The Essence of the Thing (18 page)

67

‘Susannah, something awful has happened.’

‘Then why are you grinning like that?’

‘Because it’s so funny.’

‘Oh, I see. You’ve got the Scunthorpe job. Nicola, how
could
you?’

‘It’s not
my
fault. It’s not as if I’d
tried
.’

‘So it
is
your fault. If only you’d tried you wouldn’t have got it. Oh, well, no harm done, you can just turn it down. You
are
going to turn it down, aren’t you?’

‘No, I’m not. I can’t. I haven’t. They rang me at work today, you see. The daytime telephone number. And I accepted.’

‘Oh, how
could
you? Why?’

‘Well, what else could I do? I mean, it would have looked so bad. It just isn’t on, to back off at this stage. At least without a very good reason. I was on the spot, I really had to accept.’

‘Oh,
hell
.’

‘No, it’s good, really. Six months in Scunthorpe, why not?’

‘Oh, Nicola, I can’t
believe
this. But anyway—you won’t be up there all the time, will you?’

‘Well, I might be doing a bit of popping up and down, I suppose.’

‘When do you start?’

‘On the first of June. Just a month from now. I’ve already given in my notice.’

‘That’s that then. How
awful
.’

‘No it isn’t. It’ll be very good for my career. I’ll be getting some publicity experience, and all sorts. They wanted an all-rounder, you see; someone flexible, not too set in their ways.’

‘So they chose you.’

‘Yes. They must have seen me on the dance floor at one of those clubs.’

‘Probably. They have spies everywhere.’

‘Yes: arts administration and allied trades is the big game in town, after all.’

‘Soon they’ll be nudging each other as you pass them on your way to a good table at
le restaurant du bon ton
and muttering, don’t look now, but that’s Nicola Gatling.’

‘They could even be doing it already. Or would be, if I were actually on my way to a good table, or any table, at
le restaurant du bon ton
. Oh, but that reminds me: can you all come out to dinner next Saturday night, on me? There’s an amusing new place I’ve heard about on this side of the
fleuve
, and I thought I’d ask you all and Philip and Jean-Claude. Time for a tiny little party. What do you say?’

‘I say wonderful idea. Thank you, Nicola.’

‘You see there’s just one more chore I have to do. This will be a reward for reaching the end of the whole routine. I dare say you know the routine to which I allude.’

‘Guess I do, honey. Ruby Keeler never worked harder.’

‘So I’ll book a table for tomorrow week.’

‘Whizzy.’

‘What’s whizzy?’

‘Oh, there you are. Nicola’s taking us out to dine in an amusing new restaurant next Saturday night.’

‘Me too?’

‘Yes, you too!’

‘Wow, that’s
whizzy
. Shall I go and tell Dad?’

‘You do that.’

Guy ran off, and came back a minute later.

‘Did you tell him?’

‘Yes.’

‘What did he say?’

‘He said, whizzy.’

‘Truly?’

‘Yes, truly, he did. Whizzy, he said.’

‘That’s whizzy.’

68

She’d forgotten entirely to give Jonathan her keys: but that turned out to be rather a good thing than not, in the circumstances.

Dear Jonathan,

I’m sorry this has taken so long to organise—but I thought of collecting the rest of my things next Saturday at around two p.m. if that suits you. I still—sorry for the oversight—have the keys, so I could let myself in in your absence and then lock up and leave the keys for you in an envelope in the letter box downstairs. Please let me know if this arrangement is in any way inconvenient.

Yours,        
Nicola         

Receiving no reply to this letter Nicola assumed very reasonably that the arrangement was in fact a convenient one; at the appointed time she was to be seen letting herself into the building.

She had rigorously banished all thought of the distress she might suffer in coming here once more—and then in leaving, once more, and finally: oh, how she had cautioned and lectured herself! She ran up all the stairs as quickly as she could as if to show herself how paltry an undertaking this truly was. A woman dressed in pink jeans couldn’t be supposed to be engaged upon anything grave or momentous, anything which could stop the heart. She arrived at the second floor, at the door which had for so long been her very own; she unlocked it, and taking a deep breath, entered the flat.

The silence was appalling. Her presence seemed to violate some secret force which was now in possession of the place; she almost expected hands to reach out from the walls and seize hold of her so as to inhibit her progress. In the hope of eluding them she passed as quickly as she could down the short passageway leading from the front door so as to enter the large bright space of the sitting room: there, surely, she would find some ghostly welcome—or if not a welcome, some ghostly acknowledgment, at least, of her right to be here on this one, last, occasion. She had glimpsed already the brilliant, almost-white glare of the sunshine pouring into the room: now she entered it.

The shock of its dazzling brightness passed in a stunning instant, to be replaced by a new and yet deeper impression of silence. Here, in the sunlit emptiness, the silence was more terrible still. She sat down, trembling, on the edge of the sofa, marvelling, almost stricken. I should not have come here, she thought. I can’t manage it after all. I am not as brave as I thought.

But I am here, she told herself sternly: I must simply get on with what I have to do. So that was what she did, rising from her seat, and, almost blindly, forcing herself, retracing her steps, and going into the bedroom to open the wardrobe where she supposed her remaining possessions still to be as she had left them so many weeks ago.

But here a further shock awaited her. For if the silence of the flat had appalled and even frightened her before, it now seemed to assault her. It told her that she had no right to be here, none: this silence seemed to emanate from a force darker and more secret still than that which possessed the sitting room and passageway. This room was forbidden not only to her but to all sentient creatures. This room, with its mahogany wardrobe, its discreetly magnificent bed, its north-facing windows through which she could—even now—see the tops of the trees in the communal gardens swaying in the breeze of a spring afternoon, was a habitation now only for denial, desolation and grief: for whatever dark spirits are sucked into the vacuum left by the departure of tenderness, love and trust. She perceived this in an instant, clearly: Jonathan had evidently perceived it too: she could see that he had not returned to this room either. It had been abandoned altogether. Denial, desolation and grief stroked her with their frail detaining fingers and whispered to her in their tiny keening voices; she crossed the room and turning the large iron key which secured them opened the doors of the wardrobe.

There were her boxes, just as she had left them; hanging from the brass rail above them, nothing. Nothing, nothing but black and empty space: not so much as a coat hanger remained in the belly of this great wardrobe which she had so admired. Here, it uncannily seemed, was the heart of the calamity which filled this room and beyond it the entire flat—here, and not—as might crudely have been assumed—the bed, which stood expressionless, passionless, neutral, in its place. No: here, in the darkness of the empty wardrobe, was the correlative of all their anguish. She took the boxes into the corridor one by one and left them near the front door, and then having cast one final glance from the threshold at the bereaved room, she quietly closed the door.

She was mourning now, and knew it. The death was fully and finally acknowledged, the obsequies could begin. And what could she do, what should be done, in the way of a funeral rite for a creature so frail, so incorporeal, as the life she and Jonathan had shared? She should at least pay it a minute or two of candid and final farewell; she should at any rate sit once more on that sofa (they’d paid an arm and a leg for it, and joyfully) in the dazzling silence of that midsummer-sky-blue room. That much at least she should do. Nicola entered the room once more, and once more sat down on the edge of the sofa, and submitted to the stream of memories, impressions, reflections which began now to unwind like a film on the screen of her grieving consciousness.

69

‘Oh—I’m sorry! I—’

‘No,
I
’
m
sorry—I thought you’d be gone by now, I would’ve—’

‘No, well, yes, I should’ve been, I was delayed—I’ll just—’

‘Look—’ he hovered in the doorway, as helpless as she: each as dreadful to the other as an apparition: now he took a few uncertain steps into the room. ‘As you’re here,’ he said, ‘as we’ve met like this—there was something I wanted to say to you.’

She was speechless; she trembled.

‘I would’ve written,’ he said, ‘but—anyway—look—could we sit down for a moment?’

And still trembling, still speechless, she sat down.

He came hesitantly across the room and sat carefully down on the other end of the sofa. He made a helpless gesture. ‘I just wanted,’ he said, ‘to say that I’m sorry.’

‘Sorry,’ she repeated stupidly. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I’m sorry for—everything. For what’s happened.’

‘Oh.’

‘Do you understand?’

‘No. No, I don’t. I don’t know what you mean.’

‘I’ve made a mistake. I’ve made a
terrible
, an absolutely terrible mistake.’

‘Oh, I see.’

‘I was wrong.’

She couldn’t truly take this in. It was difficult for him to go on speaking, but she couldn’t help him.

‘I don’t understand how it happened,’ he went on. ‘I don’t actually truly understand
what’s
happened. It’s just—it was just wrong.
I
was wrong.’

‘You’re saying—’

‘I shouldn’t have sent you away. I shouldn’t have said that I didn’t love you. I’ve—I’ve just—screwed up. I mean—look—I’m just—’ and he started to cry. He sat there, crying: it was a dreadful sight: but she could do nothing.

‘Jonathan, don’t,’ she said; ‘don’t, don’t.’

‘No,’ he said, his tears ceasing. ‘It’s hardly reasonable, is it, after everything I’ve done.’

There was an awful silence, black as night: they felt as if they were staring into the depths of an abyss. The silence itself seemed to echo, in that awful blackness.

It was he who eventually spoke. ‘Can you forgive me?’ he said.

‘I don’t know. I can’t say.’

It was too much to take in, in truth.

‘Please,’ he said wretchedly, ‘please—you must forgive me. I mean, you see—you see, if you can’t, if you don’t, then my life really won’t be worth living.’

He was looking at her, his blue eyes not cold any longer but blazing: he was altogether serious; he truly believed that his life would not be worth living.

‘It’s too much to ask,’ she said, ‘that the worth of your life should depend on me, on an act of mine.’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘One always asks too much.’

But she dimly saw that it might be her life which would not be worth living were she not to forgive him.

‘I’ll do the best I can,’ she said.

There was another silence; he was struggling for speech. ‘I—’ he began, ‘I hope—I was wondering if there was anything, anything whatever, I can do for you, now, or ever—you see, now, I—look— can I see you again? Will you let me see you again?’

‘I don’t know. I’m going away soon, anyway.’

‘
What?
’

She told him about Scunthorpe.

He was devastated; he sat there, helpless, defeated. Then his spirits seemed just fractionally to rally. ‘You must take the car,’ he said. ‘You’ll need one, up there.’

Here was something he could do for her, immediately.

‘No, I couldn’t possibly.’

And it was quite a classy Renault.

‘Yes, you could; you must. It’s the least I can do. You can take it now if you like.’

She explained that she had Susannah’s car.

‘I’ve probably got a parking ticket by now,’ she said. ‘I really must go.’

But she sat there, helpless, disoriented. He looked out of the window. The sun still streamed into the room where they sat, amazed and fearful: while all the ghosts waited in the walls.

He took her hand. ‘Could you just let me hope, for the moment,’ he said; ‘just let me believe, for the moment, that I can somehow repair everything? That I can—somehow—eventually—make it all right? Can you let me hope for that? At least for the moment?’

She said nothing: what could she truly say? She looked at him. Who was this stranger?

‘I love you, Nicola,’ he said.

He saw the look in her eyes, and let go of her hand.

‘No—yes—of course you can’t possibly believe this now, I do see that—’

‘Can you?’

Could anyone, at any time?

‘We’ll see,’ he said. ‘I’ll show you. I’ll devote myself to showing you;
I’ll find a way
.’

She fought down an impulse to say, don’t, please don’t. Suddenly she felt entirely depleted, as if at any moment she might herself begin to cry: and why should this be so? Then she remembered the keys; she took them from her handbag and gave them to him.

He hesitated slightly before taking them from her. Then a thought seemed to strike him. ‘By the way,’ he said, ‘do you like rubies?’

‘
Rubies?

’ ‘Yes, that’s right, rubies.’

‘I’ve never thought.’

‘I just wondered.’

‘I see.’

Perhaps he was mad. Anything, she now knew, was possible.

‘Look, I really must go now,’ she told him. ‘Susannah will be wanting the car.’

Jonathan made a shrug of resignation. ‘Give me your telephone number, will you?’ he said.

She wrote it down for him, and then he helped her downstairs with the boxes.

He leaned on the window frame and looked at her anxiously.

‘Drive carefully,’ he told her.

‘Of course.’

‘I’ll call you—oh! look, I almost forgot—you left that marmalade—’

‘That what?’

‘The marmalade my mother sent you, I’ll just—’

‘For God’s sake.’ She began to laugh.

He looked bewildered; he tried to smile.

‘You eat it,’ she said.

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes, I’m absolutely certain.’

‘Oh, thanks, thanks, I will then.’

‘Bon appétit!’

She let in the clutch. She could hardly bear to look at his face, just at this moment: it harrowed her. Then she waved briefly and drove away.

When she reached Chelsea, she did not cross the river immediately, but parked near the Embankment, and went and hung over the wall, staring for a long time down at the water while the traffic roared dreadfully past her back, and wondering why she could not—just now—feel anything other than an all-engulfing, and quite unutterable, sadness.