The Long Room (10 page)

The second tapes of Wednesday would not be ready for distribution until late afternoon. Stephen planned to leave at three and to come back afterwards, taking his chances with Security and the signing list. In the meantime he kept his headphones on and counted the minutes passing; they ticked by at snail’s pace. The telephone on his desk flashed its red light at him but he did not answer it, in case it was Rollo Buckingham. Then, for fear that Rollo would come stalking in person to his desk, he took the A-Z into the toilet and locked himself into a cubicle. He had already looked at page 76 a hundred times but he
wanted to be quite sure that he had memorised it. That took up half an hour. He made tea for himself and his colleagues. It was almost time.

‘I’m off,’ he said to Louise. ‘But I’m coming back.’

‘When is your appointment?’

‘Three-thirty. It won’t take long, I hope. I haven’t finished today’s take so I’ll come back as soon as I can.’

‘No, no don’t. Especially don’t if you have to have anything done. Where’s this dentist anyway? Surely you won’t have time to get there and back again in conditioned hours?’

‘Harley Street,’ Stephen said at random.

‘Oh. Well, it’s true that’s not so far to go. How very posh, to have a dentist there! But even so, I don’t think you ought to come back. I think you should go home. Have a stiff drink and recover! And that’s an order, Steve!’

‘But Rollo Buckingham –’

‘I’ll deal with Master B, don’t worry!’

He hadn’t reckoned on the rain or the early onset of the dark. There was daylight when he descended into the Underground but it was already shading to bruise-violet when he got onto the overground train, and by the time he crossed the river and arrived at Battersea Park station, dusk and rain were falling fast. He found the road and Helen’s block of flats with ease but when he did, he realised that he did not know the number of the flat. He had assumed the mansion block would have one main central door but in fact there were five entrances, each with a brass panel of numbered doorbells next to it, and one was on a side-street. How could he tell which one to watch? This redbrick slab was more like a fortress than an ordinary
block of flats: it extended from one side-street to the next and stood like a great bulwark against the lowlier buildings of Battersea behind it, keeping them from the green spaces of the park.

Stephen looked up at it, almost losing heart. The road between the mansion block and the park was wide, the pavements almost empty. There were iron railings along the border of the park, broken at wide intervals by gates leading onto paths, and the gate nearest the mansion block did not afford a clear line of sight to any of the doors. He thought of the tracker’s lessons in surveillance: by standing here, in the gathering dark and the falling rain, on this pavement where no one else was waiting, by staring gormlessly at the building opposite, he was breaking every rule. But then he remembered the resolve that had begun to flow in his veins the day before. Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, he told himself, faint heart ne’er won fair lady. This first step was after all a simple one and danger-free; he only wanted to set eyes on her and nothing else.

Testing different vantage points he found that from one it was just possible to glimpse the entrance on the side-street while keeping the others in view, but it was obviously not sensible to loiter any longer on the pavement. A discreet position behind the black railings was the only option. He hurried down the pavement to the nearest gate and went into the park. It was not going to be easy to conceal himself at his chosen point. Between the circular path and the railings was an ample planted border, dense with holly and dark ivy and a tangle of thin branches, leafless now. Ivy crawled across the ground as well – grotesquely twisted and whiskery with thick white roots. Fortunately for Stephen there were some hedge plants that
had kept their foliage: a small-leafed bushy thing – he thought maybe it was privet – and another, with larger, shiny-looking leaves rather disgustingly dappled with yellow, as if they were diseased. Thanking heaven for the camouflage of his dark coat, Stephen forced himself into a thicket of this speckled bush, ignoring the thorns and the pricks of holly.

The bush did not completely hide him. From where he stood he could see the mansion block quite clearly through the fret of leaves, and in the gathering dark was glad to note lights coming on above the doors. But the pavement in front of him, the road beyond, and the path behind were getting busier now. Cars drove past him frequently, obstructing his view. Children were starting to appear, a good sign, with mothers or perhaps with nannies, walking home from school. None of the women looked anywhere but straight ahead; some of the children darted quick glances to the side. Even in the depth of his preoccupation it struck Stephen how sharp-eyed these children were, how full of curiosity and yet accepting of a man standing silently inside a hedge with rain seeping down his upturned collar. One small girl stopped and watched him solemnly, before giving him a little wave. He waved back, and put his finger to his lips in a gesture of complicity that made her smile, and without a word she ran off after her mother, who had paid no notice to the dawdling child.

His life had been empty of children since he was himself a child, and even then he was seldom in their company, except at school. Other people had younger brothers and sisters, nephews and nieces, little cousins. It must be a fine feeling, to hold a trusting child’s hand in yours. He would like to be a father.

Apart from the children and their chaperones, there were
few pedestrians. Stephen reviewed all that he knew of Helen’s daily routine. She went to school by bus, he was almost sure, and the school was somewhere near Sloane Street. He had not seen any bus stops on the road between the station and the mansion block, and certainly no buses passed him. Therefore she must make the last part of her journey on foot, coming in all likelihood from an easterly direction.

He waits. A young woman on her own is what he waits for. A woman with two children unlocks the second of the doors on the façade; an older woman, grey-haired, comes out of the third door with a dog. The rain has eased but now the dark is deep. It is impossible to distinguish features clearly or even to make out figures unless by the glow of street lamps or the entrance lights.

Older children are arriving now, in clusters or alone. Cyclists spin past. A dog-walker under an umbrella marches briskly towards the park gate; the dog stops to inspect the waiting man. Stephen listens to the sounds: footfall, the rustle of twigs and leaves beneath his feet, voices, wheels swishing on the wet surface of the road, raindrops weeping off wet leaves. Invisible in the black branches of a tree a bird sings out with sudden and startling clarity, as if it had forgotten this was a winter afternoon, as if it wished to pierce the dark, to try the power of song against it. From the river to the north, the cry of gulls. And then, on the tarmac path behind him, the sound of rapid footsteps, purposeful, heels tapping, someone walking fast. Stephen swivels round as best he can while at the same time burrowing deeper into the thicket; the path is a few yards away and he is reasonably well concealed from it, but it is essential that he is not seen. Because the woman coming closer must be Helen.

He knows the sound of Helen’s footsteps. This woman walks as Helen walks: lightly, quickly, without flurry, as light on her slim feet as a gazelle. He should have known that she would walk home through the park. A woman like Helen would never choose a flinty, shit-smeared pavement, a loud exhaust-choked road, over a green path in a green shade, a soft way, a way through flowers and leaves. She walks in beauty, heralded by birdsong, she is silver, she is starlight in the night.

Stephen rages against the night. There are no lights on this stretch of the path. The woman is in a raincoat, pale-coloured, cream or fawn, a moth against the dark. She has a hat pulled down over her head, which hides her hair, and a scarf around her neck. She is carrying two bags; one slung across a shoulder, the other, seemingly heavy, in her hand. She is wearing boots. He strains his eyes but it is hard to see her clearly. He dare not make a movement to get closer – he scarcely dares to breathe lest his breath dislodge a leaf. It is vital that she should not be frightened by this watcher in the undergrowth, that she feels safe, that she is safe, that angels guard her so that she will not hurt her foot against a stone.

She walks past Stephen without a single glance. The whole world around her holds its breath to watch her go; the bright bird falls silent in salute. When she is gone a trace of her sweet scent lingers on the damp and heavy air.

His sixth sense is right. The woman leaves the main path to take the fork towards the gate and Stephen, safe from observation now, frantically pushes through branches of ivy as thick as a man’s wrist to get closer to the railings. On the pavement she halts for a passing car and then she crosses the road. Stephen can hear the thudding of his heart. On the other side she
turns right towards the side-street; he tears and tramples the shrubbery about him to keep pace. Now he can see her more distinctly in the lamplight as she walks straight up to the side door of the mansion block and stops to search in her shoulder bag for keys. She unlocks the door. It is overwhelming; he forgets to note the time.

Pale figure in the twilight, swansgleam, moonkiss, pale and slender as an evening lily. All that evening Stephen cradled her image in his heart, hidden like a treasure known only to its owner, like a medallion worn next to the skin, like an icon that cannot be exposed for adoration until the world is sleeping and the solitary worshipper is shielded by the night. He was almost afraid to bare it even to his mind’s eye as he made his way home and once there did ordinary Thursday things. The thought of food was curiously distasteful, almost sacrilegious, as if he, like a man entrusted with a vision, should be fasting until dawn. But he was very thirsty and from the corner shop he bought an extra bottle of wine and a bottle of whisky.

His neighbourhood seemed strangely full of light. The pub, the betting shop and the funeral parlour glowed; even the chapel of rest next door to him had a low light showing through its curtains. He could hear the telephone ringing inside his flat while he was fitting his key into the lock but it stopped before he reached it. Unlikely to be his mother, on a Thursday. He supposed whoever it was would try again.

He was home much earlier than usual, having realised it would not be wise to defy Louise by returning to the office. The flat seemed different at that time. What do people do by themselves when it is dark but not yet evening, before they
draw the curtains and hide themselves away, uncork the bottle of wine? He looked round the room, trying to see it as if for the first time, or as if through Helen’s eyes. There was not much in it: a sofa, covered in a nubbled, brownish weave, that Coralie had found in a sale and thought would be hard-wearing, three chairs and a table at which he could eat, if he did not always do so standing up, or with his plate on his lap in front of the television. A bookshelf. The carpets and the curtains were there when he took the lease of the flat; they are rather tired now, and a little drab. He ought to think about replacements. A coat of paint would spruce things up. Or simply a spring clean. There is a veil of dust on every surface. Certainly he would not wish her to see his bedroom in its present state. Paint is flaking off the window frames; he finds fragments of it, yellowish-white, like broken bits of shell, scattered on the floor. It is a long time since he remembered to wash the sheets. The truth is that he does not mind their sour smell, their greyness: they smell of him, familiar and consoling, they bear the marks of his own body, like a shroud. He chose the bed himself; a double. A patch of damp has drawn its contours on a wall. If he were not accustomed to the mingled smells of damp and sweat, he might worry about the added taint of mould.

What is Helen doing now, this moment? He will do the same: he will have a cup of tea, watch the television news, listen to his newly bought Schubert
Impromptus
; he has to make up quickly for knowledge yet unlearned. How can he have lived so long in ignorance of music? Helen will be sifting through her music and flexing her fingers, stroking one soft hand against the other, entwining them, before she starts to play. She will sit quietly at the piano for a while, her head bowed and her hands clasped as
if in prayer. If you press your index finger hard against somebody else’s and rub the two together with the thumb and index finger of your free hand, you will not be able to tell which one is yours. Both the conjoined fingers will feel familiar and strange; moulded into one and borderless. Helen, I knew thee before the world began; in the silence of eternity we loved.

Later, on the television, Charles Ryder kisses Julia for the last time, before a fountain in a garden in the moonlight: do you remember the storm? Stephen in the shadows watching; Helen too. Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss. Her soft lips yielding, rose petals and the taste of honey. Oh, it is hard to be alone on a night like this, and the west wind blowing and the lady as remote as if there were an ocean in between and yet only a few miles away in measurable distance. Can I get there by candlelight? Yes, and back again.

It is half past ten. Helen is alone in a bedroom full of flowers and flinging her window wide onto the night. Seizing the chance for which it has been waiting, the wind at once will come storming in to wrap her in its wild embrace. And the moon and stars, struggling vainly to be free of the confines of their orbits, can only look on jealously while their rival runs his fingers through her hair. But she will brush away the trespasser and, leaning from the window, will look down at the dark expanse of parkland where, among the dead leaves and the roots of ivy, the small creatures of the night halt their rustlings to lift their beady eyes to her in adoration. Stephen opens a window too. The outside air is fraught with cold and city smell. Please, take a message to her, Stephen asks the wind.