A Kiss for the Enemy (62 page)

A long, pacing silence.

‘Marcia, natural feelings or no, I don't think I can – tell
him. It would – it might – destroy his peace of mind, his sense of identity. For what? To get a little emotional satisfaction for myself? To clear the account?'

Marcia looked at him. ‘Something about truth? Something about love?'

Anthony had never heard or seen her so serious. He was shaken. He said,

‘My God, Marcia, I don't know how I'd do it.'

Marcia murmured,

‘Well, you're the person who would best know how Anna would see it. I rather thought, darling Ant, that the two of you shared something worth acknowledging, perpetually. Isn't that right?'

They neared the house.

‘Ant, you're trembling.' She was holding his arm tight. ‘After all these years, fourteen years, you call it a long time but you're trembling!'

‘Well, why not?' He pulled his arm away, his voice unsteady too. How could even Marcia understand what once had been?

‘Why can't it thunder and get it over? It's ghastly weather, July at its worst. What an awful evening to have to dress up and go out to dinner.'

‘They're your friends, not mine. And it would be just as sticky if we stayed here. Anyway, we'll probably get a good dinner. Anthony says the Prendergasts live very well.'

‘I'm sure of it,' said Robert Anderson. ‘Peter Prendergast would be a mean man if he didn't. He's made that company from nothing and he's made it huge. But I never relished acting for them. He's a shallow, disagreeable man, for all his business acumen. I've never envied Anthony working for him.'

Marcia recognized the evening as one which Robert had decided not to enjoy. There were many such. They had few serious rows. They simply liked different things and agreed on few subjects. Once she had found this stimulating.

‘Robert contradicts me, flatly, it's splendid. He makes me think.'

Now she admitted dully to herself that their minds, their sensibilities were out of harmony. Marcia found it difficult to
make conversation without Robert regarding it, all too patently, as inaccurate, misguided, or merely silly. And Robert no doubt found his own remarks treated with similar irritation or incomprehension. People, too, they had difficulty in sharing. Even Anthony, once so close a friend as well as so beloved a brother, could be a subject for disagreement. They were not, she knew well, really disagreeing about other things, other people. Behind every chilly or barbed exchange they were, painfully, saying things, hurt, hurting things about themselves.

Any reference to Marcia's life in Germany, to her buried wartime years, brought irritated reactions from Robert which aroused exaggerated responses in her. She had only to mention Arzfeld, for instance,

‘I suppose they shut their eyes to what was going on, like most people, quick to denounce it afterwards. Or they were just frightened –'

‘No, it wasn't exactly like that.' Kaspar's grave, hopeless face. Frido's angry stories. No, it wasn't exactly like that.

‘Of course it must have been pretty demoralizing to live in an atmosphere where an indiscreet word could land you in a camp or worse. We can't imagine it.' Robert was trying to be fair, judicious.

‘You shouldn't exaggerate, Robert. It was wartime, after all. People in every country accept that you have to be discreet, loyal, keep your mouth shut, in wartime.'

‘Not much like that here. But you wouldn't know.'

‘Really? What about people who were interned? What about a woman I heard of who was sentenced to five years' penal servitude here for saying Hitler was a good leader, better than Churchill?'

‘Well, it was a monstrous sentiment. Silly sentence, monstrous sentiment.'

Marcia sighed.

Marcia was just forty years old, and as she sat at her dressing table, touched her neck and ears with scent and looked into the glass, she knew that she was still lovely. Her skin was as it had been at twenty, her figure only a little fuller, her eyes as bright. ‘But I laugh less,' she thought. ‘I suppose that's middle age. And I
feel
much less. Maturity? Boredom?' They were well off now. Robert was successful. He worked exceptionally
hard. Their flat, on the second floor of an Eaton Square house, was charming.

‘Is Anthony going to be there, do you know?' Robert called from his dressing room. ‘He introduced us to the Prendergasts in the first place. I've only had business dealings with the man.'

‘No, Ant's taking several weeks off at Bargate.'

‘Playing at farming for a little.'

Marcia ignored this. ‘What exactly does Prendergast do? I mean, what does his company do?'

‘My dear girl, he's only head of the biggest heavy engineering business this country possesses. He operates world-wide. He's England's answer to Krupp – or what Krupp once most lamentably was. Krupp, Schneider – Creusot, you name it!'

Marcia felt incapable of naming it.

‘Surely you're ready? We ought to go.'

Mrs Peter Prendergast had indicated that it was a large party. She had also conveyed, without saying anything to which exception could be taken, that there would be distinguished people present – a good deal more distinguished than the Robert Andersons. A postcard had requested – and assumed – their acceptance.

‘What she means,' said Robert, frowning, as they drove the short distance to the Prendergast house, ‘is that they'll all be richer. That is the only Prendergast yardstick of distinction.' He looked at Marcia and said, without any change to his serious, ironic tone,

‘One thing's certain. You'll be the prettiest woman there. You look lovely, Marcia.' She smiled, politely rather than with tenderness or gratitude. She said,

‘I rather liked Peter Prendergast the only time I met him. He's got animal attraction. Magnetism.' Marcia knew as she said it, that Robert would feel a critical implication behind the words, imputation that her husband lacked these qualities. She gave an inward sigh. Had the needle been deliberate? She hardly knew. A few minutes later they moved together into the Prendergasts' drawing room.

Marcia felt eyes turning to her, frankly admiring, or surreptitious or lascivious. She knew she still had power. There were few faces she knew in the room, and those few met at
impersonal occasions, attended as Robert's wife. She found herself talking without animation to a flabby-faced man who was determined to take her upper arm to emphasize a point. Two dry martinis ahead he would be difficult to shake clear. Dinner was announced with commendable speed. Sixteen at dinner she reckoned, looking quickly at the table as they moved towards it – sixteen, and everything done very well. Would it be fun to be Prendergast? Suddenly, and as disconcertingly often these days, Marcia felt lonely.

Peter Prendergast called out to them as they edged into the dining room. He had a commanding voice.

‘We're one short to start with, I'm afraid. We've got a guest flying in from Frankfurt and I've just had word his flight was delayed by two hours. The brave chap's coming straight here. He'll be with us soon!'

Marcia heard a man murmur something and Prendergast answer, ‘That's right! Over here for this two-day get-together!'

‘They all know each other,' thought Marcia. ‘They do business with each other, make money from each other, think in the same phrases as each other. And the women are as interested in it as their men. Except me.' She told herself not to be sanctimonious and turned to her neighbour on the right, a grey-haired, pale man, who eyed her with appreciation. He was, however, almost immediately captured by Mrs Prendergast on whose left he sat. To Marcia's left was an empty chair, the guest from Frankfurt presumably. She felt happy at the prospect of a little peace from pointless conversation, filling the air, passing the time. Prendergast food, probably excellent, would best be enjoyed without the distraction of a neighbour. Marcia felt unslighted, content. Long might it continue. Long might Herr Rumpelmayer or whoever it was, be delayed in the endless passages of London Airport.

Marcia finished her pâté de foie gras with enjoyment. Trying to catch Robert's eye, she succeeded. He flashed at her a smile so spontaneous and so young that the clouds of sad years parted a little and she smiled back. It hadn't worked – but it was sad it hadn't worked.

Then there was a disturbance behind her chair, Prendergast up from his seat, moving about, talking rather loudly. The table shone, polished mahogany reflecting silver, glass,
candles, faces rosy, unnaturally charming in the candlelight. Behind the row of diners was darkness. Marcia was aware of the empty chair beside her pulled out, then filled by a stranger.

Peter Prendergast's voice said, ‘Bless you for arriving, despite the difficulties. Introductions later. We'll have a long talk after dinner. This is Mrs –' Marcia heard him hesitate, ‘Mrs Anderson. Mrs Anderson, Count Toni Rudberg.'

Ten long minutes went by, a sick sensation in Marcia's stomach. She drank some wine and felt worse. As Toni sat down, Marcia's grey neighbour on the other side claimed her attention. She heard Toni exchanging agreeable nothings about the vagaries of air travel with the lady on his left. A little more wine. Better. Was nobody talking? The room seemed silent.

Marcia heard Toni say, softly, ‘Mrs Anderson, did I hear?'

‘Yes, Count Rudberg. Why are you alive? Nobody told me.'

‘I did not feel I had the right to notify people widely. Not until I again got accustomed to life. I returned from the dead. In 1955. Adenauer did a deal with Stalin and got us survivors home. We had no expectations, no hopes, no skills. Germany was recovering. They told us we'd missed the worst.'

‘Nothing, I imagine, to what you'd had.'

‘Who can compare these things? Marcia, you again! Do you live in London?'

‘Let's talk about what you're doing now, and, if you can bear it, what happened to you then. Not about me.'

Marcia hoped she looked calm, interested, perhaps entertained. Inwardly she was shattered. She looked at Toni, carefully not meeting his eyes, inspecting him, a casual, passing glance. His hair was white. She remembered that he was born in 1909 and that his birthday was in the summer. Apart from the hair, he looked extraordinarily unchanged. There were lines on the brown face, lines at the corner of the mouth, an expression of seriousness. She guessed that he often wore spectacles now. There was less easy assurance, perhaps. But he was amazing! She heard herself saying – softly –

‘You were twelve years there? Twelve years a prisoner?'

‘Just under thirteen. The first eight in Solitary, as I was in a special category. General Staff.'

‘
Eight years in solitary confinement
! Toni! Did they do that to everyone like you?'

‘No. Some were shot, of course. Some were persuaded to join various curious organizations, to produce pro-Soviet propaganda for German soldiers. They had rather comfortable lives in consequence. Privileged.'

‘Did you feel tempted?'

‘To be more comfortable, to save my life, my health, my sanity – yes, of course. But they were opportunists – or simpletons. I knew that ordinary German soldiers would despise them. With reason.'

‘What happened to people like that?' He shrugged his shoulders. Across the table Marcia heard a man call out to her right-hand neighbour some fierce opinions about General de Gaulle who had, the previous month, been voted into office in France. She helped herself to a dish. Toni said without great interest,

‘Some are in positions of authority in the East. They've seen the Communist light. Even a few rigorously educated Prussian noblemen have seen the Communist light, been converted, become enthusiasts. Moral seriousness is a dreadful thing.'

This was more like the old Toni.

‘And what do
you
do, now, Toni?' Something strange had been teasing her and she identified it. ‘Toni! Your English! It's perfect! It – it never used to be.'

He laughed. ‘I've worked very hard. You see I'm a business man now. I have to go to and from America all the time. One can't do business in Britain or America except in English and I've learned and learned. Do I talk American?'

‘A little. Nicely.'

‘And now I'm going to be coming and going to England all the time. This is my fourth visit. But they've only been for a few days each. I like your country very much!'

‘How did you get your job, Toni?'

‘Through a man I was with in prison.'

‘Like Anthony!'

‘Anthony?'

‘My brother. He was a prisoner in Germany.'

‘Ah!' Toni did some digesting and remembering. Had there not been a story? He looked full at Marcia.

‘Marcia, I always wondered on my short visits where you were, whether you survived the war, what had happened. I longed to discover but I feared as well. So I did nothing. Now I meet you – in a tycoon's house. Do you say “tycoon” here?'

‘We certainly do.'

‘Is your husband a tycoon?'

‘No, he's a very clever lawyer. That's him, opposite. He's done business for our host at times. He's an intelligent and charming man.'

‘I'm sure of it. Have you now any contact with the von Arzfeld family?'

‘I see Lise at least every other year. She's coming over here later this month. How long will you be in England?'

‘This time only three days. I shall be coming here regularly after next month. In September I will be here. Perhaps for quite a long time. May I telephone?'

‘In September?'

‘No, Marcia, not in September. Tomorrow. Or the next day. Or the day after.'

‘I'd like you to meet Robert. My husband.'

‘Of course. Now I know your name I can discover your address, your telephone number. You live in London? There is a book.'

Marcia nodded.