Dreams of another day, p.13
Dreams of Another Day, page 13
‘I am,’ she said with an effort. ‘But…’
‘Don’t spoil it, Ming,’ said Mark as a smile broke the seriousness of his face. He leaned forward and let his lips touch hers for a moment and cling.
Ming felt a sudden surge of pleasure so intense that it almost frightened her. Amazed that anything so ordinary and familiar as a kiss could affect her so much, she put her hand on his shoulder as much to steady herself as to respond to his caress. He drew back and looked down at her seriously. She could see that he was shaken too and seemed at a loss for words.
‘We’d better go back inside or I might lose my head,’ he said at last.
Just then an erect, arrogant figure appeared silhouetted against the lighted window. Ming hissed slightly as she breathed in. Mark took her hand and led her forward. Not recognising Roger, Mark merely nodded to him as they walked past.
‘Who was that?’ he asked as they moved out of earshot.
‘My late employer,’ she said.
‘Ah.’ Mark’s monosyllable seemed full of comprehension. ‘D’you know, I think I’m actually enjoying myself after all,’ he said. ‘Come and have a drink.’
Chapter Nine
The next Tuesday Ming drove down to Etchingham for her weekly meeting at Max’s cottage. Despite Gerry’s exhortations and her own determination to cope sensibly with what she had learned about Max, Ming was nervous of meeting him again.
He felt her tension as soon as she came through the oak door into his long blue-and-white room and for a while he could not understand it. But when she flinched as he handed her a cup of coffee and touched her, he thought he knew what had happened. He tried to concentrate on his surprise that Ming had taken so long to discover what must have been common knowledge, but her distaste for him was obvious and hurt too much.
Connie saw it, too, and it made her angry. At the end of the meeting, which she kept much shorter than usual, she insisted that Ming walk back to the Dower House with her.
‘Just what do you think you were doing?’ Connie asked as soon as they left the cottage. At the fury in her voice, Ming flinched.
‘I’m sorry. I wasn’t doing anything except trying to conceal my … shock, I suppose.’
‘You didn’t do a very good job, I’m afraid.’
Ming stopped on the gravel drive up to Connie’s house.
‘Did Max know?’
‘Of course he knew. He’s morbidly sensitive in any case. Even though your face was politely blank you showed exactly what you thought of him every time you moved away from him.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Ming again, sounding helpless. ‘I never meant to upset him. It’s just so difficult. Don’t you find it difficult?’
‘Not any more,’ answered Connie more gently. ‘Come on up to the house and I’ll try to explain. How did you find out? I was sure you knew nothing.’
‘Roger Sillhorne was at the Attingers’last week and he told me. I might not have believed him because he was in a beastly mood, but Gerry confirmed it – and told me to brace up,’ said Ming with a faint smile.
‘I’ll bet she did. She’s always been sensible, that sister of yours, if a little intense.’ Connie pushed open the unlocked door.
Ming preceded her into the hall, a double-height cube with a black-and-white marble floor and pale walls covered in family portraits.
‘Would you like a drink?’ she asked, pointing to a laden table to the left of the front door.
‘I think not. I ought to get back to London pretty soon. Connie, will you say something to Max for me?’
‘Certainly not.’ Connie poured herself a glass of sherry and went to perch on the edge of the fender. ‘Sit down, Ming.’
Obediently she sat in one of the blue wing chairs beside the empty fireplace.
‘I don’t know how much you’ve been told, but you have to understand that all Max ever did was to have a love affair with another man, a painter. He has never seduced a boy, just as he has never pursued guardsmen in the park or any of the other things you’ve read about in sensational newspapers. He is the civilised, intelligent man you’ve always known.’
‘That’s what Gerry said, and I understand it intellectually, but I can’t help feeling peculiar with him.’ Ming paused and tried to explain, ‘I suppose it’s just the way I’ve been brought up. Gerry’s different.’
‘Indeed she is.’
‘But if Max is all those things, how could he have done it? I thought he once told me he was married.’
‘He was.’ Connie’s strong face seemed to shrink. ‘He was married to a very old friend of mine, who treated him really badly. Max was completely faithful to her for years – until he fell in love with his painter.’
‘I understand,’ said Ming gently, not because she did but because Connie seemed so distressed.
Her answer was a look of exasperation.
‘I don’t think you do. Gerry seems to have been remarkably discreet. Max’s wife was staying here with me one weekend and she started to taunt me for my single state.’ Connie’s voice held none of its usual confidence. ‘She often did that but for some reason that day she caught me on the raw. She went on and on about how wonderful it was to have a man’s love, and how Max was so devoted to her that he didn’t mind what she did so long as he could live with her.’
‘She sounds quite mad.’ The outrage in Ming’s voice made Connie laugh for a moment.
‘Not really; just, stupid and incorrigibly vain.’ Connie drank some sherry and sighed. ‘But I was just as stupid. I got so angry with her that I told her about Max.’
‘Ah.’ Ming did begin to understand the real story then.
‘Yes,’ said Connie, her dark eyes bleak and her mouth stiff. ‘And because of what I said, she put private detectives to watch Max and then denounced him to the police. Because of what I said out of outraged vanity he spent eighteen months in Wormwood Scrubs.’
Ming could not think of anything comforting to say to that and so she stayed silent. After a while, Connie looked at her with eyes that seemed darker and harder than ever.
‘Can you imagine a man like Max locked up with thieves and murderers? One shower a week; no more than three books out of the library in a week; rationed letters; rationed visits; nothing to write on or with; petty-minded warders. And it was my fault.’
‘It doesn’t bear thinking about. Connie, I am sorry if I’ve hurt you – either of you. I just didn’t understand.’
‘Will you let me lend you a book?’
‘Book? Why? I mean…’
‘Don’t look so scared, Ming,’ said Connie, sounding just as exasperated as Gerry had done at the dance. ‘I’m not proposing to introduce you to pornography. It’s a French novel. You read French, don’t you?’
Ming nodded. Connie got up off the fender and disappeared for five minutes. When she came back she held a thick, buff-coloured paperback in her hand. Ming took it.
‘I’ll read it, Connie. Thank you. I must go.’
‘Drive carefully.’
‘I always do.’
Ming decided to take the book to bed with her that evening so that she could make a start on it. She expected to find it distasteful if not actually difficult to read, but after the first chapter or two she found herself gripped.
The novel, Story of a Lost Love, turned out to be an exquisitely written account of a love affair between two young men who had met in the war. Ming read fast, hardly noticing the time, murmuring at intervals, ‘I see,’ and, ‘now I understand.’
By the time she reached the end she had tears in her eyes. Completely caught up in the delicately revealed love between the two men, she was desolated when one fell ill and died. Her own emotions were so near the surface of her mind just then that the mental and physical intimacy described in the book seemed idyllic.
The following morning she posted the book back to Connie with a short note:
You were right, Connie. I do understand more now, and I am bitterly sorry that I upset you and Max. You and Gerry have both said that there are too many people who are too ignorant of the subject. Do you think that we might print an excerpt from the novel in the magazine?
It is so beautifully put – and so illuminating – that it might change a lot of people’s attitudes.
Love, Ming
She took the parcel round to the Post Office, enjoying the warmth
of the July day. When she returned to the flat her charlady told
her that Mr Sudley had telephoned and wanted her to ring him back to make arrangements for Sunday’s picnic. Ming was smiling as she dialled the number of his office.
They agreed to meet at Ming’s flat and drive down to Oxford in her car.
‘Unless it’s raining,’ said Mark. ‘I draw the line at a river picnic in the rain.’
‘I can’t imagine Julia wanting that either. If it is wet, perhaps you and I could do something together in London.’
There was a short pause until Mark said quietly:
‘Perhaps I should pray for rain. Either way, I’ll see you on Sunday.’
Ming was rather relieved when she woke on Sunday morning to see bright sunlight pouring through the pale green curtains of her bedroom. The temperature rose steadily throughout the morning as they drove to the appointed boat house, where the Wallingtons were waiting with two punts. Julia sat in the first punt with her children on either side of her and David took the lead up the river.
After an hour’s gentle progress, he turned his head towards the second punt and signalled towards a break in the willows on the bank.
‘Let’s stop for lunch,’ he called.
Ming, who was punting at the time, nodded. She felt as though she were encased in a thin, hot, transparent shell, and she put up a dripping hand to cool her forehead. Carefully manoeuvring her unwieldy boat, she laid it beside David’s at the bank, where Mark tied it up to the roots of a willow.
‘Hot?’ he asked, amused, as he watched Ming lay the long, heavy pole along the bottom of the punt.
‘Boiling. I’m glad I’m such a clumsy punter that I seem to get half the river trickling down my arm each time I bring up the pole,’ she said. ‘At least it’s cooling!’
Mark laughed and held out a strong arm to help her out of the punt. The neck of his shirt was open and he had rolled up the sleeves. As he reached for her, Ming saw his muscles moving under the tanned skin of his forearm and the sunlight glinting on the fine gold hairs. He looked happy and very masculine in a way that his London clothes seemed to disguise.
She took his hand, which felt cool and firm as he pulled her up the bank into the field above. David and Julia were already unpacking their large wicker hamper and the children arranging paper plates and plastic beakers.
Ming went at once to help David spread out the rugs and groundsheets they had brought, while Mark returned to the punt for a basket in which he had packed a bottle of Anjou rose wine swathed in damp newspaper. Julia laid a thick white cotton cloth over the groundsheet on the grass and began to set out the food.
There were soft bridge rolls for the children, stuffed with ham and chicken, while for the adults Julia had brought a selection of smoked salmon, pâté and game pie. Fruit, slabs of dark Belgian chocolate, Bath Oliver biscuits and cheese, and a heavy, dark plum cake followed.
As she lay on the grass, propped up on one elbow, Ming became increasingly aware of Mark, who was sitting with his back against one of the smooth-barked willows. They were at least four feet apart and yet whenever he breathed or swallowed she was aware of it. Watching a pulse beating in his strong neck, she even felt as though she could feel the blood beating through his veins. Her own breathing became difficult. She caught his eye and knew suddenly that he was having to exercise enormous self-control to stay leaning negligently against the tree. Something in her insisted that she lean forward and touch him.
Pushing herself upright instead, she turned away to pick up her glass and swallowed a mouthful of the fresh pink wine.
‘Cake, Ming?’ asked Julia, who had been watching them both with a faint smile.
‘Thank you.’ Ming reached for the paper plate Julia was holding out to her and took a mouthful of the dark, heavy cake. Her teeth bit through the hard-baked almonds on the top and sank into the sweetness of the sultanas and crystallised cherries.
‘It’s wonderful,’ she said when she had swallowed. ‘Did you bake it?’
‘Janice made it,’ said Amanda quickly and Julia exchanged a rueful smile with Ming.
Her breathing had returned to normal and she found herself able to turn back to Mark again. He looked at her almost sternly for a while and then his face relaxed into the same friendly, unthreatening smile he had always used. He, too, accepted some cake from Julia and added a thin slice of sharp white Wensleydale cheese to it just as David said abruptly:
‘Is it true that there’s already a complete battle plan for a possible invasion of Egypt, Mark?’
The cheese slipped off the cake as Mark jumped, and it crumbled into irretrievable pieces as it hit the grass. Ming moved at once to pick them up, wondering why David had decided to bring up such a depressing subject. Julia cut another slice of cheese and silently handed it to Mark.
‘I’ve really no idea,’ he said with a careful lack of emphasis. ‘You politicians always know far more than any of us in Whitehall.’
David grimaced a little self-consciously and then nodded.
‘I don’t believe that’s true, but you’re right. I shouldn’t have tried to pump you.’
‘They can’t go to war over something as unimportant as this,’ said Ming with a depth of feeling that rather surprised Mark.
She carried her handful of cheese fragments to the river and flung them in, standing for a moment to watch the ripples spread out and distort each other as they met. Staring down at the dark green, midge-speckled water all she could think of were the torn bodies and broken minds, the betrayals and the torments that the last war had brought.
When she came back, she stretched out her legs and lay back in the cool grass, staring up at the bright patterns of sunlight and green leaves above her head, trying to bury her memories and ignore her sympathy for the regiments serving in Cyprus, who would be in the front line of any attack on Egypt.
‘They can’t put us through all that again,’ she said when her feelings were under control. ‘Not just for the Canal and the price of oil.’
Amanda, bored with sitting still and listening to the adults’ incomprehensible conversation, scrambled up from her place at David’s side and stood with a hand on his shoulder.
‘Can me and Jonathan go and play, Daddy?’
‘Julia?’ said David, lifting an eyebrow.
‘Good idea,’ she said, smiling at them both. ‘Take care of Jonathan. And no paddling.’
‘All right,’ said Amanda with an enormous sigh.
She heaved Jonathan up from the rug and ran off with him to explore the edge of the river. Ming could hear them pointing out to each other holes they were convinced must conceal moles and water rats and toads and felt some of the tension begin to seep out of her body. If she could only concentrate on the children and their games, she would stop thinking of what might happen in the Middle East. The children’s shrieks of delight grew less shrill as they wandered further and further from the others.
‘Even if some kind of military action were undertaken it wouldn’t spread beyond Egypt,’ said Julia carefully, remembering the little that Flixe had told her of Ming’s war work.
Ming turned to smile gratefully at her and between them they turned to talk of less important matters. Gradually the conversation slowed over the debris of the picnic into a desultory murmur as they all gave themselves up to the languor induced by the wine and the heat.
The sun poured down on them through the dappling leaves and a faint wind rustled the willow branches that overhung the river. Birds sang and an occasional tractor could be heard chuntering over distant fields.
‘This is heaven,’ said Ming, waking up at last. She lay back with her arms under her head, staring up through the leaves.
She was wearing the white clothes she had bought for Egypt and she looked utterly at peace as she lay with her face tilted towards the sun, smiling slightly. The other three watched her as they smoked, Mark with an expression of hopeless tenderness on his face and David with unconcealed admiration. Ming tilted her head to look at him and he smiled at her.
‘I’m glad you’re enjoying it,’ Julia said, slapping away a horse fly that had settled dangerously on her bare leg.
‘It was a brilliant idea of yours. Don’t you think, Mark?’
‘A wonderful break in the dusty routines of meetings and minutes, arguments and reasoned syntheses! It’s hard to think we’re only an hour or so from London. Why do we let ourselves be shut in offices all day, worrying about what’s happening on the other side of the world when we could lie about like this?’ he said, gesturing to the green-and-gold landscape of fields and trees and sluggish water.
An iridescent dragonfly, like a miniature helicopter, circled the small group, hovering just above Ming’s face, and then darted away to settle on the surface of the river for a moment, before skimming off again.
‘It does seem mad, doesn’t it?’ agreed David, through his teeth as he chewed the succulent white root of a long piece of grass. He looked at his watch and pulled the grass out of his mouth. ‘But we have to do it, even if we let ourselves forget for a while. And we can’t forget for much longer, Julia.’
‘Oh, not yet,’ she wailed, thinking of the long, hot drive back into London and the struggle to get her children bathed and into bed. In theory she enjoyed the rare treat of looking after them herself at weekends, but in practice she found it remarkably difficult. ‘As Ming says, it’s heaven here; don’t let’s waste it.’
‘Well, if we leave it much later the traffic will be horrible getting back into London,’ said David. ‘And Jonathan is bound to be sick. Better get it over with.’
