A Bouquet of Barbed Wire (8 page)

He could not see, apart from surface diplomacy and technical competence, that they had enough in common to ensure that what pleased one would please the other, in fact quite the reverse, but of course he could not say that. He asked instead why she wanted to go on working in publishing, expecting her either to profess a love of books which from a secretarial point of view would be largely irrelevant, or to mention glamour and excitement which after three years she must know hardly existed.

Sarah Francis said, ‘I like to feel I’m doing something useful.’

‘I’m glad you think publishing is useful.’ Manson smiled. ‘I sometimes have doubts about that myself.’

Sarah Francis smiled back as if to say that they both knew these doubts were not serious and could be dismissed. ‘I think what I mean is, I could work in, say, advertising, but I’d have to admit I was wasting my time. On the other hand, I really ought to work in something medical, only I’m a bit squeamish.’ She looked apologetic. ‘So here I am. Compromising.’

It was a curious voice: rather pretty but completely
accentless, and neither too high nor too low. It went with her looks and her clothes as if she had chosen it, picked it off a rack to complete her outfit and create a good impression.

He said, ‘And what do you do in your spare time, Miss Francis?’

She hesitated for what he now felt was the prescribed length of thinking time, and said, ‘Oh, I like going to the theatre and playing tennis and … having dinner with people. And I make clothes sometimes. That’s about all really.’

‘Do you live at home?’ He knew she would not but it seemed better than asking her if she lived alone.

‘No.’ She concealed any hint that the idea was absurd. ‘I share a flat with three other girls.’ She grinned, letting some of the poise slip. ‘It’s a bit chaotic at times but it’s fun and very cheap.’

‘I have a daughter about your age.’

For the life of him he did not know why he’d said that. He had had no idea he was going to: the first he knew was when the words were actually spoken. And yet he was not sorry because it seemed somehow important.

Sarah Francis said, ‘That’s nice. What does she do?’

‘She’s a student.’

Her eyes were serious, as if she knew more than she could possibly know about what they were discussing.

‘My parents wanted me to go to university but I couldn’t wait to start earning money. I’m not sure I was clever enough to get in, anyway. Is your daughter very clever, Mr. Manson?’

‘Not very.’

‘Still, she must be quite clever or they wouldn’t have taken her. It’s getting very competitive now, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ It occurred to him that she had trained herself to hold a conversation regardless of subject; if he had asked her to talk for one minute on any given topic she could have done so.

‘People keep telling me I’ll regret not going. I don’t know. I haven’t had time to find out yet.’ She smiled at him as if—to his newly sensitised perceptions—asking forgiveness for her youth. He stood up to indicate that the interview was over, and held out his hand.

‘Well, Miss Francis, I’ve enjoyed talking to you. You’ll hear from us very soon. I promise not to keep you in suspense.’

They shook hands. She had a very firm grip, but knew when to let go.

‘I’ll cross my fingers.’ Again the grin, which was positively mischievous compared with the smile, which was prim and polite. Somewhere under the cool facade Miss Francis had a sense of humour.

She walked to the door, the grey linen very neat and uncreased as if she had never sat down. She went out without looking back or fumbling with her bag and the door handle. No bungled exits for her. He heard her exchanging pleasantries with Monica in the outer office, then another door closed neatly. She had gone.

Monica knocked and bounced in. ‘Well, what do you think?’ Her eyes shone with pride and satisfaction, as if she had created the soignée Miss Francis out of papier maché and genius. Manson flopped in his chair.

‘All right, Monica, she’s the winner. Especially as there aren’t any other contestants.’

Monica looked crest-fallen. ‘You didn’t like her.’

‘Yes, of course I did. How could I dislike her? I just can’t believe that out of the whole of London you could only find one girl worthy of interview, even at your exacting standards.’

Monica’s expression grew more and more perturbed. ‘We had about thirty-one applicants,’ she said, ‘but I weeded them out.’

‘Evidently. That’s not weeding, that’s more like savage
pruning.’ He was surprised to find himself with an urge to needle Monica. Unusual.

‘I’m sorry if I did the wrong thing. I was only trying to save you trouble as you’re so busy.’ Her shut-down face. He had offended her.

‘I know and I appreciate it. Of course you didn’t do the wrong thing.’ Climb down; make it all right. He didn’t want to conduct dozens of interviews, anyway, and they would all be the same if Monica vetted them first, all perfectly charming and efficient. He would not be able to tell one from the other, let alone
choose
, so what was the point? But still something in him resented that he had not been given at least an illusion of choice.

Monica said doubtfully, ‘Of course you could still interview them all if you want to. Although there were only five or at the most seven who were even worth considering. This kind of job attracts a lot of the wrong types.’

Did he want to interview seven little girls? Of course he didn’t. He would probably end up with Sarah Francis, anyway. And Monica was leaving in a fortnight, come what may. He said, ‘Write and tell her she’s got the job.’

C
ASSIE SAID
hesitantly, ‘Do you think all fathers feel so—possessive about their daughters?’ She watched Marjorie position the cigarette in its holder, light it, and inhale while considering her answer. I shouldn’t be talking to her at all, she thought, only there is no one else to talk to, and I’m tired of thinking, and I’ve had too much wine.

‘I dunno,’ Marjorie said, exhaling. ‘I suppose it’s quite common. I’ll ask Alec if you like. I’m not sure how he feels about Judy.’

‘Oh no, no,’ said Cassie automatically, now feeling disloyal; then, reflecting that Marjorie would almost certainly discuss it with him, anyway, in the curious non-privacy of marriage, ‘Oh well, all right. It might be a good idea.’ It was at times like these that she should have either more friends or none at all, close to hand; it hardly mattered which. But to be stuck with Marjorie alone, bless her, was absurd.

She had lost the habit of girl-friends and confidence; confessions were hard to arrive at and stuck in her throat. Friendships, intense at Cambridge, during the war, had vanished, surprisingly, with marriage and children. She had expected to keep up with her friends but she had not. The hectic years in London meeting mostly new people and entertaining business contacts for Manson, then the move to the country when Prue was born. It had all, to her surprise, been fully absorbing, and in what time she had, she read books, propping them against the high chair while she fed Prue,
beside the bath when she washed her, above the cooker while she cooked. She read books, after motherhood, as if she had never seen a book in her life before, voraciously, one after the other and often two or three at once, as if she had never obtained two degrees (to Manson’s feigned chagrin at having only one) which she still thought vaguely she might use one day. It was as if Prue’s birth released a kind of intellectual hunger that she had only glimpsed before. But with the twins it waned: gone into the sheer physical and nervous strain of coping with two energetic small boys and Prue as a moody adolescent. It had not returned—instead she found herself making jam and gardening, occupations she would once have scorned—and it seemed to have taken her capacity for friendship with it, or to have replaced it at a time when both could not be fitted in. She had chosen books because her life then had seemed so full of people she had hardly needed any more; she had needed a refuge from them instead.

‘Of course, mothers feel a bit funny about their sons,’ said Marjorie chattily. It occurred to Cassie that she might actually be pleased to be having a fairly intimate conversation for a change. ‘Don’t you think? I know I do.’ She giggled. ‘I wouldn’t admit it to anyone else but it’s quite different from how I feel about Judy.’

Oh dear, Cassie thought, that means she regards me as a special friend. Oh dear. How can I possibly reciprocate that or deserve it? And how extraordinary. Unless of course she, like me, is stuck with no other choice so I am,
faute de mieux
, a friend. I must not flatter myself without cause.

‘I suppose there is a difference,’ she said vaguely. ‘I’ve never really thought about it.’
Was
she more maternal, more possessive, over the boys? Was there a sexual element in her love for them? Thinking about it she immediately pictured them in the bath and wondered if that was significant.

Marjorie laughed in rather an embarrassed and adolescent way. ‘Well, I wouldn’t like to go into it too closely but I’m
sure it’s there. It must be quite normal. Nothing to worry about. So I shouldn’t get in a state about Peter being a bit funny over Prue.’

‘No, you’re right,’ said Cassie at once, wanting to end the conversation and wishing she had never started it. She could not think what had possessed her to do such a thing. ‘It’s all very trivial,’ she said, to convince herself as much as Marjorie. ‘Just a bit tiresome when we’re all together, the four of us. It makes such an atmosphere, his disliking Gavin so much. That’s all that bothers me really.’

But Marjorie was not so easily deflected. ‘They like to think their little girls are pure as the driven snow, you know. Now mothers are more realistic. I’m perfectly sure Judy must be—what do they call it now?—heavy petting all over the place, if nothing worse, but I’ve never said so to Alec. Even in his profession I’m sure he’s not broad-minded about his own daughter. If she actually got pregnant he’d hit the roof.’

Cassie began to wonder if she had been right to inform certain neighbours and friends of Prue’s pregnancy. At the time of the wedding, with all its talk-provoking suddenness, it had seemed much more sensible to be open with a selected few and avoid the inevitable speculation and sidelong glances. She was always, where possible, in favour of honesty, and it was at best a difficult situation to carry off with dignity, but if Marjorie was going to keep
on
about it…

‘So he has to blame the boy,’ Marjorie went on triumphantly. ‘His daughter has to be pure so it must be all the boy’s fault. But let me see now, how would it go…? If he also
envies
the boy he has to be twice as angry because the boy’s done what
he’d
have liked to do and—’

‘Yes, Marjorie, I do understand.’ Cassie did not even care now if she sounded rude. But she blamed herself very much for letting Marjorie get the scent of blood in the first place. A nasty disloyal feeling of ‘Have I betrayed Peter?’ crept over her like fog swirling up from the ground.

Marjorie was immediately repentant, though not on the right wavelength. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, I always state the obvious, I know I do. No wonder Alec gets so impatient with me.’

* * *

‘Sure your Dad wants to screw you, baby. Sticks out a mile.’ Gavin punctured a Coke and began to drink it from the tin.

Prue felt herself starting to blush. She had not blushed with Gavin since the first time she took her clothes off in his presence. She was not good at undressing, being unconvinced that she looked better naked than dressed, and had needed a lot of reassurance on the subject, which Gavin had been happy to provide. Now she protested, ‘Oh, Gavin,
really,’
and Gavin stopped drinking to laugh.

‘I don’t mean he’s aware of it. He’s got it all buried
way
down. But it’s there all right. That’s why he’d like to cut my balls off.’

Prue dug in the refrigerator to cool her face and find a Coke for herself. She said, ‘I thought he was horrid to you. I was very cross. You were falling over backwards to be nice to him.’

‘Yeah, but what good is that when it’s you he’d like to have fall over backwards.’

‘Oh, don’t, Gavin.’ The trouble was that she got vivid mental pictures of everything Gavin said.

‘What’s the matter? You were happy enough screwing me all over town, what’s wrong with your Dad? He’s a well-preserved man for his age.’

‘Gavin, he’s my
father.’
She pressed her cheek against the cold cloudy tin of Coke.

‘So what’s wrong with incest? At least it’s all in the family.’

* * *

Manson sat alone in the office after Monica had gone. The farewells, accompanied by the inevitable drinks and tears, had got a little out of hand, and now in the ensuing silence he could still hear them ringing in his head. He had no urge to go home. He had not phoned Prue since the weekend visit and when Cassie reported non-committal conversations on the phone he did not comment. As far as possible he was excluding her from his thoughts and, totally, from his speech. It was all part of his new policy of training himself not to care. Let her ruin her life. Why should he knock himself senseless trying to stop her? Let her get on with it. If seeing her worried him, it was better not to see her, avoid all contact. Once he found something else to do in the void, it might not be so painful. It should not be too difficult: after all he had quite enough work to occupy his mind and his home life was harmonious—well, fairly harmonious, at least; he thought Cassie had been untypically moody of late, but perhaps he was merely projecting his own malaise onto her.

It occurred to him that he would like to go out and get very drunk, something he had not done in years.

* * *

Rupert, resplendent in various shades of purple, adorned with a golden tie, said to him on Monday, ‘Is that your new secretary-bird?
Really?’

S
ARAH SETTLED
in quickly. He had expected to have to train her and be patient with her mistakes but for the first week, even, there were surprisingly few. He noticed that she was often to be seen clutching or thumbing through several sheets of closely-typed paper: on enquiry he was told that it was the office routine, as set down by Monica for her enlightenment. He was impressed and asked to see it, and there, down to the tiniest detail, was the customary procedure for every eventuality. Everything was listed: the location of spare stationery, pencils, indiarubbers, stencils, carbon … There was a detailed guide to the filing-system. An outline of an average day, which he could even recognise as such, with the times for tea and coffee underlined in red, and his preferences in sugar, milk and biscuits minutely described. There was even a run-down on staff: who they were, what they did and in which offices they could be found. Under Bernard’s entry his deafness was allowed for; under Rupert’s he read “Mr. Warner may seem a little eccentric in manner but as a person he is really perfectly charming.” Even the office wolf was pinpointed: “Mr. Cowan, once firmly rebuffed, will not try again.”