Dubious Legacy (17 page)

Hector, who had been standing a little apart, now spoke. ‘Bedtime, girls. Off you go.’

Surprised, Antonia lowered her hand. Barbara said, ‘Come on, I’m whacked. Good night, everybody,’ and, putting her arm round her friend, led her away.

Halfway to the house Antonia turned and shouted, ‘How can Henry be so magnanimous?’

Calypso murmured tiredly, ‘How indeed?’

James said to Matthew, ‘Hadn’t we better see that they are all right?’ and the two men followed their girls at a discreet distance.

Hector said, ‘I don’t know about anybody else, but I could do with a swallow of Henry’s brandy from the drinks table in the sitting-room.’

Jonathan said virtuously, ‘We can’t leave this mess.’

Hector said, ‘Yes, we can. Trask and Ebro are dying to get shot of us. You are, aren’t you?’ he asked Trask.

Trask said drily, ‘Since you ask, yes.’

John said, ‘In that case, I think we two will be on our way.’

‘Shouldn’t one of us see how Henry is?’ enquired Calypso.

Henry appeared, answering for himself, ‘I am quite all right.’

‘Your throat? Your face?’ Jonathan lingered.

‘Plastered, as you see, by Pilar; scratches duly dabbed with Dettol. Are you two off?’

‘Yes,’ they said, ‘yes. Good night.’ They said, ‘It was a most, a most unusual party, dear boy, thank you for asking us.’

‘Have Maisie and Peter gone?’

‘Evaporated,’ said Jonathan, ‘as we must also.’

John said, ‘We are sorry there was, so sorry there—’

‘Was a storm in a teaspoon,’ Henry finished his sentence for him. ‘I will walk you to your car.’

Hector said, ‘Brandy. Come on,’ and led Calypso into the house.

She said, ‘He looks rather dishy, all plastered and haggard. I am not surprised the virgins wooed him.’

Hector said, ‘The virgin who jumped on the table was on the point of busting her engagement.’

‘Might be a good thing. She won’t, though she rightly called him wet.’

‘Dampish, I agree.’ Hector poured a little brandy into a glass. ‘For you?’ he offered.

‘No, thank you, I’ll drive home.’

Hector poured more brandy into the glass and gulped. ‘Ah, that’s better.’

Joining them, Henry asked, ‘Have
la jeunesse
gone to bed?’

Calypso said, ‘So one supposes.’

Henry said, ‘I would suggest sitting on the terrace, but it’s immediately under my wife’s window.’

Calypso said, ‘It’s very nice here,’ and settled on the sofa.

Hector said, ‘Couldn’t you divorce her?’

Henry asked, ‘For killing a cockatoo?’ As neither Hector nor Calypso answered, he said, ‘And who would look after her if I did?’ He took the brandy Henry handed him. ‘Tonight was my fault,’ he said. ‘She is OK left in bed. I get impatient. She
does
get up.
When
she wants to.
If she
wants to. I should have left well alone.’

‘Well?’ Calypso raised an eyebrow.

Henry said, ‘Well enough. Better than tonight, let’s say. I should never have bribed her with that dress.’

‘She looked lovely in it,’ said Calypso.

‘I did not foresee the consequences. She was intoxicated by the girls’ desire.’ Henry gulped his brandy. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I can’t divorce her, I’ve been into all that,’ and yawned.

‘Come on, Hector, we must go home.’ Calypso got off the sofa. ‘We must let Henry get some sleep, he’s exhausted.’

‘A bath,’ said Henry, ‘then it will be time for haymaking. This is a busy time of year.’

Driving through the scented lanes with the car windows down and Hector half-asleep beside her, Calypso heard him say, ‘That girl called him magnanimous.’

She said, ‘So he is.’

‘But not necessarily to young girls,’ her husband murmured.

‘You disappeared,’ said James, overtaking the girls. ‘I was worried stiff,’ he told Barbara. He held her arm above the elbow, bringing her to a halt.

‘I was with Henry,’ said Barbara defensively, as Antonia walked on with Matthew.

‘With Henry? Why?’

‘Why not?’ Barbara faced her lover. ‘He is our host. We are staying in his house. It is customary to be polite to one’s host, is it not?’

‘Don’t be like that.’

‘Like what?’

‘Snappy. You are engaged to me. I can’t have you chasing Henry.’

‘I am
not
snappy.’ Barbara took stock of her intended. ‘I was not chasing him,’ she lied. ‘If you must know,’ she said crossly, ‘I wanted to ask him about Valerie.’

‘Valerie? Who is Valerie?’ James’s heart thumped in shock.

‘Valerie with whom, so Margaret told us, you bounced in bed until the springs made such a racket you kept her awake. That Valerie.’

‘Oh,
that
Valerie.’ James attempted a laugh. ‘She was just a friend. So has Margaret been making mischief? And what,’ he asked rather cleverly, as he thought, ‘did Henry tell you?’

‘He said she was not a call-girl.’

‘Well, there you are,’ said James, relieved.

‘And he said you weren’t in love with her, but I took it that was just men sticking together. Weren’t you in love with her?’

James lied courageously. ‘Valerie was just an ordinary friend. She married some chap in insurance. I love
you,
darling, no one else. I should have thought I had made that pretty obvious. You can’t have believed Margaret; she is one of those people who can’t bear to see people happy. She’s a nutcase.’

‘I did believe her.’

‘Oh, darling.’ James put his arms round her. ‘You must not allow random malice to come between us. Margaret is mad.’

‘She is not mad.’

‘Malicious, then.’ James stroked Barbara’s hair.

‘She ruined the party. It was a lovely party. She ruined that dress; it was
such
a beautiful dress.’ Encompassed by James’s arms, Barbara mourned the Dior dress. ‘What an awful waste.’

‘Some day I’ll buy you a dress like that.’

‘How soon?’ She raised her face to be kissed.

‘When we are married. A Dior maternity dress.’

‘A
what?’
She pulled away from him.

James corrected himself. ‘I’ll buy you a Dior dress to celebrate our first baby.’

‘Have I got to have a baby?’ Barbara was dubious.

‘Isn’t that what marriage is for?’

‘Suppose I don’t want babies?’ Barbara was discovering the pleasures of being difficult. ‘Do we then bounce and break springs without the approval of Church and State?’

‘Joking,’ said James. ‘I was joking.’ There was much to be said for bouncing without strings, but Valerie had left him high and dry, bereft. ‘Would you like me to come into your bed tonight,’ he whispered, ‘just for a cuddle?’

‘Antonia is next door, she’d hear. And you wouldn’t really want me to sleep with you before we are married.’

‘People do,’ James muttered, breathing into her hair.

‘Not this person,’ said Barbara virtuously. ‘I am not Valerie.’

‘Damn Valerie!’ James exploded.

‘So you
were
in love with her?’ Barbara niggled.

‘I was
not,’
James snapped, ‘not one bit. If you insist on picking a quarrel,’ he exclaimed, ‘and ruining our engagement, that’s OK by me.’ I would be free, he thought wildly; I could recapture Valerie, be her lover again. She knows she looks best naked;
she
doesn’t bore on about Dior dresses.

Barbara began to cry. ‘You are horrible. I thought you loved me. I am so tired.’

‘I do love you, I do. Listen, sweetie, we are saying things neither of us mean. You must rest, have a hot bath, a good long soak, and a long sleep.’ He kissed her wet cheeks. ‘There, don’t cry, tomorrow will be lovely.’

Barbara said, ‘Oh, James,’ and let him lead her to the house. ‘You are right, I’d better hurry. If Antonia gets there first she takes for ever and all the hot water.’ She kissed James fondly and raced up the stairs.

Antonia, too, had a dubious time with her intended. Matthew keenly resented being called wet. He was not to know that in years to come, when he had become a Member of Parliament, the term ‘wet’ would be considered by many to be one of approval. ‘I am not wet,’ he had said the moment he got Antonia alone. ‘I will not stand for abuse.’

‘I was upset,’ Antonia riposted, ‘and so would you have been if you had had a dead bird thrown in your face.’

‘Only a bit of it.’

‘A
bloody
bit,’ Antonia raised her voice, ‘and still warm.’

‘Don’t swear,’ said Matthew. ‘I can’t stand women who swear.’

‘You put up with a lot of swearing from Richard,’ said Antonia, delving into the past, when Matthew had been her brother’s friend.

‘Richard was a boy.’

‘He still is, though I sometimes wonder how much of one. Why are we talking of Richard?’ she asked.

‘You brought him up apropos swearing. You went off at a tangent.’ Matthew remembered that Richard, much less lovely now than in his teens, had had the same evasive trait. ‘You were telling me how shocked you had been by Margaret. I was more startled by the sight of her breasts.’

‘Wobbling.’ Antonia giggled. ‘I
wish
she had not torn that dress, it was so beautiful. I longed to have it.’

‘Must have cost Henry a pretty penny,’ said Matthew. ‘Commodities he is short of. The more fool he.’

‘Is he badly off, then?’ Antonia was surprised.

‘Of course. Haven’t you noticed how shabby the house is? The curtains in my room are rotting, I daren’t draw them at night.’

‘But Margaret’s room?’

‘Keeps her happy. Ebro’s in the business. Gets a discount, I expect.’

‘But the party. So lavish! All that drink.’

‘I expect when he’s used up his father’s cellar, it will remain dry.’

‘Poor Henry.’

‘Of course he keeps his land in good heart, that’s what he lives on. If you work as hard as Henry does, you make a living.’

‘Why are we discussing Henry? And Henry’s means, as I suppose you would call them. You want to be a man of means, don’t you? I can smell it,’ said Antonia.

‘Nothing wrong with money,’ said Matthew. ‘It’s only wrong when you haven’t got it.’

‘We’ve got miles from the point,’ Antonia exclaimed. ‘I thought we were standing here so that you could comfort me for the disgusting shock I suffered.’

‘I thought you had got over it,’ said Matthew, who, having himself recovered from the horrid scene, imagined Antonia would have done likewise.

‘What
is
it going to be like married to you?’ Once again Antonia felt like hitting her fiancé. And yet, she thought, I shall marry him.

Refusing to be drawn, one of the things which Antonia would later find supremely irritating, Matthew said, ‘I think you are tired. God knows I am.’

‘Good night, then,’ Antonia snapped and left him without a kiss, racing to her room where, seeing her face in the glass still streaked with the cockatoo’s blood, she felt quite sick, tore off her clothes and rushed to the bathroom, only to find the door locked. ‘Barbara, let me in,’ she shouted, thumping the door.

Barbara called out, ‘Find another bathroom. I
must
soak in peace.’

Antonia leaned low to the keyhole and hissed through it, ‘Bugger you, I hate you,’ as though they were still at school, best friends having a tiff.

Muttering with rage, Antonia snatched the bedspread off the bed and wrapped it around herself. Setting off to find another bathroom, she padded barefoot to the head of the stairs. The house had gone quiet; there were no lights. Here, where the banisters sloped slippery to the hall, the cockatoo had launched himself. Antonia gulped. There would be a bathroom near Matthew and James, but for the moment she wanted no truck with Matthew. Margaret had a bathroom; she savoured the thought of running a bath, using preternatural force and drowning Margaret in its golden depths. She put her hand to her face, felt the cockatoo’s blood still tacky on her cheek and retched. Her need for a bath was imperative.

Backtracking, she tried doors which opened into an airing cupboard, an empty room, a door leading to an attic stair, her own door and finally, very angrily, she tried Barbara’s, but Barbara, anticipating this attack, had leapt from her bath, locked the door and returned to soak. Short of setting up a great hullaballoo and rousing the house, there would be no dislodging her.

Venturing further, Antonia explored until at last she was rewarded by the sound of a running tap; she opened a door and there, to her joy, was a bath in the middle of the room, a wash-basin on one wall and a lavatory. Beyond it a window stood open to the dawn and the sound of robins, thrushes, tits, wrens and finches revving up for another day.

As she hurried towards the basin there was a stirring by the bath as Humble and Cringe half-rose in welcome. In the bath Henry lay in steaming water, an open book blocking his view of the intruder. He said, ‘Not now, Trask, please.’

Antonia said, ‘It’s me,’ and froze.

‘What do you want?’ Henry lowered the book.

‘I was looking for a bathroom. Barbara has bagged ours. She’s so selfish. I’ve got to wash. My face is smeared with blood. I feel unclean. I can’t bear it, I simply cannot.’ Antonia’s voice rose by several decibels. She was almost hysterical with disgust.

‘Wash it in the basin.’ Henry made no attempt to move.

‘May I?’

‘Of course.’ Henry laid his book on a chair beside the bath and sank back in the water.

Antonia said, ‘Oh! Right, I will. Thanks.’ She ran the taps in the basin and, using both hands, splashed her face repeatedly.

Henry said, ‘Now you will feel better. Use my towel.’

Drying her face, Antonia said, ‘I am sorry to butt in on you.’

Henry said, ‘That’s all right.’

Antonia said, ‘I felt if I went and used Matthew’s bathroom he would—er—he would start up all over again. We’ve had a row.’

Henry said, ‘Yes.’

Antonia said, ‘You have a lot of bathrooms for such an old-fashioned house.’

Henry said, ‘My father had a thing about bathrooms. I suspect it was a guilt-induced desire to cleanse his sins. It’s a usual form of mania; my mother approved of the plumbing so, although she kept him in check otherwise, she connived at the bathrooms. She used to say, there is no greater frustration than getting locked out of a bathroom.’