Damage (16 page)

I helped her undress as one would a child. She slid into the water and under. The oil on her body and hair was like a magician’s unguent remedy. Endlessly she lay there, or she slid under the water, repeating as though to some unheard rhythm a ritual acrobatic of survival.

I sat on the floor concentrating all my energies towards her. With a power I did not know I possessed, I eliminated every other thought from my mind. Sometimes I let more hot water flow into the bath. Sometimes I let some water flow away. She did not seem to notice me as she surfaced, and slipped under again. Finally she said. ‘I’d like to sleep.’

I wrapped her in a towel and patted her dry. Then, I tried to slip a nightgown over her. She shook her head, and slid between the sheets. She was asleep in seconds. I sat by the window, and looked into the night. There was a full moon in the starless sky. I thought how rarely I had noticed such things. Some deep failure of the soul perhaps. An inherited emptiness. A nothingness passed from generation to generation. A flaw in the psyche, discovered only by those who suffer by it.

Images of Martyn as a child consumed me — one particularly, a running turn of the head as I called to him; the glory of his laughter framed by a golden summer day. I shut my eyes slowly to draw a curtain over it. I had a funeral to prepare for. I must now make arrangements for a funeral.

I found some writing-paper and started my list. Obituary notices,
The Times, Telegraph.
I feared that other announcements – less gentle – would be made by messengers of death, into the unheeding morning lives of people I would never know.

There would be innuendo in the sleazier papers and perhaps a simple statement of the tragedy in the others. For myself I did not care. To preserve the dignity of Martyn’s life seemed suddenly vital to me. Could I do anything? Agitation, terrible agitation made me jerk my shoulders and my head in short mechanical movements. God! I can’t go into a state of shock. I must hold on. I slipped from the room. I swallowed some Diazepam and went back to my list — authorities, coffin, church service, flowers, music.

Ingrid stirred. I glanced at my watch. Hours had passed. How could that be possible? The moon was gone. Dawn, it was almost today. Today was here. So now Martyn had died yesterday. Martyn died this day last week, last month, last year. It is ten years ago today since Martyn died. It is twenty years ago. When would I cease to mark it? When, oh when would I die?

Ingrid moaned. Today, and its pain, was implacably eating its way into her sleep. I watched the movements of her body change from anger to defeat. Finally she sank back in an agony of submission. Her eyes, suddenly awake, knew in a second. ‘It’s true, isn’t it?’ I helped her from her bed. We did not speak.

Slowly and silently she walked towards the bathroom and carefully shut the door. I turned to the window and watched the day approach and lengthen. Cars and people and sounds filled some strange area of consciousness. The milk van rounding the corner seemed like a space vehicle, proceeding historically across a newly discovered planet.

I knew some split had occurred. A ravine had opened. I knew that for me the real world must stay in a new and vivid focus. The separate automatic part of my existence was the one in which I would have to function. In the next few days I must inhabit this part of me totally. The other area must lie dormant to be lived in later, possibly for ever.

Fear gripped me. Start now, start now, in this dimension. Stare at cars. Hear sounds. Focus on the milk van. Look! It has jerked suddenly to a stop outside.

Ingrid came from the bathroom. Transformed. Her chignon was again shaped to its pleated symmety. Her face from which the swelling had subsided through the night had the masklike immobility of a perfect discreet maquillage. She walked into the room, cloaked in the artificial perfection with which already beautiful women arm themselves against the world. She was also naked.

The intimacy of marriage had never dulled the sharpness of that image. She stood in front of me and said, ‘What a pity that we ever met.’

‘What of Sally? There is still Sally.’

‘Yes. Yes. Sally. But you know, Martyn was the one for me. There is always just one person really. Anna, I suppose, for you?’

I sighed.

‘How lucky for you, she’s not dead. Is she? Anna is … Anna … to use the vernacular … is a survivor, is she not? Were you ever in love with me?’

‘Yes. It seemed so right,’ I said.

‘And this.’ She motioned towards her body. ‘And this?’

‘You are extraordinarily beautiful.’

‘I know that. My God! Do you think I don’t know that?’ She turned towards the full-length mirror. ‘I have,’ she said, ‘a beautiful face, look at it. Look at my body. My breasts are small but still lovely. My waist and hips are slender.’ She drew a line with her hands down towards her genitals. ‘And what about this? This part of me at the top of my elegant, elegant legs. Tell me about all this beauty? Not enough, was it? Not enough! Its failure has cost me Martyn.’

She turned to me. Now, reflected in the full-length mirror, were the slender lines of her back and the incongruous, frightening perfection of her chignon. ‘You should have died,’ she said quietly. ‘You should have died. My God, you never really seemed alive anyway.’

‘You are absolutely right on both counts. I should have died. But I didn’t think of it. I never was really alive to anything until Anna.’

‘Perhaps, after all, you are an evil man. Well you’ve worked your horror in my life. For a second, just a second you understand, I thought of making love to you.’

I looked startled. She laughed. A short, bitter, brittle laugh. ‘Looking at you I can see how totally irrelevant I have become. I will take considerable strength from that.’ She opened a drawer and slipped into her underwear. Then she put on a black dress of such stark simplicity that she seemed an icon of useless beauty, form without power.

I heard Edward arrive. Ingrid ran down to him. Edward held his daughter tight to him. The devastation in his face was terrible. ‘Oh, my Ingrid,’ he whispered, ‘my dearest, darling, darling Ingrid, my poor child.’

‘Oh, Daddy.’

I stood paralysed for a second. It was not Ingrid who called to Edward, but Sally to me.

Standing at the door of the room she whispered, ‘Oh, Daddy.’

I moved towards her. But suddenly she said, ‘No! No,’ and turned and went down the stairs, as though just to look at me had hurt her.

I followed slowly.

‘Sally, you were wonderful last night.’ Edward spoke. ‘It must have been very hard for you. Sally told me, you know.’ He nodded towards me. ‘Very hard on the girl … very hard.’

‘Sally’s very brave. Good morning, sir.’ Jonathan was in the hall. ‘I’m desperately sorry …’ his voice trailed off.

‘Can we talk … privately?’ We went into the study. ‘I’m going to take charge of ringing the registry office and the hotel,’ he said. ‘Everyone, except Anna’s parents. Lucky it was just family … Oh God, that sounds awful … you know what I mean.’

‘I’ll ring Anna’s mother. Wilbur has just had a mild heart attack. It is vital he is handled properly. Her father is at the Savoy, I believe. I’ll ring him too.’

‘Sir, I’ll work from Sally’s room, if that’s all right?’

I nodded. The request was a courtesy, all the more appreciated.

‘You love Sally?’

‘Very much.’

‘I’m very glad. I’d like to say, I’m glad it’s you.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

I rang Anna’s mother.

‘I was about to ring you,’ she said. ‘There was nothing I could say or do last night. I’ve waited since dawn to ring you.’

‘You know?’

‘Oh yes.’

‘Anna?’

‘Yes. She came to see Wilbur. Once outside in the corridor she told me. Then she left. You know what I felt?’

‘No.’

‘I felt suddenly very old. I felt very old. The French call it a
coup de vieux.
I look very old today. I should be comforting you, I suppose. But you don’t deserve it really, do you? You and Anna match each other well. You cause agony in others’ lives. She’s always had that talent. Clearly you’ve just discovered it. Your wife deserves sympathy, endless, endless sympathy. But from what I have seen of her, she won’t take well to sympathy. I think she won’t like pity.’

There was a silence. She spoke again.

‘Am I different from how you remembered me?’

‘Yes — very.’

‘All that silliness, did you think it real? It’s helped me through the years. Wilbur always saw through it. Why I married him, really.’

‘How is Wilbur?’

‘He will recover.’

‘Don’t tell him.’

‘He knows.’

‘Anna?’

‘No, not Anna. Me. He can read tragedy in my face. He said, “I warned him. I warned him.” Did he do that?’

‘Yes. Yes, he did.’

‘You should have listened to Wilbur. He knows everything. I’d like to attend the funeral. Will you let me know when and where?’

‘Are you sure?’

‘I’m very, very sure. Your son was important to me. In my own way I tried to warn him that night. But I was too subtle. Anna knew, of course. She knew what I was trying to do with my talk of Peter, and of Aston.’

‘She’s gone to Peter, you know,’

‘Yes, I know. She always does. She thinks I don’t know what happened the night Aston died. My God, she thinks I don’t understand why Aston died. I always pretended. Trying to keep a connection to her, I suppose. Useless. Everything I ever did was useless. I wish she’d had another mother. I suppose she does too. Ah, I’m tired. Goodbye … Goodbye.’

I wanted to ask if Anna had told her father. But the conversation was over. I rang him immediately. I didn’t want to think of what Elizabeth had said about her daughter, not now. I knew that looming ahead of me were years of emptiness. I would fill them with every word spoken about Anna, from the day I first heard of her existence.

‘Charles?’

‘It’s kind of you to ring. I’ve written to you … and to your wife. Separately. I don’t wish to talk to you. My wife and I are returning immediately to Devon. There’s really nothing useful I can say, or do. I have a little knowledge of what you’re going through, though of course your situation is much more terrible. That’s why I know everything is useless. Everything.’ He sighed, and he almost whispered, ‘And everybody.’ Then the phone went dead.

I had two other calls to make, calls of honour. I rang my agent. Into his early morning life I poured my sad tale. So few words are needed to tell a terrible story. ‘My son is dead.’

‘Oh, my God! What happened?’

‘There has been a most terrible accident. It will have a difficult and shocking aftermath, John. I must tell you with profound sadness that I am resigning. We’ve known each other for a very long time, John. You know me well enough to accept without question that this is an irreversible decision.’

‘What in God’s name has happened? You can’t possibly ring me up at this hour with no explanation.’ He almost sobbed, ‘Oh my dear, dear man. What can I do to help?’

‘You can be the friend to me that I most need now. Accept what I am telling you. It will be clearer in the next day or so. But please respect my wishes. My career is over. You will shortly receive calls from the press and you can make a statement to the effect that I have resigned. John, I’m really sorry. I’m really very sorry.’ I put the phone down.

I rang my Minister at home. In a short conversation I brought my future to an end. I told him no more than I had my agent. He was a man whose career was his life. He believed the same of me. He knew therefore that only a catastrophe would have led me to such a decision. Having expressed his sympathy, he said he would inform the Prime Minister on receipt of my letter of resignation.

‘I will prepare it immediately. You shall have it within the hour.’

I had now one final call to make. ‘Andrew …’

‘I was waiting for you to call. There’s been an item in the news. I’m desperately sorry. It’s an appalling tragedy. What can I do to help you?’

‘I want to make a statement. Urgently. To the press. You will need to clear it with the police. Can I discuss it with you?’

‘Of course. The news item was very short. There were unanswered questions. What exactly happened?’ His solicitor’s tone was inquisitional.

‘I’m not on trial, Andrew. I have already resigned, not only from the department but also from Parliament. I want, as a private citizen, to protect my son’s memory. I want to protect my wife and daughter from the kind of speculation and innuendo which will do them further damage.’

‘You are, and always have been, the coolest man I know. Very well. Let’s work at this statement of yours. Do you want me to come round?’

‘No. It’s very short.’

‘You’ve already prepared it?’

‘No, not fully. Anyway, there are legal aspects of which I’m not certain.’

‘Let’s agree the basis of it. Then I can make some calls.’

Eventually we agreed that Andrew would, after legal enquiries, make the following statement on my behalf:

My son Martyn died last night in a tragic accident. Naturally a post-mortem will be carried out. Some of the events surrounding this tragedy are sadly controversial. I have therefore resigned from my department, and from Parliament. My resignation takes immediate effect. As a private citizen, which I will remain for the rest of my life, I would ask for privacy for my wife and for myself so that we can mourn the terrible loss of our son. And for our daughter, who has lost her most beloved brother. We will make no further comment, either now or at any time in the future.

‘I’ll do it. There will be lots of questions. They won’t let it slip away like this.’

‘No. But if it’s clear that we will make no further comment they might leave us alone. My resignation removes me from every public role.’

‘I doubt if it will be that easy. You should prepare yourself for some very unpleasant stuff in the tabloids.’

‘I never read them.’

‘Well then, that’s OK.’

‘Andrew, I’m holding on, just. I’m trying to save what I can for Ingrid and for Sally.’

‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry. It is possible to resent your control. What about Anna?’