A Coat of Varnish (20 page)

Discouraged, Humphrey asked the doctor what he was drinking himself.

‘Vodka.’ A trace of authority returned. ‘There’s always the off chance that one has to see a patient.’

Kate was working this out. ‘Less smell? It’s bad if they know you’ve had a drink?’

‘No.’ Perryman was firm. ‘It’s just the smell of alcohol itself which is bad for them. I’ve found it makes them nervous.’

It seemed as though he were driven to the limit by professionalism, or conscience, or both. Kate and Humphrey each settled for vodka. They waited for the purpose of the evening to break through. Alice Perryman made chatty conversation about the heat. No, she didn’t mind it, she just relaxed. She was too young to have much memory of the summer of 1947; that had been as blazing, so she was told. She gave a smile remarkably like the Cheshire cat, as though her not remembering that year would give comfort to the others.

Humphrey said that he did remember, very well. He had reason to, his son had been born that summer.

Dr Perryman shifted in his chair, eyes wide open, but the muscles of his cheeks immobile as though he were a sufferer from Parkinson’s disease. That was an odd feature, not always present and not clinical, of the striking face.

‘I’m much obliged to you coming, Leigh.’ This was the first time he had called Humphrey by his bare surname.

‘Very pleased to be here.’ With clandestine pleasure, Humphrey added: ‘Very pleasant of you to ask us.’ Sometimes the simple pronouns
we
and
us
had meaning.

Perryman said: ‘I’m in a little trouble, Leigh. You see, I did a very small personal service for old Lady Ashbrook.’

‘Oh, did you?’

‘I let her pay me in currency. She liked doing that.’

‘Why was that, do you know?’

‘Oh, I took a fraction off the bill. She liked that. It was a service to her.’ Then the doctor broke into a confessional laugh. ‘To tell you the honest truth, it was a bit of a service to me, too. You see, I didn’t have to declare anything in my tax return.’ He went on, earnest, confessional again: ‘This does happen to some of us now and then. No harm done. No hard feelings.’

Humphrey inclined his head.

‘Well, you know the police have been making their enquiries. Looking for God knows what.’ He was speaking in a monotonous, unemphatic tone. ‘They found some of the notes the old lady had paid me with. Months ago. She never let a bill run on more than a few days. I think she’d have been happiest if she’d slipped me the money after each visit. Like in the old days. Anyway, the police wanted an explanation. So I told them, of course.’

‘That was sensible,’ Humphrey said. He added, out of time-worn prudence: ‘As a matter of fact, I did hear a little about this.’

‘Who from, who from?’

‘Oh, rumours float round in this kind of business, you can imagine that.’ That was said out of old practice, too. It became first nature not to mention a name. ‘Anyway, Doctor, I’m sure what you did was perfectly sensible. You haven’t anything to worry about.’

‘That’s not the point.’ Perryman spoke loudly, fiercely.

Humphrey was puzzled, genuinely puzzled. ‘I don’t follow–’

‘That’s not the point. That’s nothing like the point. I’m not worried about the police. There’s nothing in it for them. But I wanted to ask you – that’s why I told Kate I should like some advice – is there a chance that they’ll pass the word on to the Inland Revenue?’

Surprise, matter-of-fact surprise. Humphrey couldn’t help suppress a smile. Dr Perryman was not smiling.

‘I shouldn’t think so. They’ll have slightly more important things on their plate.’

‘Do they pass this kind of information on to the Inland Revenue?’

‘I haven’t the slightest idea. They’ve got to clear up a murder.’

‘If they do.’

‘If they do,’ Humphrey repeated, ‘I shouldn’t think they’d be interested in someone getting away with a little income tax. And it must be fairly little, mustn’t it?’

‘Not much,’ the doctor said.

‘Well, then. You know, you’re getting things out of proportion. I doubt if you’ll hear anything more about it. I’m prepared to bet they don’t. But if the worst comes to the worst, and they do make a signal to your tax inspector, it’s not specially serious after all.’

‘That’s what I keep telling him.’ Alice Perryman gazed at her husband with maternal beneficent love. ‘It’s not so serious. We shall forget it in a week.’

‘And I keep telling you, the news will go around.’ When he spoke to her, his tone was trusting, but he became indignant and harsh. ‘Would you like to get into the news for anything as piffling as this? Just
silly
.’ He spat out the word. ‘There’s the man who cadged his takings on the side. And thought he could get it tax free.’ He spoke with as much outrage as though someone else had committed the offence. Then he quietened, and became anxious, concentrated. ‘What’s more, these taxes aren’t a joke, you know.’ He was speaking to his wife. ‘They might get me for three times what I owe them. Just to teach people a lesson.
Three times
, you know.’

He said to Kate, who had been listening with furrowed acute attention. ‘Just you think. Three times. It’s not a flea bite. I’ve never made the money I could have done, that’s one of the problems.’

Humphrey said: ‘People do tell me you could have done.’

Dr Perryman replied: ‘Yes, I could have done.’

‘Why didn’t you?’

Perryman’s expression had become transformed. Rage, indignation had disappeared. He shone with a kind of radiance, subdued but elated, and his tone became thoughtful, temperate. ‘I wanted to do something different. After all, one only has one life. Any competent man can get success as a consultant. And any man a class better can get success in what they call research. Without false modesty, it could have been easy. I wanted something better. I wanted to satisfy myself. That’s all that matters. In the long run, that’s all that matters. It may sound ridiculous to you’ – he gazed out into the room – ‘but I didn’t want to make medicine just a shade more scientific. Hundreds of men are doing that every day. If you understand me right, if I wanted to make it anything, I wanted to make it a good deal less. That is, until I had made a new start.’

He began to talk as he had done to Humphrey in the Square gardens, the morning after Lady Ashbrook had returned from hospital. He was eloquent, fervent, borne up on his own speech. The mind–body relation (he was repeating himself). What did we mean when we talked about the
will
? (Or spirit, or even mind?) His wife gently intervened just once: that wasn’t so difficult if one had faith. She was sorry he hadn’t got there yet. They looked at each other without conflict. He went on. We know so little. How did the mind affect the body, and the other way round? Until we know that we know nothing. It was worth just spending one’s life to get just a little way.

‘Have you got anywhere?’ Humphrey’s question wasn’t just a polite throwaway, but curious, sceptical, interested.

The doctor’s answer was flatly sensible, not exalted, not cast down. ‘I’m not sure that I’ll ever know. One’s only got one life. As I said before. It may not be long enough.’

‘Of course,’ Humphrey said, ‘there are some questions which haven’t any answers. And never will have.’

‘Of course there are. But we’re no good if we don’t ask them.’

Possessively, Alice Perryman said: ‘He’s thought about these things all his life. He told me so when I first met him.’

Perryman hadn’t asked for any more advice, or referred again to the matter of the notes. When Humphrey and Kate had said goodbye and were walking in the street, it was that matter, however, about which she began to talk.

‘Curious, he’s so keen about money. He is, you know.’

She said it with cheerful realism. ‘He and old Lady Ashbrook must have made a very good pair. Like French peasants. Trying to chisel each other, I shouldn’t wonder.’

‘That’s a trifle hard, isn’t it?’

‘You can’t teach me anything about penny-pinching. I’ve had some practice. I know the signs.’ She glanced at him with her ugly, endearing grin. When she was alone with him, she liked being impudent.

She had another thought: ‘But it does seem odd, doesn’t it? I can understand Lady Ashbrook. She was a born skinflint. The more they are run after, the meaner they get. But it does seem strange in him.’

They exchanged views – it was one of their pleasures – about acquaintances. Who were generous, who were stingy, why. Yes, expansive people, broad-natured people, could be remarkably stingy. They both had affection for Alec Luria: he was rich, but no one could call him generous. Paul Mason, one of the better young men, was, apart from occasional times when he took out a dozen friends, distinctly careful.

‘But it’s not right for Ralph Perryman.’ Kate returned to her first thought and spoke with feeling.

‘Perhaps he thinks it is.’ Humphrey’s tone was flippant, sarcastic, dismissing the subject.

‘No.’ Kate persisted. ‘He’s much better than that.’

‘I dare say.’

‘He’s an idealist, isn’t he?’

‘Very likely. I don’t know him well enough.’ They were taking their time down Ebury Street, lights in the hotel windows and the top-floor flats. Humphrey had answered indulgently, but with a trace of impatience.

‘Have you noticed his eyes? He may have made a mess of things, but he is an idealist, you know. You heard what he said about his career. It sounds like nonsense, but still…’

‘My girl,’ Humphrey said, ‘you’re not a push-over for many people, but you are rather a push-over for – the inflated, aren’t you? Call them idealists, if you like.’

Her arm had been resting closely in touch with his. He felt it stiffen.

‘You shouldn’t have said that.’ Her voice was hard and strained.

‘Why ever not?’

‘You know why not.’

So far as he could trust his mind, he had spoken without intention. He could have assured her, and been honest, that he hadn’t meant to refer to her marriage or her husband. Perhaps his tongue was more truthful than his mind.

‘If you talk like this, we shall hurt each other,’ Kate said. They walked on in dense silence. It might have been a minute before she broke out. A minute was a long time.

‘What’s said can’t be unsaid. We mustn’t say too much.’ Her arm was not stiff now, but she was looking at the pavement as they walked. ‘You needn’t have rubbed it in. I’m in a trap. Do you think I don’t know that? I’m not too bad at not making little mistakes. I only make a big one.’

He felt her shaking, but it wasn’t with tears, for, taking him by surprise, she was laughing out loud, not bitterly, but as someone who had seen a joke against herself. She said: ‘I can’t tell you much. When I can I will. I promise you.’

‘Yes.’

‘I can’t see my way clear. We mustn’t say too much until I do. Because that really will bind us. But I can say something you know already. I want you. I don’t think it’s altogether one-sided.’

‘Now, that’s a triumph of perception, isn’t it?’ It sounded like a gibe, or a denial of gravity, but it was said with love.

She smiled, but it was she who spoke with the gravity he had held down.

‘I’m pretty sure,’ she said, ‘we could make something good.’ In a hurry, she corrected herself. ‘That’s being vain of me, I know it is. But, anyway, I believe I could be giving you a better time than you’re having now. That wouldn’t be too much of a feat, would it? Perhaps that’s not being too vain.’

Humphrey was touched, as he had been often before, by that singular mixture of realism and diffidence. Was it that which had first captivated him? No, it went deeper than that from the beginning.

‘I wish I could guarantee that much for you,’ he said, with simplicity.

Then silence again, the hot, thick silence of love not yet complete, as they turned down Eccleston Street. ‘I ought to tell you something else. Something perhaps you don’t know. All I’ve just said is true. You’ll hold on to that, won’t you? So will I. This is true, too. It shows you the trap I’ve got into. You’ve understood a bit about my marriage, I’ve realised that all along. Another triumph of perception.’ She gave a smile, but it was wan. ‘But you don’t know it all. I’ll tell you as soon as I can. Though when one’s made a mistake perhaps one never knows it all oneself. Anyway, anything that ever was has gone. It’s all empty, flat and empty. But yesterday he had a letter from a philosopher in Poland, saying how marvellous his work was. He hasn’t had a letter like that for years; he was so overjoyed that I could have cried. And I was happy, too. That’s part of the trap. It’s all that’s left. I had to tell you.’

Once more they weren’t talking. As they came nearer home, Kate said: ‘Have I depressed you?’

‘Yes. But it’s probably better that I understand.’

In the side street, he took her by the shoulders and kissed her, like a lover. She kissed him back, violently. ‘In that way,’ she muttered, ‘any time.’

He hesitated, kissed her again. He wanted her. He said: ‘I’m afraid this has to be all or nothing. Don’t you see?’

‘You’re thinking of yourself.’

‘We both have to, don’t we? Look, I want you to see your way clear.’

She muttered his name. ‘Then you’ll have to wait.’

‘Don’t make me wait too long.’

She said: ‘I shall be waiting, too.’

Then, with a tense goodnight, she walked quickly off alone towards the Square.

After that evening with the Perrymans, Humphrey did not invite Kate to go out with him. For a while, she wanted to withdraw without either of them mentioning it. When he met her, by chance not intention, on an errand in the street, she was lively and loving, and didn’t let him forget that resounding platitude of his: life goes on.

They couldn’t help but notice that life was going on for the police, as well as for others. Often Humphrey came across detectives he now knew by sight, in their shirt-sleeves and slacks, some of them looking boyish with long, untrimmed hair. One Saturday night a pair of them walked into the local pub, and he asked them to have a drink with him and Alec Luria. They were ready to gossip about their interviews. They liked talking shop. They weren’t so tight-lipped as his security underlings had been, Humphrey thought, but they didn’t give much away.