The Rules of Engagement (30 page)

In the
café
, among the young men in their work
clothes, I felt temporarily restored to a
mild version of hopefulness. No one knew where
to find me, and I read on until an influx of
people alerted me to the fact that it was nearly lunchtime.
Then, reluctantly, I drained my third cup
of coffee, waved to the proprietor, and made my
way home. The afternoon would present a
problem, as it usually did. I felt shy of
imposing my presence on the
café
once again and
tried to continue reading in the flat, until
discontent or merely claustrophobia drove
me out again. That was when I walked
—
anywhere, it
hardly mattered
—
buying the food I should be
obliged to eat alone, and returning to the flat
only when this pretext seemed too futile. In
any event I was not hungry; I had not
experienced a keen appetite for a very long time.
I suppose that I languished. That too seemed
a consequence of poor behaviour; it was impossible
to think of Lucy Snowe languishing. I concluded
that I was simply not good enough to gain re-admission
to the high standards of fiction and must make do with the
sorry business of real life. There had been no
telephone call from Nigel Ward, a fact which
was becoming increasingly relevant.

After Villette I decided on The
Portrait of a Lady, which I took with me when
I joined the tin hats in the
café
on
subsequent mornings. This was far more instructive,
I found. It was a story I had once
rejected, thinking it too sad for my purpose.
I must have been very young when I first read it, and still
hopeful, but the prospect of a woman living up
to the task of being or becoming a lady had seemed
onerous, too harsh to contemplate. Yes, there was
a marriage, but when I was young I could not believe
that a marriage could be so hateful, although I had the
example of my parents to convince me. It was
simply that I expected art to furnish me with
better examples, as I suppose most people do,
and I could not abandon my belief that in a certain
favourable context one would behave as well as one
had been programmed to do. One's subsequent
behaviour was bound to represent a fall from
grace, and this no doubt was the universal
experience. Mine had not been an abrupt
expulsion from Eden, rather a slow recognition that
life is subject to accidents, that these are too
beguiling to ignore, and that one was bound to make
one's peace with them, if one could. Nevertheless
Isabel Archer's choices filled me with
sympathetic horror. Behaving well seemed
to me too high a price to pay.

I was perhaps a third of the way through it, and sitting
in the flat waiting for the afternoon to end, when the
telephone at last rang. I no longer knew
whether I had been waiting for this call
or not; I had occupied a not altogether unpleasant
limbo of reading and wandering, alternating between
acceptance and bewilderment. This, I dare say, is
the essence of languor, if that was what I was
suffering; I had lost my earlier purposefulness,
and with it my decisive thoughts. I still knew what
I should do to gain my chance of companionship but I
wished the matter to be someone else's
responsibility. The earlier scenario, in which I
guided events to my satisfaction, now seemed
to me utterly unconvincing; no doubt my reading,
or rather the examples I had chosen, had undermined
my resolve and revealed my thinking as erroneous.
I wanted the impetus to be in other hands, though
I saw this as unlikely. Indeed I felt it
might be better to forgo the whole relationship rather
than make a false move which might be fatal for
both of us. Though the price might still be worth
paying I doubted my expertise, as,
strangely, I had not done previously. No
doubt I was now nearer the truth of the matter, which
no longer had anything to do with expertise, life
once again revealing its ability to teach one
unwelcome lessons. It took a certain
amount of courage to answer the telephone, although
I knew instinctively who was calling.

“
Hello?
”
I said, my voice rusty, as
if I had recently returned from afar.

A clearing of the throat.
“
Nigel Ward
here.
”

“
How nice to hear from you. Did you have a good
holiday?
”

“
Very pleasant, thank you.
”

I calculated that he had been silent for
something like six weeks, and I felt a spurt of
annoyance that he had not been more assiduous. It was
already May; soon he might disappear again,
probably when the students began to disperse for the
summer, and I decided that matters must be moved
on. Thus, without willing it, I reverted to my
earlier resolution. This, after all, had initially
felt appropriate. Now that my mind was made
up I felt almost careless, the belle
indiff
erence of the manic or the deluded.

“
You must tell me all about it,
”
I said
smoothly.
“
Why don't you come to dinner? This
evening, if you've nothing better to do.
”

“
That would be delightful.
”
After a few
seconds' silence he rang off. From this I
calculated that he may have been in the
same state of mind, but with less conviction.
There was little food in the house, but I made a
large salade
niçoise
; that, followed by cheese
and fruit, would have to do. In any case I doubted
that we should be spending the evening at the table. I
showered hastily and dressed in a manner that would not
frighten him. I wished that I had told him to take
a cab; I was not up to a long wait.

Evidently he had thought along the same lines,
for within half an hour I heard the whine of the
lift. I walked slowly to the door, opened it,
and held out my hand.

“
How nice to see you,
”
I said.
“
Do come
in. What a beautiful evening. A glass of
wine?
”

He settled himself cautiously in Digby's
chair, and drank his wine with some speed, as I
did.

“
You had a good walk?
”
I said.
“
Where were
you? Did you visit your friends?
”

“
Well, no. They decided to go to Greece.
I shall no doubt see them in the summer.
”

“
Where did you go, then?
”

“
The Loire Valley. I'm particularly
fond of that part of France. Beautiful air.
Pleasant towns. Tours. Angers. The
châteaux
, of course.
”

“
Digby and I did that, also at Easter.
Blois. Amboise.
”

“
Yes.
”

That seemed all there was to say about the Loire,
since he was not willing to expand.

“
Shall we eat?
”
I said.
“
It's a very
simple meal. I hope it will be enough for you.
”

“
It looks delicious.
”

He was nervous. I was impatient. He
applied himself to his food, though the hand that held
his fork trembled slightly. He was aware of the
rite of passage to come, and saw that escape was
no longer an option.

“
Are you busy?
”
I asked, to put him at
his ease.

“
Not very, no.
”

“
I suppose the students are preparing for their
exams?
”

“
Yes.
”

This was going to be more difficult than I
expected.

“
That was delightful,
”
he said, laying down his
fork. Most of my meal was still on my
plate.
“
Can I help?
”

I was exasperated. This was not how a man should
behave. It seemed that I should have to take the
initiative. With a sigh I stood up and
collected the plates.

“
Leave everything,
”
I said.
“
Bring your
wine.
”

“
Elizabeth, have you thought this through?
”

“
Oh, yes,
”
I said. My clothes were coming
off even before we reached the bedroom.
I was kind and patient, as I might have known
I should have to be. He was clearly not a good judge
of his own performance, for he appeared dazed with
relief. Maybe that was what he felt, after a
period of abstinence, but I also suspected
gratitude, and I had little use for that. If
anything I preferred him stern and judgmental,
thinking this a proper basis for an honest evaluation
of the facts. It is not true that one man drives
out the memory of another, but it was good to recover that
illusion of intimacy, and when I saw him in
Digby's towelling bathrobe I was
unexpectedly touched. This was a sign of the
domesticity for which I still retained a longing. Without
his clothes he had seemed infinitely more
attractive, had made no attempt to cover his
nakedness. In the bathrobe, which reached only to his
calves, he was gaining authority by the minute.

“
Did you know that that was going to happen?
”
he
said.

“
It is what most people do. It is even
mandatory. You didn't object.
”

“
You are a very attractive woman.
”

“
I'll make some coffee. Or perhaps tea.
Tea seems more appropriate. You sit
down.
”

Covered but not dressed, we drank the tea
thirstily. I had no further fears for the summer.
The Portrait of a Lady could be left for
another day.

“
Shall we watch the news?
”
I asked him.

With the benign accoutrements of the tea and the
television we both relaxed in the almost normal
atmosphere, almost normal apart from our disarray.
Yet there was much that was still undecided. I could see
that he was slightly disturbed by the rapidity with which
events had taken place. There was no poetry in
it; that was what disturbed him. In that he was more
romantic than I had ever been. Yet I had
willed this, had brought it about. I was no
more sure of my own feelings than he was of his.
With the television finally switched off an
awkwardness, which had not been there at the beginning of the
evening, descended on us both. He disappeared
to dress, and I began to clear away the
remnants of our supper. When he came back,
once again restored to his formal persona, I could
see that he was anxious to be gone. I did not
attempt to delay his departure. Future
arrangements were not discussed, such was the state of our
separate preoccupations. He would be back, of that
there was no doubt. But his overriding wish was to think
things through, as he would have put it. There was no way
in which I could enter into this process.