Last Guests of the Season (37 page)

‘Look,' he said suddenly. ‘Look, quick!'

She raised her head and saw it – a bright, beautiful flash of blue, racing away downriver, brilliant, rare. Then it was gone.

‘Well,' he said, smiling at her, ‘I think we're the only ones who've seen two kingfishers on this holiday, don't you?'

‘Three,' she corrected him. ‘It was two last time, wasn't it?'

‘So it was, you're quite right. Well done.' He smiled again, with affection, and she smiled back at him, trying to be brave. It was nice being friends, but it wasn't the same.

‘Isn't all love obsessive?' said Frances, addressing the air.

‘I don't think so. Not in my experience.' He paused, remembering a browse along the bookshelves the morning after Tom had gone sleepwalking and knocked over the shepherd's cloak. ‘“True love wants what's best for the other person,”' he said. ‘“Romantic love wants the other person.” I give you that courtesy of the Reader's Digest – rather good, isn't it?'

‘Not bad.' She drew on her cigarette. ‘Except that most of us want both, don't we? To give and to have.'

‘Yes. Well – I suppose it's unlikely that the secret of life might be found in the Reader's Digest.'

‘Most unlikely. Still, you never know.' She liked Robert: it was impossible not to like him, even if, not an hour ago, she had briefly hated him. Like Claire, generously taking over whenever it was necessary, he had qualities which in the face of her own emotional turbulence felt like rocks to rest on: he was fair, he was honest, he was kind. A good person, she thought, as they went on walking. Simply that.

‘You said you believed in sin,' she said, smoking again. ‘What made you say that?'

‘Did I? When?'

‘You know you did – surely you must remember. That evening out on the terrace …'

‘There have been many evenings out on the terrace.'

‘Yes, but you remember. When we were all talking – about God, and what we believed in. You said you believed in sin.'

‘Must have had too much to drink.' He smiled. ‘It's all right, I do remember now.' He bent down to pick up a fir cone, fiddling absently with it as they walked. ‘The last person who had too much to drink on this holiday was Oliver, if I remember rightly. Another troubled soul. Do you want to talk to me about Oliver?'

‘No.'

‘Frances. He knows. Doesn't he? He knows something, any way.'

‘Of course he knows something. If he didn't know something he'd be a fool, and Oliver is anything but that.' She dropped her cigarette to the ground and stubbed it out with her heel.

‘And you still –'

‘Still what?' She gave another ghost of a smile, with a quizzical expression which reminded him of no one so much as Oliver. ‘Still love him? Yes. Does that surprise you? I was asking you about sin – does all this sound selfish and wicked? Wanting two people?'

‘Is that what you want?'

‘I'm afraid it is.'

‘When you say “want” –'

‘I mean want in my life. Does that equal sin, in your book?'

He was twisting dry petals off the fir cone, flicking them on to the ground as they walked. ‘It seems to me that sin is not so much a Milton word as an Alice word. It means just what you want it to mean, depending on what is troubling you at the time.'

‘What about the absolutes? You said you tried to live by some kind of absolutes.'

‘Mmm. I did have a lot to drink. I seem to recall you saying that there's always an “And yet”. Isn't there? It seems to me a miracle that any marriage endures without some kind of – what shall we say? Venturing forth? Glances in other directions?'

‘Have you and Claire ventured forth?'

‘Don't ask too many questions. No, not yet. Not as far as I know, anyway. If we did, I hope we should survive it, that's all. Without making too many people unhappy. I think love is supposed to make things better, not worse. Is this woman you dream about all the time making things better? Why were you crying when we came back?'

‘Because I miss her – why do you think?' she asked. ‘Because I cannot bear to think of having to live without her. I can't tell you how lovely she is, how much I want to be with her. I want to talk to her about everything, for everything to be open between us, and it can't be. Not in the way I want. She has a family; I have a family. I want more; I know she doesn't. It's hard, that's all.'

They were walking up the slope again; a bullock cart creaked on the road above them.

‘You can't make somebody love you,' said Robert.

‘I don't want to make her love me. I just want to tell her, and for her to accept it. She might not be able to, she might be appalled.'

‘It does sound a fairly modest requirement.'

‘Try living with it.'

He shook his head. ‘Has this ever happened to you before?' he asked after a while.

She didn't look at him. ‘Once or twice. Twice, if you must know, but not for a very long time. I never did anything about it, if that's what you want to know.'

‘But you wanted to.'

‘Not like this. I'm grown up now, it's different.'

‘And you're sure,' he said. ‘You're sure she doesn't feel as you do.'

‘Certain.'

‘Then that saves you, doesn't it? From having to decide.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘I'm not quite convinced you really want more, that's all. If you were to tell her, and she were to turn round and tell you she felt the same – do you really want what you think you want?'

‘Does anyone really want what they think they want?'

‘Frances. Don't play games, don't try and be clever. This is serious, isn't it?'

‘Yes,' she said, thinking of the night's events and the morning's upheaval; thinking of the past five years. ‘It's serious.'

‘Well, then. Answer me. You're saying that you've wanted a love affair – yes? With all that that implies – yes?'

Frances was looking at the ground again, at the grey drifts of pine cones, the dense brown carpet of needles, warm in the sun.

‘It's the expression of everything, isn't it?' she said at last.

‘Can be.'

They walked on in silence.

‘So. Is that what you want?'

‘I don't know.' Another pause. ‘I think I do, but if it came to it possibly not. Probably not. Certainly not with anyone else, I can tell you that. If it were anyone else I'd be ill.'

‘This is the end of the twentieth century,' said Robert, ‘as you are probably aware. There has been a social revolution, and men are out of fashion. All this seems to have passed you by. I cannot believe that in the last however many years you could not have found what you wanted if you really wanted it. Mmm?'

‘Mmm.' She lit another cigarette. ‘Sometimes I feel as if I don't belong anywhere, sometimes as if there is the possibility of access to everything. It's one thing to see other people's liberation, and quite another to liberate yourself. Anyway, I'm not ruthless enough.'

‘Do you want to know what I think?'

She looked at him, and smiled. ‘Yes,' she said, ‘I do.'

‘I think what you want is some kind of substitute for religion, a kind of dreamy worshipping of someone who will never make real demands of you. And that's one of the reasons I dislike religion so much – when it comes down to it, it's easier to love God than another person. Don't you think? Much easier to be the bride of Christ than the bride of a real man. Much easier to love at a distance than live with someone.'

‘Actually,' said Frances, ‘I think that the way to God, if there is a God, is immensely stony and difficult and full of sacrifice. And reached by loving other people. As for loving at a distance – well, perhaps you're right, but how dull. Loving at a distance can be inspirational.'

‘You said it was killing you.'

She fell silent.

They had come to the top of the slope; they were out on the road again, where the sun beat down.

‘So,' said Robert. ‘Here you are. Agonising over what you might or might not want, or might or might not be able to have. You dream of this woman and you banish her. She has her own life. She may not want to be dreamed of –'

‘I'm sure she doesn't.'

‘She may not want to be banished, either. Doesn't she have something to say? If she is as nice as you believe, at the very least she deserves honesty. Don't you think?'

‘I – yes.'

They crossed to the shady side, and walked slowly downhill towards the house.

‘And meanwhile –'

‘I know. I know. Is that what you meant when you spoke about sin?'

‘An Alice word,' he said again. ‘It means whatever you choose it to mean, neither more nor less.' He raised his arm and threw the fir cone across the road: it bounced on the verge and rolled away down the hill. ‘Like God, now I come to think of it.'

‘Like love.'

‘I'm not quite so sure about that.'

Claire, after lunch with the boys, made sure that Tom was asleep before she left them, Jack still slowly turning pages as she got up from the yellow chair in the corner of the bedroom and went to open the shutters a little, to let out a fly.

‘Go on, shoo, off you go.' It soared away on a current of air, out above the floor of the threshing yard, and she quietly closed the shutters. It was cooler, just a bit. Where was Robert? Why hadn't he come home?

‘Mum?'

‘Yes?'

He put down the book and stretched his arms, yawning.

‘Hug?'

She hugged him, smoothing his straight dark hair.

‘Where's Dad?'

‘Coming back any minute. Go on, go to sleep now, I'll see you at teatime.' She disentangled herself and put his book down on the bedside chair; she went to the open door and blew him a kiss, and then, hearing noises, she went downstairs. The noises came from the back of the house: she went to the sitting-room.

Footsteps up from the garden; Jessica in from the terrace.

‘You must be starving,' said Claire, ‘you've been gone for ages.'

Jessica walked straight past her and into her room.

‘Jess … where's Oliver?'

‘Putting the dinghy away.' The door of the bedroom swung to, and was closed with a click. From beneath the terrace Claire could indeed hear the dinghy being dragged across the stone flags and put in its corner, the paddles propped up against the wall. Footsteps up from the garden: Oliver came through the tall white doors.

‘I'm sorry we're so terribly late – I hope you've eaten.'

‘Yes,' said Claire. ‘I've eaten, so have the boys. They're both asleep.'

‘Thank you, you're very kind.' He was putting his swimming bag down in the corner, carefully out of the way. An orderly approach to things, like Frances; not like her. ‘Where are the others?' He straightened up again.

‘They've gone for a walk.' She stood in the middle of the broad and open room which not two hours ago had felt as though it were going to explode with the sound of weeping and shouting and children's footsteps, running away. She felt as though she were going to explode.

‘Is Frances all right?' he asked.

She wanted to say to him: No, she isn't, and neither am I. I am not quite myself today. She wanted to say to him: What is the matter with Jessica? She couldn't say anything, standing in the middle of the room with a man she knew she was a little afraid of, whom she didn't begin to understand, didn't know how to talk to, had never known how to talk to. Except in the ordinary run of things it was a very long time since she'd talked to any man except Robert, and where was Robert? Who cared for the ordinary run of things?

‘Claire? Has something happened?'

‘I wouldn't know,' she said coldly. ‘You tell me. What is the matter with Jessica?'

He looked at her.

‘She's been crying –'

‘Yes.'

‘Why?'

‘Because –'

‘What have you done to her?'

‘I – nothing.'

‘Are you sure?'

‘Claire. Please. Please don't think –'

‘I don't know what to think. About anything. Why was she crying?'

‘Because,' he said slowly, ‘because, as they say, I was blind.'

And so was I, she thought, seeing, like holiday snaps in an album, Jess and Oliver swimming together, playing endless games of chess together, talking, laughing, seeking each other out, rowing away down the river together, round past the island of fallen branches, and out of sight. What have I been thinking of, all this time? I've been thinking of Frances. I've been thinking of Tom. What about my own child?

They stood stock-still in the middle of the room in silence.

‘Go on,' she said.

‘I thought of her as a daughterly companion, and she … I'm afraid I have hurt her. But not in the way you might think. Claire? I do assure you. I give you my word.'

They looked at each other: two people with little, when it came down to it, to say to each other at all. Except now. Except over this.

‘I give you my word,' he said again. ‘You must believe me. For her sake as much as anyone's. Please.'

‘All right,' she said at last. ‘I believe you. I had to ask.' ‘Of course.'

Noises came from the side of the house: the kitchen door opening, footsteps, Robert and Frances, talking –

‘I except they're all resting,' said Frances.

‘Probably.' Robert was opening the fridge. ‘Let's have something to eat. I'm starving.'

‘So am I,' said Oliver, hearing them. ‘I'll go and join them, if I may. Can I get you anything? Or did you say you had eaten?'

‘I said I had eaten. I don't want anything, thank you.'

Plates and glasses were clattering in the kitchen; she turned towards Jessica's room as he left her, and knocked at the door.