The Pornographer (21 page)

She went straight ahead after going through the door of the home, this time down a narrow straight corridor. She opened a door very quietly, and we were more in a cell than a room, white walls, a radiator, a narrow bed, a dressing table and wardrobe, and on the wall above the head of the bed a plain black crucifix.

“This is my room,” she whispered and put her fingers to her lips. “The walls are paper thin.”

There were photos of football teams on the dressing table and she lifted them, pointing out several players, “My brothers.” More than half the players in one of the photos seemed to be her brothers. I lifted another photo, that of a handsome grey-haired man and herself, both in evening dress.

“He’s very handsome. Is he your father?”

“No,” she laughed. “He’s the married man.”

“Let me stay a half-hour. Let me hold you in my arms.”

“The walls are worse than paper.”

“I’ll be quieter than if you were here on your own.”

“But it’s practically morning.”

“I don’t care. I promise to go in half an hour,” and with a smile and almost resignedly she turned off the light.

The curtain wasn’t drawn and I held her when she’d slipped out of her clothes to caress and worship her body in the soft yellow light. She was soft and amazingly beautiful, yet rugged as a young animal. I followed her as quietly as I’d promised into the narrow bed, and hardly daring to breathe held her in my arms.

This body was the shelter of the self. Like all walls and shelters it would age and break and let the enemy in. But holding it now was like holding glory, and having held it once was to hold it—no matter how broken and conquered—in glory still, and with the more terrible tenderness.

“We met on a poor night,” I whispered.

“Why?”

“I have to go to London in the morning,” and when she looked at me as if I was lying, “I know it sounds like an excuse but it’s true. You can even ask my aunt if you don’t believe me.”

“How long will you be?”

“A week or so. I can’t be certain. I’ll ring you when I get back.”

She took my mouth in a long kiss, sealing her whole body to mine.

“I suppose it’s not safe?” I said.

“It’s never safe.”

“There’s no use risking spoiling it, then.”

“The next time I’ll have precautions,” and she went below the sheets, the peace that flooded out a perfect calm, the even moonlight only a thin tattered shadow.

“You don’t resent I’m not a virgin?” she whispered as we kissed after phoning a taxi.

“I’m too old for that. Why should I? Why should you be idle while waiting for my white horse that might never gallop even close.”

“I’m glad,” she kissed me again. “You’d be surprised how many resent it.”

“Their box of tools are the only ones fitted for the job, is that it?” and she caught me beneath the arm with her nails as she laughed.

As soon as the taxi arrived, men suddenly appeared from all directions, wanting to know if they could share my taxi into town. I told them they’d have to ask the taxi man.

“This is more like a brothel than a nurses’ home,” I said as I bade her goodbye.

“I know,” she held my face a moment in her hands. “Don’t say it too loud. There have been complaints.”

Three men shared the taxi into town. One was very extrovert and sat in the front seat beside the driver.

“You’re new,” he said. “Welcome to the club.”

“Thanks.”

He picked up no hint of sarcasm as he went on to give his name, offered his hand as if he wore a bishop’s ring, and said he was the sauce chef in the Shelbourne.

“What’s your name and what do you do?” he asked as if I were lagging with my information.

I told him my name and that I was working in the advertising business.

“Doing what?”

“Writing ads.”

That appeared to satisfy him and he introduced me to the other two men. One was a plumber. The other worked as a clerk in the Customs House.

“Do you know the name of the nurse you were with?” he asked.

“I don’t think so, and by the way you’re leaving out somebody,” I said.

“Who?” he bridled.

“The driver. You never introduced me to the driver.”

“O that doesn’t matter,” the driver said, the car going very fast through the empty early morning streets. “My name is Paddy Murphy. I’m a Knight of the Realm,” he said. “And you, you’re going to Cabra West?” he said to the sauce chef as if he knew him from a previous run.

It was too late to go to bed by the time I got back to the flat. I washed, had several cups of coffee, packed and got the train to the boat.

I’d get into London between five and six. I hadn’t to see her till lunch of the next day though I was supposed to ring if I got in earlier. I’d have the whole evening to rest and walk round streets.

I stood at the rail, feeling the warm wind on my face as the boat chugged out of the bay. Passing Howth in the distance, and wondering by this time whether or not to go to the bar, I felt a silken cloth in my pocket. When I pulled it out and saw what it was I hid it quickly in my fist. I looked around. No one was close or watching. It was as white as any of the gulls following the boat. The whole tender strange night was gathered round the softness of the texture. Keeping it would be like trying to hoard the night.

I opened my hand and the breeze took it. Two gulls dived towards it as it flew past the stern, where a fresh breeze lifted it again, and suddenly it was swallowed up in the raucous crowd of gulls following the boat.

As she was on the Northern Line we arranged to meet outside the ticket gate of Leicester Square Station. She saw me while she was still on the escalator, and started to wave. The wave seemed less certain of itself than when she used to come towards me down the cherry and almond avenue. Instead of waving to that drumming inner music—I’m walking and everything is beautiful—it seemed to hesitate: It’s all a bit confusing but boy I sure am keeping on trying. She was dressed in a tweed costume and she wore a pale blouse.

“You sure are one sight for sore eyes,” she kissed and kissed me again, her eyes brimming, a blast of dead air driven up from below by an incoming train.

“Would you like to have a drink? Or would you like to go and have lunch now?”

“Wait. Wait a minute. I need to get used to you. You don’t know how much I’ve missed you. I need to drink you in for some several quiet minutes.”

“We have all day. We can go round the corner to a pub.”

“I’d rather go and eat,” she said. “I’m sorry. I felt hungry all of a sudden coming in on the tube. There’s the two of us now. I’m sorry,” she said again as she took my arm. “You can’t imagine how much I’ve been looking forward to seeing you.”

“You look very well,” I said though I thought she looked nervous and tired.

“I don’t know. I find it hard to sleep. Last night I couldn’t sleep but that was the excitement.”

“Does the place you work at close on a Saturday?” I asked as we walked into Soho.

“The yard is open till twelve, but the office is shut. Wild horses wouldn’t drag me to work while you’re in town anyhow, and I’ve arranged to take as many days off next week as I need. Will you be able to stay the whole week?”

“No. I may even have to go back tomorrow morning. I’m expecting a message. My aunt is dying. I was going to put off coming but I didn’t want to change it.”

“Thank God you didn’t change it. But you may be able to stay the week?”

“It’s unlikely. If there’s no message for me, I’ll have to ring them. It’s unlikely I’ll be able to stay longer than a day or two.”

“Where are you expecting the message?”

“At the hotel.”

“You should have given my place.”

“I didn’t like to. Anyhow it’s done now.”

After pausing at the placards outside of a few expensive restaurants we picked a modestly priced Italian place in Old Compton Street. It had glass-topped tables, and a black and white blowup of the Bay of Naples along the whole length of one wall.

“I got spoiled with Jonathan,” she said as she looked through the menu. “We went out to all those expensive restaurants. And never looked at the price of anything. I’ll have minestrone.”

“You certainly can have anything you want on this menu. I wouldn’t worry about prices today.”

“I want minestrone, and after that I’ll have the veal and spinach. You don’t know what a pleasure it is to be sitting opposite you.”

“What happened between Jonathan and yourself?”

“O boy,” she said. “O boy, that’s a story.”

The waiter brought the minestrone and a carafe of red wine. I finished a glass of red wine while she ate the minestrone. I wasn’t hungry enough to begin with anything. I blamed it on the travelling. I asked the waiter to suggest something light, and he advised lamb cooked with rosemary. I drank a second glass of wine while waiting for the lamb to come while she told me about the magazine and Jonathan’s friends.

“It was a real eye-opener. Just because I was close to Jonathan I could influence what happened to movies and books and plays, give space to actors. I sure didn’t think the world was run that way.”

“What other way did you expect?” I was finding it difficult to curb my irritability in the face of the stream of words. “Who runs anything but people? Since God gave the Ten Commandments he’s stayed out of it.”

“I soon learned that. I thought things were run on lines of good and bad, according to some vague law or other. Virtue was rewarded, vice was punished. My eyes were certainly opened. I sure had some catching up to do,” and she went on to tell me incidents which I found hard to follow not knowing the people involved.

“But Jonathan himself was all right, wasn’t he?”

“I’m still fond of him. And basically he’s a good person. He got a raw deal I suppose. But when the chips were down he turned out to be very much the businessman too, ruthless and self-centred.”

“Isn’t everybody?”

“I can’t believe that. I couldn’t go on if I believed that.”

“But he had a point, didn’t he? He wanted to marry you. You wouldn’t marry him.”

“Well, he never showed that side of himself. He was always the gallant knight,” she said heatedly. “Roses and meals and wine and tears. And suddenly it was either-or. And it wasn’t a fair position.”

“But you seemed happy when you wrote to me about the wife’s suicide, the time you were afraid she’d come home and cause trouble if she found you in the basement.”

“He became a different person after that. He even made a pass at me. I had to use all my strength to resist him. And he said he was staying the whole night in the basement, so it would be as easy to sleep with him as not since I couldn’t make up my own sweet mind. And he said horrible things about you.”

“This all happened after the suicide?”

“A few days. Ο boy, will I ever forget that funeral service out in Golders Green. Apparently she used to gamble a lot. And she owned a racehorse once. And eight was her lucky number. This enormous floral wreath in the figure of eight—it must
have cost the earth—went through the flap with the coffin. She’d put it in the will. They’d to hold it so that the flap didn’t sweep it off.”

“But why
didn’t
you marry him? The child would be secure. You were fond of him.”

“You weren’t very concerned about the child.”

“That’s true, but I didn’t claim to be, though that’s no virtue. You said we should have been married because of the child, that the child was more important than either of us. What then was so different in this case? According to that logic shouldn’t you have married Jonathan for the child’s sake?”

“You sound more like a lawyer than a person,” there were bitter tears in her eyes. “Everything was different. You were the child’s father. The child was conceived in love, on my part anyhow. Jonathan was old, older even than his years. It was a last clutching at life. For the advantages I might get, I’d have to give him my life. You may be fond of an old person but when they try to be young, you find you can’t help despising them. And I’d have to make love to Jonathan, like you and I used to make love, and no matter what you say there was nothing sinful or mean or ugly about our lovemaking. It was pure and healthy and natural. How could I make love to an old man, with the memory of that, and at the same time the child of those memories growing within me. Even if I married Jonathan I’d have to give up all hope of ever seeing you again, and there was no way I was ever going to do that.”

“You sounded quite determined about it when you wrote to me.”

“No, love. I was hoping it’d have the opposite effect on you. I suppose none of this has the slightest effect on you?”

“Of course it has. It’s an awful mess to have got into in the first place. If you’d married Jonathan it would have cleared it up, only from my point of view, granted. Now it’s just a mess again.”

“I can’t take that. I know it’ll work out all right. I know that nothing but good will come of it. Because both of us are
good people. We didn’t try to dodge anything. You wouldn’t be here if you weren’t a good person.”

“Tell me more.”

“Do you still write that stuff?”

“It’s all I get paid for.”

“But you have some money from your family.”

“Not enough to live on,” I said abruptly, closing the conversation. “What are you going to do now?”

“I’ll keep this job till the child comes. It’s very boring but it makes no demands and it pays quite well. One good thing that this upheaval taught me is how valueless our prized security is. I can get a far more exciting job here with my skills than that boring job back at the bank. I’d never have had the courage to find that out except for what happened.”

“What are you going to do with the child?”

“That’s the six marker.”

“Marriage is now out,” the way she reacted I saw she hadn’t by any means given it up. “It’s out.”

“That may change with the child. It’ll be your child. People long for children.”

“It won’t change with the child,” I said brutally. “It won’t change.”

“You can never tell those things.”

“You’ll have to take my word for it. It’s out. Completely out. And there are only two other ways left now.”