Such Visitors (26 page)

The Austin Seven was very small inside, but gallant. It snuffled through the deep snow, wonderfully slow. Mary concentrated on her driving. We did not speak. I concentrated on her profile – what there was left of it, between hat and scarf – the delicately tipped nose, the short curling upper lip pursed in concentration, and giving no hint of the smiles it contained. The sky was clear, but dark as those blackout nights when people crouched in shelters waiting for the siren to howl All Clear. It had stopped snowing. There was an infinite are of stars above us, and a powerful moon. Its light encased Mary's side view in a glittering frame. Every strand of escaped hair was visible, iridescent as cobweb threads. The fluffed outline of her childlike hat sparkled richly as silver fox fur.

At my gate, all too soon, I congratulated my driver. Congratulations! How steeped we are in convention: how it props us, clumsily, in heightened moments. So inappropriate, my congratulations in the midnight snow: would I had a poet's art of the right word. But again, she didn't seem to mind.

‘Oh, it was nothing. I'm used to such conditions. Scotland

She smelled of sugared violets, the sweet iced cakes of childhood.

‘I won't ask you in,' I said.

‘No,' she said. ‘I must be getting back.'

‘It's perishing, when my fire's out.'

I felt I owed her some kind of explanation in case she was the sort of girl accustomed to being offered late-night champagne.

‘I can imagine.' Her small smile snapped the last thread of my discretion.

‘How long are you here for?' I asked.

‘Another week, perhaps.'

‘Would you like – well, lunch or something, one day?'

She hestitated. Then she said, Yes, that would be nice, and I should ring her at her hotel.

‘Any special time?' My heart was racing, racing.

‘Any time'll do. I'm not painting much. Just – thinking things over.'

‘Very well, I'll be in touch.'

I took from my pocket the box of chocolates destined for Veronica, and gave them to her. She smiled again, said nothing. I thanked her for the lift, got out of the car. It trundled off down the snowy lane. The moon burnished its tiny roof. Its tyres left very narrow tracks in the snow. Neither of us waved.

In bed that night, frozen, shivering, wide awake, I began to think about the concept of romantic love. I had always been sceptical of its existence and was certainly innocent of its ways. Yet here I was, plainly seized by some extraordinary force, some unfamiliar form of madness, that made the rest of the night almost impossible to endure. I thought of the poets I loved – Shakespeare, Browning, Byron, Shelley – was this the sort of thing those chaps had been through? Was this the inspiration that had driven their genius? And to what measures would it drive me? My mind slithered, ineffectual as confused eels. Despite the cold, I was feverish, unable to lie still. Eventually, thank God, dawn paled the sky.

By mid-morning, I had established the nature of my brainstorm. It concerned love, and it was firing me with uncontainable restlessness. – The car, it seemed, was ‘serious'. At least a week, they'd want it, with one man off, they said. I could not wait a week. I could not wait another moment.

Some instinct, though, forced me to endure two days. The weekend was the longest of my life. At last, on the Monday afternoon, in another snowstorm, I set off for The Black Swan with Ralphie. I had contemplated ringing Mary and asking her to come over in her car, but, after a thousand changes of mind, had decided that a surprise would be better. There were only two days left of my present leave. Already the weekend had been wasted, and Mary would be gone by the time I was back again.

Despite the deep snow, Ralphie and I made the seven miles to the hotel, across woods and fields, in less than an hour. A superhuman energy pressed me to keep up a wicked pace. By the time we arrived, I was sweating. Poor Ralphie was exhausted.

I saw Mary at once, through the glass door of the lounge. She was alone, reading a book by a small gas fire, a tiny glass of sherry on the table beside her.

‘I've walked,' I said. ‘The car won't be ready for a week. I couldn't – '

‘Oh, Gerald,' she said. ‘I thought you were never coming.' She looked abashed, as if she had not meant to say what she thought so quickly. ‘But you're both frozen, soaked through!'

She patted Ralphie's head. At once the room, for all its emptiness, swirled with warmth and life, and I found myself sitting beside Mary in front of the pallid fire, shoes off, feet craning ungainly towards its pathetic heat, icy hands rasping together, speechless. As Mary seemed to be, too. At last, I said I was sorry I hadn't telephoned.

‘I like surprises,' she said.

‘Lunch?' I asked a while later. ‘I'm ravenous.' This was a lie.

‘Why not? Do you know, I'm the only guest here. God knows why they're open at this time of year. They say they have quite busy weekends, people coming to visit some home for disabled soldiers nearby. It'll be just us, and disgusting food.'

In the bleak, cold dining-room we ate the disgusting food and did not care: there was plenty of wine. An old woman with chilblained hands waited sullenly upon us, sniffing. Mary talked of her recent stay in Florence, and of her painting – ‘not very good, but comforting' – and of her own labrador in Scotland, ‘fatter than Ralphie'. Much of the time we ate in silence. There seemed no particular need for talk.

But come the castle pudding, with its smear of raspberry jam and skin-topped custard, and I could contain my curiosity no longer.

‘Why are you here, exactly?' I asked.

Mary hesitated. I could see her working out an answer.

‘Too complicated to explain, really,' she replied lightly. ‘I'm just trying to work a few things out. I wanted to be somewhere a long way from home, by myself.'

‘I see.' I would ask no more, naturally.

‘I rather like being on my own. I really do,' she went on. 'In fact, if I never got married I'd be quite happy.' My mother
would call that a terrible failure, but I honestly wouldn't mind at all.'

‘I don't suppose there's much chance of your remaining …'

The vicious thought of her being someone else's wife stopped me. Mary gave a small laugh whose echo was muted by the mud-brown carpet, the soggy grey walls, the thick curtains of stuff like woven bran. By now it was three-thirty. Chilblains had left long ago in a huff. Mary offered me another lift home. But I insisted on walking. There was still energy to be dissipated if I was to get a wink of sleep that night.

‘Very well, then,' she said. ‘I'll drive over to
you
for lunch tomorrow. How would that be?'

That was the only moment she was just the slightest bit flirtatious.
My darling, beloved Mary
–
what do you imagine? And stay for ever, please.

‘Early as you like,' I said.

At midday I began to imagine that she was snowbound, upside down in a ditch, or had changed her mind. I suffered all the torments of a waiting lover, fretting over the smoky fire, the mud from Ralphie's paws on the sofa where she should sit, the draught from the windows. Provisions were a little odd, but by now I was confident she wouldn't mind that sort of thing. I had found one last bottle of port, given to me by my father on my twenty-first birthday, so pretty mature by now. Apart from that, there was a pound of sausages and a couple of stale rolls. The village shop had run out of pickles and cheese.

Mary arrived at one forty-five, by which time my equilibrium was in a wretched state. She had a shining cold face and wore green trousers: she gave no reason for being late.

‘This,' she said, coming brilliantly into the room, a barren place, then, ‘is
marvellous.'
She looked out of the window to the view I've lived with for forty years. ‘Imagine when the apple tree is out.'

We grilled the sausages over the fire, burned and abandoned the rolls, and drank most of the port from my mother's old silver goblets. I put on the Beethoven violin concerto – scratchy old record, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered. For the life of me, I can't remember what we talked about (the erosion of that conversation has been a mental torture ever since). But I
do remember we laughed a lot, made tea when it was dark and the wind fretted at the bare windows, and planned a walk together the next day – my last.

Each day with Mary, somehow, was so extraordinarily different, as if the Lord was giving us a chance, at least, to see each other in a variety of weathers. The Tuesday was sunny: great strips of gold slashed across the wind-bitten snow, draining the blue from shadows. Robins shrieked from the apple tree. The hedges, snow-covered chariots, were parked on cobweb wheels of diamond cogs, spun by millionaire spiders. Unable to stay indoors, I set off to the village with Ralphie, thinking I would meet her on her way. I sang ‘Rule Britannia' very loudly, not knowing the words of any love songs, and found children skating on the pond. I thought: this is my last chance. What can I do? How can I let her go?

An immediate plan came to my rescue. For the first time in my honourable career, I would make some excuse and take two more days' leave. Thus, before she left, we might have a little more time.

I heard the pooping of a small horn behind me. The Austin Seven was chugging towards me, Mary in her woollen hat, smiling. She was out of the car in a trice, running.

‘I'm terribly early. Sorry! Hope you didn't – I mean, we mustn't waste the sun.'

We didn't waste the sun. We walked for miles. God knows where we went. I remember woods, the creak of snow in the hush of ash trees, the squawk of a frightened blackbird. I remember a lighted village church, women bustling about with clumps of evergreen, preparing for a wedding or a funeral, a smell of paraffin, the organist perfecting ‘Abide With Me'. Wickedly cold, suddenly, when we came out again. The sun had gone. The sky was a starless navy.

Mary was tired by now. We had had a glass of mulled wine in a pub, but had eaten nothing. Time ignored the ordinary junctions of an ordinary day. We were surprised by the suddenness of the evening. In a lane a mile still from the car, Mary suddenly slipped, stumbled. I put out my hand to save her, pulled her to me. Instead of resisting, she clung to me, a childlike hug with the fingers of her woolly gloves spread out on my arms. She gave a small sob. I could feel it against my
heart. Looking down, I saw tears pushing under the long lashes of her closed eyes. I kissed her forehead. She straightened up, dabbed at her eyes. In the failing light, a smear of tears glinted on her cheek. I could see a drop of crystal poised under one nostril. We began to walk again. She let me hold her hand.

And, back at the car at last, she permitted me to kiss her on the forehead once more. In retrospect, I am glad, so glad, I was spared from knowing at the time this was our last moment. For, then, I had plans. Tomorrow I would surprise her: turn up in the mended car, take her to London, lunch, the Tate, theatre, dinner, anything. I said nothing of this, however, and shut the door of the toy-like car. She waved, this time, with a smile that I think was rather sad, but I may have imagined that. Working over the same small fabric of memory so many times, the weave plays tricks. Anyway, it was quite dark by now, and tonight no moon replaced the sun.

The following day I put on a suit and my regimental tie, polished my shoes. The Wolseley, full of new life, deposited me at The Black Swan at eleven-thirty precisely.

I asked for Miss Jay at the reception desk, as the lounge was empty. But she had gone. Checked out. No forwarding address. Nothing.

No need to remind myself of the pattern of my despair that followed, the struggle to heal a broken heart. I cursed myself for the stupid risk surprises mean, drove wildly to the Knights to make enquiries. They had left for Canada the day before. I skidded home to ring every Jay in the Borders' telephone book, but no one had heard of Mary. I wanted to end my life. I returned to being a soldier.

Six months later, almost to the day, I read in
The Times
the engagement was announced between Miss Mary Jay (address supplied, too late) to Mr Vaughan Robert Macdunnald of the Isle of Skye. (Oh God, had she waited six months for me to give some signal?) On one of Petronella's unwelcome visits, she mentioned that Mr Vaughan Macdunnald was a friend of her husband Henry, and the whole family would be going up to the wedding. Later, she tried to tell me about the nuptials. I
told her that I had briefly met Mary Jay, but was not interested in hearing how her wedding day had passed. Petronella gave me one of her horribly knowing looks. I assumed, rightly, that I would have to avoid years of scraps of information pertaining to the Macdunnald household.

Three years after Mary's wedding, the Knights returned home. One evening I asked them, in a nonchalant manner, if they had ever heard of her again. They had not, though they had written to her at the time of her marriage. I went on, in casual fashion, to describe the nature of her departure.

‘Well, it must have been very difficult for her, mustn't it?' said Janet. ‘She'd come down here to try to persuade herself she couldn't go through with it, the marriage to Vaughan. But there was so much pressure on her. They had known each other since childhood, and he'd been trying to marry her for years, you know. Apparently he had a wonderful castle on the sea – everything you could want, if you loved Scotland, which Mary did. But he was blown up in ‘42 – helpless invalid for life. I think Mary believed that if she said no, that would be the end, for him.'

In the event, the end took forty years. Poor bugger. Poor Mary.

Mrs Cluff, I see, is coming up the garden path, basket over her arm, mind on the pork chop and baked apple she will cook for my lunch. She's a good soul, Mrs Cluff. And over those years, what for me? The odd fling, the casual affair, no thoughts of marriage: the saving discipline of army life, the pleasure of retirement here. I can't complain.