William Boyd: Stars and bars

He wondered whom he should phone first. His ex-wife or his mistress. He should phone Melissa, he knew, she liked her calls returned. He phoned Irene.

“Hello, Irene. It’s—”

“Tonight, don’t forget, that’s all.”

“I’ll see you there. I haven’t forgotten. Christ, I asked you .”

“Don’t be late. I’ll give you fifteen minutes then I’m gone.”

“I won’t. Bye.”

Henderson stood up and took off his jacket. He moved to the door to hang it up and paused there for a moment, his jacket in one hand, his square jaw in the other. He stroked his jawbone gently, like a man coming round after a novocaine jab. What on earth was he doing, he asked himself, getting more deeply involved with Irene when what he really wanted to do was re-marry Melissa? He shook his head. This too was typical: a clear and predetermined course of action had become complicated by his own maverick and wayward desires and his seeming inability ever to resist them. Now he was being driven to the brink of having to make a choice. The worst possible state of affairs.

As he fitted his jacket onto the coat hanger he saw the envelopes in the inside breast pocket, and among them the red and blue flashes of the airmails. Rushing out of the apartment that morning he’d snatched up his post without looking at it.

He laid the two airmail envelopes on his desk, feeling sensations of reverence and trepidation behind his ribcage. They were from Britain; his own handwriting was on the envelopes — he always sent stamped, addressed envelopes to ensure prompt replies. On one the postmark said ‘Northampton’. With a blunt thumb he ripped it open.

Dear Mr Dores,

Thanking you for your letter of the 7th March. I remember Captain Dores well. He was my company commander during the operations around Inchon in ‘43. He was a fine and fair man and popular with the other lads.

I am sorry to say that I was taken ill with cerebral malaria and sent back to India where I spent three months in hospital. By the time I rejoined the unit your father had died six weeks previous, and there was not much left of the company I’m sorry to say as we had seen a lot of action.

I suggest that you write to the following who were in the company when your father was killed. Pte David Lee, Royal British Legion, 31 Hardboard Road, Chiswick, London and L⁄cpl Campbell Drew, Royal British Legion, Kelpie’s Wynd, Innerliethen, Peebleshire. I last saw these chaps at a regimental reunion in 1967 so cannot vouch as for their being still about.

As I said, Capt. Dores was respected by all the chaps. It was a great sadness to us all to hear of his death at the time. Trusting I have been of some assistance.

Yours sincerely,

Sgt (retd) Graham Bellows and Btn Loyal West Kents.

Another blank, but at least he had another name to write to. He had already written to Drew. He looked at the postmark on the other letter — Galashiels — and this, doubtless, was his reply.

Drew’s handwriting was large and jagged; he clearly pressed down very hard on his biro.

Dear Sir,

With reference to your letter about your father. I was in the company near Inchon when he died. It was a very difficult time for us all, operating as we were behind enemy lines. We had fatalities almost every day from disease, enemy action and even accidents. Your father was a good man and a good officer. It was a great blow to us all when he died.

Yours faithfully,

Campbell Drew

Henderson smoothed Drew’s scored crisp page flat on the desk. He sat back and exhaled. At last. Someone who had been there. But the letter was maddeningly obtuse and uncommunicative. What exactly had been going on that day — list March 1943—in Burma? More precisely what were the circumstances of Captain Dores’s death? How, where, when and by whom? He felt a sudden envy for this heavy handed Scot. Drew had known his, Henderson’s, father; had served under him and conceivably joked and suffered with him; shared a kind of intimacy, in short, that had been denied his son.

He stared at the reproduction of a Monet landscape which Mulholland, Melhuish had sold in London in 1963 for £45,000. The colours shifted. He let his eyes cross and attempted to go into a brief trance, hoping to expunge the sadness that seemed to brim in his body. It didn’t work. Why didn’t he feel more tired, he wondered? As a chronic insomniac surely he had a right to feel permanently exhausted?

Kimberly buzzed him.

“Mrs Wax, sir. Line one.”

With only the briefest pause, Henderson picked up the phone.

“Melissa,” he said enthusiastically. “Just got your message.”

“You haven’t forgotten, have you?”

“Of course not.” He wondered what he hadn’t forgotten. Everyone reminding him today.

“See you later, then.”

“Exactly.” He fenced. “What time did you say again?”

“About seven. Bryant’s looking forward to seeing you.”

“Likewise. Seven it is.”

Mrs Wax hung up. He thought he heard a spat kiss come winging down the wire. That was something, he reflected, with dubious pleasure. He frowned. One of the most onerous of the multitude of conditions Melissa had laid down — before she would even consider the thought of them getting together again — was that the children of her second marriage should ‘learn to love Henderson as a father’. Henderson, for his part, was so eager to please that he agreed to anything, including the rather staid ban on pre-remarital sex. Hence this meeting tonight. He remembered: it was Bryant’s birthday, and Bryant was his stepdaughter to be. He did some computing. Melissa’s at seven. He was meeting Irene at nine, in the bar of a restaurant in Soho. He should make it all right. Now all he had to do was buy the girl a present.

Henderson looked at his in-tray: three letters. With some guilt he realized it was only now that his mind was turning to his work and he had been in the building an hour. His own private concerns, as ever, took up an increasing portion of his day…He forced himself to concentrate.

Business couldn’t be said to be booming at Mulholland, Melhuish. Which was precisely why he’d been brought out from England: to get things moving, whip up some trade, start making a name for the firm. He thought suddenly of Pruitt’s news: prospects of an Impressionist sale. He winced; he should really be finding out more, exhibiting some curiosity, instead of reading letters and phoning girlfriends. After all, it was his area.

Mulholland, Melhuish had needed an ‘Impressionist man’ and accordingly had sent for him. For some reason, the key factor in establishing an auction house in America was a large Impressionist sale. Only then did you seem bona fide; only then did you acquire a reputation. Or so the pattern had proved in the case of the New York offices of the other famous London auction houses. Little real, profitable business was attracted until there had been a significant Impressionist sale. It was a rite of passage. Why this should be so wasn’t exactly clear; it was just one of the illogical rules of the game.

He drew concentric circles on his blotting pad. Mulholland, Melhuish had opened their New York office eighteen months ago. Since that day there had been no significant Impressionist sale. He had been brought over as a final gamble. As an authority on late-nineteenth-century French painting, his expertise, his academic contacts, his knowledge of the private collectors were meant to lure and instil confidence in potential clients.

At first — another sign, another omen — it had gone gratifyingly smoothly. In the first fortnight he had acquired for sale a large Berthe Morisot. Morale was raised; relief and hope became an almost palpable presence in the offices. But since then, nothing.