East fortune, p.18
East Fortune, page 18
It was the last thing he wanted to do.
‘Who is Julia?’
‘A researcher,’ he said.
‘I hope you’re not going to deny it.’
‘Deny what?’
‘Oh for God’s sake. Just answer my question properly. Who is Julia?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘I think it does. I think it matters more than anything has ever mattered – certainly in our marriage if you have any desire to hold on to it.’
‘Of course I do.’
‘How long has this been going on?’
‘Nothing’s been going on.’
‘Oh really? When did you first meet her?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘I’m sorry, Douglas. You seem to be under the impression that I am very stupid.’
‘I have never thought that.’
‘More stupid than her, obviously.’
‘You’re not. You’re much cleverer than her…’
‘Who is she?’
‘She works for the British Council.’
‘I don’t think her profession has got much to do with it.’
‘She organises lectures and conferences.’
‘And why is she lonely, obsessed, confused, intoxicated, sensual, and, it appears, paranoid?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Is she your lover?’
‘I don’t want to talk about this.’
‘That means she is.’
‘It doesn’t mean anything.’
‘Oh for God’s sake.’
Emma threw the letter on to the bed.
‘Who is this fucking bitch?’
‘She’s not a bitch.’
‘What is she then?’
‘Someone I met.’
‘You did more than meet her, you bastard. What did you think you were doing?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Is she married?’
‘I think so.’
‘God, you don’t even know that.’
‘Yes, I do, she is.’
‘And does she have children?’
‘Two.’
‘Oh well, that’s all right then. I suppose she won’t mind having some more then.’
‘That’s got nothing to do with it.’
‘It’s got everything to do with it.’
‘I didn’t want children. We discussed this. Everything was all right.’
He wished he could have been more discreet, or kept silent, denied everything.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Sorry? Is that all?’
‘I don’t know what else to say.’
‘You’re pathetic. Absolutely pathetic.’
It wasn’t so much the infidelity, Emma said, as the fact that he had done so little to avert it. Douglas had surely seen it coming. He could have talked to her and even if he had made one drunken ‘error of judgement’ (such a ridiculous phrase, but Emma couldn’t think of anything else) then they could have spoken and done something about it. But this appeared to be a sustained and secret operation that had been carried out behind her back for months.
‘Part of me wants to know everything,’ said Emma. ‘Whether I’ve met her, what she looks like, what she wears, what attracted you to her – everything. Did you know that you were going to do this from the start? Did you do anything at all to stop it – although obviously you can’t have done because you wanted to and you were just too fucking selfish to stop, I can see that – but I’d like to know whether at any stage you thought of me and what you were doing and whether it might, it just might, you know, be the wrong thing to do…’
‘Of course I did…’
‘Don’t interrupt.’
‘I’m not interrupting.’
‘You are.’
‘I didn’t want to hurt you.’
‘You suppose that makes it all right?’
‘I’m not saying that.’
‘What are you saying?’
‘I don’t know, I was lonely, I didn’t mean to do it; I thought I could avoid hurting you or you finding out.’
‘Every word in that sentence is rubbish and you know it.’
‘I don’t know. I don’t know anything any more. Perhaps I did it because I thought you’d be better off without me.’
‘I think I’m the one that decides that.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I don’t understand you at all. You’ve kept this letter when you could have destroyed it. Perhaps you wanted me to find out all along and didn’t have the courage to tell me face to face. The next thing you’ll be telling me is that you only did it as a favour to make our marriage stronger or that I should be grateful to you for giving me the excuse to leave.’
‘I don’t think that.’
‘It never occurred to me to be unfaithful, do you know that? Even though I work in the theatre and people somehow expect it of me. They assume, because I am an actress, that this is what happens, that I must have so many opportunities and I’m always at it but I’m not. It’s not in my DNA. But you – one whiff of an opportunity and your trousers are down and in you go.’
‘It wasn’t like that.’
‘No? Well, what was it like? Actually, no, don’t tell me. I really don’t want to know about your sordid four-minute sessions in hotel rooms round the world or wherever you fucking did it. In fact, come to think of it, I’d rather know nothing. I’ve heard enough of your so-called confession – the one that’s supposed to make our marriage stronger.’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘I’m the one doing the talking. So in fact what I’d like to happen, what I’d like you to do now is just leave, get out, don’t talk to me, keep your dirty little secrets to yourself.’
‘I don’t know where to go.’
‘There’s a hotel round the corner, you can stay there – or why don’t you just move in with her?’
‘It’s complicated.’
‘What? It’s complicated? Of course it’s fucking complicated. If it was easy everyone would be doing it. But now, of course, it seems that everyone is doing it. I suppose you could always just fuck off and live with her.’
‘I can’t do that.’
‘Why? Because she’s married?’
‘She won’t leave her kids.’
‘Do you really think I need to know this? Is that supposed to make me understand that she has some kind of conscience? Can you not see that every sentence you utter is full of the most complete crap anyone has ever heard?’
‘Don’t be so vile.’
‘Well, I’m sorry. Perhaps you should have thought this might happen. Perhaps, when you were taking your trousers down, you should have stopped and thought – do you know what – maybe I shouldn’t be doing this, maybe I should stop – put it away, pull my trousers back up, leave the room, or wherever you were, maybe it was some crap toilet in an airport, I don’t know – and never see her again. But then it was too late, I suppose. Then you were “committed”, as you are supposed to be to me – well, you were supposed to be to me – but that’s all gone now. I could just about forgive the drinking and the absences and the selfishness and the sheer lack of awareness of anything to do with me. I know you didn’t really want children but I did. I wanted two or three, in fact, but now of course off you go and fuck someone else and soon there’ll probably be a whole nursery of little Douglas Hendersons popping out all over the place and how do you think I’ll feel? How do you think I’ll live with that?’
‘It won’t be like that.’
‘No? What will it be like then? Do you think we can just carry on after this and pretend nothing has happened – or that you could go on seeing her? Perhaps we could have her round to dinner and you could compare the two of us face to face. Tell you what: let’s invite the whole family round. You could turn it into a reality show on television. Wife or Mistress – the Family Decides. Then the public could vote. You’ll probably need the money by the time I’ve finished.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘I’m not being ridiculous.’
‘I wish I hadn’t told you.’
‘Well, it’s a bit late for that.’
‘Couldn’t you tell that something was wrong?’
‘Of course I could tell. I just didn’t expect you to be such a walking cliché. I thought you had a bit more muscle than that. A bit more moral fibre. But clearly you haven’t.’
Emma sat down on the chair by the window.
Douglas hoped that it had all come out and there would be no more.
‘At least we’ve talked about it.’
‘And that’s all we’re going to talk. I can’t face speaking to you any more. You’ll have to do it through lawyers from now on.’
‘Already?’
‘Yes, already, Douglas. You don’t expect me to forgive you, do you?’
‘No. But isn’t it a bit soon for lawyers?’
‘No. It’s a bit late. I should have seen it coming, found out sooner, acted more quickly, and then I would have been spared all this crap.’
‘It’s not crap.’
‘It is crap.’
‘Emma…’
‘Don’t you “Emma” me.’
She stood up and started pacing the room.
‘Don’t you dare use that wheedling tone with me. Don’t even think you can get out of this. This is it. Just forget that we were ever married or that you ever had a chance or that you ever thought you could ever talk your way out of this.’
‘Don’t be like this. Please…’
‘Like what?’
‘So fierce.’
‘Well, I am fierce. If you don’t like it you should just carry on and get out.’
‘You really mean it?’
‘Of course I mean it. I’ve never meant anything more in my life.’
Douglas checked into a Travelodge. He visited a series of pubs, read the newspapers without concentrating, and drank throughout the day.
Perhaps, he thought, he could get a taxi to the airport, catch a flight down to London and see Julia? He could even turn up at her work, surprise her, and tell her that all he wanted to do was to start a new life with her.
Perhaps not.
In an alley behind a restaurant he could see a woman pouring discarded mussel shells from plastic boxes into black bin liners.
‘I’m taking them back to the sea,’ she said.
She looked like a younger version of his wife.
Douglas thought back to when they were first married and how contented they had been. Emma used to sing as she moved through the house, unaware that he was listening.
When I last rade down Ettrick
The winds were shifting, the storm was waking,
The snow was drifting, my heart was breaking,
For we never again were to ride thegither,
In sun or storm on the mountain heather,
When I last rade down Ettrick.
Douglas realised, as he walked past the dark-red sandstone tenements, uncertain where he was going or what he was doing, that he had ruined his life.
Emma had warned him that without children they had needed to find an even greater determination to love each other. There was no one else, nor was there going to be. They had to share absolute trust.
He remembered an evening years ago with his brothers, a kitchen supper with red wine and lasagne back in the family home. Angus and Tessa had been at the table with Jack and Maggie. There had been singing and Tessa had said how happy the evening had been, with the Henderson brothers together and at ease in each other’s company, and Emma had said yes, she knew it had been a good and rare night. It was that special, she said, and they had to promise to remember it, because such times didn’t happen very often.
They had laughed and they had been happy; confident and free to say whatever they wanted. They were protected from the world by family and by companionship.
What a privilege it was, Emma had said, to be cocooned in this way.
But then she had stopped and begun to clear away the plates because even at the time, in the midst of all that happiness, she had known that it was only fleeting and she couldn’t bear it.
You can never rely on these moments, she said. They don’t come round very often and you can’t anticipate them or expect them to last.
They were unexpected gifts, temporary moments of respite, and even then they weren’t always enough to sustain you through the bad times; because, as she had said even then, you can never trust a man not to throw away his own happiness.
Fifteen
Jack tried to think what it would have been like if he had done things differently; if he had persuaded Krystyna to stay, or thrown everything in his life to one side and gone wherever she was going.
He called her mobile but it was switched to automatic answer. He tried to work out what he felt:
Fear. Krystyna had never got on the bus at all but had hitched a lift and been abducted. Perhaps he should report her missing. It seemed a bit melodramatic.
Anger. She was back in Poland, thinking of no one other than herself. It was thoughtless, ungrateful and selfish.
Jealousy. There was another person with whom she had been in love all along; not Sandy, not Jack, but someone so secret that he could not be mentioned.
He did not know if he loved her, missed her, or hated her for disrupting his life. Krystyna could do anything and go anywhere, losing herself in the world, whereas Jack had withdrawn into solitude.
He knew that it would be so much easier if he forgot all about her and concentrated on his work. He returned to his desk:
Respice
Look Back
Item quam nil ad nos anteacta vetustas
Temporis aeterni fuerit quam nascimur ante
Hoc igitur speculum nobis natura futuri
Temporis exponit post mortem denique nostram.
The everlasting time before our birth
Has been to us as nothing; this, therefore, is the mirror
Which nature holds up to us, showing the time to come
When we at last must die.
Numquid ibi horribile apparet? Num triste videtur quicquam?
Is there anything terrible in that? Is there anything sad?
Non omni somno secures exstat
Is it not
The safest sleep?
He thought of Krystyna and then of Sandy lying in the road: the safest sleep. He turned back a few hundred lines.
Non potius vitae finem facis atque laboris?
Why not rather make an end of life and trouble?
He had avoided the word ‘labour’ but was ‘trouble’ sufficient? A ‘troubled mind’. Could that really describe Sandy’s emotional state? And what about Krystyna? He looked at another translation.
If life is only wretchedness, why try to add more to it?
Why not make a decent end?
He wanted to find words that expressed the fear, the anxiety, and the terror: not of dying but of living. He remembered that Creech, one of the commentators on Lucretius, had once noted on his manuscript, NB. Must hang myself when I have finished.
He did not know if he would ever see Krystyna again.
A few days later Maggie called to say that she was coming to Edinburgh. She wanted to see him and there were things they needed to talk about. Jack wondered how much he would have to tell her and how long it would take.
He chose a neutral venue, an Indian restaurant, near the university.
Maggie was surprised at the choice.
‘Are you sure? You don’t even like Indian food.’
‘I thought it would make a change.’
‘You know how it doesn’t agree with you.’
‘It’s the only place I know that’s quiet.’
‘I thought we might be going somewhere Polish.’
‘Annie’s spoken to you?’
‘There’s so much you haven’t told me, Jack. I’m really shocked. To keep it all from me…’
‘It’s over now.’
‘I’m not sure these things are ever over.’
The restaurant was dark and deserted, with red-and-gold-lacquered chairs, painted screens and a ceiling that looked like the dance floor of a 1970s discotheque.
Maggie had lost weight and wore a fitted grey dress with yellow stripes. Jack thought it looked as if it had been made out of curtain material. He noticed that it was cut lower than the clothes she had worn when they were married. He assumed she was going on to something more important later. Perhaps Guy was waiting for her.
She ordered confidently: dosa with dhal, Hyder Abadi, and a glass of lassi. Jack was less familiar with Indian food and plumped for an onion bhaji and marinated chicken tikka masala. He really didn’t want to think about this. He was in the wrong restaurant with the wrong person at the wrong time. To make it worse, the waiters were behaving as if it was their wedding anniversary. Yes, he would have a bottle of Cobra.
Maggie spoke brightly. Jack remembered how her voice was always higher when she was trying to pretend not to be nervous.
‘Annie told me what had happened,’ she began. ‘I couldn’t understand what you were doing until she mentioned the accident. Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘It wouldn’t have been appropriate. I didn’t want to get you involved.’
‘We used to be married to each other.’
‘I didn’t want to talk to anyone. And I didn’t want to annoy Guy. You know, the ex-husband coming round with a spectacular tragedy just when you were settling down.’
‘That’s very considerate of you. But he wouldn’t have needed to have known.’
‘You mean you have secrets from each other?’
‘No, that’s not what I mean.’
‘What do you mean then?’
‘There’s no need to be aggressive.’
‘I’m not being aggressive. I’m being specific.’
‘Well, it’s good to see you haven’t changed, Jack.’
The starters were served. Maggie was right. It was a mistake to have come to an Indian at lunchtime. Jack wondered if he could escape by two-thirty.
‘How is Guy?’ he asked.
‘Do you really want to know?’
Guy was a sculptor in Bristol. He was older than Maggie with grown-up kids and he had inherited enough money to keep them both going. There was some kind of workshop attached to the house and so he spent most of his time at home. When he had first met him Jack had been surprised how similar he had been to himself and almost questioned Maggie about the wisdom of her departure. It was like trading in a Vauxhall Vectra for a Ford Mondeo. There didn’t seem to be much point.
