All the Beauty of the Sun (14 page)

‘You, I think.'

Paul winced against the smoke as he inhaled. ‘Always smiling isn't natural. They might put you away.'

‘If they caught me.'

Paul looked down; he seemed to be making a decision about whether he could be bothered to pick up his cup or not. He did, saying, ‘Do you have an ashtray?'

‘No. Use your saucer.'

‘I don't like to.'

‘I don't smoke, Paul. Not really. I don't have all the
accoutrements.'

Paul snorted, an odd, dismissive sound he wouldn't have thought him capable of, giving him the uncomfortable insight that he really, truly didn't know him very well at all. Afraid that this mood Paul seemed to be slipping into would make him even more of a stranger, he got up and fetched one of his most crazed and chipped plates. ‘Use this.'

‘I'm sorry I smoke so much.'

‘I don't mind.'

‘Then you're the only one who hasn't minded so far.'

‘In that case you don't have to go any further – you can stop with me and no one will have to mind ever again.'

He was still standing in front of him, holding out the plate, and Paul looked up at him, frowning. ‘It's tempting.'

‘Be tempted.'

‘Why do you like me?'

Edmund laughed, dismayed at the self-pity in his voice: this wasn't Paul; perhaps it was Francis. He was sure the man in the portrait had called him Francis. ‘What kind of question is that?'

‘A bad one.' He looked down at his cup. ‘You're right to look at me in that way. Edmund …' He looked up at him again. ‘Sit down, don't tower over me.'

They sat in silence, a little space between them that caused Edmund's whole side to ache with the strain of not touching Paul. The Canaletto was directly in his line of vision now, too, and he stared at it, thinking of Paul in a wintery Venice with someone else.

His room was taking on the alien smell of cigarette smoke, and although the cigarettes Paul smoked were particularly expensive and not as disgusting as they might be, he got up and opened the window a crack. As he sat down again Paul said, ‘I got lost in Venice. I walked out of the hotel and couldn't find my way back. There was a mist from the sea, you could hardly see a thing, and I couldn't remember the name of the hotel to ask directions … I panicked, I was so frightened. He found me. I hadn't gone so far. I was crying my eyes out, like a baby …' He laughed brokenly and looked down at his cup.

Edmund waited. He waited and swore to himself he wouldn't speak until Paul spoke, Paul or Francis or whoever this person was who seemed to want to confess so much. He waited, he even sipped his tea, he even thought about the Canaletto, how he had knocked down the seller's price a little. He wouldn't think about Paul crying so pathetically.

At last, flicking cigarette ash on to the plate, Paul glanced at him. He said, ‘His name is Patrick, Edmund. We have been together for a long time. We met during the last few months of the war; he was my sergeant …' he laughed, the same broken, self-conscious noise he had made a moment ago. ‘
My sergeant
.
My rock.
He did everything, ran everything, but he had to call me sir. He used to make
sir
sound like an endearment.
Sir, are you all right?
' He laughed again. ‘I was, until I met him, but then there was Patrick, asking if I was all right and I realised I wasn't all right any more and I couldn't cope any more, not without him. So I gave up. Caved in. And I know I was weak and cowardly but I just couldn't seem to help myself.'

Paul had returned his gaze to the
Return of the
Bucintoro
. For once his cigarette was ignored between his fingers, his lips parted as if he was about to say something else, something he couldn't quite find the right words for; he blinked and his hand went to his eye, and it seemed that the right words still eluded him because he turned to Edmund and frowned, as if they were schoolboys asked some tricky question. Edmund felt that he should say something. But the only words that occurred to him were, ‘Buck up, old man.' He would sound like an idiot. Floundering he said, ‘You don't have to tell me any of this – none of my business, after all,' and his voice sounded false to him, a bad imitation of his father's.

Searching his face, Paul said, ‘I should have kept quiet, shouldn't I?'

‘No!' He was blustering now, and he laughed, a harsh, desperate noise that had him getting to his feet in a rush of cringing embarrassment. ‘No, of course not – you can tell me anything –'

‘I've said enough, I think.' On a rush he added, ‘I've been thinking about staying in London. How would that be, do you think?'

‘I don't know –'

‘I could start again. I could find a place to live, a studio to work in … And if we were discreet and careful … And now you look horrified.'

‘No –'

‘I've said too much. It was just … I don't know … I wanted you to know, and now you look like you want to run away, as though you have finally come to your senses.'

‘No, no I don't think so.'

Taking his hand, Paul said, ‘Don't think so, eh?' He smiled unhappily and looked down at their hands clasped together. ‘We should just go to bed, shouldn't we? Not talk.' Looking up at him he said, ‘Is that all right?'

‘Yes, of course.'

Edmund went to the window to draw the curtains; catching sight of himself in the dark glass he thought how pale he looked. He turned to speak to Paul, only to close his mouth hard on the words. Paul was undressing. Tugging the curtains closed, Edmund sat down on the chair and began to untie his shoelaces.

Chapter Sixteen

D
ANIEL SAID
, ‘I
NEED
to speak to you.'

In his shirtsleeves in his garden, wondering where to begin on the weeds that had grown up under the close protection of the viciously thorny roses, George turned to see Iris's husband standing over him. At once he turned back to the roses, concentrating on the grey thorns that grew thickly all along their stems. He felt as though his heart might break out of his chest, a cowardly feeling, one, he supposed, that adulterers must endure from time to time. Only he hadn't expected this feeling so soon; he had hoped that a fair god might have given him a little more time with Iris. He should have known that there was only Daniel's god, vengeful and pedantic.

He took off his spectacles, folded them and placed them in his shirt pocket; he didn't want them broken; nor did he want to appear older and weaker than he was. Turning to face him he said, ‘Shall we go inside?'

‘Yes. That would be for the best, I think. More private. I think you will want this to be kept private.'

George looked up at those few windows that overlooked his garden. He wasn't on speaking terms with any of his neighbours, not since Paul's conviction; it didn't matter to him at all if they witnessed his further humiliation. But he supposed it mattered to Daniel, and he owed him privacy, at least.

He led him across the lawn that needed mowing, past the summer house that needed repainting, up the steps to the terrace that needed the sludge of last year's leaves removing, this year's horse-chestnut blossom, twigs and moss swept from its corners. He led him through the French doors to the dining room he never used, where the dust had settled thick enough for the mice to leave prints, where the sun had worn holes in the curtains. Grace had chosen those curtains, he realised, as he led Daniel Whittaker along the passage and into his study. Grace had asked him if he thought they were ugly. He wondered why he thought of this now; it wasn't one of those few memories of her that came most often to him. He remembered Grace because of Iris, of course. She had made all kinds of memories resurface, as though he was reconnecting with his life – coming back to life
.
And now his resurrection was to end. He imagined telling Whittaker that he couldn't stop him from seeing Iris – and that they were running away together; how defiant he would sound, how idiotic.

In his study, where the grate was still grey with last night's ashes, a newspaper, tea cup and crumb-strewn plate still on his desk, the curtains still closed, George motioned that Daniel should sit down and went to draw back the curtains. The sun would shine into Daniel's face, disadvantaging him. He opened the window because the room was warm and stuffy and he was ashamed of this stuffiness as much as he was ashamed of anything. He felt horribly resigned, and also that he might cry, once left alone.

Sitting at his desk, he cleared the cup and plate to one side and his voice was quite calm as he said, ‘How may I help, Daniel?'

He saw Whittaker's face become a little more set, a little grimmer: Daniel didn't like him to use his Christian name. He should call him Reverend; as the father of a criminal he had no right to be on such familiar terms; George knew Daniel thought he used his name to irk him; Daniel was right.

He was about to repeat his name, when Whittaker said sharply, ‘I hear you went to see your son in London?'

George wondered what this had to do with Iris and him; perhaps he was playing for time, unable to bring himself to the point. He realised he was holding his breath and exhaled. ‘Yes. I went to see Paul. There was an exhibition of his paintings.'

‘I'm not interested.'

‘Then why mention him, Daniel?'

‘Because he's the reason I'm here. How long will he stay in London?'

‘I don't know –'

‘Has he any intention of coming here?' When George didn't reply he said, ‘You must see that he doesn't.'

‘Must I?'

‘Yes. Because if he comes anywhere near my family again I will kill him.'

George laughed. ‘You'll kill him?'

‘Yes, I will. I will not have him shaming my daughter again – making her cry with shame
again
. If I ever set eyes on him –'

‘Daniel, go home. I think enough has been said, don't you?'

‘Give me your word he won't come here.'

‘No, Daniel. This is his home.' More gently, because his relief allowed him to be kind, he said, ‘He won't try to see Margot. He understands what he did to her.'

Whittaker looked astonished. ‘Understands? He
understands
? No, he doesn't! I almost lost her! For months she didn't eat, didn't sleep – I thought she'd cry herself to death … Her mother and I …' His hands became fists. ‘Her mother and I had to see to her as if she was a baby again …' He brought his fist down hard on the desk, making the cup jump in its saucer. ‘He doesn't understand anything! And I would like to know where he is … I would like to know so that I can
make
him understand.'

George had an idea that he should stand up, walk around his desk and put a steadying hand on Whittaker's shoulder, just as if he was a patient. He would say, ‘I'm sorry,' knowing how little he could do to help when a man was as angry as this. He would say, ‘I understand,' as sometimes he did, but the word would only make the man more furious.

All the same, he did understand Whittaker's anger, sometimes he even shared it; his anger at Paul could flare up like a boil because he had come to love his daughter-in-law – she was tender and patient, the wife he would have chosen for poor, shattered Robbie; more than that, he had loved her because she loved Paul and seemed to want him and because Paul seemed to love her. Sometimes he had wondered if Paul wasn't simply a very good actor. Most of the time he was just enormously relieved: he had been wrong about Paul, or at least only partly right. The day he had found out he had been mostly right he had wanted to give him the kind of good hiding another father might have meted out.

Getting up, George went to the window and drew the curtain so that the sun wasn't in Daniel's face. He sat down and almost used his name again, only to stop himself and say, ‘Reverend, I've talked to Paul and I believe he won't come to Thorp again.'

‘You see that he doesn't.' Whittaker stood up. He was a big man in a black cassock, stooped a little now, his grey hair a little too long, his hands knobbly and arthritic; he had aged since the war as they all had, sagging into their grief. Robbie had liked this man:
‘He doesn't talk any guff, Dad.'
Robbie had gone to Whittaker's church every Sunday during those few fine months after the war. George bowed his head, the familiar panicky grief making him want to rock back and forth in his chair. Instead he clasped the chair's arms; his grief had a peculiar comfort he shouldn't take refuge in, not in front of this man. He should be robust, responsible; he should face his guilt decently; he remembered Iris naked in his bed and said as evenly as he could, ‘I'll see you out, Reverend.'

George turned the lawn mower on its side and stared down at the helix curve of its blades. They were blunt, encrusted with last year's grass. Paul would have cleaned and sharpened and oiled the mower before putting it away last autumn. But Paul hadn't been here to do any of those things. He hadn't been home for years, he would never come home; he had to face this stark truth:
Don't have any hopes for me, Dad.
Such modest hopes he'd had: that his sons would live and be happy.

He pushed the mower back inside the shed, where plant pots and watering cans, trowels and trugs were arranged neatly on the cobwebbed shelves. Hanging from nails on the walls were the spades and forks and hoes, the shears and lawn edger. There was some kind of feed for roses in bottles on the floor, there were canes and pieces of netting and a hessian sack folded neatly beside a bucket. There was the oilcan, its long, fine spout connected by a grey cobweb to a can of linseed beside it. The spider was dead between these two cans, had been for some time, like the butterfly caught up in another web in the corner above the spade, its blue wings still remarkably vivid after so many months. But inside the shed was always dark, there was no chink for the sun to penetrate to wash out the colour, and no one ever went inside any more except him, and then only to fetch the lawn mower once in a while. He must have left the shed door open one late summer evening for the butterfly to become trapped.

He had found Paul in this shed the morning of his trial. He had been rubbing a rag along the blade of the shears and there was the engine-like smell of the lubricating oil he'd used. Paul had been wearing his gardening clothes, a soft, collarless shirt and trousers that were so old he believed they must have belonged to his grandfather. His head was bowed over his task, his face pale in the dim light from the open door, wearing the same expression he'd had since his arrest a few weeks earlier: a kind of surprise that seemed to George to be the seeping out of a deep shock that was otherwise strictly contained. It seemed to him that everything was contained behind this disconcerting expression, all Paul's fear and grief for the life he had just lost, everything he had ever experienced since 1916. Paul had become silent again, just as he had in the months after the war's end. He worked in the garden and in the shed and everywhere was tidy, swept, weeded, pruned, sharpened, and oiled. Even these shears, even their wooden handles, wiped with the oily rag before he hung them on their nail. Paul had turned to him, alerted by the blocking of the light from the doorway. ‘I'm just coming.'

‘It's all right, Paul. Plenty of time.'

‘Yes, but I need to bathe, to shave. I should press my suit. My good shoes need polishing.'

‘I've done it.' He'd attempted to smile. ‘Suit and shoes done, shirt too, and tie. All present and correct.'

‘Thank you.' Paul placed the rag down on the bench he worked at when filling pots with compost and sowing seeds; there was always something he was tending to in here. The bench was clear now, scrubbed down. Paul picked up the rag again and looked around as if wondering where it might best be placed. He stared at it. Absently he repeated, ‘Thank you.'

‘That's all right. Come in now, eh? I'll make you a sandwich.'

‘No. No, I'm not hungry.'

‘You should eat, Paul.' He had stepped inside cautiously, afraid of approaching him, of touching him, of showing any sign of his own anxiety that flapped uselessly around his head, his heart, his guts, keeping him from sleep, from the food he would try to make Paul eat. He was afraid that Paul would collapse, that the police would have to come to carry him to court because they wouldn't allow him to get away with it; they wouldn't let him off just because he was frail and badly damaged and might not survive prison. No, they believed that what he had done was much too bad for any show of leniency. Touching another man's private parts was much too heinous a crime for compassion. They would be on the doorstep to take Paul away because the law's the law, no good coming up with your sob story about your sick son – you-mean-your-sick-in-the-head-son – no good at all.

George remembered how he had taken another step towards Paul, then another, as though he was playing Grandmother's footsteps, and that he had said, ‘Let me take that from you,' and had reached out and taken the rag from his hand, felt its greasy pliability, as though the oil had made something else of it. He saw Paul place both hands flat on the bench, bowing his head, his shoulders, his breathing coming too quickly and too shallowly, and for a moment he'd thought that he couldn't do anything at all but watch him.

He wondered now, these few years later, if his own son had repelled him. But no, that feeling of repulsion couldn't have been true, it couldn't; it had only been his fear that made him pause, even though that fear was so agitating it had never given him a moment to pause before. He
had
only watched Paul, however; he knew he hadn't tried to comfort him immediately; he knew his watching seemed to go on and on, the rag twisted tight in his hands so that he had left oily marks on Paul's back when finally he had pulled him into his arms.

George picked up a cane and swiped at the dead butterfly, knocking it down onto the bench. He stared down at it; one wing had detached from the desiccated body. He'd thought butterflies were meant to turn to dust at such a blow, to become indistinguishable from the ordinary dirt. But that couldn't be, of course; there was substance, still, and the cornflower colour. He found a dustpan and brush under the bench and swept the insect up, the wings fluttering as if such things could never truly give up on flight.

He thought about Iris and her shyness when she undressed for him; she hadn't wanted him to look at her. Not until afterwards, when he held her in his arms and they talked a little, did her body relax against his; and later she put on his dressing gown as though she wore it every day, as though he had seen her wrap it around her naked body every day. He thought of her in his kitchen eating bread and soup and laughing because it occurred to her that he looked like a character from the
Mikado
in the red silk robe he wore. ‘Paul sent it to me one Christmas,' he'd told her, ‘Paul's idea of a joke.' He thought how everything came back to Paul.

He carried the dustpan outside and flung the butterfly onto the lawn, the least he could do; he locked the shed, went into the kitchen and returned the key to its hook beside the back door. At three o'clock Whittaker would be leading mourners up the aisle of his church, climbing the steps of his pulpit to make his funeral address – Iris had told him last night, their last night together before Daniel's return this morning. ‘I'll meet you in the park,' she'd said. ‘We'll have an hour, at least. I'll bring Bobby, if I can.'