
‘They may like to know about the wedding.’
Verna gave the ring a wrench. ‘Then it’s up to someone else to tell them. After our last exchange of letters they won’t be expecting it from me.’
‘I’ll tell them,’ Anne said quickly. ‘I know how to handle Grandad Mackenzie.’
‘But please, no invitations,’ her mother said. ‘It’s probably too late, but you never know.’
So that was that: and a little saddening, in view of Colin’s attachment to his family. They had all come down for his own wedding and they had made a strong impression on me. James Mackenzie, his father, was skipper and owner of a trawler; a tall, romantic-featured man, with – it was unusual at that time – long, flowing hair. Since the wedding was an important family occasion he had donned Highland jacket and kilt, and altogether cut a striking figure in the sleepy Devonshire town. I recalled his ringing Gaelic greeting and the warm embrace he gave his son, and the pride in Colin’s voice as he presented me to his father. They loved each other. Verna’s neglect must have given James Mackenzie mortal offence. On the whole I could sympathize with her wish to avoid a confrontation with her formidable father-in-law. He would be in his seventies now but still, I imagined, hale and strong, and perhaps not the less awe-inspiring for his grey locks and matured authority. His wife, who was younger than himself, had been a handsome woman in 1938, and had shown herself in no way behind him in her affection for Colin. With them had come Colin’s elder brother, Iain, who was mate on the trawler, and his sister, Marie, whom I must confess I greatly fancied. I wondered what had happened to them all in the intervening years but it was plain that the present occasion was not to gratify my curiosity.
We returned to the lounge for our coffee. Alex and Earle talked of their work; Anne, who was sitting a little apart, seemed as engrossed as they with the subject. I sat by Verna. On a stand by the window I had noticed a piece of native carving, and I decided to use it as a lever to bring Colin back into the conversation: I pointed to it.
‘Your husband always had a weakness for picking up junk.’
‘Oh, that.’ Verna glanced at it indifferently. ‘You can buy them for nothing in the bazaars in Salisbury.’
‘I expect you had lots of them.’
She frowned. ‘It was Colin’s taste, not mine. His den in the bungalow was choc-a-bloc with them, each one labelled with the tribe it came from. But of course, I couldn’t bring them all back. Anne brought that one for a souvenir. The rest were sold at the auction. It was a rush at the end.’
‘Did Colin like Rhodesia?’
‘He loved the country. He was a bit stuffy about the administration. You knew Colin. He wasn’t above offending people if they didn’t think quite as he did.’
‘What exactly was he doing when he was killed?’
‘He was sent on a pacification mission.’
‘A dangerous job?’
‘Yes.’ She made a mouth. ‘They probably sent him on it to get rid of him.’
I hesitated. ‘Who?’
‘I told you he wasn’t above offending people.’
She rose abruptly to take my cup, when I became aware of Anne’s blue eyes regarding me. Again I felt a sensation of shock: it was so like looking up and catching Colin’s eye. But there was no smile in the eyes that met mine, just that intent, impenetrable gaze. It was I who had to smile. Then she responded and looked away.
‘Of course,’ Verna said firmly, ‘there is a certain advantage in having a son in the BBC. He gets to know such interesting people. He brings them down with him at the weekend.’
I received my cup without enthusiasm: there was a lot more that I would have liked to ask about Colin. But Verna was determined to have done with him and to put the conversation on a general footing.
‘Last week, for example – what was his name? An attaché from the Brazilian Embassy. Then there was the couple who sailed here from Australia, and a very charming American professor. We get all sorts. You mustn’t think we’re out of the swim here at Blockford.’
Alex smiled indulgently. ‘They come here mostly to meet Verna. My glamorous mother. The word goes round. Everyone wants to come down to meet her.’
‘Oh nonsense, Alex! Don’t tease.’
‘But it’s the truth,’ Alex laughed. ‘Ask Earle. Señor Alfonso came here after seeing your photograph on my desk.’
‘You’re making it up.’
‘Not a bit. He saw your photograph and fell.’
‘When he was here he was simply polite.’
‘Ah, but that’s how Latin lovers begin.’
Verna’s eyes were bright. ‘I don’t believe a word of it! He simply came for a quiet weekend. And don’t annoy me with your foolishness in front of George – he doesn’t know you, he might believe it.’ But she didn’t look offended. ‘In any case, I prefer your people. That’s how we first got to know Earle. There are delightful people at the BBC.’
‘Thank you, Verna,’ Earle said.
‘We do our best for the image,’ Alex said archly.
‘We surely do,’ Earle chorused. ‘Even us colonials out of the hills.’
Verna turned to me. ‘They have one thing in common, the people whom Alex invites down. They have talent. They are all people whom it is stimulating to be with. You feel they have an urge for life. It’s the same whatever they may be doing – acting, writing scripts, or organizing programmes, like Alex. I can’t remember him inviting anyone whom I wasn’t delighted to entertain.’
‘Except perhaps just one,’ Anne said softly.
Verna gave her a sharp look. ‘Not one. I don’t know who you are thinking of, but they have all been charming when they were here.’
‘She’s thinking of me,’ Earle said smilingly. ‘I don’t have talent. I’m just the voice of Canada.’
‘She’s thinking of Nigel Fortuny,’ Alex said quickly. ‘And if you don’t mind we’ll change the subject.’
Verna bit her lip. There was nothing playful in Alex’s expression now. The young man’s mouth was small and his dark eyes were averted. Anne, too, was looking vexed, and Earle’s ready smile had faded. Someone else had put their foot in it, and this time nobody ventured an explanation.
Verna hastened to smooth it over. ‘I know,’ she exclaimed. ‘Let’s have some music! Earle does have talent – he plays the piano. And Alex sings very well, in a camp-fire way.’