Pat Barker - Double Vision

‘I went down last evening. I can give you the number of the person I stayed with, if you like. Alec .’ The tone was almost caressing. ‘You surely don’t think I had anything to do with it?’

Alec was compulsively honest. ‘It crossed my mind.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘So you bloody should be. What’s going on?’

‘I think perhaps we’d better not talk at the moment.’

‘Alec, I haven’t done anything. All I did was go to London. You were perfectly happy to have me mowing the churchyard a few weeks back. You weren’t worried about Justine then.’ He waited for a response. ‘So why now? I wouldn’t do anything to hurt Justine. You know that. I loved her.’

‘I wish I could believe that.’

‘I went out with her for six months. What did you think it was about?’

‘Making me jump. You were always good at that.’

‘Oh, I see . It was about you ? Now why aren’t I surprised?’

‘You should’ve told her. You had a clear moral and legal responsibility —’

‘So why didn’t you report me? Why don’t you?’

Alec touched his forehead. ‘This isn’t doing any good.’

‘It certainly isn’t. You don’t actually believe any of the things you claim to believe. Do you?’

Alec didn’t bother to reply.

Justine woke to the sound of voices. Dad and Angela, she thought. Angela must have come back. But then after a while she realized both voices were male and that the second sounded familiar. She got up and looked out of the window. Just visible between the trees was a white van.

She wrapped her dressing-gown round her and went out on to the landing, thinking it might not be Peter. She could have been mistaken in the voice, and thousands of people have white vans. Whoever it was, they were in the living room. She knelt on the landing, looking down through the banisters, reluctant to go downstairs and face them, but unable to go back to bed. Like a child, she thought, spying on adult life.

The voices went on. She couldn’t catch individual words or even judge the tone. Once she thought she heard her father almost shouting, but mainly it was a low rumble. Then it became louder. The door opened, letting a wedge of light on to the hall floor. She shrank back against the wall, furious with herself for wanting to hide the bruises. Incredibly, she felt ashamed, as if it had been her fault. Ashamed, or vulnerable. Perhaps she simply preferred not to risk a meeting with Peter when she was hurt.

It was Peter. She could see him now.

They were in the hall, walking towards the door. Peter was smartly dressed, suntanned, his hair longer than she remembered. At the door, he turned. ‘Well, give her my love.’

Dad said nothing. They were facing each other. For a moment she thought they were going to shake hands, then Peter leant across and kissed him. Dad neither returned the kiss nor pulled away. He just stood there and took it; it might as well have been a blow. Peter stood back, smiling. She knew that look, amused, mocking, confident of his power to attract. ‘Oh, I almost forgot,’ he said. ‘Congratulations on your engagement. You are engaged, aren’t you?’

Dad opened the door and Peter went out into the night.

After he’d gone, Dad didn’t go back to the living room, but instead pressed his face into the door, hands spread out on either side of his head. He stood there, not moving.

‘Dad?’

He turned. ‘Oh, you’re awake.’ He came to the foot of the stairs, obviously delighted to see her up and about. She might have hallucinated the last few minutes. He didn’t even look like the same man.

‘Yes, I’m feeling a lot better.’ It might be true. She was too bewildered by the scene she’d just witnessed to know.

‘Come and have some supper.’

There was a covered plate of chicken sandwiches on the sideboard in the living room, ready for when she would feel hungry and come down. They ate them over the fire. Chewing wasn’t easy, because the movement of her jaw made her nose hurt, but she forced herself to finish one sandwich before pushing the plate aside.

‘That was Peter.’

‘Oh, I thought I heard voices.’ She didn’t want him to know she’d seen the kiss. ‘What did he want?’

‘He’d heard about the…er…’

‘Burglary.’

‘He just wanted to know how you were.’ He waited for a response. ‘He sends his love.’

She could have done without this.

‘He was upset,’ Dad went on, ‘because what happened to you reminded him of what he did.’

‘You mean why he went to prison?’

‘Yes. He was in a house stealing money and the old lady whose house it was came back unexpectedly and…’

‘He beat her up?’

‘Worse than that. He killed her.’

It should have been a shock, but it wasn’t.

Dad said, ‘He was very young.’

So was the little bastard who hit me, she thought. ‘I’m very young. I don’t go round murdering old ladies.’

‘No, very young. Adam’s age.’

For a moment she couldn’t take it in. ‘Christ.’ She just couldn’t get her head round it. ‘Sorry,’ she said, a second later, knowing her use of the word would offend him.

When she tried to examine her feelings, she found only turmoil. Not even compassion for the old lady, if she was honest, just a shrinking away from a horror she couldn’t bear to imagine. ‘Why are you telling me this now?’

‘Because I should have told you before.’

‘Yeah, I think you should have.’

‘I begged him to tell you.’

‘He finished with me instead.’

‘I’m afraid I was rather pleased.’

‘Yeah, me too. Eventually.’

‘Would it have made a difference?’

‘I don’t know. It’s easy to say no, isn’t it? But I don’t know. It might.’ A short silence. ‘Still doesn’t answer the question, though. Why tell me now?’

‘Because of… Today. The man who did that.’ He risked a glance at her face. ‘I know it doesn’t make sense, but… There is a connection. I keep having these terrible thoughts, but they’re not just thoughts, they’re more like waking nightmares. No, I shouldn’t burden you —’

‘No, go on.’

‘I imagine I’ve got him tied up and I…’

Unexpectedly she giggled. ‘Break his nose?’

He tried to laugh. ‘That sort of thing. I didn’t think I had this much hatred in me.’

Justine started to speak, stopped and tried again. ‘I’m going to get over this, Dad. I’ve no intention of wallowing in it. And neither should you .’

‘No, well, I’ll try.’

He seemed surprised. Perhaps she’d sounded tougher than he gave her credit for, or perhaps he’d sensed her resentment. Because he had burdened her. The onus was on her to get better quickly, so he wouldn’t have to go on feeling bad about himself. Was it fair to say that? Perhaps not. She was too tired to work it out.

‘Peter brought you some roses. They’re out there. I’ve put them in water. Shall I bring them in?’

‘No, let’s leave them, shall we?’

And why choose today to tell her about Peter? Now, when it was too late to do any good? It simply focused her attention back on to him and his relationship with Peter. What kind of tropism for the limelight was going on here? And yet he meant well. He loved her. She made herself get up, go to the sofa and sit beside him. He put his arm round her shoulders and she snuggled into his side. It wouldn’t hurt to go on being his little girl for a few more hours. One last time. The world would catch up with them soon enough.

They were going to the Farnes. Justine couldn’t wait to leave, sitting forward in her seat, waiting impatiently for Stephen to start the car.