Authors: Muriel Spark
‘Elsie!’
he called after her as she opened the outside door and ran down the stairs. ‘What’s
wrong with the girl? — Elsie, this is quite a proper decent poem, I assure you.
It is Horace, it is merely—’
‘I’ve
got the letter that Patrick Seton forged,’ Elsie shouted up at him. ‘But I
intend keeping it. It’s here in my bag, but I’m keeping it.’
Matthew
sat at a table in the ‘Oriflamme’ watching Alice who had told him, ‘Elsie won’t
be here this afternoon.’
‘I
thought she always worked on Saturday afternoons.’
‘Well,
she’s not coming today, I don’t think.’
‘Any
idea where she is?’
‘No
idea. She may come in later, of course.’
‘I’ll
wait,’ Matthew said. ‘I’m on duty tonight from six, but I’ll wait till five.’
‘You’re
very keen,’ said Alice.
‘No I’m
not,’ he said. ‘I like sitting here watching you.’
‘While
waiting for Elsie.’
‘I’ve
got to see Elsie on some business. Can you guess what it is?’
‘No,’
Alice said, ‘and I wouldn’t care to try.’
‘She’s
a very nice girl, of course. A beautiful girl,’ Matthew said.
‘Oh, is
she beautiful? — Not that I’m saying—’
‘Well,
now,’ Matthew said, ‘I believe in original sin, and that all the utterances of
man are inevitably deep in error. Therefore I speak so as to err on the happy
side.’
‘She
has a beautiful nature, Elsie has, I’ll say that,’ said Alice anxiously. ‘I’m
sorry she’s not here for you. But I’ll give her a message for you. You can’t
sit here drinking coffee all afternoon.’
‘I’ll
take a cup of tea,’ Matthew said. ‘Do you serve teas?’
‘No.’
Alice hung around him, as if waiting for more information. It was early yet for
the afternoon trade and only two other tables were occupied. ‘Elsie may not
come,’ she said.
‘Sit
down a minute,’ Matthew said, ‘and rest yourself.’ Her small stomach showed a
slight pear-shaped swelling which appealed considerably to Matthew.
She sat
down, resting her wrists on the table and drooping her long neck. Her
shoulder-blades curved gracefully.
‘Has
Elsie got the letter?’ Matthew said.
‘What
letter?’ Alice said.
‘Has
she mentioned anything to you about the letter in Patrick’s case? The one he
forged—’
‘The
widow wrote it. Patrick did not forge it. That’s a lie. It will be proved when—’
‘Has
Elsie seen the letter?’
‘Elsie?
Why should Elsie see the letter? Ask your posh friend Ronald with his rolled
umbrella about the letter. He’s working on it, isn’t he? I bet he’s being paid
to say it’s a forgery. He hasn’t got anything to do with Elsie if that’s what’s
in your mind.’
‘Ronald’s
all right.’
‘Well, so’s
Patrick.’
‘He isn’t,
you know.’
‘A lot
of people are jealous of Patrick. It’s the price he has to pay. Why are you
waiting for Elsie?’
‘You’re
jealous of Elsie,’ he said.
She
jumped up and went to the bar where she ordered coffee for him. When it was
ready she brought it over to his table and placed it before him with a gesture
which was as near to throwing it at him as was compatible with not spilling a
single drop of the coffee. Meanwhile, he admired her pear-shaped stomach.
‘I said
tea,’ Matthew said. ‘However, this will do, Alice, my dear.’
‘I said
we don’t do teas. Patrick is a poet beneath the skin,’ she said.
‘I’m a
poet in the marrow of my bones,’ he said.
She
stroked her head, drawing her hand up and over the high piled hair and, looking
up at the blue and starry ceiling, disappeared into the back quarters.
Matthew
wrote a secret poem to Alice to while away the afternoon. As he wrote she
served him with three more cups of coffee and a slice of walnut cake.
There
was still no sign of Elsie at half-past five, so he paid his bill and left the
secret poem on the table where she later found it.
To
Alice, Carrying her Tray
O punk me a mims my joyble prime
And never be blay to me.
The wist may reeve and the bly go dim
But I’ll gim flate by thee.
And all agone and all to come,
The sumper limm beware.
I’ll meet thee ever away away
At Wanhope-by-the-Pear.
Chapter X
NEXT day, Sunday morning,
Sunday afternoon and the long jaded evening — the very clocks seeming to yawn —
occurred all over London and especially in Kensington, Chelsea and Hampstead,
where there were newspapers, bells, talk, sleep, fate.
Some
bachelors went to church. Some kept open bed all morning and padded to and from
it, with trays of eggs and coffee; these men wriggled their toes when they had
got back to bed and, however hard they tried, could not prevent some irritating
crumbs of toast from falling on the sheets; they smoked a cigarette, slept,
then rose at twelve.
Those
who were conducting love affairs in service flatlets found it convenient that
the maids did not come in with their vacuum cleaners on Sundays. They made
coffee and toast on the little grill in the alcove behind the curtain.
Tim
Raymond had a large front furnished room on the first floor of a house in
Gloucester Road, Kensington. The carpet was green, the walls a paler green, the
sofa and easy chairs were covered with deep brown plush. He had hung on the
walls of this furnished room some sea-scape water colours executed by a
deceased uncle; he had placed on the lower shelves of a bookcase, behind the
glass, three pieces of Georgian silver — a coffee pot, a fruit dish and a salt,
relics of a great-aunt; on the upper shelves were some fat light-brown call..
bound racing calendars dating from 1909, which Tim rightly thought looked nice.
There
was a divan bed, in which Hildegarde Krall still lay half-asleep, and in the
opposite wall an alcove containing a small electric grill and a wash-basin
where Tim was brushing his teeth.
Hildegarde’s
head was turned away from Tim, and at this angle of profile he thought she
looked masculine. She turned round and propped up on her elbow to watch him.
She said, ‘It’s twenty to eleven.’
Tim
brushed his teeth at her, turning his head towards her.
She
said, ‘Is it raining?’
The
telephone rang. Tim spat out his tooth-water into the basin and went to answer
it. ‘I suppose it’s my Aunt Marlene,’ he said.
‘Halo,’
he said. ‘Yes, Marlene. No, I’ve been up for hours. Yes. No, I’m afraid not
today. No, not, I’m afraid. I’m afraid not. All day today, no. Well, yes, I do
see, Marlene, but I don’t want to be involved, really. One doesn’t want…
Well, Aunt Marlene, I hardly ever really saw him in action, I mean. I mean, I
know he’s a good medium, but really don’t you think the law should take its
course? Yes, the law, but I mean it should take — They cross-examine all
witnesses, you know. I can’t possibly manage today, Marlene. Tomorrow, yes, at
six.’ Tim tucked the receiver under his chin and wiped his glasses on a handkerchief.
‘At six, yes. Yes,’ he said, ‘tomorrow. Oh, I’m lovely, how are you? Goodbye,
darling. Yes, ye—six.’
He
flopped into the brown plush chair and lit a cigarette. ‘I’m too young for all
this,’ he said. The telephone rang again.
‘Hallo
— Marlene! No, not at all. Yes, Marlene. —Well, can’t we discuss it tomorrow?
Yes, of course, do tell me now — Yes. Yes. Oh, but Ronald’s probably away. Away
for the week-end. In fact, I’m sure he is, I think so. I haven’t got his
number, Marlene, isn’t he in the book? He wouldn’t discuss it with you, anyway,
he’s awfully strict about confidential — Oh, no, I’m sure he couldn’t have lost
anything. He never loses —No, you’ve been misinformed, really. No, I’m sorry, I
haven’t got Ronald’s number. I’ll ring him at his office in the morning. Yes,
don’t worry. The morning. I’ll ring — No, not at all. I say, I must go, I’ll be
late for — Yes. ‘Bye-’bye.’
‘What
has Ronald lost?’ said Hildegarde.
‘A
letter connected with a criminal investigation.’
‘Ronald
has lost it? He needs someone to look after him. I used to do everything for
him. I used to—’
‘Yes,
you told me.’
‘Well,
so I did. What does your aunt want with Ronald?’
‘I don’t
know. I don’t want to be involved, quite frankly.’
‘I used
to mend all Ronald’s clothes. I used to buy the theatre tickets. I used to rush
to his flat after my work and___’
‘I
know,’ said Tim, ‘you told me.’ And he plugged in his electric razor, the noise
of which drowned her voice.
Ronald came out of church
after the eleven o’clock Mass and noticed that the youngest priest was standing
in the porch saying appropriate things to the home-going faithful. Ronald did
not like seeing this very young priest, not because he disliked the priest but
because the priest was young, and of a physical type similar to himself, and
reminded Ronald of his own blighted vocation. This very young priest prided
himself on knowing the majority of the Parish by name.
‘Well,
Eileen,’ he said, as they emerged. ‘Well, Patsy. Well, Mrs. Mills. Well, John,
and what can I do you for?’
‘Oh,
good
morning,
Father.’ … ‘How’s yourself, Father.’ … ‘Oh, Father, when are
you coming to see us?’ … ‘The bingo drive was nice, Father.’ ‘… delightful
sermon, Father.’
‘Well,
Tom,’ said the priest. ‘Well, Mary, and how’s your mother?’
‘A bit
better, thank you, Father.’
‘Well,
Ronald,’ said this very young priest as Ronald came Out.
‘Well,
Sonny,’ Ronald said.
The
young priest stared after Ronald as he rapidly walked his way, then remembered
Ronald Bridges was an epileptic, and turned to the next comer.
‘Well,
Matthew,’ he said, ‘and how’s life with you?’
‘All
right, thank you, Father,’ said Matthew Finch. ‘Father, if you’ll excuse me I
can’t stop. I’ve got to catch up with Ronald Bridges, Father, before he gets on
the bus. But I’ll be seeing you, Father.’
Matthew
caught up with Ronald at the bus stop.
‘I managed
to see Elsie early this morning,’ he said. ‘She’s got the letter but she won’t
part with it unless I sleep with her again.’
Ronald
said, ‘Tell me later,’ for a number of the church people in the bus queue had
turned to take note of this talk.
‘I told
her she’d be arrested,’ Matthew rattled on, ‘for entering your flat on false
pretences and for robbery. I told her—’
‘Come
back with me and then tell me all,’ Ronald said.
‘Well,
she wants me to sleep with her again, and I’m not going to. She’s a pervert, I
can tell you that much, and I don’t like perverted girls. If she isn’t a
pervert she’s a nymphomaniac, it’s just the same.’
The bus
drew up. Ronald and Matthew followed the queue on to it. Those who had formed
the most interested audience for Matthew followed them upstairs. Two girls sat
behind them, giggling.
‘Don’t
say any more now,’ Ronald murmured. ‘People can hear you.’
‘Two to
South Kensington, please. I don’t want,’ Matthew said, ‘to sleep with Elsie, I
want to sleep with Alice. If I was to sleep with Elsie again I’d have to
pretend it was Alice. And anyway, I’m not sleeping with girls any more, it’s a
mortal sin and you can’t deny it,’ and he took his change from the conductor. ‘Elsie,’
he said, ‘is—’
‘Shut
up.’
‘Elsie,’
Matthew whispered, ‘is a bit jealous of Alice and her beauty. She hasn’t a man
of her own, and she was after some spiritualist clergyman but she found out he
was homosexual, and she couldn’t stand for it. Homosexuals send her raving
mad. She was going to give him the letter yesterday, and didn’t she find out
yesterday—’
‘What
did this clergyman want with the letter?’
‘He’s
in the spiritualist group. They all want to plot against Patrick Seton or plot
for him, there’s a great schism going on in the Circle just now.’
They
got off at South Kensington and walked to Ronald’s flat.
‘Elsie
is going to use that letter to get a man and it isn’t going to be me,’ Matthew
said. ‘She’s got some passionate ways in sex. Not that I’m narrow-minded, only
she’s not beautiful like Alice, and you can’t allow for funny passions in a
girl that isn’t beautiful.’
In the
flat, Ronald said, ‘I’d better see Elsie. Will she be at the “Oriflamme” today?’
‘Yes,
at six tonight.’
‘What’s
her address?’
‘Ten Vesey
Street near Victoria, first-floor flat.