Rachel Cusk - The Country Life

‘She doesn’t need your compliments,’ said Martin haughtily. ‘She’s embarrassed, and I don’t blame her. Those were the only clean things she had to change into. I assured her that none of you would be rude, and you have been. I’m ashamed of you all.’

This final touch, trespassing as it did into excess, threatened to topple the heroic structure of Martin’s speech; but to my surprise it held.

‘Sor- ry ,’ said Toby ironically.

‘I think she looks charming,’ added Pamela. ‘Why not, if you’ve got the figure for it? That’s what I say.’

I forgave Martin instantly for the transgressions of the afternoon. Pamela I regarded as having levelled her score. Toby was now reassuringly lodged deep in my contempt; and thus set to rights, I felt rather more in the mood for another drink.

‘Actually, I will have something,’ I said confidentially to Mr Madden, as he passed with his tray. He bent his head towards me and I caught a gust of his breath.

‘G-and-T?’

‘Lovely.’

‘We were just talking about Friday,’ said Pamela, in her ‘hostess’ voice. ‘I think it’s going to be a real hoot. Mark and Millie are coming down for the night, and Derek and Caroline, and then there’ll be all of us—’

‘What’s Friday?’ said Martin, wheeling himself towards the fireplace.

‘Honestly, Martin, you are the end,’ said Pamela crossly. She looked over her shoulder. Mr Madden was safely from the room. ‘It’s your father’s birthday, in case you have forgotten. Sometimes I wonder if you ever think about anybody but yourself.’

With my advocate thus cast into disfavour, my cut-off trousers seemed to regain something of their controversy. I sidled to the sofa on which Pamela was sitting and stood behind it.

‘Dad’s birthday’s on Saturday,’ said Martin.

‘I know, but we’re celebrating it on Friday. Mark and Millie can’t make Saturday. They’ve got to be back in London for something.’

‘Darling!’ Mr Madden’s voice floated in from the hall. ‘Have we run out of gin?’

‘Of course not!’ Pamela shouted back. ‘There’s a new bottle in the cupboard in the kitchen.’

‘No there isn’t,’ said Mr Madden, appearing in the doorway and scratching his head.

‘There must be!’ Pamela turned around on the sofà to look at him. ‘I only bought it a couple of days ago. In fact, I saw it there earlier today!’

I tried to catch Martin’s eye, but he was watching his parents as they debated the matter with so comically innocent an expression on his face that I prayed they wouldn’t look at him. I myself, surprisingly, did not panic. After Mr Madden’s first mention of the gin, I had checked internally my capacity to lie, as someone going down a steep hill in a car would check their brakes, and found it to be intact. I had no doubt that if questioned, I would deny all knowledge of the theft. Of my accomplice I was not so sure.

‘Well, it isn’t there now,’ said Mr Madden.

‘Are you sure you really looked?’ persisted Pamela, putting her hand on the arm of the sofa as though she were about to get up.

‘Of course I did!’ said Mr Madden crossly. ‘I’m not an idiot.’

‘Well, you do miss things sometimes, darling,’ said Pamela condescendingly. ‘You know what you’re like. It was definitely there this morning.’

‘I promise you that it isn’t there now.’

There was a moment of silence.

‘Well! How peculiar!’ said Pamela finally. ‘I wonder what could have happened to it?’

‘Are you sure you bought a new one?’ said Martin, to my horror. ‘Perhaps you left it in the shop or something.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ snapped Pamela. ‘Anyway, as I said, I saw it this morning.’

‘Perhaps you only thought you did.’

‘Why on earth would I think a thing like that if it wasn’t true?’

‘Well,’ said Martin. ‘Let’s say you did buy a bottle but left it in the shop; your memory of having bought it might have created the illusion of it being in the cupboard. You might have created that illusion to reassure yourself that it was there, because subconsciously you remembered leaving it in the shop. Things like that happen all the time,’ he added, chewing his finger.

‘Are you sure you didn’t leave it in the shop, darling?’ echoed Mr Madden, evidently converted to this new theory.

‘Of course I am!’ said Pamela. She put a hand to her head. ‘God, I must be going mad.’

‘It’s Alzheimer’s,’ said Toby, sniggering. ‘What’s your name, dear?’

‘ Could I have left it behind?’ whispered Pamela, a look of fierce concentration on her face. ‘Let me think. I went to the supermarket—’

‘What’s the date?’ continued Toby in a loud voice. ‘1967? No, you’re a bit out, dear. Try again.’

‘Shush!’ cried Pamela, raising a hand to silence him. He sniggered again. She sat, evidently deep in thought, and finally raised an astonished face to the room. ‘Do you know, I must have. How silly of me. I must have left it there. God, do you think I really am going bonkers?’

‘Absent-mindedness is a sign of intelligence,’ said Martin. ‘Apparently.’

‘Oh well,’ said Mr Madden. ‘We’ll have to have something else.’

‘No, no, let’s just get on with dinner,’ said Pamela distractedly. ‘It’s all ready.’

I caught Martin’s eye several times as we sat around the dinner table, in the hope of telegraphing to him my approval, but each time he merely looked at me blankly as if he had no idea why I was glancing so significantly at him. I soon, however, forgot about the incident; for with Toby sitting beside me, I found myself once more drawn in to the covert conflict his presence seemed inevitably to set in motion, by which with every proof of stupidity or boorishness issued by his brain the form which enclosed it advanced in loveliness.

It is difficult to explain how it could be that I found myself increasingly attracted to someone of whom my opinion correspondingly descended. I had never experienced such a thing before. It was, I suspected, the very weakness of his personality that gave fatal embellishment to the thought of being physically overpowered by him; for without a rival intelligence to negotiate, without the whole vast and varied territory of taste, intellect and conversation to be explored and cultivated, the sexual domain lay invitingly close by, ripe for momentary plunder. I had no doubt that Toby’s charms appeared accessible to everyone he met; but the cheapness of my desire did not make it any less urgent. I wondered that I did not feel more guilty at the thought of Edward, for whom, though I clearly knew him to be the better person, I had not felt this greed; and who, so short a time ago, I had injured so deeply and so wantonly that an entire lifetime of virtue would not have paid for it. I imagined him looking into my thoughts there at the dinner table, but although I felt ashamed, I could not support the opposition for long. I had freed myself from Edward as one would release the hand of someone dangling over a precipice: because my own survival had depended on it. At least, that was how I had seen it at the time. Increasingly, I was coming to regard my action as less catastrophic for all concerned; in other words, that I had been the dangling figure, and had let go merely because it had hurt too much, and seemed too hopeless, to hang on; and that when I had had the good fortune to land on something soft and yielding, I had merely neglected to inform Edward of the fact. He, I didn’t doubt, was grieving at my disappearance; but at least he would have the chance to recover. Had I stayed with him longer, his portion of blame would have grown larger and larger, his innocence less. My unhappiness would have infected him; an infection he might have passed on to the next person he loved.