All the Beauty of the Sun (18 page)

Paul stepped away from the music shop window. His forehead had left a mark on the glass and he wiped it off with his handkerchief; can't go around leaving marks, some kind of evidence. He walked on, lighting another cigarette as he crossed the road, dodging the buses and the taxis, moving as if he had purpose, somewhere to go like the men and women walking around him and past him, quicker, more purposeful; he should keep up and not think; perhaps think about Edmund, be kind to himself and think about Edmund.

Edmund. What was there to think of except he should confess everything to him, as he'd tried to the night they'd returned from the nightclub. But that night Edmund had worried him – there had been something distant about the boy so that he'd had to keep a tight rein on himself so as not to say too much, although he'd said enough, almost too much.

He was always ready to tell him about Patrick; to speak his name in Edmund's presence had become a compulsion he had to keep in check. But sitting on Edmund's bed he had seen the Canaletto and been transported back to Venice, and the fear he'd felt by the side of that freezing canal he'd felt again: he had lost Patrick and would never find him again and he would die. And so he'd had to talk of Patrick just to remind himself of the life they had together. Yet this talking now seemed a kind of boasting, a nasty little betrayal of both men, even if he didn't believe in the love that both professed so easily.

‘I love you,' Edmund had told him again, after the sex was done with, and he had said all right so that he would be quiet, so that they wouldn't have to talk any more, already ashamed of everything he'd said. And they had sex again, but this time slowly and tenderly, or at least Edmund had been slow and tender, as though he felt he should minister to him as a nurse might, tending wounds that were too painful to be touched without the utmost care. He had only accepted the boy's ministrations passively, his guilt making him useless, until at last Edmund had whispered,
tell me what to do,
and there had been despair in his voice and desperation, as though he was ministering to the dying, and so he had forced himself to respond, to make less of his guilt for Edmund's sake. He stopped him and took over their love making and Edmund had been relieved so that he felt his heart would break for this boy because he was so young, so flawless; more than that, there was something in his eyes he hadn't seen before and he realised that it was fear: perhaps Edmund didn't want to be this man. Yet, this morning, in the bright sunlight, he had seemed happy; he had seemed to want him all the more.

Paul walked on, almost at his hotel now, almost breathless so that he slowed. He thought how he would bathe and put on cologne and dress in clean clothes and polish his shoes so that they shone; and he would look at himself carefully in the full-length mirror set in the wardrobe door and he would part and comb his hair which was too short, which he would allow to grow a little, for Edmund. For Edmund he would look less like a convict; he would put on a show – hadn't this kind of showmanship worked during the war, before he met Patrick? He quickened his pace again, eager to begin this transformation.

Chapter Twenty-two

B
ARNES ASKED
, ‘D
ID YOU
have a nice lunch?'

Edmund grinned. ‘Splendid, thank you.'

‘Splendid? How splendid. Where did you go? I shall go if it's so good.'

‘Only to Bright's.'

Barnes snorted. ‘I'm very pleased you're so easily pleased. Very pleased you're at all pleased, in fact. It seems lately that the gloom of the past months has lifted. Hoorah.'

Glancing at him from shelving a pile of books, Edmund said, ‘Do you know places around Newcastle, south of Newcastle?'

‘
Everywhere
is south of Newcastle.'

‘No, seriously … I suppose I mean towns around there … You're from the north, aren't you?'

‘I'm from Leeds. A place which is, undoubtedly, south of Newcastle. Why the interest?'

‘No reason.'

‘He could be talking about Durham, of course.'

Edmund kept his eyes on the books. ‘He?'

‘The man you're trying not to talk about. The very gorgeous man I saw you with the other night. Come to think of him, he did have a very
northern
air. Rather dangerous-looking, I think. A northern Barbarian.'

Edmund felt his face colour. He had put all the books on the shelves, straightened them, there was nothing left to do; unable to go on just staring at the spines, he brushed past Barnes and went to the shop counter. A customer came in and he almost leapt on the man, serving him with an enthusiasm he had never found for his work before. All the time he sensed Barnes watching him. When the customer had gone he made himself say, ‘He's just a friend.'

Barnes laughed as though this was genuinely funny.

‘Listen –'

‘Edmund, it's all right. No one thinks any less of you, actually the reverse. So, tell me, what did you think of the singer in the club? He's overrated in my opinion. Good dress sense, though, beautiful bias-cut frocks.' Barnes came to stand a little closer to him. Gently he said, ‘Tell me to be quiet if you will, but I do have to say be careful. I've known men like that, all charm one minute and the next … well … Maybe next he'll do more than black your eye.'

Edmund laughed in astonishment. ‘He didn't, that wasn't him –'

‘Gosh, we are living a busy life.'

‘It's not like that.'

Barnes patted his arm. ‘I'm only saying. If it wasn't him who blacked your eye then it had something to do with him.' He sighed. ‘I know the way of it, Edmund. I've been around too long. No doubt he's married. Men like him – good-looking, hard-faced – are as faithless as can be.'

‘He's not married.'

Barnes snorted. ‘Sure about that, are you?' He sighed. ‘All right, that's enough out of us both. Fetch the books in from the front. Let's make a head start on closing up.'

That lunchtime Paul had been waiting for him in Bright's, sitting at a table near the door. As he'd sat down opposite him, Paul said, ‘I've ordered egg and chips twice. Be quick to tell the man if you want something else.'

‘No, that's fine.' He'd glanced at Bright behind the counter, all twenty stone of him, his apron greasy as ever, his sleeves rolled up to reveal the smudgy anchors tattooed on his forearms. What had he made of Paul? Nothing, he supposed; he had to keep reminding himself that not everyone looked at him as he did, or as Barnes did. He imagined Paul actually blacking his eye, finally turning all that pent-up anger on him. He couldn't imagine defending himself.

Paul had said, ‘How was your morning?'

‘Fine.' He'd smiled at him and because Bright's back was turned he risked touching his hand. ‘Yours?'

‘I went to the National Gallery.'

‘You didn't have much time – you could spend a week in there –'

‘Then maybe we'll go back together. Take a tent and a camping stove.'

Paul had shaved; he had bathed, just as he said he would; Edmund could just about smell the delicious scent of him above that of frying chips. He looked as polished and immaculate as he had looked on the steps of St Paul's, when he'd had to stop himself grinning with pleasure at the sight of him. This was the dressed-up, detached Paul, although this incarnation had a slight variation, like an extra pin tuck on an evening shirt: this one made jokes and smiled back at him and touched his foot with his under the table. Quietly, smiling, Paul had said, ‘What time do you finish work?' and Edmund had at once had the beginning of an erection.

Lifting up a box of books outside the shop, Edmund thought how Paul had finished his meal, all but a few of the chips. ‘How can you leave chips, for God's sake?'

‘You eat them.' Paul had lit a cigarette and grinned at him. ‘You're a growing boy.'

Don't look at me like that, he had wanted to say, or speak with that inflection; don't be funny in that queer's way.

Carrying a box of books inside, he stopped short, the box heavy in his arms; he concentrated on its weight, the bulk of it hard against him. Barnes was queer. His friend Andrew was queer. The men in that club were queer. And Paul. The box of books might have been empty, weightless, he could only think of this, the idea that he didn't think of himself as anything like them, like Barnes, like Andrew; like Paul. He could almost laugh with the absurdity of it. He thought of his father telling him about French letters and scrupulous girls; he thought of Ann, but the fact that he had made love to her seemed absurd too; his relationship with her belonged to a life he was walking away from, as though it was a room he'd stopped renting.

He put the box of books down and stared at it. He thought of Paul who was ordinary, really, a man he would have passed on the street and not seen because he was so undistinguished, a slight, insubstantial man. Paul didn't even behave in ways that would cause him to despise him; the way certain types of effeminate boys had behaved at school. And if Paul did behave like those boys, it was only sometimes. He thought about those sometimes: how could he love a
sometimes
man? How could he love a man? He must be mistaken. How could he have made such a mistake, as though he didn't know himself, his own body, his own heart and mind?

Barnes had come outside and was watching him.

‘Edmund?'

‘I'm sorry. I have to go.'

‘Wait.' Barnes caught his arm. ‘Edmund … Listen, think about what you're doing.'

He shrugged him off. ‘It's none of your business.'

‘He's a user, Edmund.'

‘I don't know what you're talking about.'

‘No. All right.' Suddenly he said, ‘It's just that I like you, Edmund. I do. And when I saw you with such an obviously self-centred –'

‘As I say, I don't know what you're talking about.'

Barnes sighed. ‘Then I'll just say this – we're not all like him. Some of us –
most
of us – are faithful and honest.'

Despite himself, Edmund said, ‘You don't know anything about him.'

‘I know what's written all over his face. I know …' More vehemently, he went on, ‘I just know, that's all. Don't let him eat your heart out.'

Edmund laughed; he had never felt so much scorn for another man. ‘
Eat my heart out
? For Christ's sake –'

Barnes picked up a box of books. ‘Go, if you want. Throw yourself at him. With a bit of luck he'll be so appalled at your enthusiasm he'll fuck off before he's completely wasted you.'

Walking towards Paul's hotel, Edmund suppressed the urge to go back to the shop and have it out with Barnes. He imagined grabbing the man by his lapels, pushing him up against a wall of bookcases, lifting him off his feet in his outrage. He thought he knew him! Barnes thought he knew everything about him and Paul just from seeing them together in that nightclub. Edmund slowed his pace; he was breathless with anger. He glanced back toward the shop and saw a customer go in. He couldn't cause such a scene. No one he respected ever caused scenes – such bad form. He thought of his father, always so calm, never losing his temper. As far as he could guess his father had never felt like this, so full of rage it was all he could do not to punch a wall.

His father had said, ‘I'll give you a year, Edmund. A year to do just as you like – to paint, if you must, but to be out from under the wing.' He'd smiled. ‘Make mistakes – tilt at those windmills, eh? And then we'll see. If after this year you would still prefer to go to art school instead of Oxford, well, so be it.'

He hadn't painted for weeks. Since he'd met Paul he hadn't even thought about painting, or about anything but him. He had thought one time after they'd made love, when Paul was relaxed and not so waspishly edgy, that he and Paul might discuss art together.
Art
! He almost laughed. What kind of discussion would that be? A painful discussion, awkward and faltering and exposing them both as frauds: Paul because he tried too hard and him because he didn't try hard enough.

Edmund drew breath in an effort to steady himself. He thought about Paul's paintings, seen so briefly at that exhibition. Perhaps they were better than he remembered; he didn't like to think about it because perhaps they were worse. And perhaps Paul really was worthless; he knew he was faithless. He thought of Patrick – he knew this man, the noble, long-suffering lover, so much an archetype that he could believe Paul had invented him.

He should go back to his room, be alone to think: he hadn't been alone for days – Paul had taken over his life, taken over his thoughts, invaded him like a virus, leaving him weak. He should go home, would if he was sensible. Instead, he walked on, towards Paul's hotel.

Chapter Twenty-three

T
HE RECEPTIONIST SAID
, ‘N
O
, sir, we have no Mr Harris staying with us.'

‘Yes, yes you have. He told me he was staying here, at the Queen's Hotel. Please, please check again. Paul Harris.'

The man glanced down at his ledger, a brief glance, he had already checked after all. ‘No sir. Not even a Mr
Paul
Harris.'

George looked at Iris. She was holding Bobby in her arms because he was tired, his head against her shoulder, she was smiling and murmuring in his ear, not panicked as George was, not frantically wondering what to do. Desperately he said, ‘I know he said this is his hotel, it's so near to the gallery … The Queen's … This is the Queen's?'

‘Yes sir.'

‘Listen, he's a young man, slight …' How could he describe his son; he looked to Iris, but she was setting Bobby down, steadying him, taken up with him. On one breath he said, ‘He has a false eye …'

‘Oh. We have a gentleman … with … yes, but his name is Mr Law. Francis Law.'

George felt as though he might collapse with relief. ‘Yes. Mr Law. It's a name he uses …' The receptionist raised his eyebrows. Beside him, Iris touched his hand.

‘Perhaps we could book a room, George. Bobby's so tired.'

He looked down at his grandson who had been so good on the train, a child who hardly ever said a word, still less asked a question, trusting these two adults who had whisked him away from his mother. George had a sense that the world had stopped behaving as it should; he had stepped outside his life and he was lost and if Bobby started to cry for Margot he would cry too; Iris would have to contend with both of them, man and boy.

He crouched down in front of Bobby. ‘Well, we're here …' He couldn't think what else to say, only lifted him into his arms. Turning to the receptionist, he said, ‘Do you have a room for the three of us?'

‘Yes, I think so, sir.' The man looked down at his book again and George thought of St Peter at the gates of heaven and wanted to laugh, a feeling of hysteria rising inside him. ‘A double room, we can put up a bed for your son. What name is it?'

‘Harris,' Iris said. ‘Mr and Mrs Harris.'

She had been there, on the station platform, holding Bobby's hand. He'd thought only that she had come to see him off, not seeing her suitcase at first. When she'd told him of her plans he had only stared at her.

She had told Daniel she was going to her aunt's in Carlisle, taking Bobby because Margot was tired and ill with morning sickness, and Margot was grateful. There, all arranged: tell the same lie to everyone and you won't be caught out. ‘And I think Paul should see Bobby one last time, perhaps we owe him that.' She'd taken his hand. ‘Besides, I can't let you go yet.'

‘What if he finds out?'

She had shrugged.

As they travelled on the train, he had thought about that shrug and wondered at it. She had caught him watching her and smiled and didn't seem to be surprised at all at her own audacity. He thought how marvellous she was and had laughed, turning away to look out of the train window because she was too marvellous for words. He had seen his reflection in the glass and hardly recognised himself.

George sat Bobby on the reception desk and signed the hotel's registration card. The receptionist smiled and said, ‘Here's Mr Law now, sir.'

Iris said, ‘I'll take Bobby up to our room, George. You talk to Paul.'

George took a step towards his son, afraid that Paul might faint with the shock of seeing them. There was a couch opposite the reception desk, and he took Paul's arm to lead him to it, but Paul shrugged him off, staring at the stairs that Iris and Bobby had just ascended out of sight. He made to follow them but George said quickly, ‘Wait. We'll give Iris time to settle him.'

He looked at him. ‘I need to see him now.'

‘Paul, think a little about what you might say to him first.'

‘
Say
?' He seemed to panic. ‘What shall I say? Will he recognise me, do you think?'

George hesitated. ‘No. No, I don't think so.'

‘Because they told him I was dead …' He shook his head as if to clear it. His fingers went to his eye and he glanced back towards the doors on to the street. ‘I don't want to frighten him –'

‘You won't!' George laughed as though the idea of Bobby being afraid of Paul was preposterous, even as he knew that the child would be afraid of this man. He felt as though he was seeing Paul for the first time as a stranger might see him, perhaps even as Daniel had seen him: a highly strung, unpredictable boy. Gently he said, ‘Paul, try to be calm –'

‘Calm? You do this to me and say I should be calm? Is Margot here too?'

‘No, she doesn't know –'

Paul's voice rose in alarm. ‘She'll be worried!'

‘No, she knows he's safe with his grandmother. Paul … Iris and I thought you should see him.'

Paul slumped down onto the couch. He glanced towards the stairs and then back to him. ‘I wouldn't have recognised him. He's grown up.'

‘Still a baby –'

‘No. A little boy. He'll wonder who I am. What will I say to him?'

George sat down beside him, lost for words. He hadn't expected to feel so deflated, so utterly foolish. He'd been thinking only of himself, himself and Iris, not even Iris alone but how she was with him, away from her ordinary, responsible life. He hadn't thought of Paul, still less of Bobby. Ashamed, he said, ‘I'm sorry.'

‘I want to run away.' Paul laughed painfully. ‘And I want to go to him now and crush him to me –' He looked again to the door out on to the street. ‘I should go – if you're staying here I'll find another hotel – best if I go. Do you think so? Do you think I should leave?'

George gazed at him; he saw the child he once was, given to these agonising indecisions, always afraid of doing the wrong thing, the bad thing; he had never known a child to be so wracked by his conscience, made so timid by the fear of self-reproach. He'd always wanted to tell him not to be afraid in this way, but instead to make sure to do only what was right and honest, but he could never bring himself to be so forthright with Paul; even as a child Paul had known his life would never be so straightforward.

Paul stood up suddenly, so agitated it seemed that he might run up the stairs. ‘I'll go to him now,' he said. ‘Now before I change my mind.'

Iris buttoned Bobby's coat. She looked at Paul. ‘You'll take good care of him?'

‘Of course.'

George saw how impatient Paul was to go; he didn't look at Iris, it seemed he could hardly see either of them, just Bobby, his impatience animating him so that he almost looked like a child again, a nervous twelve-year-old boy. This boy held out his hand to Bobby, who was shy and hung on to Iris's hand. Gently she said, ‘Go on, Bobby. You'll have a lovely time.'

When they had gone, Iris said, ‘He looks terrible.'

‘Yes.'

‘What did they do to him in that prison?'

‘Iris …' He sat down on the bed; if she said any more he would cry and that would be shaming. She had looked so shocked when she saw Paul, and he had forgotten that the last time she had seen him he was just her daughter's husband – not ordinary, exactly, but beginning to be less …
odd
, he supposed. When Iris had last seen Paul he was Bobby's father and more than anything else being Bobby's father made Paul
right
: a twenty-three-year-old man struggling like any other with the responsibilities of a family.

Iris sat beside him. ‘George … I'm sorry … He's fine. I'm sure he's fine.'

George stood up. He went to the window and there was Paul, holding Bobby's hand, walking away. He imagined running after them because suddenly he didn't trust Paul not to keep walking, to never come back because why would he? Why would he lose his son again?
Go,
he thought.
Take him. He's yours. He was always yours more than he was anyone's.
He put a hand against the wall to steady himself. Another man's wife was watching him from a hotel bed, outside the afternoon sun was shining as if it would never give up on the day and he had run away from home.

He felt Iris's hand on his arm. ‘Come and lie down. You're tired, such a long day …'

She led him to the bed; she took off his shoes and lay down beside him, taking his hand in hers.

George slept and Iris lay still, not wanting to move in case she woke him. She felt she should get up, wash and change because she smelt of the train; her hands felt sticky, her feet sore from walking from the station to this place, this shabby little hotel hidden away down a back street.

She shouldn't have brought Bobby here;
she
shouldn't be here: Daniel was bound to find out; Bobby would say something to his mother. She breathed in, held her breath, exhaled. Margot wouldn't give her away; she had to count on that, on her daughter's need to keep the peace. And perhaps Bobby wouldn't say anything at all; he was such a quiet little boy. All the same, she had told him that this was a game and that the fun of the game was not to tell anyone, not even Mummy, that Granddad had come on this trip too. Wasn't that fun? Wasn't that wicked to ask a child to lie? Not lying, not really, just a game, a not telling. And perhaps Margot suspected, anyway. She knew Paul was in England. She'd asked her, ‘Do you think he'll come to Thorp and try to see Bobby?' Her face had such a look on it, hopeful and horrified at once.

George mumbled something from his sleep, frowning, anxious. She turned her head to look at him because he was a fine-looking man and there would be few chances to look at him soon enough. It was masochistic to come here with him, knowing that she had to give him up, and yet she wouldn't regret it, even if Daniel found out and never spoke to her again.

She gazed at George; the women of Thorp would quite envy her this gazing, even though it made her feel rather silly and self-indulgent. The women on the parish council, on the church-cleaning rota, those who had volunteered with her during the war to serve tea to soldiers on Darlington Station, all of them had a good word for Dr Harris; some had a fancy for him, too, always a smile in their voices when they mentioned his name. At least, they had behaved like this before Paul shamed them all so badly. Before this George was always
poor Dr Harris
and none of them understood why he had never remarried.

She had said to him once, laughing, ‘Mrs Simms wonders why you remain single.' He had only shaken his head, exasperated; she'd been told by others that more than one mother had thrown a daughter at him in the early years after Grace's death. But men grow older and set in their ways, and their children grow older too, from adorable little boys into awkward adolescents, although perhaps there had been a brief time, when both George's sons were in uniform, that the little family became glamorous again. A brief time, when Thorp could overlook Paul's
manner
because he was fighting, one of the brave boys; and in that uniform he almost looked like anyone, like his brother. But the fighting ended and Paul came home.

When she saw Paul walk into the hotel, before he noticed her or his father and son, she had wanted to hide away; she wouldn't be able to speak to him, or behave in any normal way around him at all: he was utterly changed. The boy she'd been expecting, the ironic, kind boy she had grown to like, was nowhere to be seen in this man. This man would make her want to look away if he passed her on the street; she would be afraid of him, he was so obviously possessed with anger; and his hair was so short, his face reduced to sharply defined cheekbones as though he had been planed from wood. Always slim, now he was thin, angular, hard-looking, full of an energy that made him seem as though he was about to launch himself into a fight. Despite his beautiful clothes, the fine cut and expense of his coat and suit and shoes, he was a thug.

She had thought of lifting Bobby down from the desk and running away with him, back to King's Cross, home, away from this man she didn't recognise as Bobby's gentle father. And then he had seen her; before he saw his father and son he'd seen her and looked as if he would kill her.

Perhaps she shouldn't have allowed him to take Bobby out of her sight. But she had never seen a man change so quickly from hardness to soft, smiling joy. Bobby transformed him; she could see the old Paul again, although his voice was rougher, as though he had to live down to his appearance, but soft again when he spoke to Bobby. He had knelt in front of him,
‘Hello Bob,'
and cupped his face in his hand. She had always known how much he had loved him – of course he had loved him. But this was love like no other she had ever seen before. Bobby had turned to her, unsure of this man whose face shone with such intense feeling.

So as not to disturb George, Iris got up as quietly as she could and went to the window. There was the narrow street they had walked down, unsure that this dingy place could really be their destination. The building opposite was an unbroken mass of red brick punctuated with haphazard windows and doorways that might open on to anything – a warehouse, a factory, a workhouse, perhaps. The city sprawled beyond these buildings, all its shops and restaurants and hotels, parks and palaces, all its bridges, all the places made famous by nursery rhymes and songs. Paul was out there with Bobby; she might never see them again, and then Margot would be lost to her too, and Daniel.

Softly she said, ‘Don't come back,' to test the words out, the feeling behind them, but there was only hollowness; Margot was her whole life; Paul knew this. Paul would bring Bobby back because he
was
Paul, and not that man she'd glimpsed in the hotel's lobby.

* * *

Bobby whispered, ‘That man is very fat.'

‘Yes. He is. Perhaps he ate too much ice cream.' Paul took out his handkerchief and wiped a chocolate ice cream smudge from Bobby's mouth. Quietly he said, ‘Perhaps you shouldn't stare at him, Bob.'