The Facts of Life (79 page)

‘You were good at it.’

‘Not really my thing,’ he muttered.

‘But you
seemed
to be enjoying it.’

He waited a moment or two then said, ‘I hadn’t meant to.’

She stepped up beside him, pushing aside the curtain a little so that she too could look out at the night.

‘God these stars!’ she exclaimed softly. ‘Enough to break your heart.’

‘And don’t tell me the pain doesn’t last for ever,’ he said suddenly, pursuing his own track of thought. ‘Because I know.’

Myra turned, leaning her back on the window to face into the room, as though guarding him from sudden approaches. She wondered whether to tell him Alison loved him, but bit her tongue. There was time enough for him to notice. Time enough for matchmakers to interfere once the mysterious child was born. There was always time.

‘When my third husband died – George – I didn’t want the pain to stop,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘It was as though if I stopped hurting I would have stopped loving him.’

‘I thought he was queer,’ Sam said, and she heard an edge of cruelty in his voice. ‘I read the book,’ he added.

‘He liked it both ways,’ she said. ‘He had a lot to give. I knew about the others. It didn’t touch me. He loved me too. He loved me so it hurt when I looked at him. The pain’s gone now but I swear if he walked through that door now I’d still crumple at the knees. I never loved anybody as much.’

‘Not Eddy?’

She stopped to think.

‘No,’ she admitted. ‘Not even Eddy.’

‘Look,’ he said. ‘He’s down there now. Waiting for you.’

‘Where?’ She turned and Sam pointed to where Teddy was standing outside the barn, caught in the light spilling through its half-open door.

‘He’ll catch his death out there,’ she said. ‘The idiot.’

‘He doesn’t want to dance without you,’ he told her. ‘You’d better go and rescue him.’

She stood there, feeling the cold radiate from the window-panes, watching Teddy stamp his feet and rub his hands together. Then her breath misted the glass and hid him from view.

PATRICK GALE
was born on the Isle of Wight in 1962. He spent his infancy at Wandsworth Prison, which his father governed, then grew up in Winchester. He now lives on a farm near Land’s End. As well as writing and reviewing fiction, he has published a biography of Armistead Maupin, a short history of the Dorchester Hotel and chapters on Mozart’s piano and mechanical music for H.C. Robbin Landon’s
The Mozart Compendium
. His most recent novel is
The Whole Day Through
. His new collection of short stories,
Gentleman’s Relish
, is published this year.

Visit the website: www.galewarning.org

Warmest thanks

to Pippy Ennion, the Curé d’Arsenal, Dr Frank Heibert, Jonathan Dove, Madge, Patrick, Simon, and to everyone at Bethany, for letting me plunder their memories and expertise.

To Michael and Moira, for all those frosty weekends in Norfolk.

To Jonathan Warner and Charlotte Windsor, for their patience.

To Alan Hollinghurst and Barry Goodman for their rigorous proof-reading.

And to Fingal, for the walks on the beach.

P.G.
1.7.94

From the reviews of
The Facts of Life
:

‘A monumental feat of imagination, achingly true and beautiful. I’d be hard pressed to recall the last time a novel so totally captivated me’

ARMISTEAD MAUPIN

‘It is impossible to put
The Facts of Life
down. A rural English blockbuster. Beautifully done’

Daily Telegraph

‘A wonderfully readable family saga. Fifties movie stars, waspish dons and wise old women make up the supporting cast in a novel that is as straightforward as it is otherworldly – like reading Iris Murdoch without the puzzles’

Independent

‘Imbued with a generosity of spirit towards all its characters. A memorable achievement’

The Times

‘Well written, unerringly true and very moving, the book reveals Gale to be an unabashed romantic and a novelist of increasing accomplishment’

Scotland on Sunday

‘An extraordinary blockbuster of a novel. Always fluent, Gale manages to be both brutal and witty’

Time Out

‘Gale’s best and most complex novel. Gale is both a shameless romantic and hip enough to get away with it. This reads, page by page, like a superior gushy blockbuster, but has, as part of its form and subject, a sober consideration of the place of sentiment and rigour in life and art’

New Statesman

The Aerodynamics of Pork
Kansas in August
Ease
Facing the Tank
Little Bits of Baby
The Cat Sanctuary
Caesar’s Wife
Dangerous Pleasures
Tree Surgery for Beginners
Rough Music
A Sweet Obscurity
Friendly Fire
Notes from an Exhibition
The Whole Day Through
Gentleman’s Relish

Fourth Estate
An imprint of HarperCollins
Publishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF

www.4thestate.co.uk

This Fourth Estate edition published 2009

First published by Flamingo in 1995

Copyright © Patrick Gale 1995, 2009

PS Section copyright © Rose Gaete 2009, except ‘The Writing of
The Facts of Life
’
by Patrick Gale © Patrick Gale 2009

PS™ is a trademark of HarperCollins
Publishers
Ltd

Patrick Gale asserts the moral right
to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

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