The Birds of the Air (4 page)

Barbara was trying to be brave. She was cold, and her hands shook. Her face was dry and wore a cutout smile, as stiff and unnatural as a cardboard party mask, and she hardly knew what she was saying to the mobile faces around her as they opened and shut to speak or eat. She had told herself repeatedly that everyone else in this room had had extra-marital affairs and no one had died of it. No one minded any more – it was acceptable, it was smart, it was only human, it was ‘sophisticated’. At the old-fashioned word she felt tears in her eyes. She had never even learned to be sophisticated and now that everything had passed beyond the very concept she was lost – a stranger among her friends. ‘Oh, the smoke,’ she said, to explain her overflowing eyes.

‘I’m sorry,’ said some woman offendedly, flapping at the air in front of her mouth to clear it.

‘No,’ said Barbara. ‘Oh no . . .’ Oh, she thought, I wasn’t brought up like that. I was brought up to be faithful and polite. I don’t smoke or complain when other people do. What’s happening to me? I didn’t mean it, I didn’t mean it.

It was a good party. Everyone except herself seemed to be having a lovely time. Apart from the autochthonous notables there was a sprinkling of peers and politicians, and someone had briefly brought the currently fashionable Russian dissident. He had a spoilt, invalidish air – partly because he was so well wrapped up in scarf, gloves and hat and partly because of the unnatural deference accorded him.

Barbara herself unconsciously shared the feeling of intermittent unease that afflicted most of the university population who, while confident that their institution was the centre of the universe, were also vaguely aware of a certain provincialism. Those dons who could afford it had flats or even houses in London and at least a few friends not directly connected with the academic world.

One of these desirable outsiders was speaking to her now, asking after her sister. Why, she wondered irritably, did she think of him first as Mary’s friend rather than as Seb’s editor? Her sister had a way of defining people by her relationship with them, and while Barbara loved Mary this was no time to be reminded of ancient jealousies.

‘She’s all right, Hunter,’ she snapped, realising from his tone that he already knew perfectly well how Mary was. Mary, she thought distractedly, remembering with panic that she had liked the Thrush, had liked having musical friends. Having no particular gifts of any kind herself, she had determined to appreciate music more than anyone else. She had pointed out as often as possible, to whoever would listen, how much she appre -ciated music. And now even that was ruined. Her friend, her interest and her husband – all lost to a mouthful of turkey.

‘Are
you
all right, Barbara?’ asked Hunter.

‘I think so,’ she said pitifully. ‘I might sit down.’

Hunter ousted an elderly gentleman from the nearest chair and placed his hostess in it.

She was ashamed, she was frightened. But she was going to cry – here. And now.

Sam switched on his tape.

Greatly amplified, the voice of the Canon was heard: ‘. . . a humble pride in the fact that the chapter . . .’ For a moment the Canon thought he’d gone mad. He stared round wildly.

‘. . . the
most
lovely William-and-Maryish sort of house,’ roared the amplifier.

‘. . . goose de cook,’ it informed them at an unbearable pitch of sound.

Sebastian seized the plug and pulled it out. There was total silence save for his wife’s now reasonably restrained sobbing.

‘See how you have upset your mother,’ said Sebastian quietly to his son. ‘I hope you are satisfied.’

Of course after that there was laughter: nervous, and in a few cases artificial, laughter – but laughter none the less. People bent down to peer kindly at Barbara’s damp and twitching face. They lightly squeezed her forearm, or patted her shoulder with quick consoling movements, not wishing to imply that there was anything seriously wrong but eager to express sympathy. A few of the harder, coarser guests regarded her sideways, with disgust.

Hunter, gazing into the distance, put his arm about her and turned her head against his hip. He stroked her ear once, patted her hair and then hurried away – but not soon enough. There stirred in Barbara that unreasoning affinity of the newly hatched gosling for the nearest solid object. Crawling painfully from her shell of rejection, she permitted herself the beginnings of a fixation on Hunter – as doomed to disappointment as the infant goose seeking succour of a fox-terrier or a cardboard box.

She raised her head and smiled – which made her look a little mad.

‘Her sister is very ill,’ Sebastian told his guests discreetly. ‘Barbara is under great strain.’

Reassured, they resumed their enjoyment of the party.

Hunter sought out Sebastian’s American publisher, of whom he was in charge. He didn’t really think that Otis Mauss would have been particularly offended or disturbed by the recent events, but his unusual sense of responsibility drove him to make certain. Mr Mauss, as he had expected, was standing happily alone, gazing about and holding his glass with both hands. He was an undemanding and amiable man who, Hunter felt, thought of the English with whom he had to deal as a bunch of clever monkeys who were not to be judged by normal American standards. Hunter himself thought of Oti Mauss as rather more foreign and strange than a dynastic Chinaman.

‘Have you talked to some nice people?’ he asked.

‘Yessure,’ said Mr Mauss.

Hunter wondered which they had been and looked around for an untried likely victim. Most of the people present had good manners, so he reached out and seized an elbow at random.

Barbara was sickened to see the Thrush talking to Sebastian’s editor. It was plain to her that the immoral woman meant to infiltrate every aspect of Seb’s life. Barbara felt as though she were drowning, falling through a bottomless space of lovelessness with no hand to catch or prevent her.

Hunter was pleased to be able to introduce his charge to the Thrush. Although in the wider world she wouldn’t have passed muster in the qualifying round for Miss Llandudno, by university standards she was considered exceptionally beautiful. His conscience clear, he chatted happily to the Canon.

The wind had dropped. The lamp lit a corner of the window pane, illuminating a swarm of snowflakes, and the smokeless fuel in the fireplace burned brightly. Mary, her book open and unread on her lap, listened to her mother and Evelyn talking in the kitchen. They always sat there in the evenings after W.I. meetings, perched on high blue stools, drinking coffee out of mugs and eating biscuits from a blue tin.

‘You must first make a little list,’ said Evelyn. ‘Two little lists. One for Christmas Day itself and one for the other days.’

Mary could sense her mother’s irritation.

‘I’ve
done
that,’ said Mrs Marsh. ‘I could
paper
the kitchen with little lists. I’m trying to think where to put everybody.’

‘Well,
you’re
staying with me,’ said Evelyn. ‘I thought you’d decided . . .’

‘I mean for lunch on Christmas Day,’ said Mrs Marsh. ‘Mary’s in the dining room. The kitchen’s too small, and as I’ve got rid of the dining table I shall have to put up two small tables in the sitting room, and if the worst comes to the worst the children can eat on the stairs. There’s you and me, and Barbara and Mary, and Kate and Sam and Sebastian and Mary’s Hunter. There are three straight chairs, these two stools, the pouffe, and two people will have to sit in armchairs with cushions, but it makes the tables so crowded.’

‘Then put the children in the hall,’ suggested Evelyn helpfully.

‘I’m going to do that if I have to,’ said Mrs Marsh, sounding, as she spoke, as if she were grinding her teeth.

‘You were silly to sell all your dining-room things,’ said Evelyn, and Mary held her breath. But her mother answered mildly enough and absently, as though she were already thinking of something else.

‘Mary could hardly have slept on the table or in the sideboard,’ she said. ‘I think I’ll put Barbara and Kate in one room, and Sebastian and Sam in the other. The children are really too old to sleep together.’

Someone ran the tap and turned on the electric kettle and the voices became inaudible. Mary twisted herself round to look at the small vertiginous area of falling snow and heard no more.

It was growing late, and Hunter’s eyes were a little blurred.

‘I must get you back to the Savoy,’ he said to Mr Mauss.

‘That’s very good of you,’ said Mr Mauss equably, putting down his glass and looking round for the door.

‘Well, in a minute,’ said Hunter. ‘I must say goodbye.’

‘Oh, me too,’ said Mr Mauss, quite unruffled.

Hunter kissed Barbara’s cheek – something he hadn’t done before. ‘It was a lovely party,’ he said. ‘I’m so looking forward to Christmas Day.’

Barbara gazed at him silently, waiting for some explanation of this odd remark.

‘I’m going to Mary’s for lunch,’ he explained. ‘Your mother asked me.’

Barbara smiled slowly. Somewhere in that area of the human mind where the wish is father to the thought activity was taking place. Hunter, Barbara decided, had wangled this invitation in order to be with her. Not even his description of her mother’s house as Mary’s annoyed her now. Hunter desired her, and Sebastian should be taught a lesson.

She didn’t move or speak, merely smiled a slightly batty smile and watched him walk away.

The smile alarmed Hunter. Being in the world of books he was familiar with lunacy in all its forms and that smile reminded him of something. He had last seen it, he remembered, on the face of an author who had written a book combining the basic principles of zoology with psycho-analysis which he believed beyond all doubt would change the course of the world. He shuddered. Sebastian was a tiresome fellow, he thought censoriously, and being lazy-minded about human relations he didn’t bother to ask himself why Sebastian’s infidelity should bring that particular look of loony expectation to Barbara’s face. Seizing Mr Mauss, he made for the door.

Kate, flushed with praise and approval and quite above herself, rebuked her brother for making their mummy cry.

Sam had remained at the party, prominently placed in the centre of the room, in order to save face. He hadn’t enjoyed it, and this was too much.

‘Fuck off,’ he said very loudly.

Hunter had to intervene. Seeing Sebastian’s expression, he dropped Mr Mauss and stepped in front of Sam, wondering as he did so why it was that so many publishers were regarded by their authors as mother, father, guide, philosopher and friend (not to mention pimp, psychiatrist, midwife, bank) and, what’s more, so often felt it incumbent upon themselves to fulfil these expectations. He himself didn’t like authors much, especially Seb Lamb.

‘My dear,’ he said, seizing Sebastian by the upper arm. ‘Otis wishes to say goodbye to you.’

‘G’bye,’ said Mr Mauss docilely. ‘Seeya m’next trip. Come to Dallas.’

Stepping thankfully through the front door into the cold air of the stone town, Hunter was yet again pounced on by a Lamb.

‘Sam’s gone,’ Kate gabbled excitedly. ‘He’s run away, and Mummy’s gone after him, without her coat.’

Handing Mr Mauss back into the hallway, Hunter took off down the street. Barbara was wringing her hands on the next corner and peering despairingly to right and left. Twice before Sam had been brought home by the police and she was sick of it. She couldn’t bear any more . . .

Hunter saw Sam first, across the road, standing in a bus queue with one or two old people who were talking to each other because it was so cold.

‘Sam,’ called Barbara. ‘Come here at once.’

Sam stared deafly ahead.

‘Sam,’ repeated Barbara on the edge of hysteria.

‘A’right, OK,’ said Sam, loping nonchalantly across the road.

The old people gazed, silenced, at their departing companion wondering perhaps whether this was an abduction, but not very interested.

Mary awoke early to a sky the colour of writing paper, very high and blandly indifferent. She wished she could throw something human, something bad, at that pale and careless sky – beyond which, she suspected, the little gods were playing selfish games.

The snow had gone in the night, there was no wind and the day was as still as that day in Aulis for which Iphigenia paid the price.

‘Nice cup of hot tea?’ yelled her mother from the kitchen, going on to complain in normal tones that the snow had melted and she did think for once they might have had a white Christmas.

‘I feel like a great white vegetable,’ said Mary, unanswerably.

‘
What
?’ cried her mother, dashing from one door to the next and viewing her daughter with angry alarm. She was a gardener herself and had no love for those horrid, neglected, water-retentive tubers, blanched beyond recovery. ‘Your breakfast’s ready,’ she said, panting a little.

No one could leave without breakfast. If, regularly, nice little meals were brought for her straying daughter, Mary wouldn’t be able to leave. When would she find the time if tea was ready, or her milk drink with the skin skimmed off? Mary wasn’t really ill-mannered. Mrs Marsh planned ever-widening palisades of breakfast, elevenses, lunch, tea, dinner, supper, to contain her child.

Mary was quite sorry for her. It seemed hard that mothers should be the means of letting into the trap that was life those creatures they loved best in the world. For despite their designation the entrance was not entrancing, nor the exit exciting. And the space between held more of bitterness than was promised with the salt, the balm, the joyous clear water and the white cloth of baptism.

Mrs Marsh got out her fur-lined boots. They were slightly too small – she was vain about her little feet and refused to admit that they had spread since her dancing days.

She went into Mary’s room to pull her boots on and discuss what she should buy at the shops. The discussion was largely conducted with herself, since Mary, unlike Barbara, wasn’t interested in shopping.

‘Old Soames had some nice geese,’ said Mrs Marsh grimacing, pulling at the back of her boot and stamping down on the final word. ‘Except a goose would be no good for all of us – just bone and buckets of grease. Daddy used to like a nice goose though, with a sharp apple sauce. I mustn’t forget to pick up my jacket from the cleaners. Is there anything you want?’