Going Away and Other Stories Page 8

  ‘You shouldn’t take everything too literally! It’s faith and the ideas that matter.’

  But all this was getting him nowhere, he realised, as his orange juice, coffee and croissants arrived. Take stock! Literally, that’s what he’d resolved to do. The stock market had crashed and showed no signs of recovery. His shares were now worth roughly half what they had been. Interest rates had fallen too. Sixty per cent of his money was on deposit at a variable rate of interest and was now only earning about 4.25%. Goodness, at one time it had been 7.5%! So his finances were not in good shape. He’d hardly enough income to live on without resorting to capital and he’d have to do something about it!

  He hadn’t worked for the past twenty-five years. He should be grateful for that. After Cambridge and the very short abortive law course, he’d taught in an awful boys’ prep school for two and a half years. All right if you liked little boys. He didn’t! The worst bit had been when the head had approached him and asked him to teach French.

  ‘Well, Headmaster, my French is very basic.’

  ‘Never mind, Horatio, at least you can keep order. All those bloody Froggie French masters I get are hopeless. I can hear the row from the French room here in my study. I’ll pay you extra, of course.’

  And because he’d been hard up, he’d agreed. It was terrible! He did keep order, but in every form there seemed to be an awful little beast who obviously had a French mother or granny or something who ran rings round him! What a relief when his father had died and he’d inherited – well, so much that he’d been able to give up school-mastering. He’d sold the big old family house in Hampshire and bought himself a flat in South Kensington. He’d invested the rest of the money (not too wisely, it seemed now!) apart from ten grand, which he’d set aside to buy some nice pictures. He’d always wanted a picture collection. Once he’d resigned his job, he’d done nothing for several months and it proved so blissful he’d decided it should be his future – the life of a leisured gentleman, watching cricket, going to races, the theatre, concerts, parties. If you didn’t have to work, why do it?

  And then there were the pictures.

  He’d started to go to Christie’s auctions just down the road and he had the time to go to the innumerable art galleries in London. He’d read about art and painting extensively. Overall, he had an idea that he would be able to buy a picture or two very cheaply by someone famous. Something that everyone had overlooked because it was unsigned. However, the more often he went to Christie’s or the dealers in St James’s, the less likely this seemed. So he started going to small country auctions where pictures were only a part of the mixed bag of furniture and bric-a-brac. Then suddenly, when viewing a row of very uninspiring pictures one day in a small town in Sussex, he gasped. Surely it was a Picasso, or was it somebody trying to be like Picasso? He looked at the uninformative catalogue. ‘Lot 203 – Head of Man’ was the only description. It was a small sketch with, of course, one eye below the other. Surely, he thought, Picasso always signed his pictures? Well, maybe Picasso forgot this one. He stood at the back of the auction room.

  ‘Lot 203 – Head of Man. Will somebody start me at fifty pounds?’

  He put up his hand. There was no other bid. Obviously that was just above the reserve price. Well, if it was a Picasso, he was in luck. If it wasn’t, he’d only lost fifty pounds. When he got it back to the flat he’d undone the back and taken it out of the frame and there, under the mount, was the signature! He was told it was genuine and, now reframed with the signature showing, it was hanging in his living room together with his two other scoops, both picked up for practically nothing as well. He loved them all. Not only because they were what they were, but because they were worth such a lot and cost such a little! But the insurance premiums were beginning to be a problem.

  And then he remembered the less, much less happy occasion when he paid way above the estimate at Christie’s for a large oil painting. He could have guaranteed at the time it was by somebody much more famous than the attribution. He couldn’t bear even now to name the name! He’d taken it to be authenticated and he’d been told that he was surely wrong and Christie’s had got it right! He didn’t try any more scoops after that. He just made a nice little collection of Victorian watercolours. They sat very well with the three scoops.

  But once again he realised that he was not really ‘taking stock’. The real problem was money. He could sell a painting or he could try to get a job if anyone would have him at his age – though he really wasn’t qualified for anything. He’d hate to teach again. But, ah! . . . Either Vera or Astrid might somehow be the solution. He considered them in turn.

  Vera he’d met at a dinner party; sat next to her. Undoubtedly he’d been showing off his knowledge of art somewhat as Vera had said to him as they were leaving that she didn’t know anything about art but would love to learn and could he perhaps teach her a bit if they went to the National Gallery together? This was a bit of a come on, he thought, particularly as Vera had mentioned during dinner that she was a widow. The ‘winsome widow’, he’d come to think of her. Anyhow, he’d arranged to take her one afternoon to the National Gallery, where they’d start with the Primitive Rooms, and after an hour of that, which he’d stipulated was quite enough, they’d come back to tea at his flat. Vera was probably in her mid-forties and rather running to fat, but a very pleasant and grateful companion. She’d looked a little askance, he’d thought, at the dust and untidiness of his sitting room, but was of course greatly impressed by the story of his scoops. During tea she mentioned that her husband had left her well off, but that she wouldn’t mind getting married again! Lunch at her house on the Thames near Hampton Court followed shortly. It was quite a nice large, modern house, but furnished in what he considered execrable taste – curtains with swags and flounces, big imitation leather sofas, and glass-top coffee tables everywhere. Each one had a crochet-work mat and a table lamp with an extravagant shade. The lunch was (oh God!) vegetarian with rather sweet tepid hock to drink. After lunch, during a walk along the riverbank, Vera had suggested once again that she wouldn’t mind getting married again. She’d helped in her husband’s business, which was now sold, and was trying to fill in her time by taking up golf and bridge. Did he play? Inwardly shuddering at the thought of either, he’d replied quietly that he was afraid he did not.

  Well, obviously Vera would be willing and it would solve the financial problems, but she’d never want to come and live with him in his flat; he’d have to go and live in that awful house. No. It simply wouldn’t be worth it. Vera was a non-starter.

  And then there was Astrid – younger and more attractive physically, but perhaps not so good financially. He’d only met her a few weeks ago at a party in Chelsea. It was a warm evening and the guests had spread themselves outdoors into the small garden. He saw Astrid standing under a hanging jasmine holding a half-empty glass of wine and looking forlorn. It was probably the smell of the jasmine that had attracted him to her.

  ‘Hello – you’re looking sad!’

  ‘Am I? Well, I don’t know anyone apart from the colleague I came with and she’s met someone. She’s over there.’ She nodded, indicating a man and a girl in very close conversation.

  ‘Oh dear. Well, then I’d better talk to you, hadn’t I?’

  He’d learned that she was a ‘keeper’ – or was it an ‘under-keeper’? – of some era of porcelain – he still could never remember which – at the Victoria & Albert Museum.

  ‘That’s a coincidence. My father died years ago and left a small collection of china. He always said it was valuable, but I’ve no idea. I think it’s Wedgwood. I’ve always meant to get someone to look at it and tell me what it really is.’

  ‘I’ll look at it if you like.’

  ‘Oh, would you! How kind. What shall I do? Shall I bring it into the museum? I’m a bit afraid of breaking it, even though I only live nearby.’

  ‘If you like I’ll come and look at it at your house.’

  So she
’d come and looked at his china and said it was very nice, but only worth a few hundred pounds. She did not seem to mind that the china was very dusty and the flat untidy. He had, of course, been unable to restrain himself in recounting the story of his scoops. Astrid had replied that he was ‘wewy, wewy clever’.

  ‘Look, I’d like to thank you for looking at my china for me. Would you let me take you to this concert that’s coming up on Friday week at the Cadogan Hall? It’s the Mozart Players.’

  ‘Oh wather. Lovely,’ she replied. ‘Absolutely wipping!’

  The fact that Astrid couldn’t pronounce her r’s was rather endearing at first but became increasingly annoying as time went on. But she obviously liked him a great deal. She came for lunch or supper almost every week now. It seemed that love had passed her by. She was 32 and lived with Mummy in a big house in Dulwich. Daddy had died two or three years ago and she hinted had left her a ‘nice little twust fund’. While he sat back confidently in his armchair, she always sat forward on the edge of the sofa looking at him earnestly and appealingly while they discussed art, music and literature very seriously. He’d never touched her. He thought it might lead to all sorts of things that he hadn’t then wanted.

  ‘Oh God,’ he’d thought after she’d gone the last time, ‘I’m just playing with her.’

  He was being unfair. Really, he didn’t want any involvement.

  But what about the money? he asked himself again and again as he walked back home and up the six flights of stairs to his flat. He ripped off his jacket and cravat and rolled up his shirt sleeves and sat down. He’d thought when he woke that morning that he’d go for a walk in Hyde Park and look at the Serpentine and maybe see a nice girl or two bathing. But it was far too hot for walking. He’d just sit there and visualise the walk and think about the money problem while he did it. He’d just about reached the Serpentine in fantasy when he had a thought – ‘Oh God’ – Astrid was coming to supper that night and he’d have to go out – again – into the heat sometime and collect the Dover sole he’d ordered from the fishmonger. Later! For the time being a little music to help the thought processes! Radio 3 – The Times said merely: ‘10 a.m. – 12 noon Schumann.’ He switched on and lit his first Villiger cigar of the day. It was Schumann’s piano concerto. Very romantic stuff. As you listened, you always thought you were coming up to the edge of a great mystery or revelation, but then it never quite made it. It was a bit like his feelings on his very occasional visits to nearby Brompton Oratory.

  But he wasn’t making any progress with what he should do! It was getting very hot in the sitting room. He pushed the sash window fully open. There was a bit of noise from the traffic, but also a very welcome slight breeze. That was better! Make some black coffee . . . it might spur things along . . . While he drank the coffee he looked at the Picasso, the Turner and the J.S. Cotman. Somebody must have died in each case and some distant relative cleared the house and just sent everything to the local auction rooms and the auctioneer had not paid much attention.

  He shook his head. No, I can’t bear to part with any of them! he thought. Really, Astrid seemed the best proposition. He’d have to try and find out a bit more about this trust fund and whether it looked promising, then ask her to marry him. He got quite excited by the idea. She could come and live with him and it would be convenient for her job. They’d have her salary as well as his income plus anything from the trust fund. But then he thought, ‘She might want to have a baby. That would be awful! I’d have to put my foot down about that. Anyhow, there’s no room for a baby here and there are those six flights of stairs down to the street!’ And he hoped two people in the flat wouldn’t get in one another’s way. But Astrid was quite thin and she’d be out at work all day. So it would probably be all right. She wasn’t really bad looking. Her legs were a trifle too thick and her hips a bit broad and her bust, well, disappointing. But her sad face, with its fair hair all around, looked really quite pretty when she smiled. And maybe she wouldn’t want a baby anyhow. Better talk to her all about it tonight! It was a particularly romantic bit of Schumann now and he could picture himself sitting beside Astrid on the sofa and maybe holding her hand. But he’d better carefully rehearse the questions about the trust fund, living in his flat and the baby, so that he put them in the right way and in the right order – but she would probably be so eager that she’d agree to anything he wanted. No babies would mean birth control of course. But he supposed he wasn’t really a Catholic any longer and anyhow there was a majority of the committee at Vatican II in favour. It was just that the popes didn’t like it. He could see their point of view – theoretically.

  As it was his birthday he’d lashed out on some caviar for them to have that evening before the Dover sole. But what he’d do now to celebrate his decision about Astrid was to open a bottle of champagne (they could finish any that was left this evening) and have just a little of the caviar for lunch, followed by an omelette.

  Such concentrated thought had made him feel very hungry and the lunch went very well. The caviar was delicious! He’d eaten more of it than he should and there wasn’t really enough left for the evening. Never mind, he’d pad it out with some blinis. And he’d drunk the whole of the bottle of champagne! Well, the heat made one thirsty. After he’d listened to The World at One on the radio, he’d go out and get the fish, but first a little cognac and one of his best cigars.

  He remembered turning off The World at One as it was finishing and tapping the ash off his cigar and then he must have dozed off. He was having a dream that he was in hell, or was it purgatory? He could feel the flames round his legs and he expected at any moment the demons to come at him with pitchforks, like in the old religious paintings. His father was standing above him and haranguing him, shouting something about Kant’s ‘Ultimate Imperative’, to ‘treat every person as an end also and never as a means only.’

  He woke up coughing. Oh God, the place was filled with thick acrid smoke and it was pouring out of the open window. The rug under his feet was on fire. He must have dropped his cigar into the wastepaper basket! He could hardly see across the room. He was going to be burnt alive. He got out of his chair and tried to shout for help. But it was no good, he was choking to death! Savagely, he tried to beat out the flames with a cushion, but only succeeded in burning his hand, scorching his eyebrows and hair, and setting fire to the cushion . . . Then there was the sound of a fire engine outside and a fireman’s helmet appeared at the open window.

  ‘Hang on, mate,’ the helmet shouted. ‘You’ll be all right. We’ll get you out.’

  The fireman was over the sill and had wrapped him in a blanket and hoisted him over his shoulder in no time.

  ‘Just you, is there?’

  ‘Yes, just me,’ he coughed.

  Horatio lay on the pavement wrapped in the fire blanket and thanked God he’d been rescued. He watched another fireman go up the ladder with a hose and start spraying water into his living room through the window and realised that his flat and all his belongings . . . his pictures … would be ruined.

  ‘You all right, mate?’ said the first fireman to him. ‘We’ve called an ambulance.’

  ‘Yes, but my things . . . my flat . . . my paintings . . .’

  ‘Well, I expect it’s all insured, isn’t it?’ said the first fireman cheerfully.

  At that stage he must have passed out because the next thing he knew he was lying in bed in a hospital ward. There seemed to be bandages around his head and chin and both his hands. He felt terrible.

  Soon, he saw a familiar face. It was Astrid looking solemnly and closely at him. She patted one of his bandaged hands, causing him to wince.

  ‘Oh Howatio,’ she said. ‘Oh deaw, oh deaw. I came to see you but your flat was in wuins. Thank God you wewe saved!’

  ‘Yes, somehow . . . But I’m confused about it. Is my flat a total write-off?’

  ‘Yes, I’m afwaid so. The west of the building is all wight though.’

  ‘Oh good.’
>
  ‘It’s your biwthday, too. But they say you’ll be out of hewe in a few days!’

  Horatio mumbled something in reply. What on earth was all this about? Why had it happened? He’d been selfish, but not so as to deserve this. And anyhow, Astrid might have been happy about his asking her to marry him. He’d lost everything apart from his investments . . . And he could see it all – the insurers refusing to pay up because they said it was his fault for dropping his cigar while asleep after heavy drinking!

  At this point Astrid put her face very close to Horatio’s bandaged one.

  ‘Oh, I do love you, Howatio. It’s tewible that this has happened. You’ll have nowhere to go. I’ll must ask Mummy, of course, but I’m sure it will be all wight. You must come and stay with us as soon as they let you out. We’ve got tons and tons of woom and I could take time off wowk to look after you.’

  Tears of self-pity trickled down his cheeks and into his bandages as Horatio imagined his life at Astrid’s mother’s house in Dulwich (he’d been there once). Everything neat and tidy. Having to go into the conservatory or the garden to have a smoke. Mummy and Astrid fussing around him. And tea and cornflakes for breakfast!!

  Seeking Paradise

  I was somewhat late in arriving for New Year’s Eve at my sister’s. She had recently moved from Ealing in London and she and her husband were now living in a small ‘arty’ community by the seaside, where my brother-in-law was setting himself up as a potter. After thirty years working for a bank, he had resigned the previous Christmas and announced that he was ‘going to pot’. All this, no doubt, had something to do with the fact that our mother had died and left my sister a large amount of money. I had, of course, also benefited, but the last thing I wanted to do was to change my lifestyle. Being a Chancery barrister suited me admirably.

  I was very intrigued to see Margot and her family’s new way of life and annoyed when my train from London was delayed and I had to wait around in a cold and dark station yard for a taxi. Then the driver had some difficulty in locating Jersey Cottage, which was near the bottom of a very steep lane at the edge of the town.