Susan Howatch - Absolute Truths

I was so dazed that all I could say was: ‘Is that true or false?’

‘True. Dinkie was stunned. “Gee, I had no idea!” she said, and I answered with immense sympathy: “I’m afraid in England gentlemen don’t talk about their incomes. So tiresome of them, isn’t it?” We ended up sitting on the sofa together and chatting like lifelong friends.’

Words finally failed me.

‘Of course she tried to tell me she was pregnant,’ said Lyle as an afterthought, ‘but I soon got her to admit the pregnancy is mere wishful thinking. The situation’s simply this: she’s in her mid-twenties, time’s ticking on and she knows she’s got to get a husband before the eligible men start regarding her as a has-been. I think she does like Michael, I’ll say that for her, and I’m sure she’s grateful that he’s given her free lodgings for so long, but the truth is she’s exploiting his idealistic infatuation, and I’m sure that if he thinks she’s been faithful to him, he’s deceiving himself. God knows what she gets up to when he goes away on location to shoot the outdoor scenes for his dramas, but of course poor Michael, welded to his idealism, would have overlooked all the signs of infidelity.’

‘If she’s been seeing other men while living with Michael she must be very disturbed.’ For the first time I caught a glimpse of Dinkie not as a stereotype but as a complex human being whose behaviour was more of a mystery than I had ever bothered to imagine. ‘I hope she doesn’t start taking hard drugs when things don’t work out as she wants,’ I said, troubled. ‘I hope this isn’t the beginning of a road to disaster.’

‘Oh, don’t be so stupid, Charles, of course it isn’t! The girl’s a classic gold-digger, tough as old boots, and in the end she’ll nail a rich husband and live happily ever after. No chance of that one ever dying young of an overdose of heroin!’

I made no attempt to argue because by that time my thoughts had returned to Lyle’s Machiavellian machinations. ‘Wait a moment,’ I said. ‘Isn’t there something you’ve forgotten? How’s Michael going to forgive you for pointing Dinkie at Robert Welbeck?’

‘Very easily because I’m now ninety-nine per cent sure that I was right and he came down here panting to be rescued from the whole ghastly mess. His idealistic dream of “saving” Dinkie proved impossible to endure in reality … Charles, if you’re going to light that cigarette you’d better do so before you tear it to pieces.’

I took off my clerical collar before flicking open my lighter. ‘But if what you say is true,’ I said at last, ‘why was Michael so angry with me for opposing the marriage?’

‘Because he knew you were right and he couldn’t stand it.’

‘But why couldn’t he have talked to me honestly?’ I was in despair. Finally I said: ‘I just don’t understand where I’ve gone wrong with that boy.’

‘Oh God.’

‘I’ve tried so hard to be a good father –’

‘Look, you need a drink – and for heaven’s sake don’t abandon this one when it’s only half-finished. Come and sit in the kitchen with me while I cook dinner.’

I stood up obediently but I was still grappling with despair. ‘If only I could understand what it all means –’

‘Darling, it means absolutely nothing except that parenthood can be hell and young men can make damned fools of themselves over tarts.’ She paused to give me a kiss. ‘It’ll all come right,’ she said at last, and added with unexpected fierceness: ‘I’ll make it all come right.’

We were just embracing each other as if to crush out my misery when yet again the telephone started to ring.

The hospital chaplain was ringing to let me know that Desmond had awoken from the anaesthetic but could remember nothing about the assault; the policewoman stationed at his bedside had departed and the doctor had again recommended that my next visit to the hospital should not take place until the following morning.

‘I feel like murdering that instrument,’ said Lyle, eyeing the telephone as I replaced the receiver. ‘Leave it off the hook while we have dinner.’

Before I could answer, Michael and Dinkie descended from Lyle’s upstairs sitting-room and announced their intention of dining at Jock’s Box, the local lorry-drivers’ café, before departing for London – a statement which drew a wail of protest from Lyle who begged him to leave the long drive until the following day.

‘I’d like to,’ said Michael, ‘but all I can afford is Jock’s Box and the petrol to take us home. I’m not going to let Dad buy me off with a flash of his cheque-book after giving us such a bloody awful reception.’

At this point I decided it would be best for all concerned if I withdrew from the scene so I retired to the cloakroom and did not emerge until I heard the front door close. Returning to the kitchen I demanded: ‘Did he allow you to write the cheque?’

‘No, but as soon as you were out of the way dinner at La Belle Époque became affordable and he said they’d bed down at the nearest guest-house … Where’s your drink?’

Retrieving my glass from the cloakroom I sat down again at the kitchen table and drank in a morose silence while Lyle cooked a mixed grill.

Afterwards as she washed up I distracted myself by switching on the television and staring at the news. Mr Kosygin had received a cool welcome in Peking. Frightful things were happening as usual in Vietnam … I dozed, but it was hardly surprising that I was exhausted. Sexual intercourse was not, for a man of my age, the wisest activity to indulge in before trying to survive a diocesan disaster and a family débâcle.

‘Worn out?’ said Lyle as we toiled upstairs to bed.

But unfortunately my brief doze had revived me and my brain was active again. ‘I’m so worried about Desmond,’ I confessed. ‘I forgot to tell you that according to Dido he was seen recently in Piccadilly Circus with a young man in black learner.’

‘What absolute poppycock – a sexy young man in black leather would never look twice at poor old Desmond!’

‘Poor old Desmond … There’ll be a terrible interview when he’s well enough to discuss the future – if I’m not careful he’ll wind up utterly pulverised.’

‘Being pulverised is the least he deserves and I can’t see why you should wallow in agony about it. Just offer him a full pension and boot him out on the grounds of ill-health. Personally I think he’ll be damned lucky. In the old days he’d have been tried in the ecclesiastical courts and booted out with nothing.’

‘But I can’t help feeling I’ve failed him in some way –’

‘Rubbish! You took him on, didn’t you, when no one else would touch him? If anyone’s failed Desmond it’s Malcolm, never noticing that Desmond was coming apart at the seams!’

‘And who’s responsible for Malcolm?’

‘Charles, you cannot blame yourself for this disaster, I absolutely forbid it! Malcolm slipped up, that’s all, but anyone can make a mistake, even a first-class archdeacon. Now stop agonising, stop thinking about wretched Desmond and switch off. Shall I run your bath for you?’

‘Thank you,’ I said dryly, ‘but I think I still have enough strength to turn on the taps.’

I had a long hot bath and repeated over and over to myself my mantra: ‘All things work together for good to them that love God’. Then I tried to think about Hippolytus and the sexually lax Bishop Callistus, but the thought of sexual laxness only reminded me of Michael and the moral wasteland of the 1960s and the horrible changes which were being made in the name of progress. Abolishing the grammar schools, ignoring coffee-bar hooliganism, showering publicity on gangsters like the Kray brothers, turning bad singers into idols, embracing American culture without discrimination (and what on earth was America getting up to in Vietnam anyway?), permitting mass-mockery of distinguished institutions, encouraging the destruction of moral standards, campaigning for the legalisation of homosexuality … I started thinking of Desmond again. Hauling myself out of the bath I opened the medicine cabinet to retrieve my indigestion tablets.