Хилари Боннер - The Cruellest Game

As I relieved myself the tears pricked at the back of my eyes again. I made myself take some deep breaths and splashed my hot flushed face with cold water.

Back in the bedroom I threw open the windows to the cool air of another wintery Dartmoor morning and did some more deep breathing.

What was I going to do? If I left Robert, where would I go? I had no money of my own. I supposed I could go back to teaching full-time, but in order to acquire a proper staff appointment I would almost certainly have to retrain.

In any case, was that what I wanted? Did I want to leave Robert? Or did I still love him and want to be with him, flaws and all? I really wasn’t sure. And just how bad were those flaws?

Maybe what he had done was not so very dreadful. Certainly his motives seemed to be good. But if a man were capable of such a massive deception over such a long period, what else, I asked myself not for the first time, might he have been keeping from me? What other secrets could he be holding?

I didn’t know, of course, and I had to accept I might never know. But, just as I’d half suspected, I did feel slightly different about the whole thing in the cold light of morning. I knew I had to think very carefully before destroying whatever might still remain of the life I had once so enjoyed. But on the other hand, I was aware that I might just be kidding myself to even consider the possibility that any significant part of that life could really be salvaged.

I pulled on my dressing gown and made my way downstairs to the kitchen. I needed a cup of tea. I also realized, rather to my surprise, that I was hungry. In spite of having barely eaten anything the day before, I’d rather thought I’d never be able to face food again.

Robert was sitting in the big old leather armchair by the Aga. He was asleep when I opened the door but immediately awakened. He was unshaven and ravaged-looking again. It was pretty obvious he hadn’t been to bed.

The kitchen was very warm. He must have fetched in more wood, stoked and relit the range. Indeed, the box which stood beside it was overflowing with logs. Florrie lay at Robert’s feet, curled up on the mat. She rose and ambled sleepily over to me, wrapping her body around my legs and stretching her neck so that she could lick my hand.

Robert didn’t speak. He just gazed at me. His eyes were imploring. Under any other circumstances I would have been overwhelmed with compassion for him. As things were, I really didn’t know what I felt for him any more.

That morning I was empty of emotion.

The kettle simmered on the Aga’s slow plate, as usual when Robert was home. I stood it for a minute or two on the fast hob and then took two mugs and a couple of tea bags, poured in boiling water and added a splash of milk to each.

I handed one of the mugs to Robert. He mumbled a ‘thank you’ as he took it from me. The first word either of us had spoken.

‘Would you like some breakfast?’ I asked.

He nodded. An expression almost of puzzlement flitting across his face.

I reached for the big old iron frying pan that hung from a hook above the stove, took some bacon and eggs from the fridge and began to cook.

‘Make some toast, will you,’ I instructed Robert. ‘There’s sliced bread in the freezer.’

I didn’t really know what I was doing, and I don’t think Robert did either. Whatever he had expected from me that morning, I doubt it was this kind of normality. It wasn’t what I would have expected from myself either.

But it was, of course, just how people did behave when someone died. Even when that someone was their son. They just carried on. Only this was different. I still did not know if I would be able to carry on with a man who had deceived me so, nor if I really wanted to. I had decisions to make, that was for sure, but maybe the sensible thing to do was to defer deciding anything irrevocable until I’d had time to come to terms with all that had happened.

It was always said, was it not, that big decisions should never be made right after bereavement. Particularly an unexpected one. And I had an additional shocking dilemma to deal with.

I carried two plates of bacon and eggs to the table and set them down. In our usual places. In front of our usual chairs. I tried not even to glance at that other usual place. At Robbie’s place.

Robert piled toast into a basket and put that on the table between us.

We began to eat. I was surprised at how good the food tasted. Strange. I hadn’t expected to be able to taste anything. I’d thought I was totally numb.

We ate in silence. Robert, I think, was afraid to speak. I hadn’t yet worked out exactly what I was going to say to him. Nor even if I wanted to say anything yet. But I did still have questions.

By the time I’d finished eating, and drained the last of my tea, I at least felt ready to ask some of those questions.

‘You still haven’t told me where you were yesterday,’ I said.

‘I did tell you. I needed to be on my own. I went walking. I’m so sorry I left you alone. Really I am. I wanted to be with you, but somehow I just needed time—’

‘You told me you were taking the hire car back,’ I interrupted. ‘It’s still here, parked at the front.’

‘I’m sorry, Marion,’ he said. ‘I can’t explain yesterday. I’ll never be able to explain yesterday. I don’t even know what I did for most of it, to tell the truth. I just walked...’

His voice tailed off. I glanced across the kitchen. His shoes lay where he’d presumably discarded them the previous night, alongside the leather armchair. There was no mud on them and they did not even look as if they had recently got wet, even though the previous day’s weather had been so awful.

‘I know I should have been with you,’ Robert continued after a bit. ‘I wanted to be with you. I’m just so sorry. All I can say is nothing like it will ever happen again. We are both grief stricken. I promise you I will be here for you one hundred per cent from now on.’

I looked at him, sitting in his familiar place at the table. My Robert. Except that this was a Robert I barely recognized. Unshaven. Eyes wild and swollen. Above all a man who was not what he had seemed to be for all those years. I’d caught him out in an enormous lie. A lie which rocked the very basis of our life together. Even his name was a falsehood. Yet he was all I had. That and our home, though suddenly even Highrise, wonderful Highrise, didn’t mean much any more.

‘How can I trust you?’ I enquired in an almost conversational sort of way. ‘I thought I knew you through and through, knew everything about you. It seems that I didn’t. How will I ever be able to trust you again?’

‘You can, Marion,’ he said, his eyes and his whole body language imploring me now. ‘I promise, promise you. You just have to believe me, you really do.’

‘Do I?’ The question was rhetorical. But he answered it anyway.

‘You must,’ he said. ‘You cannot throw away all that we’ve had together. We’ve lost Robbie. We cannot lose each other, surely?’

I was afraid we already had. But he looked and sounded so anguished that, angry as he’d made me, I did not have the heart to say so. I remained silent. After all, whatever he may have done, this was my son’s father.

‘I’ll put it right,’ he continued eventually. ‘I will, Marion. I’ll find my first wife somehow. I’ll get that divorce. We’ll get married again, you and me, somewhere exotic, just the two of us. Mauritius, the Maldives. Somewhere like that. We’ll have a ceremony on the beach as the sun goes down...’

His voice trailed away as if even he realized the nonsense of what he was saying.

I shook my head in exasperation.

‘You’re a fantasist, Robert,’ I said. ‘A romantic fantasist. Maybe that’s partly what I fell in love with in you. But now, now, with Robbie dead and all this deception, this terrible deception coming to light, it’s just...’ I searched for the right word.