The Good Father (12 page)

Guy blew out cigarette smoke, remembering how at once Esther had become so much older than him, stern, authoritative. She had held onto Ava's arms and repeated that she should be quiet, be good. ‘Hush now,' she'd said, and, ‘What a to-do! There – see! Danny's fine.' She'd glared at him, as if to say ‘
See what you've done!
' But this rare flash of anger was quickly over with. As Ava cried and struggled against her, Esther had said quietly, ‘You'd best leave us alone.'

He'd gone to his room. He listened to Ava's shouts and cries and felt like burying his head beneath his pillows but had forced himself to listen, his body stiff with the effort of just lying there. Eventually she became quiet. And eventually, his thoughts turned to Esther's backside as she bent over the oven.

He heard his father arrive home and guessed that in a few minutes he would come upstairs, tap on his door and come in without waiting to be asked. He would ask him what he'd been doing all day, wearily, not really caring. He might even sit on his bed, in that slumped, defeated-looking way of his as if everything was really too much of an effort, sitting and sitting and not saying anything, sighing from time to time. When his father was in these moods of his, Ava used to tease him, reminding Guy of a bright, brave bird flitting around the teeth of a crocodile. But Harry never shouted or became impatient with Ava as he did with him. Ava wasn't ever scared of his father. ‘Your daddy rescued me,' she always told him. ‘Your daddy is the kindest, best, most generous man in the world.'

Obstinately, he'd said, ‘I don't call him Daddy.'

She'd replied, ‘Then we shall be very right and proper and call him
Vater
.'

All this said in German, that strict, stern language Ava made soft.

In German, softly, she told him about her brother Hans. ‘He was my bright star,' she said. She showed him a photograph of a tall, blond boy in an SS uniform. ‘This photo is our secret,' she whispered. ‘You father would not like to know that it exists.'

He knew he shouldn't have found Hans glamorous, that he shouldn't have been so much on his side, but Ava made him heroic.

His father knocked on the door, opening it at once. He said, ‘May I come in?'

Guy sat up; he crushed his cigarette out in the ashtray he'd commandeered from the living room and smiled at Harry brightly. ‘Good evening, Father. How was your day?'

Wearily, Harry sat down on the chair in the corner of his room and gazed at him, his expression unreadable so that Guy decided it would be best to keep quiet. At last he said, ‘Guy, Esther told me that Ava was upset earlier.'

‘Yes.' He frowned. ‘She didn't say it was my fault, did she?'

‘Was it?'

‘No! What did she say?'

‘Only that you picked up one of the dolls.'

‘I forgot, all right? I put it down again
straight away
! I can't believe she even told you!'

Harry looked different tonight. He looked crumpled; there was a grubbiness about him, an untidiness that was out of character. His trousers had ridden up so that between turn-ups and socks an inch of death-white skin was exposed, a few sparse, straggly black hairs. He needed to shave, to wash his hair that was combed, greasily, thinly over his scalp. He looked older than most fathers Guy knew. Older, fatter, sadder. Guy's anger dissipated into a kind of exasperated pity.

‘I'm sorry,' Guy said. ‘I'll stay out of her way in future.'

‘You only have to be careful, that's all. I don't want you to stay out of her way, as such. Just . . . well, be kind to her.'

Guy was outraged; he wanted to say that he
was
kind, had always been kind, but he forced himself to suppress his outrage, to keep his expression neutral. Lighting a cigarette, he drew the smoke deep into his lungs, hoping it would help smother his anger.

‘Guy?' Harry laughed slightly. ‘You smoke like a hardened criminal. When did you start smoking, anyway?'

He glanced at him before tossing the spent match into the ashtray. ‘At school.'

After a while, Harry said, ‘Have you thought any more about what we discussed last night?'

‘Discussed' was the wrong word, Guy thought. His father had talked and he had listened, or pretended to. He had allowed the words to wash over him, only making the right noises from time to time. He had thought about Hope despairingly because he'd come to a realisation that she was too beautiful for him and that she must know this; he had an idea she would laugh at him when he arrived at her house to take her out. Laugh, or shut the door in his face, or both. He was just thinking how terrible it would be if he never got to see her naked when his father had said sharply, ‘Guy, are you listening to a word I'm saying?'

Now Harry said cautiously, ‘I know you're against the idea of going to university.'

‘There's no point.'

‘Of course there's every point! Your Headmaster thinks that if you only applied yourself –'

The boy made a derisive sound.

‘Don't pretend you're not intelligent – that you're not brighter than most,' his father snapped. ‘So, are you going to just sit around and wait until you're called up for National Service?'

‘Actually, I thought I might enlist of my own free will.' Guy had been thinking about this vaguely and suddenly it seemed suddenly the right, proper thing to do – obvious, even. He smiled at his father's incredulous expression.

‘Is that really what you want to do with your life?'

‘Probably not my whole life, Dad.'

‘For God's sake, boy! This is serious – can't you stop smirking for five minutes?'

Guy bowed his head, disturbed as he always had been as a child by his father's anger and contempt. As a child he'd suspected that his father blamed him for his mother's death; later, he was certain that he blamed him for the accident.

The accident
. No one ever referred to it; for years it had been just two capitalised, terrifying words that he knew had the power to stop his heart if they were ever spoken aloud. Except sometimes, rarely, when he was feeling particularly angry, he had an urge to ask his father if he really believed that he'd pushed Ava over that cliff; but then he would be standing on the cliff's edge, ground shifting beneath his feet, he would see the sudden, tumbling avalanche of rock that bounced and struck against the cliff face, rock that until a moment ago had been safe and solid as any pavement. And he and Ava, holding hands, were falling after the rocks, bouncing and striking in exactly the same way, two rag dolls like Danny and Martha, soft and helpless. He would see the two of them sprawled on the ledge that had broken their fall and saved them, spears of yellow gorse poking between their bodies, and his anger, his urge to confront his father over his shaming suspicions, would shrivel and die, overwhelmed by fear. He could no more talk about the accident than throw himself under a train – no matter how strong the urge.

He stood up, too agitated to sit enduring his father's gaze. He said, ‘Did you want to speak to me about anything else? Because I'm going out tonight so I should get ready.'

‘Oh?' Harry made an attempt to look interested. ‘Where are you going?'

‘To the cinema.'

‘Who with?'

‘No one.'

Harry gazed at him. At last he said, ‘Guy, if you want to join the Army . . . well, all right. If you believe you'll be able to cope with the discipline, with taking orders – things you've never shown any respect for before . . . ' More gently he said, ‘Look, please reconsider. I really don't think you're the type of boy –'

‘Dad, I'm sorry, but I would like to change now.'

‘Why change if you're going to the cinema alone?' When he didn't respond, Harry went on, ‘So, are you seeing some girl?'

‘I said I was going alone, didn't I?'

‘All right. Have it your way. Be quiet when you come home, I'll be angry if you wake Ava.'

He left, and Guy listened to his heavy tread on the stairs, heard him say something to Esther. A moment later Esther shyly put her head round his door, her voice anxious as she said, ‘He wasn't cross with you, was he?'

It was impossible to stay angry with someone who looked so timid, so remorseful. On impulse, Guy took her hand, leading her into the room before closing the door. Releasing her, he said, ‘He's terribly angry. He's throwing me out, in fact, on the streets. I was just about to pack my bags.'

Nervously, she glanced over her shoulder at the closed door. Looking at him she said, ‘That's not true, is it?'

He gazed at her, thinking that perhaps it was her timidity that attracted him, her servility; he imagined that he could order her to take her clothes off and she would do so, shaking and fearful, but unquestioning; she would lie still. Feeling the beginnings of an erection, he turned away and went to open the window, imagining that the room stank of his bloody wanking.

Trying to make her voice light, she said, ‘He wasn't really angry, was he?'

‘No.'

‘Good. That's okay then.' She glanced around, and he realised that she had never been in his room before. Her eyes rested briefly on his unmade bed, then went back to the door again. ‘I should go,' she said.

He nodded, although he would have liked to have stopped her, to take her hand and lead her to the bed, just to sit and talk with her, to gaze at her and try to make sense of her. After all, next to Hope she was a scrawny, common little thing. Suddenly, he wanted to lie on top of her and overpower her completely; he thought of Hans, who would no doubt do just that, without conscience to trouble him. Ashamed of his filthy urges he said, ‘Were you really concerned about me?'

‘Yes.' She met his gaze for a moment before turning away and letting herself out of the room.

Chapter 12

Hope fed her brothers a supper of Heinz tomato soup and sliced white bread which they tore up, floating the bits in the soup and calling them bread boats. She told them not to play with their food, to hurry up and finish it or they wouldn't get any pudding.

Stephen looked at her in surprise from sinking a boat with his spoon. ‘Is there pudding?'

‘Apples.'

‘Bugger and pooh!'

‘Stephen! If you say words like that again, I'll tell Dad.'

He gazed at her. ‘Bugger, pooh, bugger, bugger.'

‘You're horrible.'

‘Bugger.'

‘Stop it.'

From the kitchen doorway her father said, ‘Yes, Stephen. Stop it, now.' He came in, put his briefcase down and went to stand behind Stephen's chair. Stephen hunched down, expecting the usual clip round the ear his father administered. Taking a slice of bread, Jack dipped it into Martin's soup and ate hungrily. ‘Have you eaten, Hope?'

‘No.'

‘That's good, we'll eat together. I need to talk to you.'

Martin said, ‘Talk to us, too!'

‘It's grown-up talk.'

‘She's not grown-up!' Martin was outraged. ‘She's not! If she is,
I
am!'

‘And I am, as well.' Stephen twisted in his seat to look up at his father. ‘I'm the second eldest, anyway.'

‘By all of ten minutes. Tell you what, I'll speak to Hope and then we three men will have a special talk when you're in bed, all right? And if you're good and listen nicely, afterwards I'll read to you.'

Jack never read to them. The boys' eyes grew wide with anticipation. Martin said, ‘Read one of Uncle Peter's books.'

‘If you like.' Glancing at her, Jack said, ‘Should I open another tin of soup?'

Hope expected him to talk about Val. She knew that his last date with her had gone well because, the morning after, she heard him singing in the bathroom as he shaved. To her surprise he sang ‘Peggy Sue', although only the same couple of lines over and over. For the last few days he had been humming the Buddy Holly tune under his breath and she decided that it was good that he was happy. She hadn't told him yet that this evening she was going to the pictures with Guy; she had secretly decided it would be best to tell him at the last moment when he couldn't do much about it, knowing in her heart that this putting-off was only cowardice. Besides, she could barely imagine Guy turning up as he'd promised. The whole idea of Guy Dunn seemed too good to be true. Thinking of him, her stomach quickened with nerves so that she could barely swallow the sickly soup her father had heated and poured into Martin's emptied bowl so as to save on the washing-up. He took Stephen's bowl, having chased the twins off to their room. Sitting down opposite her, he said, ‘How was school today?'

‘Fine.'

He dipped a folded slice of bread into his soup. Swallowing a mouthful he said, ‘Nothing worrying you, then? Everything's all right?'

She looked at him sharply, afraid he might have guessed she was nervous and would want to know its cause. More firmly she repeated, ‘Everything's fine.'

‘Good. Excellent. And you know that if you need any help with your maths homework, you only have to ask.'

She would never dream of asking him; all the same she said, ‘All right. Thank you.'

‘Uncle Peter's house is closer to your school than here, isn't it? Not as far to walk.'

The mention of Peter's name had become enough to turn her stomach over. Suspiciously she asked, ‘And so?'

‘Do you like his house? I know it's a bit dark and dismal, but it's big, isn't it? And the garden's fantastic. The boys love it there – better than here. There's more room.' He paused, then said, ‘Hope, I might as well just tell you straight. Uncle Peter's father has left me his house. And money. House, money – the lot.'

‘Why?'

Jack laughed, bemused. ‘I know, it's astonishing, isn't it? I keep asking myself why. And you know why I think he did it? Spite. He did it to spite Peter.' Reaching for another slice of bread only to put it down again, he said, ‘I'm still not certain if I should take it or not. Peter wants me to.'

Trying not to sound as anxious as she felt, she said, ‘If you do, would he live with us there?'

‘No. He says he wouldn't want to do that. I suggested it, of course. But he said no.'

Hope tried to imagine living in that horrible house, its rooms so stuffed full with furniture, with the kind of ugly knick-knacks she only ever saw piled up in boxes outside junk shops. She remembered playing hide and seek there. Peter had found her easily because she had hidden in a blanket box but had been too scared of its musty darkness to close the lid completely. She had held it open an inch, her hand trembling against its weight. Peter had crouched down, his eyes smiling through the crack. ‘Sprite, have you seen a little girl pass this way? Her name's Hope and I think she wants to be found now.' Lifting the lid a little, he said, ‘Oh, it
is
you!' As he opened the lid fully, she held up her arms for him to lift her out. She remembered that a moment earlier she had been thinking that she was too old to be playing this game; now she wanted only to be babied by him, to be cradled in his arms as he cradled Stephen and Martin, a feeling that came over her often in those days when Peter was around and the accident had taken her parents away.

Her father said, ‘Hope? You're very quiet. I would like to know what you think about all this.'

She shrugged.

Jack pushed his empty bowl away and immediately lit a cigarette. ‘Shall I tell you what I think?' He exhaled, cigarette smoke flaring his nostrils. ‘Oh, I don't know. I hate the house, really. It's full of the old man – I feel I should have to ask Father O'Brien to exorcise the place. Or I could sell it, I suppose. Not that I'd get much for it, the state it's in.' Flicking ash into his soup bowl, he said, ‘I know what your mother would say.'

He rarely mentioned her mother. Afraid that showing too much interest might silence him Hope asked lightly, ‘What would she say?'

‘That we shouldn't take Peter's home from him.'

‘Then don't.'

‘No. No, of course. You're right.' Jack pushed his hand through his hair. ‘Well, I suppose that settles it,' he said dully.

She wished she had mentioned Guy earlier, when his mood was still lifted, because now he was gloomy, obviously preoccupied with what he had just decided to give up. If she mentioned Guy now he would be stern, too full of questions; he might, because of his own disappointment, decide not to let her go. But it couldn't be helped – Guy would be arriving in less than an hour.

Quickly she said, ‘At that party on Sunday, Irene's cousin asked me if I would go to the pictures with him.' Because she thought he might approve of what they were going to see, she added, quickly, ‘He wants to see the film about the Battle of Britain that's showing.'

‘Oh, does he?' Jack grunted. ‘Well, tell him not to bother – it's rubbish.' Stubbing his cigarette out he said, ‘How old is this boy?'

‘Seventeen.'

Her father raised his eyebrows; he always knew when she was lying. ‘Seventeen?'

Blushing, she looked down at her half-finished soup and heard her father sigh.

‘How old is he, Hope?'

‘Eighteen.'

‘Eighteen?' He held her gaze. After a moment he said, ‘Is he coming here? Then I want to meet him.'

‘But I can go?'

‘If you're back by ten o'clock.'

‘I will be.' She smiled at him, relieved. ‘You'll like him.'

‘Will I?' He shook his head. ‘I very much doubt it.'

He was late. Hope waited at the window for him and after fifteen minutes of waiting she went to the front gate and looked up and down the street. She saw him then, walking briskly; when he saw her, he quickened his pace, not quite breaking into a run. He was too cool for that, she thought, and didn't know whether to like him more or less because of it. As he reached her he said, slightly breathlessly, ‘Sorry. Are you ready to go?'

She looked back at the house. Her father was upstairs reading to the boys as he'd promised, but he had repeated that he wanted to meet Guy and she was afraid that if she disobeyed him on this, he might not allow her to see him again. Hesitantly she said, ‘Would you come in for a minute?'

‘Why?'

Feeling childish she said, ‘My father wants to meet you. Sorry.'

Guy laughed. ‘That's all right. I'm good with parents.'

Hope remembered how he had been with Peter and how Peter had seemed unimpressed with the way he called him
sir
so often. She dismissed this thought at once. Peter was odd, he didn't behave like ordinary men. Her father would like Guy, despite what he'd said.

Leading Guy into the house, Hope called up the stairs. Her father appeared on the half landing; she was relieved that the twins were nowhere to be seen. As Jack came down, Hope told him, ‘This is Guy.'

Guy held out his hand, his voice as bright as it had been when he met Peter. ‘Hello, sir. Pleased to meet you.'

His outstretched hand was ignored. ‘Have my daughter back here by ten, do you hear?'

‘Yes, sir.'

Looking at her, Jack said, ‘Ten o'clock, Hope. No later.'

Guy said, ‘Do you want to go to the cinema?'

Hope looked at him uncertainly and he thought how shy she was, more timid than he remembered so that suddenly he felt angry that she wasn't the sexy girl he'd built up in his imagination. Too sharply he said, ‘Let's do something else instead.'

‘All right.'

She sounded wary of him and at once he was ashamed of his anger. After all, she was still the girl who had kissed him so surprisingly passionately. He thought about the party and the way she had looked at him as though he was special; no one had looked at him like that before. His fingers went to his eye. He said, ‘I know somewhere – somewhere we can be alone. Would you mind being alone with me?'

She shook her head, making him smile because she looked so scared.

‘Sure? All right. It's this way.'

The house had been uninhabited for years. When he was much younger he would go there, climb over the wall and play in the overgrown garden. He told no one about the house, this derelict, wild place he had discovered; each school holiday he would return, finding it subtly changed each time – a drainpipe fallen further from the wall, another windowpane broken. On one of his very first visits he had found a key hidden beneath a loose paving stone; it unlocked the back door. He had explored the house, empty but for a table and a few broken-backed chairs. In the summer, the rooms smelled of dust, a dry, inflammable smell. Dead flies and moths gathered on the window sills amongst the flakes of white paint; the floral patterned wallpaper peeled from the wall above the marble fireplace in the sitting room.

The house was kept secret by the trees growing in its garden, horse-chestnuts and sycamores, too-big trees Guy believed would one day destroy the foundations so that the house would fall in on itself, becoming nothing but a pile of bricks and timbers.

He hadn't thought of taking Hope to the house, not until he saw her and her shyness had made him feel so unexpectedly angry. All at once he couldn't be bothered with going to the cinema, with the crowds of people, the shuffling, infuriating queues for tickets, for ice cream – she would expect ice cream, he was sure. He especially couldn't be bothered with having to sit still watching a film about the war. The war was too close, there all the time in his house where it hung about his father like a bad smell, hanging about Ava, too, of course. He was sure Ava lived in 1945 in her head, an explanation for her sadness, and her preoccupation with the bloody dolls. The war was the last thing he wanted to watch; to waste his precious time with Hope in such a way had suddenly seemed unthinkable.

Outside the house, he said, ‘This is it.' Feeling it would be easier to lie, he said, ‘It belongs to my father, he just hasn't got round to selling it.' He pushed open the creaking gate and took her hand. ‘We have to go round the back.'

He took the key from the new hiding place he had found for it beneath the kitchen's rotting windowsill, unlocked the door and picked up the torch he left just inside on the abandoned table, knowing it would be dark soon and that anyway the soft evening light would hardly penetrate the grimy windows. He turned to Hope. ‘I've made a kind of den,' he said, and felt childish suddenly. Quickly he added, ‘There's somewhere to sit, anyway.'

She smiled at him uncertainly. ‘No one lives here?'

‘Only the ghosts.' He took her hand again and squeezed it. ‘Don't be scared. They've been dead so long they've forgotten they're supposed to be frightening.'

He had brought cushions from home and an old rug, laying them out in front of the fireplace where he had placed half a dozen candles. The candles stood securely in puddles of melted wax and Guy took out his matches and lit them, filling the room with shadows. Sitting down on the rug he held out his hand to her. ‘It won't dirty your dress,' he said. ‘The carpet's clean – from home.'

She sat down, a little way from him. ‘You just took it? Won't your mother notice it's gone?'

He gazed at her, thinking how little she knew about him, how much he would have to tell her; or not tell her. He supposed he could go on lying, invent a whole family for himself; like his lie about the house, it might be easier than explaining the truth. Much easier, in fact. The truth sounded like a lie, so implausible, so preposterous – it set him apart from normal people like Hope. Then he remembered that Hope's mother had been killed, that her death had been the kind of tragedy people talked about, just as they talked about his family. He remembered the strange man who had collected her from Irene's party, someone she was so quick to disown, and thought that perhaps Hope wasn't as normal as she looked.