And whatever had Nick been doing talking to Glyn? She can hardly believe this either: “I wanted to ask him to speak to you about . . . everything. Put in a word for me.”
Only Nick could have come up with such a ruse, or only Nick in some manic state. Provoking Glyn to this backhander. It is as though we are all possessed, she thinks.
Glyn goes back to basics. Research. A hunt is on once more. He trawls directories, he harries the Crafts Council, he picks up false leads and goes down dead ends, but eventually he is able to make a phone call and arrange a visit.
Elaine finds that she needs urgently to call in on a well-known garden in Gloucestershire which she has not seen for some while; it would be professionally remiss not to check up on their new water garden, and see what the tree peonies are like this year. This trip will take her very close to Winchcombe, where there is someone she would rather like to talk to right now. She picks up the phone: “Hello. This is a voice from the past. Elaine—Kath’s sister. I was wondering if by any chance—”
Oliver goes through old address books. He does this furtively, of an evening, while Sandra is in the kitchen or the bathroom, slamming them quickly back in the drawer when she returns. This is one of the aspects of coupledom that is always a trifle irksome—the fact that any harmless little activity that one does not wish to have to explain must be circumspect. Where basics are concerned, you cannot fart or pick your nose. At another level, anything that may give rise to casual queries that one would prefer to avoid becomes surreptitious. Whyever should he be feeling guilty about a search for the phone number and address of an old acquaintance?
Eventually, he is successful. Here it is, not in any address book but scrawled in the back of a notebook, amid jottings about printers and suppliers and pages of figures and costings. All this dates from the Hammond & Watson days. And next to her address he has written “photos,” and circled the word. He must have scribbled this down at the very end of the picnic at the Roman Villa; he must have promised to send her photos. And presumably did so, though that he cannot remember, but in making the selection he would have come across the fatal frame. Which he presumably did not include in the batch that he sent to Mary Packard.
Nick cannot get rid of Glyn’s voice. It reverberates in his head, a voice not heard for a number of years, but at once entirely familiar—a dark voice with a lilt to it, conjuring up the man himself. “Elaine and I—” The sound of it flings Nick back into that other time, when Glyn was a frequent visitor, with Kath, always talking, holding forth, quenching Nick himself, whose role that had been. Even then, Nick was prepared to admit himself outtalked.
Elaine’s voice rings loud too. What she said. How she said it: frosty, but with an undertow of confusion. Nick himself is in a turmoil now, but it is in some ways an oddly reassuring turmoil; actually, he is feeling better rather than worse, though he cannot quite work out why, and maybe it doesn’t matter anyway. Glyn has refused to be drawn in as an intermediary, and Nick wonders now how he can ever have imagined that he would, but instead Glyn has thrown this bombshell. Or is it just a small firework? Nick is trying to get himself sorted out about this. What does he feel about it? Well, he is surprised. Elaine and
Glyn
? Though it would seem that there wasn’t all that much to get excited about. But even so . . . Does he feel angry, jealous? Well, not exactly. Though perhaps a little . . . upstaged. And it puts a rather different complexion on things, does it not?
Most of all, Nick finds himself plunged suddenly into endless replays of Glyn’s voice. Not only now, but back then. That day. When Kath. He hears him then, sounding the same, but different. The phone rings again, and it is Glyn: “I need to speak to Elaine.”
That Day
A Thursday. Glyn left early for the university on account of a nine o’clock seminar. He had woken late, reached for the clock, said, “Bloody hell, look at the time!,” and saw Kath lying wide-eyed beside him.
“Why didn’t you wake me? I’ve got to get in early.”
Everything about that day stood out in bold relief, later. What was said; what was seen.
He showered, he shaved. He saw his own face in the mirror, foam-flecked, and a reflection of Kath passing behind him—a bare shoulder, her profile. When he went back to the bedroom, she had gone; he dressed. Downstairs, she was in the kitchen, wearing that blue toweling bathrobe, making toast; bare legs below the bathrobe, her hair brushed behind her ears. There was coffee on the table. She said, “Boiled egg?”
“No, I haven’t got time.” He went into his study, gathered up papers he needed, returned to the kitchen, poured coffee, glanced through a student essay.
“A boiled egg takes four minutes.”
“No, no—”
Afterwards, he would home in on this repeated offer; usually, it was take it or leave it—or he fixed something for himself.
In the garden, the sound of an autumn robin. He looked up from the essay: the grass freckled with fallen leaves, the skinny branches of the trees.
She said, “How about we go out for supper tonight? The Italian place?”
“I shan’t get back till nine or so—there’s something I have to go to. Bit late—”
“OK. I may go to the pictures with Julia.” She had friends in the city, people he hardly knew, people she saw on her own.
She was sitting opposite him, reading the front page of the newspaper; the shape of her face, its perfect planes—intensely familiar, but always catching the eye.
She looked up, held out the paper. “Did you want it?”
“No, thanks. I’m off in a minute.” He went back to the essay.
She said, “It’s nothing but death and disaster.” He saw a headline about famine in Africa, the wizened features of a ragged child.
“It was ever thus. This student is telling me—somewhat inadequately—about the demographic effects of the Black Death.”
Kath said, “I wish I was one of your students.”
He did not know what she meant, nor would he do so subsequently—examining the words. “Why?”
“Oh . . . just, they know someone I don’t. Do you get fond of them?”
“Some leave an impression. It’s a relentless tide, you know. One lot goes, another comes.” He swept the pile of essays into his briefcase, took a final swig of coffee. “Right—”
“Glyn—” She put her hand out as he stood up, as he moved past her towards the door—she touched his arm. He paused: “Yes?” Hurried, distracted.
“Nothing.” And there was nothing in her face, nothing that he could see then, or would see later. A smile. “You get going. See you—”
Thus, that morning. The beginning of an autumn day, a working day, unexceptional. Her voice, her presence, as on a thousand other mornings. He went out of the front door, heard the robin again, got into the car. He may have glanced back at the house, in which Kath was sitting in the kitchen, drinking a cup of coffee, reading the paper. Perhaps picking up the phone to say, “Hi! What about a film this evening . . . ?”
At the university he gave a seminar on eighteenth-century agrarian reform to third-year students. In his office he went through the mail, wrote some letters and a student reference, took a completed paper to the departmental secretary for typing. He stopped to chat with her for a minute: Joy, a chirpy young woman who served as the hub of local activity, pestered by staff and students alike. At twelve, he lectured.
What did you do that day? While she was home, alone.
At one o’clock he went over to the cafeteria for something to eat, joined a couple of colleagues, got into an argument about student expansion, discussed a proposed new course, had a beer. At one-fifty he returned to the department in haste, to collect a file on his way to the library. Joy beckoned as he passed her open door. “Your wife rang. She tried your direct line, but you weren’t there. She asked if you could call her back.”
He picked up his file, and was at once waylaid by an importunate student; the student occupied his attention for ten minutes, driving other thoughts from his mind. At two-twenty he was on the steps of the library, and briefly remembered Joy’s message. The phone call to Kath would have to wait—he had only an hour and a half in which to finish off some crucial checking of references.
In the event, he got back to the department five minutes late for his four o’clock appointment with a research student, already waiting patiently outside his door. That session overran, which meant that by the time the man left, Glyn’s five o’clock seminar group was also camped in the corridor.
At a quarter past six he was through with them. There could be a further quick foray to the library before the inaugural lecture and ensuing reception, which he planned to attend. He was going to this not out of intellectual curiosity and support of a colleague, but in order to confirm his view that this appointment, which he had opposed, was a disaster. He was halfway down the stairs when he remembered that he should phone Kath.
He went back to his office, made the call. No reply. He listened to the ringing tone for a minute or so—maybe she was in the bathroom—then hung up. Gone out, presumably.
A useful hour in the library. Then the lecture, which was satisfactorily poor. Finally, the reception, at which he stayed for rather longer than he had intended, carried away by a couple of glasses of wine.
At ten past nine he arrived home. The hall light was on—but he knew at once that there was no one here: the inert feeling of an empty house. He went into his study, dumped his briefcase. Then to the kitchen for a glass of water; the breakfast things were still on the draining board. He looked in the fridge: some cold meats, and the wherewithal for a salad. Kath would no doubt eat out.
He went up to the bedroom to shed his jacket and find a sweater. He switched on the light, and saw that the bed was occupied.
She lay on her side, turned away from him so that he could not see her face. He knew, as he stood there. He knew before he went over and touched her, looked at her. There was no one here; the room was empty of life, just as the house had felt barren as he entered.
When at last he walked over to her—looked, touched—it was as though she were a husk. This was Kath, but also it was not Kath at all; the face hers, but also a mask, a void. She had vomited; her mouth was open, there was a mess on the pillow. He wanted to cover her up; no, there were things that had to happen now. He saw the glass on the bedside table, the little capless brown bottle, some empty packets. He seemed to be acting like an automaton; he could move about, respond, but at some other level there was rampaging disbelief. This was not possible. Impossible that he was here, in these moments, with this around him; the proper place to be was hours ago, back this morning, dressing in this room, while downstairs Kath made toast and coffee, picked the newspaper up off the mat. That was real, this was not.
The ambulance came, and went. Later, the police arrived, two of them, a man and a woman. They went up to the bedroom, incongruous invaders, and came back down with the things from the bedside table. They sat with Glyn in the kitchen and asked a few questions—dispassionate, perhaps apologetic.
What did you do that day? While she . . .
The woman asked if there was anyone he would like them to call. He shook his head.
When they had gone, he sat there; the automaton struggled with the rampaging disbeliever. He made a cup of tea, but never drank it.
Then he reached for the address book and looked for Elaine’s number.
That morning, Elaine was planting the two
Sorbus cashmiriana
which had arrived the day before. Perfect circumstances: crisp dry late-autumn weather, the ground still nicely workable. She and Jim moved the young trees from position to position until they had it right, dug the holes between them, carted compost. It was an hour or so before the job was done, the stakes in, the two stems of future promise standing bravely alongside the grass walk to the orchard. Returning to the house, she turned to look back at them, visualizing how they would be ten years on—tall, sturdy, with those jeweled, snowy clouds of autumn berries. To garden is to harness time.
Eleven o’clock by now, and the day snapping at her heels. Sonia needed guidance, Nick wanted to talk about buying a computer, which would give him a head start with this exciting new scheme he had to tell her about, there was a tricky phone call to be made to a new and exacting client. Elaine set Sonia straight, deflected Nick, was relieved to find the client unavailable, and turned at last to her largest current project—landscaping the grounds of a refurbished country-house hotel. She spent a couple of hours on design and costings.
A sandwich lunch in the kitchen with Sonia and Nick (“The thing about the technology, sweetie, is that in a couple of years it’s paid for itself, in terms of cost efficiency”). By now Elaine was watching the clock; she planned to catch a train to London. In the early evening there was the reception and press launch of the new wing of an art gallery, for which she had designed a courtyard garden, and before that she intended to visit the Royal Horticultural Society’s Lindley Library, in pursuit of information about an extinguished Edwardian garden of which she had once seen photos, which might prove inspirational for her current project.
Nick drove her to the station. He had given up on the matter of the computer; both he and Elaine knew that he would return to the subject and that Elaine would probably have to concede, and provide the money, given that he was indisputably in tune with contemporary thinking on this matter. Well, the thing could be set against tax. At the station, he dithered for a moment with the thought of coming with her, tempted by the notion of the champagne extravaganza at the art gallery, and then decided he couldn’t be bothered. He would pick her up when she got back.
At the library, Elaine was instantly immersed in her search, absorbed with catalogues and a growing pile of books. An hour later, breaking off to take stock, she realized that she had forgotten to ask Sonia to get together and dispatch some papers needed urgently by the accountants. Not too late to get her before she left at the end of the afternoon.