Saving Agnes (16 page)

‘I got the job,' said Nina abruptly. ‘I'm quite pleased, actually.'

Agnes had not known she was applying for one. She looked from one to the other of them in bewilderment.

‘Just think,' said Merlin, coming to her rescue. ‘Our girl on the pages of a national newspaper! Elwood Street at the whirling vortex of the mass media!'

‘That's great,' said Agnes, more confused than enlightened by Merlin's rather baroque explanation. ‘Great.'

Nina looked at her closely and then shrugged.

‘Don't overdo it,' she retorted. ‘You might actually sound as if you meant it.'

She got up and left the room. Merlin watched her go and drummed his fingers anxiously on the arm of the sofa.

‘It wasn't my fault!' Agnes protested. ‘I didn't know about her job.'

‘I know,' sighed Merlin. ‘But couldn't you – well, couldn't you at least have
pretended
to be pleased?'

Agnes had many memories of doing things against her will, but one occasion had always stuck particularly prominently in her mind.

It had happened when she and John had gone back to his house one night after a party. Sometimes they went back to her house, but more often these days they each went home alone. On this particular night, however, although comforted by the acceptance his invitation implied, Agnes had not felt much in the mood for the rites which were its usual conclusion. She was tired and had drunk too much, and had broadcast these symptoms several times on the way home in the hope that he would not press her into further denials once ensconced there.

‘Let's go to bed,' he had said as soon as they arrived; and Agnes did, snuggling up against the far wall so that their bodies would not touch, with as much of the aspect of an ailing child as she could muster.

He switched off the lights and got in beside her at a respectable distance, but scarcely five minutes had passed before his hand reached over and began caressing her. She sighed and attempted to feign sleep. His hand continued its wanderings undeterred. Suddenly, with one jerk of his body, he was pressed up behind her.

‘I – I don't really feel like it,' she said, troubled more by her own aversion than his persistence.

He hadn't replied, appearing for a moment to desist, but seconds later she felt his hands on her again. He sat up in the darkness and turned her reluctant body on to its back.

‘I don't want to!' she had daringly cried.

His face was cloaked in shadow, but all the same she could have sworn she saw him smile. While it was going on, a
curious form of revenge had occurred to her. She would do nothing. She would play dead and see how he felt about that. Her body lay inert, as if on a marble slab. Her arms lay still be her sides. Unperturbed, he had merely arranged her limbs for her. She waited for what seemed like hours while he gasped and sighed above her, but he did not seem troubled by her lack of participation. She imagined then that he was raping her. On to the oval blur of his face she imposed that of a stranger. So this is what it feels like, she thought. As he pumped and shuddered, her mind seemed to be growing further and further away until she appeared to be observing events from the ceiling. A lump of anger sat heavily on her chest. She tasted resentment, oppression and rage on her tongue like foreign foods. She had always known those things were there – she had read about them, after all, in books – but it seemed then as if she had simply never chosen to experience them for herself.

‘Thank you,' he said finally, flopping down beside her while she lay still and opaque as a moonlit sea. ‘Thank you.'

He hugged and kissed her passionately. At one and the same time she suddenly felt deeply, achingly guilty, and terribly afraid. He got out of bed and paused to look down on her benignly and touch her cheek.

‘Agnes, will you marry me?' he said.

‘What?' She sat up. ‘What did you say?'

She felt she had finally discovered how to make him love her. She felt punished, grateful, devious and rather sick. It was so easy!

‘I
said
,' he repeated, a smile which in the shadowy room appeared oddly contemptuous spreading slowly over his face. ‘I
said,
would you like a cup of tea?'

St Joan's in Highbury Barn was an arkish construct. Agnes would eye it nervously as she passed, disapproving of its squat modern form and wide wooden belly. Such aesthetic disdain was a natural by-road off her main omission. Had the church
been more attractive, the implication ran, she would surely have entered it by now. As it was she slunk guiltily past it like an old people's home in which a decrepit, lonely great-uncle sat forlornly awaiting her visit.

Of late, however, things had changed. Agnes had begun to nurture a dawning awareness of a lack, a growing vacancy at her core. She was ripe for conversion, but while in others such a need brought with it the danger of being brainwashed by a religious sect or enrolling in night classes, Agnes's mettle had since birth been cast in a mould which dictated its own
modus operandi.
Feeling the call, then, she had taken her sorrows up the hill to St Joan's in the hope that by now some wonder of modern theology might have invented a panacea for them.

Once inside she felt slightly disappointed. She had missed the service and the church was empty save for a few worthies busying themselves with the tidying up of hymn-books and parish newsletters. She sat down in one of the wooden pews and waited for her spirit to be claimed. The pedestrian setting, however, did not facilitate access to the Presence. Perhaps she needed incense and a pre-pubescent choir. She found herself thinking about the new issue of
Diplomat's Week.
It was to carry another of her articles, which she hadn't quite finished yet. Merlin crossed her mind and she considered his predicament briefly. She thought about Tom. She ought to phone him.

While it was at least pleasant to have time to think, her ruminations had the effect of making her want to leave the church so that she could attend to them. Her eye wandered impatiently over the altar, behind which hung a crucifix bearing the usual gorged and bloodied simulation of agony. She regarded it indifferently, liiere had been a time when such representations had transfixed her with their animate, piercing gaze, causing her heart to sing with hope and grief. She had changed, she knew, but she didn't quite know how or when. Like an old car, the addition of new parts over the years had left little of her original material, but her form remained
unaltered. Could she, she wondered, still be said to be the same person?

Indeed, it seemed to her now that there had been a time when
all
her emotions had been as spectacular and colourful as a firework display. She had always known she was meant to feel things. She had believed she was special, so open was she to pain and love. Or was it only that she had indulged such emotions to protect herself from any lengthy contemplation of duller things: boredom, loneliness, failure, all of the things which hovered outside the door like tax inspectors, vigilant and malign?

Sitting there, it all became horribly clear. This dullness that seemed to inhabit every corner of her spirit was nothing but the unpainted, unadorned face of reality. She had no resources herself to enliven it. She had always captured emotions and then visited them like animals at a zoo, saddened by their moulting pelts and mournful eyes. And as for love, well! Had she not once felt herself to be rich with it? Had she not once ruled her world like a queen with palaces? It angered her that John had created a version of herself which she could somehow never imitate afterwards. Try as she might to accommodate them, her subsequent lovers had stood in her life like Ming vases in a council flat.

Agnes sat slumped in her pew for some time. It seemed that she could no longer shelter in the conviction of her own sanctity. Once he had wanted her, but that didn't mean she was chosen. There was, however, she saw, a certain liberation to be found in ordinariness. Without John, without the myth of his faith in her, the cursed claim it made for her own exceptionalness, she was free to be as miserable as she liked.

IN daydreams Agnes had construed her future as a career woman with elaborations which at the time had not seemed particularly fantastical: herself at the frantic centre of office life, fielding calls and making deals, jittery with caffeine and wearing a suit perhaps. The reality was at once more demanding and more pedestrian.

On Monday morning she sat alone at her desk with an interminable set of galleys for the new issue. A wet stain from a cup of coffee spilled moments before over her leg was beginning to cool, and her trousers adhered damply to the flesh of her thigh. It was eleven thirty and Greta had not yet appeared. The office was overheated, although outside the winter air was unusually damp and sticky. Agnes leafed disconsolately through the pages and grew tearful. She could sit here and weep and no one would notice. This realisation alone was enough to make her cry. Instead she stamped her foot and, in a fit of daring, brought back her hand in order to sweep the pile from the desk and send it flying, disordered, to the floor.

‘Not in yet?' said Jean, putting her head round the door before Agnes could follow through her sabotaging blow.

‘Not yet.' Agnes replaced her hand on the desk and suddenly found herself strangely absorbed in her work. She creased her forehead at the page in front of her and scribbled something in the margin. ‘Is that hotel feature ready for layout?'

‘I'm sure I don't know,' replied Jean, with the ineffable certainty of her position. She hovered in the doorway. ‘When you have a moment, dear,' she continued presently, ‘perhaps you could give her a little ring on the telephone. Make sure all is well.'

Jean disappeared from view, leaving Agnes to nurture feelings of resentment that Greta's failure to come to work should be met with a tender concern somewhat lacking in the admonishments she received for her own shortcomings. In the spirit of defiance she loitered over her proof-reading for a further half-hour before making the call. She was sure Greta would not be at home in any case. Her lapses tended to occur in transit. She would emerge from the grey area of hazard and adventure which was the transport system with the triumphant aspect of one who had overcome great odds and gambled with death to do so.

To Agnes's surprise, however, the phone was picked up after several rings, albeit without any of the usual pleasantries.

‘Greta?' she ventured into the silence. ‘Is that you?'

‘Who is this?'

The voice sounded so unfamiliar that Agnes thought she must have dialled a wrong number; but while her feelings on such occasions were normally a mixture of horror and fascination as she landed with the arbitrariness of a falling meteor on the house of a complete stranger, her prevailing sense of Greta's essential oddness led her to persevere.

‘It's me. Agnes. From the office,' she added stupidly.

‘Oh,' said Greta (for it was indeed she), apparently enlightened by this latest addition. ‘What do you want?'

‘Well – nothing really. It's just that you didn't come to work and we wondered what had happened to you. We thought you might have overslept so we decided to give you a wake-up call!'

‘Just leave me alone.'

Greta's voice had at least the effect of distracting Agnes from uncomfortable ruminations about her own tone of asinine plural jollity. Greta put the phone down. Agnes stared at the receiver in her hand and felt unutterably wounded. How
could she speak to her like that, she who was only trying to help? As if she, Agnes, were in the wrong, sitting here alone in the office at twelve o'clock with no one to help or comfort her! Worse still, as if Agnes were not a friend or a sharer of confidences! As if she didn't have her own cross to bear on this muggy Monday morning, with Finchley Central loitering on her doorstep like a persistent beggar and a stack of work dull as a telephone directory on her desk!

The receiver in her hand began to emit an alarmist noise. She recognised within its unrelenting blare the possibility that Greta had come to some harm which she was not prepared to divulge over the telephone. She wondered what she should do. To phone again would be futile; to raise the alarm somehow presumptuous. To do nothing would assist neither of them, for she would surely not be able to concentrate on her work with such a conversation so recently in her memory? The only remaining option appeared to be an impulsive act. She must go to Greta's house herself and offer succour.

‘I'm going out!' she cried, barrelling into Jean in the corridor, who wisely stood back as if from the path of a wailing ambulance.

She left the building and headed for the tube station. As if sensing her new-found command, a train came immediately. She boarded it and the crowds seemed to part like water before her, affording her a choice of seats. As the train was set in motion, Agnes felt the very tracks reverberating with her intent. Her face reflected in the window opposite looked severe but heroic, and the other passengers maintained a respectful distance. She drew herself up, ruminating upon the defence a sense of self-importance could provide against the importunate presence of the general public.

As the train rattled downhill towards Camden, however, the mysterious nature of her crusade began to nudge against her consciousness. What manner of thing could it be that had laid Greta, normally blithe and buoyant in adversity, so low? Perhaps she had received bad news from Mrs Sankowitz, her voice leaking through the interference from Saskatchewan to relay the particulars of death or destitution. Or something
closer to home, a burglary or even an attempt upon her life. Perhaps she was unwell. Agnes disembarked at Camden with less composure than she had set out. What help was she, who knew so little of the world? What comfort could she offer, what unconventional wisdom, that she did not herself require? She trudged disconsolately over the lock and turned into Greta's road. Perhaps, worst of all, Greta was merely suffering from world-weariness and angst; and for that, Agnes knew, there was no cure.

She knocked softly at Greta's door, half-hoping not to be heard. Within seconds, however, the door flew open and Greta was before her. Her eyes were red and her cheeks puffy, but otherwise she seemed unharmed. She stood back to allow Agnes through.

‘What do you want?' she said when they were in the sitting-room. Before Agnes could take steps to defend herself, she added: ‘I've got tea, decaff, or juice.'

‘What kind of juice?' said Agnes, playing for time.

‘Mango.'

‘I'll take tea.'

The preliminaries over with, they sat down in two facing armchairs. Greta's flat was small but light. Being on the ground floor, Agnes could observe passers-by on the pavement outside. That combined with the comfort of her chair and the steaming cup of tea could have served to make the ensuing silence quite pleasant, had Agnes not found herself becoming rather annoyed. It was her job to comfort and reassure, but she could surely not begin it until Greta had completed her own task of confessing, weeping even, and most importantly requiring her assistance. She began thinking about the more straightforward work she had left behind at the office.

‘You'd better go,' said Greta. ‘I'm sure you're busy.'

‘Not at all,' replied Agnes politely. ‘How are you, anyway?'

‘Fine, fine,' mused Greta vaguely. ‘The proofs are due back tomorrow and since I didn't show up there must be heaps to do.'

‘Jean's taking care of it,' said Agnes, abandoning her only
means of escape, ‘It's almost finished, anyway. What's wrong with you, actually?'

Greta gazed at her. She seemed to have no intention of replying. Agnes found something quite unsettling in her bearing, as if she had left her body to go through the motions while her mind hid somewhere dark and quiet.

‘I've been thinking about my father,' Greta volunteered. ‘Normally I don't think about him, but today he's been on my mind.'

‘Oh.'

‘I really hate him, you know.'

Interesting though this was, Agnes could not help but wonder nervously where it was all leading.

‘Why?' she said, hoping for something specific. ‘What makes you hate him?'

Greta gave an explosive snort of laughter.

‘Well, what particularly?' Agnes persevered. ‘I mean, why has he been on your mind?'

‘Well, I was thinking about the last time he spanked me, actually,' Greta replied. ‘He pulled down my pants, you know, and did it with his bare hand.'

‘How old were you?' said Agnes. She couldn't think of what else to say.

‘About sixteen. What a sleaze, huh?' Greta folded her arms over her chest. ‘Not that it was anything unusual. It was just kind of part of the scenery in our house. He used to beat all us girls, and my brother too until he got too big to hit. The first time I remember him doing it was when my parents came back from this trip to Toronto. My dad used to go there sometimes for work and Mom would go to shop. Anyhow, they left the others in charge which was pretty dumb, seeing as they were into some weird stuff in those days. When my folks were away they could get pretty wild.'

‘How old were you?' said Agnes. It sounded even less interesting second time around.

‘About six, I guess. What they used to do was, they would smoke a lot of pot and then they would make me smoke
some. Then they used to dress me up in funny clothes, like my sisters' lingerie, you know, suspender belts and things. Then they would put this big fat joint in my mouth and take pictures of me. Like that. Weird. Anyway, I remember my dad coming in the room and everyone stood up because they were so surprised. They didn't hear the car or anything. I was kind of lying on this sofa in this dumb underwear and I couldn't get up because I was so stoned, and he just stared at me, like stared without saying anything. Then he threw the others out and he came over to me and spanked me. You little tart, he said. Thwack.' Agnes flinched. ‘That's what he called me, a little tart. I was, like, six!'

Agnes sat in silence. She wished she had never asked Greta about her father. She was unequal to such revelations. There had been a time, a while ago, when she had felt embarrassed by Greta's candour and somehow superior to it. Now, however, she felt embarrassed by her own inadequacy. Greta had shown her a secret wound, and Agnes had merely driven slowly by like a prurient motorist past a pile-up. She remembered the first night her lover had come back to her house, when they had sat on the bed exchanging pleasantries while the unspoken thrashed and flailed between them. She wondered when exactly in her life she had ceased to act, had ceased to be effective. Every time she came to the brink of another person, their borders lapping, she would draw back, afraid to jump across.

‘Has something happened?' she said then, rather stiffly.

Greta nodded. Tears began to roll down her cheeks.

‘I was raped!' she cried, shaking her head. ‘I – he raped me!'

‘Who?' said Agnes, horrified. ‘Your father?'

‘What? No, not him. That guy, the one – the guy I met on the tube. London Transport.'

She began to sob uncontrollably. Agnes got out of her chair and knelt awkwardly beside her.

‘Do you want to talk about it?' she said. This was a line borrowed from innumerable television dramas which Agnes had hoped to pass off as her own.

‘Not really,' gasped Greta, her chest heaving.

Agnes regarded her in agony of uncertainty. The television dramas had never dealt with rebuffal. She put a tentative arm around her, and felt Greta sag heavily against it.

‘He came here last night,' she said thickly. ‘He said he wanted to talk so I let him in. I let him in!' she cried, turning her shiny face incredulously to Agnes. ‘And he wouldn't leave, so I said I was going to call the police and then he just kind of came up behind me. And there was nothing I could do. Nothing! He was really strong, you know? I didn't know people were that strong. I just – I just screamed and screamed.' A strangled laugh escaped from her throat. ‘And then I hit him with that hat-stand over there. I guess I must have drawn blood. And then he left.'

Agnes felt Greta's body shake, and then realised that she herself was shaking. She felt sick to her stomach. Her heart felt strangely as if it were actually bleeding. She also felt something else, something rather like anger or disappointment; a blind, enraged surge of bitterness that the world should turn out to be so cruel and inferior a place, when all they had ever done was believe in its authority.

Down at the police station, Greta sat on a bench while Agnes attempted to attract the attention of one of the officials on duty. The station was bleak and neon-lit, and the air was heavy with misdemeanour. A man with wild nest of grey hair was striding up and down the waiting area, ranting at those who entered.

‘It's black against white,' he informed Agnes. ‘The forces of evil are rising up, all around! They come by night – they come by night, in the darkness, when we can't see them. They prowl through the streets!'

‘Go home, then,' said Agnes curtly. ‘That way you won't have to worry about it.'

The man strode off, muttering. A few minutes later, Agnes secured a policewoman and related Greta's misfortune. The
woman went to make her a cup of tea. When she returned, she informed Greta that she would have to go to hospital, but that first she would have to give details of the incident. Greta assented quite cheerfully. She seemed to have recovered some of her composure.

‘And then I whacked him over the head with a hat-stand,' she informed the balding policeman who was taking notes.

‘A hat-stand.'

‘Yeah. Victorian mahogany with these kind of curly bits at the top. Oh, yeah, and when he was leaving I yelled after him, “You bastard, you could at least have worn a condom.” '

The policeman's face twitched.

‘Is that all?' he said.

‘Well, what did you expect me to do?' Greta demanded. ‘Invite him back for goddamned elevenses?'