Colouring In (22 page)

‘I read it over and over again,’ she said. Was I acquainted with it?

I said I’d read Classics at Oxford, and, yes, indeed, had much enjoyed the Boar Hunt, though I’d not read it for many years. From there we progressed to the past, her life here – never lonely for a single second. ‘Solitude is an art worth learning,’ she assured me. I understood her once eager buyer of pictures to be a married man, but she did not go into any detail. We discovered we had a few Norfolk friends in common, though two of them were now dead. She explained that these days her work was much interrupted by completely unsuitable people the estate agent sent to ‘view’ (another of her sneers) the house. Some of them were so appalled they didn’t even bother to look round, drove away fast.

‘People fancy they’d like remoteness,’ she said, ‘but faced with the reality they soon change their minds.’

A lot of London people had been moving to the east coast in recent years, but couldn’t take the harshness and – thank God – moved away again. She smiled, laughed – a soft, cooing laugh like a mourning dove.

We sat talking through the afternoon. She produced fish pâté and homemade bread, more carrot cake, and damsons from the garden. A bottle of claret was opened. I fetched logs from a pile outside and put them on the fire.

Eventually, she thought it time to wrap my pictures, and in the intense muddle of the room managed to find paper and old plastic bags. They came to a very large amount, she said: I said I didn’t mind, and wrote her a cheque for what seemed to me a rather modest sum.

And then – I don’t know how it happened. It certainly wasn’t a premeditated thought. But as I walked towards the door, mellow with food and wine, pictures under my arm, I asked if I might buy the house as well. It’d save you any more bother with estate agents and unsuitable viewers: we could negotiate between us, I said, to break a long silence. Rosie stood bemused, pink cheeked, incredulous.

‘The house is yours,’ she said quietly.

‘I’ll come back tomorrow,’ I promised, and kissed her on the cheek. It was the happiest afternoon I’d spent for years.

And, yes, now, reflecting on it all, I’m convinced I’ve done the right thing. Living here is a thrilling prospect. What I shall do, exactly, I’m not sure: what I would like to do is put a large part of my fortune to good use. I can consult Rosie about that. She’ll know exactly how best I can help around here – the preservation of Norfolk churches, perhaps. She’ll have lots of ideas. And when I’m not working at whatever it is, I’ll read all the books I’ve been meaning to read for years, when there was no time. I’ll walk, I’ll sail. Like Rosie I’ll learn the art of solitude. Isabel will slowly fade.

But for now I must get up, return to Rosie to make arrangements, which should be very simple.

The telephone rings.
Isabel
. Isabel!

She wants to know how I am, what I’m up to, when I’m coming back to London. In my internal struggle about whether to tell her what has happened, I become hopelessly inarticulate. She’s annoyed by my reticence. ‘Something’s up, I can tell,’ she says.

So I tell her. I tell her of my change of life plan, and the story of how I bought – well, am about to buy – a house. There’s a long silence.

Then Isabel asks if I’m
sure
. I tell her I am: I’m sure, I’m thrilled, this is the answer I’ve been waiting for. Then I swear her to secrecy. I confess I would not have told anyone, just yet. But I was in a state of such excited anticipation that it would have been hard to keep it entirely to myself. Darling Isabel said she quite understood and swore not to tell anyone, even Dan. I have a feeling – though I could be wrong, I’m so happy my antennae could be muddled – she sounded a touch sad. But I assured her I’d be back in a week or so, and would come round immediately.

She said: ‘Do. We miss you. I miss you.’

Isabel misses me…

A few moments later, putting on my socks, tiresome practical thoughts zoomed in: the house is in a terrible state, needs a lot of work. How should I set about all that?

I tie the laces of boots suitable for the marsh path.

Carlotta comes to mind.

In the end, I stayed till the Sunday afternoon. Mr. G had taken Sylvie off to see her grandmother, so Mrs. G and I had an omelette and salad, then Mrs. G drove me home. She gave me a basket of provisions – everything I could possibly need, for the next few days, and a lovely pot of jasmine besides. ‘A real Red Riding Hood,’ I said. She’s kindness itself, is Mrs. G. The arrangement is that I go back to work at the end of the week if I’m feeling up to it. Which I’m sure I will. Besides, I’d be bored stiff sitting at home all day, nothing to do. I can’t wait to get back to normal.

I’m definitely well on the way to recovery. My cheek is still various nasty colours, but fading, and the swelling has gone down. Even the red eye is better. Well, I suppose I’m a tough old thing, I told myself, as I took a long hard look in the bathroom mirror. I do look more like a pensioner than I did before the fall, but it would take more than a punch or two to knock me completely off my feet … thinking of which, my legs for some reason are still a bit wobbly. My knees were shaky coming downstairs at Number 18, but then the doctor said shock takes us all in different ways. Perhaps the shock still isn’t out of my system, though the mercy is I haven’t had any nightmares.

Home! My…! Needs a good dust and a breath of fresh air. I opened the windows and put on the kettle. The past week, the comfort, the kindness, it’s been like a dream. Whatever would I have done without the Grants? I put on the kettle and sat down at the table. The chair was very hard beneath my legs. I wondered if I’d ever noticed that before, or has it just come to me now I’m used to the Grants’ lovely furniture? I moved to the armchair, and there again I was surprised. The springs in its seat, pushing up at me. I don’t recall them, either. It came to me what I should do is save for a new armchair, and few yards of the pretty cotton stuff with the pictures in the spare room at Number 18. I’d grown so fond of it. I knew those shepherds. Yes: that was my plan. Save for a few nice things. Life isn’t worth living if you’ve nothing to look forward to. I’d look forward to a few improvements here, very much. Only wish it wasn’t so noisy, and there was a nice view over a garden. Still, you can’t have everything and compared with some, I’m pretty well off.

I went back to the kitchen table with a cup of tea and began to open my post. Nothing interesting. I was half hoping for a word from the children – but no. Only circulars, the gas bill and an official looking communication from the police. Seems they want me to go along to an identity parade at my convenience. I’ll have to let them know that my convenience won’t be for a while.

I decided that when I’d finished my tea – and Mrs G, bless her, had put in a box of very top of the range ginger biscuits – I’d unpack my bag, get out the hoover, take things slowly. I looked through the envelopes again to make sure I’d missed nothing before throwing them away. I suppose I’d been hoping for some word from Yarmouth: but that was a foolish hope.

‘You’re very lucky, Gwen,’ I said to myself. ‘You could have been really badly injured, or even dead. So count your blessings, take a grip. Next week, perhaps, think about getting out a bit. Ring your old friend Sheila, start going to Bingo again. Maybe the mugging was a message from above to say live a little, Gwen: don’t get stuck in a rut.’

Maybe, I thought, I would sum up the courage to go to the pub one evening, just have a quiet gin and orange, look at the people, come home. Maybe I’ll do that once the identity parade is over.

Maybe I will.

Yesterday afternoon I went round to number 18. I was fed up with being so out of touch with Dan and Isabel.

‘Oh yes, Dan told me you’d rung and would probably come round,’ Isabel said.

With a funny sort of look, I thought. As if she wasn’t entirely
au fait
with the idea of my ringing her husband. But maybe, in my rather odd current state, I was imagining that.

Dan had taken Sylvie off to see her grandmother – relief! So it was just Isabel and me. She’d just come from taking Gwen back to her flat. Gwen’d been in the house for over a week – pretty noble of the Grants, that. Not a word of grumbling from the saintly Isabel, of course, but I bet it drove her barmy, having to do the housework before getting down to work. She made us tea and talked for a very long time about Gwen. Described her flat in minute detail – I could
imagine
, for heaven’s sake. She didn’t seem to notice my lack of interest. On and on she went. I fear Isabel has a tremendous
penchant
for those less fortunate than herself, but God she can bore on about them. I sat at my usual place at the kitchen table listening. I wanted to scream at her to shut up. But I just went on listening. I could feel the mock interest setting hard across my face.

When at last – at last – she stopped droning on about Gwen, she turned to Bert. What on earth did I think he was doing in Norfolk? She said she’d had a long talk to him on the telephone – this piece of information she delivered, I thought, with an air of gleeful superiority.
She
had been in touch with him, was her triumph. Not for anything would I have told her I’d had a long talk, too. Did he ring you, then? I asked. I couldn’t resist that. There was a long pause. Then Isabel – as if she’d been undecided how to play the truth – admitted that it had been her who had rung. I gave her a huge smile and said how lucky she was to have Bert as such a close friend. She blushed a little, I swear. Perhaps she has a secret fancy – but no. Never. She’s dottily, quite boringly in love with Dan. She went on to ask how Bert’s house was getting on. It was my turn to bore her.

I wished like anything that Dan and Sylvie – yes, for once, Sylvie – would come back. But they didn’t. Isabel and I eked out conversation, oddly, awkwardly. It was as if there was suddenly no longer anything to talk about. All the old ease had gone. A kind of mistrust, or suspicion, had risen between us. Why? How? Surely, surely Dan hadn’t said anything, despite his stupid belief that you should tell a spouse
everything
. But I don’t think it could have been that: he was so agitated about
my
not saying a word – hardly likely he’d do so himself. So I don’t know what’s happened. A sort of horrible gap has opened up between Isabel and me, after so many years of easy friendship. Perhaps our lives and interests have diverged so far there’s nothing but the past left to bind us anymore.

Isabel pressed me to wait till the others got back, stay for supper. But I said no. I was really depressed by the hour we had together, and longed to get out of the house – the house in which I’d had so many good times, knew as well as my own. But I didn’t want to go home for a Sunday evening on my own, yoghurt in front of the television. So I decided to go round to Bert’s, see how things were progressing.

There, I cheered up. The builders had done brilliantly. They must be the only builders in London who actually get ahead of their schedule. I wandered from room to room, marvelling at the transformation. Surely Bert would be pleased. What’s more, though there were still a few minor things to do, and curtains to be put up, any time he wanted to come back from Norfolk he could move in. I’d ring him tomorrow, let him know.

In the sitting room I threw back a dustsheet from the sofa and sat down. I calculated I’d only need to take one whole day off work to get everything finalised for Bert, then there’d be all the fun of seeing his amazed face. I rather look forward to that. I’ll make sure there’s a bottle of Veuve Cliquot – I think that’s his favourite – in the fridge.

I sat back in the sofa and found myself thinking how nice it would be to live
here
, rather than my flat. How nice it would be, actually, to live here with Bert. I don’t know how I’ve come round to thinking any such thing, having been so determined I wanted him only as a friend, but I have. Necessity, perhaps. There’s not much choice around. But no, it’s not that. I’m intrigued by Bert’s capriciousness, his odd charm, his determination to keep his distance, his
strength
. God, there aren’t many men who could have resisted, with such dignity, my foolish strip tease, and then had the charity not to berate me. So, yes, in an ideal world Bert and I…

But I’m not blind. I know damn well when something isn’t reciprocated. To him I’m nothing more than a friend and useful decorator. He needs me only for getting his house done. Once he’s seen it, and said thank you, that will be that. Oh, he might ask me out occasionally. We might do a few things
à quatre
with Dan and Isabel. But I know I’m not in his calculations, and never will be.

I also know I’m suddenly fed up with London, my job here, my life. The feeling that’s been creeping up on me exploded, surprisingly, in Bert’s half-done sitting-room. I’m nearly thirty-seven. I want something to happen. So: I’m going to make it. I’m going to leave London, go to New York. I’ve lots of friends there. With my qualifications I’ll have no trouble finding a job. I’ll get an apartment in the Village, go and stay with the Haileys at their house in the Hamptons. Suddenly, I can see it all.

The gloom of two hours ago vanished. I’d hand in my notice in the next few days – they’ll let me go in three months, I reckon. Then, a new life.

The excitement was immense. I decided not to tell Isabel, Dan or Bert. Or anyone, just yet.

Dejection – utter dejection, these last few days. Nothing to write, no ideas. A feeling of hopelessness, of loss, of wandering in a wilderness in which there are no signs. When you’re not working at something you love doing, there’s a pointlessness in life. I didn’t tell anyone – not even Isabel. I went to my study each evening as usual, read other peoples’ plays –
Tartuffe, Betrayal, Cymbeline, Jumpers.
They were meant to inspire, but they just depressed me. Perhaps I should recognise the fact that writing a play is out of my reach: but I can’t. I can’t stop believing in possibility.

One morning a few days after Gwen had left, after I’d dropped Sylvie at school, I drove to Holland Park and went for a walk. My rather dotty old father-in-law was always on about walks being a cure for almost everything. In his case, except for moments of acute vagueness combined with some rum ideas, that did indeed seem to be so. I fell to thinking about him as I hurried along the paths, still empty at this time of the morning. He was a man of great tenacity. I remember the instance of the fountain. He was determined he should build it with no help, though he knew nothing of drainage or water design, or even how to stick stones together. But he stuck at it. Over two years of work, it took him, making mistakes and then having to re-build. I think all of us gently scoffed at him at the time. But he took no notice, kept at it for hours every day. And in the end he achieved it – an amazingly handsome fountain admired by all. He was so pleased with himself, the evening of its ‘opening’ as he called it. We all stood around drinking pink champagne, congratulating him. I’ve never seen him so happy. It’s a good feeling when you overcome difficulties, I remember him saying in his very long launching speech. He hadn’t had the opportunity to make a speech for years, and was making the most of it, though his voice was barely audible against the tinkling jets of water he had so painstakingly designed to arch before they fell. But then, later, I saw doubts rush in. The long job accomplished, what now? What now? he whispered to me. I know how he felt, though I’m still waiting for something equivalent to his fountain.