Henry Green - Back

“You are cheerful, aren’t you?”

“Bad about Mrs Grant, isn’t it?” he began. “Loss of memory can be a terrible thing.”

“I don’t want to hear about them, I’ve already told you.”

“Sorry,” he said. “I can’t seem to keep off the subject.”

She moved impatiently in her chair. “I’ve got my own life, as I mentioned before,” she explained. “It’s not exactly cheerful for a girl, is it, to talk of someone losing their memories when I’m a sort of walking memory to other people, complete strangers in every case? It’s only natural I suppose, but you men, that used to know her I mean, with her red hair you all talk about, I suppose you’re dead easy to think only of yourselves?”

Suddenly frantic, he looked about for the bed, to torture himself with the sight. She must have guessed, and guessed wrong, because she drew her skirt down over her knees, although she had not been showing too much leg, or no more than is usually shown.

“You’ll have to go in another minute,” she said, “and that’s meant to mean what it says.”

“I’ll go now before … before …,” but he could not finish. He rushed out, grabbing his hat, and slammed the door.

“Was there ever any girl as unlucky as me,” she wondered. “But I like his brown eyes. Oh well that’s all over, and I shan’t see him again, thank God,” she thought.

The next morning, after about the worst night he had ever had, he telephoned Mr Grant. He did not bother to ask Dot to leave the room. She was all the more certain something must be very wrong when she heard him insist that he should meet Mr Grant the same evening. He even fixed the time he would be there. And it did not help him, she noticed, for his work still suffered terribly all day.

When Charley got out to Redham, straight from the office, he found Rose’s father hanging around in the front garden.

“She’s better,” this man began at once. “Mother’s much better today. Tell you the truth I can’t make her keep to her bed, she will begin running downstairs the whole time. So I shan’t take you inside, if you’ll overlook it. Not after the recent occasion.”

He said this in such a way as to make it appear that he blamed Charley for the last visit, when Mrs Grant had been so upset to see what she understood to be her brother John. And Charley found himself tongue tied.

“So I presume you’ve come to apologise, my boy, eh?” Mr Grant said, walking up and down past Charley on the small patch of lawn. “But there, we mustn’t blame you young fellows. I know. You’ve been through a whole lot, and we all ought to be grateful. What’s more you’re not looking too fit in yourself. Gone thin. Lost weight? You want to take things easy at first, believe me. I’ve no doubt it’s the food. You’ve been on starvation diet out there so long that, when you are back, even the little we get is too rich for your stomach. I shouldn’t wonder if that wasn’t it.”

But Charley, as usual, was some sentences behind.

“I’m sure I’d never … I mean, if I’d known, I’d not have let Mrs Grant see …,” he mumbled, to protect himself from the unexpected charge of its being his fault that he had made Mrs Grant so much worse.

“Don’t give the matter another thought, boy,” Mr Grant said. “It was partly my error, I’ll confess. When I’m in the wrong, or not entirely in the wrong because things aren’t often black or white, life’s not so simple as you’ll find when you grow older, no, when I consider I’ve been the least bit in the world to blame, then I’m the first to admit the fact, that’s me. But giving me away to Nancy is a different kettle of fish altogether.” And he halted before Charley, who, in confusion, lowered his eyes.

“I can’t understand that even now,” Mr Grant accused, staring at him.

“I never …” Charley tried to begin, only he looked so guilty it encouraged Mr Grant.

“Now see here, my boy,” he said, “I’m older than you, I’ve had more experience. What I’m going to tell you will be of benefit in your job. Never divulge a confidence. That’s all. Never. I’ve had men come to me in business, competitors, who’ve let something drop which if I’d liked was not less than putting a hundred pound Bank of England note right in my hand. But what they’d done was in confidence, mind. They just used those few words to start with, that changed the whole conversation from a useful tip to something sacred. There you are. And it’s paid me. Many’s the time, even when I couldn’t see what value there might be. I still kept silent. For why? Because it was a trust.”

A voice quavered from the house. “Gerald,” it called twice, thin and fretful.

“We’d best keep out of sight,” Mr Grant remarked, leading the way out of his front garden. “We don’t want Amy to have another of her turns.”

Once they were behind the tree, where he had given Charley Miss Whitmore’s address with no word about keeping the source dark, Mr Grant began to lecture again. The injustice of all this absolutely silenced Summers.

“Mind, I appreciate your coming down, though of course you can’t tell how difficult it is for me to get outside the house, even just for now, with Amy in the condition she’s in. We all have our troubles, right enough. The only difference there may be, lies in how much we talk about ’em. There’s another truth for you. No, I appreciate it that you felt you had to say you were sorry. Shows you have the right stuff in you, Charley boy.”

“I’m sorry, but …,” Charley said, and Mr Grant interrupted him.

“I tell you it pays hand over fist, keeping a confidence. That’s what life’s taught me.”

“But why did you send me?” Charley got out at last.

“To be a bit of company for her, of course,” Mr Grant said, as though it was the most natural thing in the world. “She’s living alone now. She had her husband killed out in Egypt, and changed her name back. She’s a plucky little thing,” he said. “Because what you have to remember, Charley boy, is that you’re one of the lucky ones. You’re back. I know I reminded myself of that, come the finish of the last war, when I couldn’t seem to understand at certain times, just after I got out of France. You see I trusted you. It’s not everyone I’d give her address. And I trust you still, if I may have been mistaken in one respect. Don’t you younger fellows ever think of others? There’s that little lady been alone now for close on two months, ever since the fly-bombs got so bad. Of course I thought of you.”

“When did she marry, then?” Charley managed to ask.

“While you were in Germany,” Mr Grant answered, bright. “That’s all the life they had together. In 1943 it was. They had three leaves, then he was gone. And once he was killed it seemed to turn her bitter towards me. Life is like that sometimes.”

A bigamist, Charley thought. Would this awful thing never stop? His jealousy got hold of him again.

“There’s Arthur Middlewitch living right across the landing,” he said, so bitterly there was no mistaking it.

“Middlewitch?” Mr Grant cried out. “Who’s with the C.E.G.S.?”

Charley was beyond an answer.

“How do you know?”

“She told me,” Charley said, with a sort of satisfaction.

“Are you acquainted with Arthur Middlewitch?” Mr Grant enquired, cautiously.

Charley did not reply, which seemed odd to Mr Grant.

“Do you know him, then?” he repeated, sharp.

“He was where they fitted my last leg.”

“And you took him along to her?”

“Me?” Charley brought out, with such disgust that the older man could see he had done no such thing.

“I should hope not and that’s a fact,” Mr Grant agreed. “It’s true I recommended Arthur to your landlady, the same as I done for you. There’s a number of you young fellows I’ve served a good turn when I had the chance. That’s what we’re here for, after all. But not that man for Nance. You’d hold a funny opinion of me to think I’d introduce them. Because you might as well confess up. That’s what you’re supposing, isn’t it?”