Implosion, p.16
Implosion, page 16
“I think so,” said Bart evenly, in the calm after the storm. “I’m an expert, I recognize the symptoms. You’re lonely.”
“You could put it like that.”
Bart paused perceptibly at that. He did not look at her, but turned away again and picked up a cigarette box. He said, “But you wouldn’t put it that way?”
“No,” she replied with equal calmness. “No, I wouldn’t—and the box is empty.”
Bart looked down in surprise at the box. He swung on his heel away from the steady gaze he knew she was giving him. He tried to keep the same tone in his voice, but his pulse was racing uncomfortably. “There must be some somewhere.”
“You think I’m a first-class bitch, don’t you?” she accused.
Bart, cigarette-hunting with excessive vigor in the bureau, had his back to her. “No, not really—however hard you try to cast yourself for the part.”
Mary stood up. “Never mind those bloody cigarettes! Look at me!” she commanded. He turned and looked. Her eyes were sparkling with anger, and more than anger. “John Bart, you still don’t understand!” She drew a deep breath. “You’re as cold as ice, weak as rubbish! Yet everybody knows you’re the most ruthless bastard—apart from Farmer—since Genghis Khan! You’re a damned good surgeon, a brilliant organizer, yet you can’t organize a better supper than that!” she pointed scornfully. “You own, body and soul, all the fertile women in Britain, yet know not a thing about women. What, in God’s name, are you?”
She paused, her chest heaving. Bart stood silent, clutching the cigarette box, his gaze fixed on her eyes, hardly aware of her tirade. In anger, he thought, they are identical … Mary took two steps toward him, looked up into his eyes, then quickly down, an action irresistibly evocative of Julia. At that moment she was Julia.
She went on calmly, “What you don’t understand, John, is that identical twins are often identical in a lot more than the obvious way. Julia must have told you it was love at first sight. Not that I expect you believed her—you wouldn’t. She did love you at first sight. And so did I.”
She dared not look at him. To ease the tension she turned away, and went on in a mildly jeering voice, “You’ve a rotten memory for some things, just try and remember when that was.”
Bart shut his eyes in sheer self-defense. He remembered well enough when they had first met. It was at a wedding reception. Hers.
There were a great many sides to Bart’s character, some of which he tried, with varying success, to conceal. Julia said he was inhibited, some said he was shy, others held it was a crashing inferiority complex. He was quite unmoved. For a long time he had supposed his mind was much the same cast as most, but gradually learned that this was not so. He was not proud of the fact, nor did he imagine himself unique, or better in any way. But too often had he been conscious of men, men with far better brains than his, who were faintly uneasy in his company, dimly aware that this was a mind of an order quite different from their own. Bart did his best to cover it up, for the herd disturbed is dangerous. Farmer’s remark about the sharks getting him was true. He was wary, chary of revealing anything about some facets of his mind. He sought no kindred spirit, but he cried out for someone who might at least understand. Such a person could only be a woman, for they alone have the deeply intuitive quality necessary, and this only when they are in love. Then a woman will give all she has.
Bart was like any small boy who, in a sudden surge of affection or hero-worship—and with much heavy breathing—digs among the grubby bits of string, the conkers, the fluff-covered sweets and the broken penknife to find his secret, most dear treasure, perhaps a bright colored stone—only to be laughed at by the unfeeling and unknowing. The humiliation and the bitterness the boy would know. But small boys grow up, and lose their visions in the quest for the gracious way of life, or some other futility …
Julia and he had gone quite a way together, and she penetrated deeper, frequently quite unconsciously, into his character, but Julia was receding fast from him, and the growing loneliness was all the greater. Now here was Mary so incredibly Julia, offering him love which might be real. But was his love of so little moment that it could be as easily transferred as a bank account? Yet Mary was Julia …
“Well? Say something!”
Bart blinked and returned to the immediate situation. “Be fair, Mary. This is not the moment for me to say something clumsy.” He softened his words with a smile, but in her ears it had the sound of reproof and there was dejection in the slope of her shoulders as she sat down. “I suppose we’ll have to play it your way.” She rallied slightly, “Don’t tell me there are no cigarettes.”
Bart found some, and replenished the box. He poured two brandies, handed her one, and sat down on the sofa, near her.
“That’s a bit risky, isn’t it?” she observed caustically. “Aren’t you afraid I’ll do something clumsy?”
“Don’t be difficult. If you knew a fraction of the things in my mind you’d be more understanding.”
“You’re shocked, aren’t you—admit it!”
“I’m a lot less shocked than you suppose—at least by the things you expect to shock me. It’s much more disturbing to be confronted with one more like Julia than Julia herself—now.” He moved over to the attack, “You came here with every intention of staying the night.”
“You’re probably right. I only know I can’t spend the night in that house.”
This was patently genuine, and other considerations apart, Bart was not the man to refuse to help. At once he said, “Of course you can stay here.”
Mary was back in her hard-boiled mood. “You really are rash,” she said in mock wonder. “Where do I sleep—on this?”
Bart’s anger flashed. “Stop being so bloody silly!”
Mary was immediately apologetic. “Sorry, John. Truly. I know I shouldn’t have let go as I did. Love is not a thing you can order. It happens. It happened to me, there was nothing I could do about it. I had to make the best of the situation, and I did. Roger and I were happy together; we had some simply marvelous times, but I could never forget that this was not it.” She crushed out a cigarette, and immediately lit another. “Don’t misunderstand; I know as only a woman can know, love is not just supersex in Technicolor on wide, wide Vistavision. It is the most appalling and most wonderful thing that can happen to a woman. Men, some men, have visions. Some women have love. I’m not making excuses; superficially I feel guilty about Roger, but deep down, there’s none.” She waved her cigarette impatiently, “Oh, leave it for now. All I know is I can’t spend the night in Harley Street.”
Bart was more moved than he cared to show. “Yes, well, let us be practical. I can’t have looked in the spare room for months,” he was brisk, desperately clawing his way off a lee shore, “but if I know anything about Mrs. H it will be all ready.”
It was ready. Mary watched from the doorway as Bart satisfied himself that the bed was aired. A sudden thought occurred to him.
“Did Julia know?”
“About my mad passion?” Her tone was bantering, but her eyes belied her words, “Very probably. We never discussed it.”
“She knew,” said Bart with conviction. “I always thought that fear of you, after the incident outside Harrods, was odd.”
“Be careful, John, you’re delving into the darker side of the female mind.”
“Yes,” replied Bart. “I can see that.” He edged past Mary, careful not to touch her.
She smiled sardonically, “Is it as bad as that?”
He looked straight at her. “Yes, it’s as bad as that. Now: I suppose you didn’t bring a nightgown?”
“No, I didn’t think about it.”
“You’d better have one of my shirts. Pajamas would be too big.” He pointed. “That’s the bathroom, the lavatory is next door. I’ll get that shirt.”
When he returned, she was in the bathroom. He had to raise his voice to be heard above the roar of the bath taps. “I’ve left the shirt on the bed. Good night, Mary.”
She answered indistinguishably through the thick door. Bart did not bother, her tone was cheerful. He returned to the sitting room, and shut the door. He hesitated, then poured a large brandy. He felt elated in a way that was unusual, and the feeling of virtue at resisting a very real temptation was pleasant. At its lowest level, he could not complain that this had been yet another dull lonely evening. He gulped his drink. Now he would sleep.
He did sleep heavily, so heavily that the first he knew was a small soft hand had gently undone the cord of his pajama trousers … He tried; fighting himself and her, but half awake, his resistance was low. “Julia—Mary! Be fair, you can’t make me—”
But Mary, who rightly knew nothing of fairness, and even if she had, was far, far beyond caring, could, and did.
17
For the next fortnight only two things kept him in anything like a state of equilibrium. Firstly, the pressure of work was unrelenting, and secondly, there was Mary.
From the start she made no bones about her action. She was in love and alone; he was alone and in desperate need of love. It was as simple as that. Left to his own devices he would have vacillated, struggling with his conscience, evaluating and reevaluating every possible angle of the situation. By forcing, Mary had thrust him irrevocably past the first and largest barrier. Bart, incapable of lechery, could not make love against his own inclinations, and he had made love. That was inescapable. Mary knew too that at first she might be a Julia-substitute. She could accept that; given time, she would come into her own.
Bart, in his innocence, had not known how powerful a woman in love can be. He had often smiled—and winced at Julia’s gay, wildly impractical attitude, and Mary had been, so far as he had seen, the same. But in those first weeks she was like a rock.
That first morning it was hardly surprising he overslept. Mary was wide awake, but lay still beside him. She was not going to be absent in sleep or anywhere else when he awoke; he would need careful handling. Meanwhile she watched and waited with the patience of a mother rather than a wife. She was very weary, and not a little thirsty. Apart from catnaps, flicking into instant watchfulness when he stirred, she had not slept. Meanwhile there was much to think about. Her instincts had been right; this was the man for her. In their lovemaking she had exerted a power she had never exercised before, not that it was in any way calculated or planned. She had taken a boy, an unwilling boy, and by sheer power raised him to a man. And he had not come to her in the full vigor and wonder of manhood, but humbly. For they both knew that for this time, and perhaps never again, she was not just Mary Flavell, but the great, and in some aspects, terrible goddess Aphrodite herself.
Bart, near waking, stretched out a long pale arm and accidentally touched her. The action woke him, and as Mary intended, the first thing he saw was her solemn face, framed in the long fair hair that hung loosely about her neck. His lips began to form “Julia,” but recollection flooded into his eyes, and his mouth shut. For what seemed a very long time they gazed at each other.
“I don’t know what to say. If you had just made me make love, perhaps I might say a good deal, but last night was as far removed from sex—”
She had been in no real doubt that he had understood, but all the same she breathed a soft sigh of relief. The immediate, and possibly final, battle was won. She wanted to touch him, yet the world pressed, and she had to think for them both. She smiled, a smile that changed to mock severity.
“John, you cunning devil! I thought you had two single beds at Stanhope Mews—and here I find you wallowing in a double! I’ll bet your secretary knows this better than her own!” It was nonsense, but it took the intensity out of the situation.
“I bought most of the furniture with the flat.” He yawned and tried to laugh at the same time, “My secretary!” He caught sight of the time and the laugh vanished. “My God! Look at the time!” He swung out of bed, and almost fell, his trousers were round his ankles. Deeply embarrassed, he turned away to hoist them up, flushing under the amused gaze of Mary. “I’m late! The car will arrive any moment!”
Five minutes later it did. Bart, panic-stricken as junior clerks used to be at the prospect of being late, left, breakfastless. Just this once, Mary did not mind, she had to give him time. The door slammed, and dressed in his shirt she looked with faint dismay at the disorder. Pajamas in the bathroom, a wet towel on the sitting-room floor, and half the drawers in his dressing chest open. In some ways the scene warmed her. He was essentially a helpless male, a mere child. The only child she could ever have.
The faint dismay was not for this minor disorder, but the remembrance of Mrs. H this conjured up. She might be old, and judged from Mary’s twenty-five years she was very old, but she was still a woman. And a woman cannot maneuver another woman with a smile and a quick twist of the conversation.
One reason for his precipitate departure was an early meeting—nine thirty—with leading gynecologists to consider the feasibility of cutting the Mums’ rest periods from three to two months. In the bald words of the proposal, “If practicable, a theoretical increase of eight and a half percent in production could be achieved. In practice, wastage might be expected to reduce this figure to about six percent.”
Bart was against it—one reason why he wanted to take the chair at this meeting. At eleven there was an appointment with Farmer and Education to iron out a demarcation dispute that had assumed serious proportions between their two ministries. At twelve o’clock he had to be back in his Ministry to present certificates of commendation to some zealous members of his MOH Service, and afterwards he had to at least put in an appearance at a sherry party for the honored ones, plus a number of MOHS senior officers. In between he would have to toil at his endless paper work, and settle any departmental matters brought to him for decision.
By nine twenty he was at his desk, drinking coffee while he shaved, listening to Miss Parkins reading his brief for the inter-Ministry dispute. Even so, odd personal thoughts intervened, to be instantly repressed. But he could not conceal from himself, despite his haunting guilt, a sense of well-being and increased vitality. Above all, there was the memory of a profound mental experience, amounting to a revelation. No psychologist’s views were worth a light if he had not experienced a similar revelation. Jung, now—he knew …
“Shall I read that again?” Miss Parkins eyed him sharply.
“What? Yes, please. I was thinking.” He blew sharply on his razor and dropped it carelessly back in a drawer.
Somehow he got through the morning. The protagonists of a shortened reproduction cycle went away, temporarily thwarted, and Farmer ruled in his favor in the inter-Ministry dispute. Only the presentation was intangibly unpleasant.
The half dozen MOHS women, smart in their best uniforms and highly polished stout brogues, were drawn up in line. Bart made a short speech, and then the presentations. These women had only been doing their duty at his dictates, but he could not avoid the feeling that they enjoyed it. Hunting down other women, to condemn them to a new and dreadful form of servitude, should not, however necessary, be pleasurable.
TV cameras rolled as Bart posed, smiling mechanically, with the group. None of this would be shown in the Homes. There the MOHS was now hated and feared in a way Europe had not known since the Gestapo. As soon as Bart had realized this, he banned all uniformed personnel inside the camps, apart from the reception areas.
Despite personal feelings, he had to go along with it all. They were a useful force, and outside the camps they were regarded by the ordinary public with that amused tolerance the British reserve for women in uniform. In the National Schools they were particularly valuable, handling all the non-teaching services—catering, laundry, cleaning, health and clerical. There was talk of incorporating the teachers as well, but Bart was not in favor, despite the advantages of semi-military control. Most teachers were men, and there were other problems.
During his lunch half-hour he rang his flat, there was no reply. Which was just as well, for Bart had no clear idea what he was going to say. If Miss Parkins could have seen inside his mind at that moment, she would not have believed that this was the same man, capable of instant hard decision. What she would have made of his personal situation is impossible to imagine. A spinster well over forty, she had her own private fantasies woven around her boss, and they remained private.
There was a Cabinet meeting after lunch. The latest UN resolution calling for a complete ban on PROLIX was shortly discussed without much interest. Farmer said bluntly it was a waste of time, and no one disagreed. Forward Planning and Agriculture had schemes for the reforestation of parts of the Kentish weald, and large-scale increases in sheep farming in Cumberland and Yorkshire. Housing had a pilot scheme for demolition of “nonviable community centers”—which meant villages. As the population decreased, it was clearly essential to regroup. Six half-empty villages would take far more effort to run than three full ones, and despite the great strides of automation, no waste of manpower could be allowed … Minor road closures were discussed. A final decision to abandon further plans for motorway extensions was taken; tentatively it was agreed to complete existing schemes …
Bart had to hurry to get back for a five o’clock meeting with the Attorney-General on the Home Harmony proposals. By six the main points of difficulty had been ironed out, and the A-G left. Bart’s engagement pad showed he was now free to concentrate on his paper. That could wait. With some misgivings he rang Julia.
“John darling! Lovely to hear you! I suppose you’re up to the eyebrows?”
He said yes, there was a good deal to do. Julia said she knew what it was like. They were madly busy in the Home. She was on the Management Committee and had had a terrible afternoon, making some of these women see reason about the laundry. Then, “Look, John, I know it’s a bit sudden, but there’s an exchange visit with the North Wales Home—you know the scheme—coming up. I’m due in May, and there’s just time for me to get this visit in comfortably before I go static. Would you mind terribly if I went?”
