A Man Over Forty (9 page)

‘But in Illinois, at this time of year, he'll get pneumonia.'

‘It might be kinder if he did. But no, she'll look after him.
She's a widow with a married daughter and another at the University of Chicago – and if he marries her I'll have to look after them all, as I've had to work for him and my dead brother's wives – their wives and children – all of whom I loathe and abominate.'

‘What are you going to do?' asked Palladis.

‘Go to Palm Beach, of course, and break it up if I can.'

‘But can you?'

‘I know more about my father than she does; and she may listen to me.'

Weatherby Scroope, a temperate man, walked heavily across the veranda and filled a full tumbler from the dark red jug that held rum punch.

‘So I'll have to leave you,' he said, ‘but you mustn't let that upset you. Treat the house as your own, and Mary will look after you. You know your way about now, and on Friday you must go to the Rochester Cattle Show and meet old Quigley Bone who's got a house to sell. Everybody knows him, and any of the stewards will tell you where to find him.'

‘If I can do anything to help,' said Palladis—

‘No,' said Scroope, ‘I shall have to do it alone – and, if I can, cut him out from under her guns.'

Balintore, still looking at the photographs, said softly, ‘The terrible frivolity of old men!'

Early On Friday morning – a grey, beclouded morning – they set out for the Rochester Cattle Show in a mood of straitened or diminished enjoyment. It was twenty-four hours since they had said goodbye to Weatherby Scroope, whose departure had left them with a feeling, curious and unexpected, of loneliness and disorientation. He had driven to Montego Bay, to board an aeroplane for Miami, and the grimness of his expression had not been mollified by Palladis' suggestion that he might make the best of a bad business by marrying the woman himself.

They had spent an idle day on the veranda, disinclined for movement, only half-inclined to reading, and a little tired of intrusive humming-birds and redundant fireflies when darkness fell. They missed the triangular pattern of conversation to which they had grown accustomed, and Balintore had bored, not only Palladis but himself, with a prolix and unilluminating monologue on the uneasy relationship between tragedy and farce.

They felt hopeful, but not assured, of entertainment at the cattle show, and when, half-way to Rochester – it was a long drive – the sky cleared and the sun shone warmly, Balintore began to speak, with increasing happiness, of the cottage he was about to inspect. He spent the next hour in pleasant anticipation while Palladis gave his attention to the road in front and the map beside him.

They came by a minor road into a long open valley of cultivated fields, and presently joined a dusty procession of buses, motor-cars, and many bicycles. Policemen at a crossroads were directing traffic with well-drilled gestures, and at the entrance to the show yard stewards with red rosettes and soft voices took their half-crowns and car fees. Busy young men controlled the car park, and girls with large yellow rosettes sold programmes. Through a loud-speaker an amplified voice issued incomprehensible instructions, and in a roped-off ring a dozen small, neatly fashioned, dark red cattle were inspected by two slow, deliberate judges and a circumference of intent and silent observers. Elderly ladies sat on wooden chairs in front of a marquee, and at another marquee cases of beer were being opened. Picketed in long lines were animals of different sorts and breeds, and in a long open tent were displayed potted plants, jars of jam, home-baked cakes and needle work. Children ran noisily to and fro; voices louder than the majority betrayed persons of more importance than the majority; and the amplified voice from the loud-speaker made crackling noises which no one could understand.

‘It is exactly like a cattle show at home; a small county show,' said Palladis.

‘But everyone is black.'

‘Well, nearly everyone.'

‘And I prefer their voices.'

‘Their use of colour is less inhibited.'

‘The weather is better.'

‘The cattle are smaller.'

‘The children are prettier.'

‘Beware of chauvinism,' said Palladis.

‘These people,' said Balintore proudly, ‘may soon be my neighbours. I wonder where Quigley Bone is? We must try to – find him.'

‘There's no hurry. Let's have a glass of beer and walk round for a little while.'

For half an hour, or more, they admired the lively variety of the show – the cattle and their exhibitors, the gaily dressed children and a stall of fantastic vegetables, the self-possession of the English minority in their dowdy dresses and casual old suits — and then their attention was taken by the arrival of two bus-loads of tourists, who appeared to be American.

‘Their choice of colour is also uminhibited,' said Palladis.

‘But tartan shorts! They shouldn't be allowed to wear shorts and pantaloons – look at that tiny man and that enormous woman – shorts and pantaloons of Stuart tartan!'

‘They may be Royalists,' said Palladis. ‘Fidelity to the Throne is not restricted to people with an athletic figure.'

Their attention was distracted by the voice behind the loudspeaker which, suddenly loud and clear, announced, ‘Mr Quigley Bone is anxious to meet Mr Edward Balintore. If Mr Balintore is here, will he kindly proceed to the Members' tent, where Mr Quigley Bone is waiting for him.'

‘Come along,' said Balintore, ‘come along. We mustn't keep him waiting.'

They found the Members' Tent, and standing in front of it saw the tall and slightly stooping figure of a man who wore an old-fashioned double terai hat, khaki slacks, and a bushshirt. He had a lean and humorous face, bright blue eyes, and a meagre, drooping moustache. He came towards them and said, ‘Balintore? You're Balintore, are you? Well, I'm in a hell of a pickle.'

‘I'm sorry to hear that. Do you know Guy Palladis?'

‘A cousin of Weatherby's, aren't you? Why isn't he here?'

‘He's in a pickle too.'

‘His old father, I suppose? Damned old scoundrel he is. Well, don't tell me about him. I'll hear the story in God's good time, and that's when it's all over, one way or the other. You want to talk about that cottage of mine, I suppose?'

‘I do.'

‘I wish you had come a couple of days ago! I was ready to sell, and sell dirt cheap to a friend of Weatherby's. But now – well, the fact is I've had an offer, or a tentative offer, from some damned fellow who says he's going to come and live here – made a packet of money, wants to retire, and thinks well of our climate – and his offer, or his tentative offer, is half as much again as I was going to ask you, and I've been afflicted by greed. Sheer, bloody, shameful greed.'

‘How much has he offered?'

‘That's the cottage,' said Bone, and gave Balintore several photographs. ‘Nicely situated, down by the river, but no use to me. My sister built it, after she got her divorce. Fool of a woman she is, can't learn her lesson. Married again now, and living in Vancouver Island, God help her. It's been standing empty for a year.'

‘How much?' said Balintore.

‘Two acres of land with it, and some nice fruit trees—'

He was interrupted by a woman's voice that cried loudly, ‘Ned, oh, Ned! You got away from me two days ago, and I thought I was never going to see you again. And then we heard your name on the loudspeaker – we were away across on the other side of the field – and we came right over, and oh, Ned, how well you're looking! You haven't changed a bit.'

His astonishment at seeing her was tinged with consternation – a vague, uncharted dismay – but because her intrusion angered as well as surprised him, he could dissemble his unease, and he responded to her exuberant manner with a tolerable imitation – an English imitation – of social greeting.

‘Betty!' he said. ‘What a long time—'

‘Don't tell him how long,' she said. ‘I've lied about my age. You remember Chris, don't you? Well, I'm Mrs Bulfin now, and I bet that's a surprise. We're on our honeymoon.'

She was a handsome woman, but dressed too obviously in
assertion of her remnant youth – a white dress with a pink sash, a broad-brimmed white hat with a pink ribbon – and the husband she introduced had the over-confident look of a man who knew what money could buy, and a face painfully reddened by sunshine hotter than he was used to. ‘Yes,' he said, ‘we've met.'

‘Yes,' said Balintore, ‘of course I remember. But to think you're married – well, I hope you're both very happy.'

‘We've made a good beginning,' she said complacently; and her husband offered his cigar-case to Balintore and Quigley Bone.

Balintore introduced Palladis: ‘My friend Guy Palladis, Mrs Bulfin.'

‘Betty,' she said.

‘And Chris Bulfin.'

‘Have a cigar,' said Bulfin. ‘Havana, not Jamaica.'

‘Disgracefully but unrepentant,' said Palladis, ‘I smoke only cigarettes. They're my link with suburban housewives and the sturdy proletariat.'

‘I didn't realize you knew each other,' said Quigley Bone. ‘Now I'm deeper in the pickle than ever!'

‘How come?' said Bulfin.

‘He wants to buy the cottage too.'

‘Do
you
want to buy it?' said Balintore.

‘I'm interested,' said Bulfin.

‘Good God!'

‘And you?'

‘I came here to see it.'

‘I haven't made up my mind yet,' said Bulfin. ‘I've been looking at another house a couple of miles away: a bigger house with a lot more land.'

‘Well,' said Quigley Bone, ‘as you know each other, you'd better talk it out between you. I want to offend no one. Never have! I'm nobody's enemy except my own – and my own faults are simple indolence and from time to time a little plain, ordinary, inoffensive greed. See you later, I hope.'

‘Oh, Ned!' said Mrs Bulfin, ‘we must have a talk. A proper talk! Do you ever see anybody from the old days in Ceylon?'

‘Not often,' said Balintore.

‘How well I remember them!'

Bulfin, walking with Palladis, asked, ‘Have you known him long?'

‘About four years.'

‘Has he ever told you about my brother?' asked Bulfin.

Balintore And Palladis shared a picnic lunch with the Bulfins, and left the show ground an hour later. They did not see Quigley Bone again.

For some while they drove in silence, and then Palladis said, ‘It's often embarrassing to meet old friends.'

‘Between them,' said Balintore, ‘they are going to ruin everything.'

‘As bad as that?'

‘The cottage,' said Balintore, ‘is exactly what I wanted, and the original price – he told what he's prepared to give me for it – the original price I could well afford. But he can out-bid me, and I can't afford to out-bid him.'

‘But if he buys the other place he spoke of—'

‘They would be my neighbours – neighbours within two or three miles of me! – and how could I live with those people on my doorstep?'

‘Why not?'

‘It's an old story. Too old to start now. Wait till we get home – home, by God! I wish I'd a home to go to – but wait till we're on top of that hill again, and I've had a drink or two – wait till then. And you may have to help me.'

‘It's what I'm paid for,' said Palladis.

The absence of Weatherby Scroope still left a sense of vacancy, of a partial vacuum, in the Great House; but Mary and the other servants looked after them with undiminished attention, and the table on the veranda was furnished ready for their return.

Darkness came, and fireflies to decorate it, but after three drinks Balintore was still reticent.

‘Your friend Bulfin told me quite a lot about himself,' said Palladis. ‘He is one of our new rich – on a foundation of chemical manure.'

‘A poisoner of the fields,' said Balintore.

‘And now, having sold his firm or factory to a much larger firm, for a handsome price, he proposes to enjoy his leisure.'

‘Why can't he enjoy it somewhere else?'

‘His wife – she says I must call her Betty – has always wanted to live in Jamaica; and as they have been married for only six weeks, he still listens to her. She was engaged to his brother—'

‘I know.'

‘Then he lost sight of her for many years, and met her again in romantic circumstances.'

‘In Paignton.'

‘She told you, did she?'

‘At great length.'

‘It's a charming story. He, newly enriched but lonely, a widower for two years, goes to spend Christmas at Torquay. He knows no one there, and makes no friends. He goes for a walk, and it starts to rain. It rains heavily. But he walks on, because he has nothing else to do. He walks all the way to Paignton, and there—'

‘He sneezes.'

‘He feels a cold coming on. He suddenly realizes that he's wet and miserable, and across the road he sees a little tea-shop, warmly lighted, decorated for Christmas. In he goes, and takes off his coat. He sneezes again, and a sympathetic voice says, “Oh, you poor thing! What a day to be out!” He turns and recognizes her—'

‘A most damnable mischance that was.'

‘And three weeks later they are married.'

Balintore got up to give himself another drink, and Palladis asked, ‘How did you happen to know her brother?'

‘He was with me in India. In Arakan when the Japs made their counter-attack and were beaten.'

‘Was he in Intelligence?'

‘Not precisely. He was an officer observer.'

‘But you were in Intelligence?'

‘I was doing a temporary job at that time. With the Fourteenth Army. They needed publicity. Badly needed it. It used to be called the Forgotten Army. So its Public Relations were reorganized, and I went down to Arakan. From Delhi. The new job wasn't altogether divorced from Intelligence. I had to censor the stories that correspondents brought in.'