John Bingham - A Fragment of Fear

It was late, and I know now that subconsciously I was beginning to worry about Juliet’s attitude.

“I can’t tell you whether she has or whether she hasn’t, unless you tell what she might or might not have told me, or be about to tell me, can I? Well, can I?”

He turned round from the mantelpiece and gawked down at me, tall and spindly, and I noticed that his tow-coloured moustache had not turned as grey as his thin hair. He looked, as he sometimes implied to other people that he was, like a former member of a crack cavalry regiment officered by rich young men, though I knew from Elaine Bristow that in fact he had been in the Pay Corps during the last war.

“Well, it’s only fair you should know, old boy-in point of fact, Juliet is not really our daughter. She’s an adopted child.”

He looked anxiously at me, swirling his whisky in his glass. He looked really worried. I could have laughed in his face.

So far from feeling dismay, I was aware of a surge of relief that Juliet was not the result of the marriage of this uninteresting couple; and mingled with the relief, piercing through it, here and there, I began to ponder certain things, such as her dark, withdrawn attractiveness, her mixture of gaiety and seriousness, the touch of mystery about her, the occasional secretive look. Were they due to her blood or to the knowledge she had of herself? Had she, in fact, suspected the truth long before they confirmed it? An overheard remark, a hastily broken off conversation, can reveal more to a child than adults realise. Children are no fools.

None of her characteristics could have stemmed from the Bristows, and I should have known it; and even if, as I had thought, she had had some more interesting ancestor, the dull Bristow blood would have thinned it beyond hope.

“My dear Stanley, what on earth does that matter?” I said lightly, and realised that in my relief that Juliet was a full-blooded non-Bristow I had for the first time called him by his Christian name.

“I hoped you’d say that, old boy. I’d have said the same myself. I’ll tell you about her parents, I’ll tell you something she doesn’t know herself.”

“You don’t need to.”

“It’s only fair, old boy.”

He went ostentatiously to the door, opened it quietly, an inch or two, as if to make sure that nobody was coming along the passage, then closed it and walked back to the fireplace.

“Actually, I’d rather not know,” I said quickly. “I’d rather not have that sort of secret between Juliet and me.”

“I think you should, old boy-you see she’s only half English.”

He spoke in a half whisper, and looked at me as if he expected me to fall down in a dead faint.

“Half English-half Italian,” he muttered. “Remember that hotel I recommended near Sorrento? Remember Signor Bardoni? That’s her father. Good fellow, eh? Don’t know her mother, old boy. English, but just a name-Smith, or Brown or something. Disappeared. Got it?”

I nodded. I’d got it all right. But I couldn’t speak.

“And she doesn’t know?”

“She knows she’s an adopted child, old boy. But she doesn’t know who her parents are, she doesn’t know Bardoni is her father. And her father doesn’t know who adopted her. That’s the way these adoptions go, of course, and quite right, too, old boy, saves a lot of trouble and heartache in later years. But I found out-through a friend of a friend. You know? Made inquiries. Can’t be too careful.”

“And you went and stayed at the hotel a couple of years ago? You and Elaine and Juliet?”

I stared at him in amazement.

“There was no danger, old boy-Elaine knew of the relationship of course, but nobody else. Wanted to go to Italy anyway. Thought it would be an interesting experiment-you know, see what happened, call of the blood and all that stuff, see if they were attracted to each other. Do you know what happened, old boy?”

I was stuck with him for years and years. It was no good showing disapproval, no good saying that in an indefinable way I felt the whole idea repellent. He wanted me to ask, “What happened?” but I couldn’t. I couldn’t bring myself to give him the satisfaction. I took a sip of whisky and fumbled for a cigarette.

“Do you know what happened?” he asked again. So I had to say something in the end.

“What happened?” I said.

“Nothing! Nothing at all, old boy! We all talked to Bardoni now and again. But they didn’t take any interest in each other at all. Fascinating, old boy.”

“How did you know he was managing the hotel?”

“Through this adoption society chap-indirectly. They keep in touch, you know, sometimes. Just in case. You know?”

I sat looking into my whisky glass, wondering why Juliet hadn’t told me herself that she was an adopted child. She must have known it would make no difference. I wondered again if it accounted for her withdrawn manner, her secretiveness. I was aware of a feeling of hurt. I said:

“At what age did you tell her that she was an adopted child?”

“At what age? Well, at the age of twenty-two, old boy! We told her tonight-after you dropped her here in your car. While she was changing to go out. Elaine went in and told her.”

“Just like that-a sort of ‘Welcome home’ greeting?”

I couldn’t keep the bitterness out of my voice. I thought if anything was typical of this dull and unimaginative pair it was to spring this news on her just when she had arrived back tired and exhausted. I was angry, and he saw it.

He went all stiff and more snuffly than ever:

“There was no need for us to tell her-or you, old boy. I trust you realise that? In these days the birth certificate merely gives the name, date, and place of birth. But Elaine and I talked it over, old boy, and at first we were against telling her-or you-and then we said no it was not fair to you, old boy. So we told her. And very reasonable she was about the whole thing. Very reasonable.”

He sounded aggrieved.

I finished my whisky and got up. It is useless to be angry with stupid people, and pointless to argue with them.

“No wonder she looked pale at dinner. I thought she was just tired.”

“I think she really was just tired, old boy.”

He looked at me with his protruding grey eyes, leaning droopily against the mantelpiece, stroking his thin hair, a worried expression still on his face.

It was a hopeless situation. I gave up.

“Maybe she was just tired. I expect that was mostly it.”

I forced myself to smile. He brightened at once.

“Good! So now we’re all in the clear, old boy?”

“That’s right.”

“Good-o!”

“Good-o!” I repeated, and was nearly sick. “I must be off. I’ll just pop along and see if she’s asleep.”

Her bedside light was on, but she was asleep, and did not stir when I put my head round the door. Thus I knew that she did indeed realise that the evening’s revelation would make no difference to me, and was not worried.

It could also have meant that she did not care one way or the other.

The news about Juliet had driven other things from my mind. Within a quarter of an hour there occurred something which shook me considerably, because it gave a warning of the violence which lay ahead.

It has to be remembered that I was too young to have fought in the war, and that I had lived in a peaceful and well-ordered society. I was not prepared for hazards other than the normal perils of accidents or ill health.

I had read about peasants who were observed, threatened, stalked, and finally clawed down by the jungle carnivores, but it always seemed to me that if one stuck to the safer paths one could, apart from Acts of God, reckon on physical security in this twentieth century.