The Dower House (7 page)

Adam said, ‘I was amazed to see you eating peas at the club last week.'

‘I know.'

‘Sorry, did it show? I mean, you were eating with relish.'

‘I owe my life to peas and beans. And lentils. Why should I dislike them?'

‘I know. It's all very logical. But even so . . .'

‘That's not what I mean. I'm talking about watching another prisoner being clubbed to death and thinking,
Gott sei dank
it's not me! Or stealing a crust from someone so close to death that it wouldn't help him anyway. Thinking only
me-me-me
! I had to learn to think like them – to think that the life of another human being was worth any sacrifice if it preserved my own.'

‘I've tried to imagine it so often since that day . . . the unbelievable horrors of that day . . . wondering if I could have tolerated even one hour of it. Objectively, of course, I know I could have, probably – since so many obviously did.'

‘They killed a hundred and eighty-five of us a day, every day – average – someone told me.'

‘But thousands also survived – you among them, thank God. Even so, I still can't imagine how. We must never let ourselves forget it.'

‘That's your problem. You're right, of course – for
you
. For me, it's opposite. Art saved me for a purpose. When I first went into the camp they put me carrying quarry stones up those famous steps. One hundred eighty-six of them. Nobody ever lasted more than six weeks there. If you fell, they shot you. And they left your body there until sunset,
pour encourager les autres
. Then they needed skilled masons to shape the stones and the Kapo volunteered me. It was good of him. He was a communist and normally they only looked after their own. I'd done some stone carving but not much – only little things. Bagatelles. Clay modelling, metal welding – that was me. I had a one-hour apprenticeship between dawn and the time the head mason started work. He was an Austrian civilian. A Nazi, of course. By then I was rival to Bernini, believe me!'

‘But that's admirable.'

‘So? That's my point. And by the way, when it comes to Marianne Johnson . . . just assume . . .'

‘Yes?'

Felix hesitated and then said, ‘Just take it that I have every reason to sympathize with her predicament when her parents sent her to work in Germany at the age of seventeen.'

Adam sighed. ‘In a way, much as I'm fond of Willard, I hope they decide to go back to Boston. I don't think Nicole will accept her in the same generous spirit. She spent all those years pretending to be nice to Nazis while she hated them from the bottom of her heart.'

‘Well – that's what Marianne must always remember and Nicole must try to forget.'

‘Easily said.'

‘She must, though, for her
own
sake.'

‘Maybe
you
can get her to do it.'

‘Tell me something about
him
– Willard. Is he a good architect?'

Adam hesitated so long that Felix had to laugh.

‘No, no!' Adam protested. ‘He probably is quite good. It's just that you've made me realize I don't think of old Willard in either category – good or bad. He has a nose for what's important. For what's powerful. For the
movers
, as he calls them. I saw him once walk into a room full of two-star generals and yet he headed straight for a mere colonel. It seemed so out of character but afterwards we learned that the generals were all has-beens on their way out while the colonel was the rising star.
That's
Willard. So to ask if he's
good
misses the essential man. He's certainly going to be
successful
. I guarantee that within five years his office will contain at least a hundred drawing boards. Well!' He rubbed his hands and, looking about them, said, ‘What d'you think? Will it do?'

‘It will do very nicely. I will be grateful—'

‘You will be no such thing! It's the very least we can do. When I told my father you were possibly coming here, it was all I could do to stop him coming down to meet you this afternoon. Yet until now he's had absolutely no sympathy with our project.'

‘I was going to say I will be grateful if I could leave paying the rent until . . .' He saw no reason to be too specific.

The old servants' quarters and lumber rooms in the attics formed a square around the dome that gave light to the main stairwell of the house. Originally the parapet, which disguised the sloping roof and produced the architecturally correct Georgian box, had obscured the attic windows; but during the wartime occupation by the school, when the attic rooms had been converted to boys' dormitories, they had cut part of the parapet away in front of each window for fire escapes. It opened up views on all four sides that were spectacular – east to Bramfield, west to Bull's Green, north to Watton-at-Stone, and south across the Mimram Valley (which Cowper called the loveliest in all England) to Welwyn Garden City.

Sally left the Johnsons to talk it over in private.

‘Lavender glass,' Willard said. ‘Hand blown and flattened. They'd pay a fortune for just this one window back home.'

‘Home?' Marianne took Willard's hand. ‘Mmm?'

‘Here?' he asked. ‘Think so?'

‘Don't you?' She squeezed his hand again. ‘We could be very happy here – starting right now.'

‘Eh?'

‘There's a key in the door. Shall we test the floorboards for squeaks?'

Adam and Felix had rejoined Sally in the Victorian-Tudor annexe to the genuine Tudor remnant.

‘How much does Nicole know about . . . Marianne?' Sally asked as soon as they came in. ‘Don't look so surprised. She told me when I was showing them over the attic rooms.' Then to Felix: ‘Can you really just shrug it off?'

‘Felix thinks we must all draw a line across history,' Adam said. ‘Not just us – everyone in England.'

‘Or even . . . dare I mention the word –
Europe
?' Felix suggested.

‘Yes, there too, of course.'

‘I must say, Felix, that's very Christian of you . . .' Her voice trailed off in dismay. ‘I mean . . . of course . . . oh, dear!'

Adam sought to repair the damage. ‘She just means you're a real white man.'

Felix let her flounder until a small debt was created; dear friends of his who had been unable to make such cold calculations were now dust and ashes in Austria. Then he laughed and squeezed her arm reassuringly. ‘Let's agree it's very humanist, eh? From this point in history onwards, God must take lessons from the humanists, I think, don't you?'

‘Why not?' Still embarrassed, she turned to her husband. ‘Has Tony told Nicole? About Marianne?'

Adam bit his lip. ‘Marianne wants to be the one.'

‘So neither of you has told her!' Sally was shocked.

‘Frankly, I saw no reason to. I thought they'd give this place the once-over . . . maybe enjoy a few moments of pleasant fantasy . . . then wake up to stern reality and take the next boat to America. I still think they'll do that. Marianne certainly has no ties to keep her on this side of the Atlantic.'

‘Well, you can think again, my darling. They've fallen in love with the attic unit. And how d'you think they'll get access to it? What's the only staircase that leads up there?'

She turned to Felix to explain but he said, ‘I imagine it'll be through Tony and Nicole's unit?'

‘You're quick!' She grinned. ‘Anyway, we'll know soon enough. I think you're playing with fire.'

Adam looked at his watch and said, ‘They should be back by now – unless they've fallen into one of the septic tanks.'

‘Let's go and see.' Sally led the way through the communal labyrinth to the front portico, where they arrived in time to see Tony and Nicole climbing out of the ha-ha that divided the front lawn from the parkland beyond. The lawn was flanked on either side by a rotting oak pergola, paved in red brick and so sunken in places that it would have been safer to walk on the lawn – if that wasn't a riot of weeds and volunteer saplings. Nicole stopped to pick a small bunch of bluebells. Tony halted, too, beneath the two overarching roses, where he tapped the ashes and dottle from his pipe against his upturned left heel.

‘Ha!' Felix relished the complex arabesques of his silhouetted arms and legs.

‘What?' Adam asked, startled.

‘That day. In Mauthausen. He tapped his pipe on his heel just like that.'

‘He set fire to some
GS
stores once,' Adam said. ‘“Just like that.”'

‘Felix!' Tony called out, having noticed them at last. To Adam he shouted, ‘Is he going to take one of the flats?'

Nicole joined him and they trotted across the weed-littered carriage sweep; she had all the right attributes for a Mata Hari, Felix thought admiringly. Her hair had grown well again, lustrous, and raven-black – so black, indeed, that its highlights held a bluish sheen.

‘Monsieur Breit?' Rather shyly she offered him the bunch of bluebells from several paces away.

‘
Pour moi
, Madame Palmer?' He swiftly descended the steps to their level. ‘
Vous êtes vraiment charmante!
'

‘Ongley, cherry,' Tony muttered.

She gave him a look that would have served for mustard and passed the bouquet to Felix.

‘Do the septic tanks look as if they'll work?' Sally asked.

‘Nothing's broken down above ground,' Tony said. ‘It's the sort of engineering an Ancient Egyptian would understand.'

Nicole said, ‘My husband has told me your story, Monsieur Felix. I heard your name back in the war, when I was visiting Paris. You were arrested and then released?'

‘The first time, yes.
Tiens!
' He held the bluebells up beside her cheeks and said to the two men, ‘The colour! It matches her eyes perfectly, see!'

An English girl might have blushed, but not Nicole; her gaze remained as cool as the blue of her eyes – even when he brought the bouquet to his lips and gave it a playful kiss. ‘Sartre told me,' she added.

‘You knew him well?' Felix asked, though he had never liked the man much.

‘None of us knew him until
after
the Normandy landings,' she sneered. ‘Then,
tout d'un coup
, we got to know many great artists and intellectuals who discovered overnight how anti-Nazi they had been all those comfortable, well-rewarded years.'

‘Thank God it's all over and done with, eh!'

She sniffed. ‘Is it?'

They drifted up the steps and indoors.

‘I think I've found another interested couple,' Tony said. ‘Name of Prentice, Arthur and May.'

‘Not two more bloody architects, I hope,' Adam said.

‘He's a cameraman with the
BBC
. They're going to expand television transmissions soon, so it's a good, secure thing. He worked for Pathé during the last show. Arthur's more Felix's age. When were you born, old chap?'

‘Nineteen twelve,' Felix told him.

‘Well, he's probably a couple of years younger. May is more our sort of age – mid-twenties. They've got two brats under the age of three. He obviously got home quite often in the war.'

‘It would be good to have the patter of tiny feet about the place,' Adam said. Then – as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb – he added, ‘Actually, we have a bit of a surprise for you two . . .'

She stiffened. ‘If you mean Fräulein von Ritter – the Nazi . . .' She turned on her husband. ‘I still can't believe you let me
fraternize
with that . . . that . . .' A new thought struck her. ‘And now you do the same with poor Monsieur Breit!'

‘
Mais pas du tout, Madame!
' he said. ‘I know all about
Mrs Johnson's
past. I also know my
own
past.'

She gave an expressive, Gallic shrug. ‘
Alors?
'

‘And I say if the past will not set the present free, then we are still at war. You still seem to be at war with the Nazis. So you cannot yet claim victory. You keep the Nazis alive so you can go on fighting them.' He tapped his skull. ‘And so you deny yourself this wonderful present –
doux present du présent!
It is just one handshake away!'

Nicole tossed her head but felt she could offer no rebuttal to this – especially to the one who made it. ‘Another reason I'm angry is that I
liked
her. I thought we can have European nights here at the Dower House . . . Swedish cuisine, French cuisine, and . . .' She gazed uncertainly at Felix. ‘Hungarian, of course. Goulash –
c'est au poile
!'

‘The French never quite got the hang of rationing,' Tony said apologetically.

They crossed the hall, which was almost filled with the semi-spiral volute of the main staircase, a light, elegant structure that seemed too delicate to support even itself, much less the schoolboys who must lately have charged up and down it.

Nicole turned to Felix. ‘Why are you looking at me so . . . so . . .'

‘Intensely?' he offered.

‘Par example!'

He laughed. ‘I was wondering if you would allow your husband to pose for me?'

‘Good God!' Tony snorted.

‘The pose you were in beside the lawn just now . .' Felix mimed his tapping his pipe on his heel. ‘When I saw that I suddenly remembered you coming into Mauthausen. You did exactly the same thing then. I remember thinking at the time that if an Englishman can march into the camp and do that – so easily, so casually – then we really must be liberated. I think such a moment in my life should be immortalized, no?'

‘I say, are you serious?' Tony asked.

‘Not really,' Felix laughed again.

‘The memory is true, though,' Adam said. ‘He reminded me of it the minute he saw you.' He glanced at Felix as if expecting him to confirm it.