What a Carve Up! (34 page)

I looked at it for several minutes before it started to make any sense. All I could see at first was this random patchwork of colour, striking enough in itself, but oppressive and disorientating. Then gradually, as I began to make out certain curves and boundaries, it came to seem less like a patchwork and more like a vortex, and I felt myself caught up in a giddying swirl of movement and energy. Finally, some shapes started to emerge, and I began the treacherous business of trying to put a name to them: that globe, which dominated the left-hand side of the painting, and what seemed to be some sort of netted implement … Could it be anything as mundane as a clogged and muddled still life? A roughly sketched scrub of waste land – in the corner of Joan’s back yard, say – with a football and an old tennis racket in it? It seemed increasingly likely, and I felt my excitement begin to subside, when …

‘Please don’t look at that.’

Phoebe stood in the doorway, clutching a paper bag to her chest.

There was nothing I could say, except, ‘I’m sorry, I – I was just curious.’

She carried the paper bag to her desk and took out a drawing pad and some pencils.

‘I don’t mind you coming in here,’ she said. ‘But I don’t like people looking at my work.’

‘I’m sorry, I should have just … asked you or something – ’

‘It isn’t that.’ She pulled the sheet back over the canvas and started to rearrange the bunch of wilting gyp which stood in a jam jar on her window-sill.

‘It’s very good,’ I said. I could feel her grow suddenly tense, but persisted in blundering on: ‘I mean, to fill a picture with so much drama and power, when you’re dealing with a couple of everyday objects like that; it’s remarkable. I mean, a football and a tennis racket – who would have thought it …?’

Phoebe turned to face me, but her eyes remained lowered and her voice muted. ‘I don’t have much confidence in my abilities as a painter.’

‘Well you should.’

‘It’s the last in a series of six pictures inspired by the Orpheus legend.’

‘And if the others are as good as th–’ I stared at her in surprise. ‘Pardon?’

‘It shows his lyre and his disembodied head being carried along by the waters of the Hebrus.’

I sat down on the bed. ‘Ah.’

‘Now you see why I don’t like to show people my work.’

There was little prospect of an end to the ensuing silence. I looked blankly into the middle distance, too flustered to manage anything in the way of an apology, while Phoebe sat down at her desk and started to sharpen one of the pencils. I had almost come to the conclusion that it would be best if I got up and left without another word, when she said abruptly: ‘Has she changed much?’

This threw me at first.

‘I’m sorry?’

‘Joan. Has she changed much, since you knew her?’

‘Oh. No, not really.’ Then I thought about it. ‘Well to be honest, I can’t really say. I mean, I’ve never really known her as an adult, only as a child. It’s been a bit like meeting her for the first time.’

‘Yes, I’d noticed. You’re almost like strangers.’

I shrugged: but in a rueful rather than a nonchalant way. ‘Perhaps it was a bad idea for me to come.’

‘No, I don’t think so. She’s been looking forward to this for weeks. And she loves having you here, I can tell. She’s very different with you around. Graham thinks so too.’

‘In what way different?’

‘Less … desperate, I suppose.’

I didn’t like the sound of that.

‘I think she gets lonely up here, you see. And her work can be very demanding. We both do our best to jolly her along. I know she’s dreading the summer, when we’re not going to be here to keep her company. Not that we find it a strain, or anything,’ she added earnestly. ‘We both get on with her all right, and there are really only one or two things which seem – well, beyond the call of duty … Like when we have to play games.’

‘Games?’

‘Quite often, after dinner, she wants us to play board games. Monopoly, Snakes and Ladders, things like that.’

I said nothing; just shuddered, for some reason.

‘Anyway, that’s one thing you don’t have to worry about. She won’t be doing it while you’re here, that’s for sure. Doesn’t have to.’

∗

‘Now – who’s for a quick game of Scrabble?’

Joan beamed expectantly around the table, and all three of us did our best to avoid meeting her eye. Graham resorted to his trick of stacking the plates again, Phoebe concentrated on slowly draining what was left in her wineglass, and I developed a sudden interest in translating the Polish Trade Union poster which had been staring me in the face for the last three evenings. But then, after a few seconds, I began to sense that the other two were relying on me to come to the rescue, so I said: ‘Actually I could do with an hour or two alone with my notebook, if that’s all right. The ideas have been coming thick and fast today.’

Brazen falsehood though it was, it was the only excuse Joan was likely to accept. ‘Oh well,’ she said, ‘I’d hate to come between you and your Muse. But if this is a new book you’re working on, you must make me a promise.’

‘What’s that?’

‘That I can be the first person to read it when you’ve finished, of course.’

I smiled awkwardly. ‘Well, this is something of a long-term project: I doubt if it’ll see the light of day for years. In the meantime I’ve got something else to be thinking about. I’m contemplating a move into non-fiction.’ It was hard to tell, from her expression, whether Joan was impressed or baffled by this revelation. ‘I’ve been offered the job of writing the history of a certain eminent family. It’s quite a distinction, if you must know.’

‘Oh – and who might they be?’

I told her, and Graham snorted with incredulous laughter.

‘That bunch of vampires? Well, you must be on your uppers, that’s all I can say.’ He disappeared into the kitchen, carrying our plates and the remains of Phoebe’s excellent
parmigiana.
As he left he could still be heard muttering, ‘The Winshaws, eh? That’s a good one.’

Joan stared after him, her eyes wide with incomprehension.

‘Well I don’t understand what he meant by that. What’s so special about the Winshaws?’ She turned to me for enlightenment, but Graham’s reaction had stung me into sulky silence. ‘Do you know what he was talking about?’ she asked Phoebe. ‘Have you heard of the Winshaws?’

Phoebe nodded. ‘I’ve heard of Roderick Winshaw. He’s an art dealer. He was meant to come and give a talk to us a few weeks ago, actually, about survival in the marketplace, but he never showed up.’

‘Well, Michael,’ said Joan, ‘you certainly are a dark horse. I want to hear all about it. I insist.’

‘Oh, it’s all quite – ’

‘Not now, not now.’ She held up a restraining hand. ‘You’ve got work to do, I realize that. No, we’ll have plenty of time to hear the whole story tomorrow. We’ll have all day, in fact.’

That sounded ominous. ‘We will?’

‘Did I not tell you? I’ve managed to get the day off, so we can go out to the dales for a picnic, the two of us.’

‘Mm. Sounds lovely.’

‘And rather than take the boring old car, I thought we’d cycle.’

‘Cycle?’

‘Yes. Graham’s said that you can borrow his bike. Isn’t that nice of him?’

Graham, returning to the table to collect the cutlery, flashed me a malicious grin.

‘Very nice,’ I said. ‘Very nice indeed. Is the weather going to be good enough?’

‘Well, it’s funny you should mention that,’ said Joan, ‘because there are storms forecast for the end of the day. But we should be fine if we set off in plenty of time. I thought if we got up at, say … six o’clock?’

The will to resist had deserted me. ‘Why not?’ I said, and handed Graham my fork and empty glass.

∗

That night I found it impossible to get to sleep. I don’t know what it was: maybe the thick summer heat, or perhaps simply the knowledge that I had to get up early the next morning, but I lay on that sofa for more than an hour, each position more uncomfortable than the last, until there was nothing for it but to try and find something to read; something to clear my mind of the tired spiral of thoughts which seemed to be clogging it up. But there were no books downstairs: only the ones I had brought with me, and three or four vegetarian cookbooks in the kitchen. That wasn’t what I needed at all. I needed something undemanding but compulsive, and immediately I found myself thinking of the children’s mystery story I’d rediscovered in Joan’s room today. If only I’d brought it down with me while I had the chance.

Ten minutes later, I knew that the only solution was to steal up to her room and fetch it.

I was in luck. Her door had been left a couple of inches ajar, and I could tell that her curtains were open, letting in a good deal of light from the street lamps. Since the bookshelf was right next to the door, there should be no problem slipping in there without waking her up. I paused on the landing for just a second or two, listening, then eased the door gently open and stepped inside. It was about half past one in the morning.

Joan was lying on her back, her skin grey and luminescent in the silver lamplight. She was not wearing any nightclothes, and had thrown off most of the duvet in her sleep. It was eight years since I’d seen a naked female body, in the flesh, as it were; and I think it’s true to say that I had never seen one as beautiful as this. Verity had been slender, strong-boned and small-breasted; by comparison Joan, basking without shame in the fullness of my hot gaze, seemed almost immorally ample and voluptuous. The word ‘generous’ came to mind: it was a generous body, both in the heavy grace of its proportions and in the uncomplicated readiness with which it submitted to my scrutiny. I stood there, transfixed, and it seems to me now that those few guilty moments were among the most glorious, the most unlooked-for, the most thrilling of my life. And yet it was all over so quickly. In no time at all, Joan had stirred, turned towards me, and I backed out of the door without making a sound.

3

‘Look at these arms,’ she said, squinting at them irritably and pinching the pale flesh until it blushed pink. ‘Like an Italian peasant woman. I just tell myself it’s in the genes and there’s no point in fretting.’ She spread raspberry jam thickly on to a slice of granary loaf and bit into it, then wiped her mouth with a paper napkin. ‘Do you think I’m overweight?’

‘Of course you aren’t. You know, your body is something you should feel comfortable about. It doesn’t have to be a particular shape.’

The shape of Joan’s body was very much on my mind that day, I have to admit. It was another hot summer morning and it had taken us nearly two hours to cycle out into open country. As soon as we reached what Joan deemed to be a suitable location we threw ourselves down upon the ground, and for the next few minutes, in spite of my fatigue, I was acutely conscious of the lazy pleasure with which she was stretching her limbs, the movement of her breasts as her breathing rose and fell, the thinness of the pink and blue blouse which she had untucked from her jeans and rolled up at the sleeve. For my part, I was bathed in sweat and panting noisily. For the first part of the ride I hadn’t been sure that I was going to make it. Joan had led me on a steady climb, choosing the steeper road every time we came to a junction: sometimes the incline had been so fierce that I nearly keeled over, it was so hard to keep moving. (Graham’s bicycle, I need hardly mention, was not equipped with gears.) But then I found myself getting more confident and the going became easier. Soon the terrain had levelled out, and at one point we hit upon a fabulous stretch of road – downhill but not too steep, just enough to get a bit of speed up, take your feet off the pedals and coast forward with the wind skimming your face and rushing through your ears, sweet tears of excitement welling at the corner of each eye. For a brief instant I felt the years slipping away, like a heavy burden which had been breaking my back, and we were children again, Joan and I, riding down the lane towards Mr Nuttall’s farm. She told me afterwards that I had let out a whoop of joy. I wasn’t aware of it at the time.

‘So,’ she said, ‘are you going to tell me about this mysterious new project of yours?’

‘It’s not definite yet,’ I insisted, and then gave her a full account of my extraordinary meeting on the train.

Joan gasped when I got to the part about sharing a carriage with somebody who was reading one of my books. ‘How
amazing
!’ she said. As soon as I had finished, she wanted to know, ‘I suppose she was pretty, was she, this Alice woman?’

‘No, not especially.’ It was surprisingly difficult to say this. The mere act of telling the story had brought Alice’s beauty vividly back to mind, and Joan at once seemed as plain and ungainly as when I had first caught sight of her on the station platform. I fought hard against this realization but there was no stopping it: I felt a shiver of desire pass through me as soon as I remembered the laughter and the teasing invitation I had glimpsed in Alice’s eyes.

‘Cold?’ said Joan. ‘Surely not.’

We talked a little more about the Winshaws and my writing and this somehow got us on to the subject of the stories we used to make up when we were children.

‘I suppose it’s rather exciting,’ Joan said, ‘to think that I once collaborated with a famous author.’

I laughed.
‘Jason Rudd and the Hampton Court Murders.
I wonder what happened to that little masterpiece. I don’t suppose you kept it, did you?’

‘You know very well that you had the only copy. And you probably threw it away. You were always ruthless about things like that. I mean, fancy having to come to me for that photograph.’

‘I didn’t throw that picture away, I lost it. I told you that.’

‘I don’t see how it could have just got lost, I really don’t. Anyway, I remember you throwing all your Jason Rudd stories away when you started on your science fiction phase.’

‘Science fiction? Me?’

‘You know, when you wouldn’t write or talk about anything except Yuri Gagarin, and you tried to make me read that long story about him flying to Venus or something and I wasn’t interested.’