Upright Piano Player (13 page)

“You remind me of my ex-wife,” he said.

“Is that good?”

“She loved gnocchi—all Italian food.”

“Did she like it here?”

Henry realized that he had been tactless.

“No, this place wasn’t here when we were together.”

He was back in the lift again, metaphorically staring at his shoes, unable to think of anything else to say. He had steered the conversation into a cul-de-sac.

They were rescued by the arrival of a platter of
carta da musica
—crisp, paper-thin sheets of unleavened bread, seasoned with rosemary and olive oil.

“This is special. The chef is from Sardinia and … well, you’ll see … it’s completely addictive.”

The awkwardness passed and over the next two hours they began the age-old journey from attraction to involvement. It
is always a passage fueled by confession. He talked of Nessa and the divorce, she of the man with the socks.

When it was time to go she invited him back to her flat. Inside the building she had kissed him—encouragement, she said, to climb the five floors to the attic. Once there, she led him by the hand into her bedroom. He was breathless from the stairs and hesitated at the door. She sat on the bed and lifted her shirt over her head. He gave an involuntary gasp. Her skin was olive and her breasts extraordinarily beautiful, unexpectedly full—the nipples ringed with bold circles the color of milk chocolate. Later, he believed he had tasted vanilla in the creases of her body.

It felt good to be driving with her beside him.

For Henry, true intimacy in a car had always taken place in the
front
seats, not the back. He did not mean the head in lap kind of thing, though in his teens he had not been a complete stranger to that. No, the romance had been in the simple act of driving with a woman next to him. There was the obvious togetherness, the common destination, and the pleasure in a shared landscape. He particularly liked driving at night, when the glow from the dashboard mimicked the lighting in 1940s black-and-white movies. At night, all his companions had been beautiful.

But best of all had been the talk. He and Nessa had always had their truest conversations on long drives. In a car you are side by side, not looking directly at each other, warily watching for the minute tics and involuntary gestures that belie the spoken words. The Catholic Church, with its curtained confessional, had always known that face-to-face is no way to learn the truth. Analysts have us lying on a couch, none of that nonsense about looking each other in the eye.

He glanced at Maude’s knees—less distracting now that
she had a road map resting on them. At Mildenhall, he had taken a wrong exit at the roundabout and she, realizing his mistake, had found a left turn that would get them back on course. In this manner they had discovered one of the most beautiful roads in England, the kind of road that immediately knocks fifteen miles per hour off a driver’s speed, for no traveler wants to leave it too quickly.

A lesson for our road planners, Henry had thought, composing in his mind a new letter to the
Times
. Perhaps trees and landscaping can achieve through beauty what speed guns and cameras have failed to do by threat.

The neatness of his argument was undermined by the niggling suspicion that speed cameras might have been effective. Never mind, he could rework the argument to make the point that the advantage of beauty as a deterrent is that it causes pleasure, not a resentment of the forces of law and order. Yes, there was something in that. He would think about it back in London.

He had slowed the car to twenty miles per hour and opened the sunroof. There was no traffic, most drivers preferring the signposted route to Brandon that takes them past the American Air Force base at Lakenheath, with its screaming jets and scruffy golf course.

This slower, alternate route undulates through the edge of the Thetford Forest and seems like a throwback to the fifties, literally, a memory lane. Initially, the forest keeps its distance, recent felling opening up vistas on either side of the two-lane road. After a mile or so, the trees advance—first, strands of Scots pine and birch and then the full canopy of the forest
itself arching over the road. Even in mid-April, the architecture of the overhanging trees was thrilling and Maude had temporarily put aside her misgivings about the trip. At first, she had refused to come.

“Henry, it’s an awful thing to do. You haven’t seen Tom in years and then you turn up with some bimbo girlfriend.”

“You’re not a bimbo.”

“That’s what he’ll think.”

“It will be less awkward if someone else is there—less chance of recrimination. He can’t be angry in front of strangers.”

“You’re wrong. It will be a disaster.”

In Swaffham he pulled into the market square and rang Tom as requested—some culinary timekeeping demanded notice of his whereabouts. Henry had been mostly silent during the call and Maude had grown uneasy.

“All right, I’ll see you in about forty minutes.” He put the phone down and turned to look at her.

“I need some air.”

He did not move to open the door as she expected, but lowered his forehead onto the rim of the steering wheel.

“Henry, what’s happened?”

He looked up.

“It seems I have a grandson.”

She did not answer.

“They have a child. A boy. His name is Hal and he’s almost four years old, for pity’s sake. Four years … and I didn’t even know he existed.”

He opened the glove box, looking for tissues.

Maude sat motionless in her seat, wanting to comfort him, but at the same time repelled by his distress. It made her feel uncomfortable. She noticed the softening line of his jaw, the tears on his cheek. What on earth was she doing here?

“I’m so sorry, Henry.”

The road map was still on her lap.

“You can drop me off in Fakenham and I’ll get myself back to London.”

When he answered, she could hear the bruising in his voice.

“Would you? That would probably be for the best.”

He left her at a hotel in the center of town where she could get a taxi to Norwich and then the train to Liverpool Street. They had parted awkwardly.

“I must give you some money.”

“I have a credit card.”

“No, no.”

He shifted on the seat, reaching into his trouser pocket. The seat belt made it difficult, but he did not think to release it. Maude sat looking straight ahead.

“I’m sorry it’s turned out like this.”

She took the money. He walked round the car and let her out. They did not touch. A flutter of hands and she was in the hotel.

It’s over, he thought as he drove away. She’s not going to sleep with a bloody grandfather.

Driving through a small town he saw a newsagent with toys in the window. He stopped, hoping to find something for Hal. He tried in vain to remember what Tom had played with
at four. A train set? Or was it Lego? In the event, it did not matter, for the main toy section on the first floor was closed. On Sundays, they sold only things for the beach—balls, kites, crab lines, and fishing nets. He bought a kite that looked unlike any kite he had ever seen, assured by the teenage shop assistant that it would do the business.

He wanted to stop at a pub and steady himself with a large whiskey, but feared arriving with alcohol on his breath. He did not want that to be his defining aroma when meeting Hal.

Outside Tom’s village, he pulled off the road. He was shaking. He prayed that he would be able to hide his anger. He locked the car and clutching the kite walked into the village.

Tom and Hal were at the window of the front bedroom watching for the Mercedes.

“I guess it will be a Mercedes,” Tom said. “That’s what he always used to drive.”

“I don’t think he’s got a car, Daddy.”

At that moment Tom saw his father in the distance. He knew him instantly: the same spare frame, his hair still dark, and worn slightly too long as he remembered. As often with tall people, his father walked with his eyes downcast as though the ground were treacherous; but now the steps were more tentative and Tom realized that Henry was aging and the knowledge made him gasp.

“There he is—that’s him.”

Hal was gone—out the front door and running down the street, disregarding every parental warning. From the window Tom saw that the road was safe and fought back the inclination to shout out a warning. He saw the small boy run up to
the man and stop. He saw the man kneel down and place a hand on the boy’s shoulder, the kite lowered carefully to the ground. They were talking, the boy uncharacteristically still as one question followed another. When the man finally stood up, the boy held out his hand and brought him to the house.

“Grandpa, do you like organic vegetables?”

The boy had insisted that Henry should sit next to him at lunch and had kept up a merry chatter throughout the meal.

“They’re very good for you, you know.”

Henry had told a story. Once on holiday with Nessa in Venice, they had sat next to a large party of American socialites at lunch. The hostess was a woman called Nan something or other—he had seen her photograph in magazines. The women were all thin and more vivid than their menfolk. They were on their sixth carafe of wine and the talk was careless. They were discussing wealth and an Englishman had said in all seriousness, or so it had seemed to Henry, “that the main difference between the rich and the poor is that the rich eat smaller vegetables.”

Tom and Jane had laughed, but Hal had been puzzled.

“Excuse me, Grandpa, we eat small vegetables, but we’re not rich, are we, Daddy?”

After lunch they had taken the kite to the beach at Salthouse. The wind had been perfect and the kite had performed as promised. There had been a tacit agreement to
fill the afternoon with activity. When the wind dropped, Hal took charge, recruiting his grandfather to search for the white round pebbles he needed for his collection. On the way back, they had made a detour to show Henry the duck pond by the roadside.

“Watch the cars,” Tom had said.

Several of them were parked at the water’s edge and at intervals a window would be lowered and a handful of bread thrown onto the water. Sated swans ate only the food that fell into their immediate orbit, content to let the ducks and gulls squabble over the rest.

They went back to the house for tea.

“Why don’t you and Hal go up and make the toast, while I give Henry a tour of the shop.”

If it had been prearranged, Jane had made the suggestion seem entirely spontaneous.

There were three rooms given over to books, each with a couple of chairs for reading. In one room there was British fiction, in another, American novels and short stories, and in the third room, poetry. The shelves were full and there were vases of spring flowers on the window ledges. He hoped there would be time to browse after tea.

“He’s been so excited and nervous about you coming.”

“He is a wonderful little boy.”

“Yes, he is wonderful—but not so little. I’m talking about Tom.”

Jane opened the door to the office.

“Come and sit down, Henry, I want to show you something.”

The office had a window overlooking the salt marshes.
Henry perched himself on the edge of a chair looking out onto the view. Jane had gone back into the shop.

“You’re probably familiar with this.”

She had brought back a small blue cloth-covered book. He looked at the title:
Journal of Katherine Mansfield
.

“Yes, I know it.”

“When we started the shop, some of the stock was ours—books we owned—and some we got from book fairs and house sales; rather a mixed lot.”

She was talking slowly, as if reluctant to make her point.

“Sorting them out, I flicked through this one, the way you do, and I noticed an underlining—the only one in the whole book. I thought the person who did it must have been so unhappy.”

She gave him the book, open at the right place. He would always remember that the lines were at the top of page six:

The underlining, in pencil, was not a neat and studious exercise aided by a ruler, but deep, freehand wounds in the paper. Henry was suddenly fearful.

“And then I turned to the front and saw Tom’s signature; it was one of his university books.”

She was standing in front of him, her arms crossed over her chest, holding herself so firmly that her fingers had almost disappeared into the folds of her woolen sleeves.

“Living all these years without you has been tough for
Tom. If you ever reject him again, I promise you, I will haunt your days.”

She let her hands fall to her side.

“Come on, let’s join the men.”

Following her up the stairs, Henry thought, My God, how Nessa must love this woman!

After tea and toast, Hal had climbed onto Henry’s lap and clasped his face, the little fingers warm on Henry’s cheeks. Then with the gentlest of pressure, like a good barber, he had indicated how he wanted Henry to move his head. He had studied Henry’s face in silence, as though committing it to memory. Then with a smile, he had hopped down from the chair.

Henry had left half an hour later. He had asked after Nessa, but Tom had said that she wanted to give him all the news herself. They had walked back to the car with him. Strangers driving through the village would have seen a family tableau—a pretty woman with corn-colored hair, linking arms with an older man, the other two, so obviously father and son, skipping on ahead. “Ahh,” they might have exclaimed.