An Immoral Code (14 page)

‘You’re actually saying that, because I am married with a child, that I am worth less to you?’

‘I’d hardly put it that way. But some people would accuse us of having no sympathy with the problems which working women with families face, if we failed to take regard of your domestic position.’

‘But I work just as hard as Fred, I shoulder just as much responsibility as Fred!’ She turned to James Rothwell. ‘What about those new Japanese clients that I’ve just taken on? They must be worth quite a bit to the firm.’

There was a pause, and then Mr Rothwell said quietly, ‘You may have forgotten, Rachel, but you yourself pointed out, only two weeks ago, that you couldn’t be expected to have evening meetings with those very clients. You have to leave at five-thirty to get home to your baby. That’s what you said.’

Rachel was at a loss to reply.

‘My very point, you see,’ said John Parr easily. ‘Fred wouldn’t have got his partnership if he insisted on leaving on the dot every evening.’

There was a silence, then Rachel took a deep breath and glanced at each man in turn. ‘I can promise you that I don’t intend to let this rest,’ she said, rising from her chair. ‘You may feel that you have arguments justifying your inequitable treatment of me, but I regard it as sheer sexism.’

John Parr sighed the smug sigh of one who has had the best of an argument. ‘You can call it that if you like, but we have to take due account of the amount of time and commitment which staff are prepared to give us.’

Mr Rothwell tried to smooth out matters by interjecting quickly, ‘Your salary is due for review in the new year, in any event. I’m sure we can sort something out.’

Rachel looked at the two men, acutely conscious of her own femininity, their masculinity, the vague sense of threat which, despite the moderate, civilised tone of the discussion, seemed to fill the air. Was she, because of her past, sensitised to it in a way which other women were not? She felt a return of the feeling of powerlessness which so often used to strike her in the company of men, the feeling of which Leo had cured her. But there was no Leo now. She could think of nothing to say. She turned and left the room, closing the door quietly behind her.

James Rothwell sat back in his chair and let out a deep breath. ‘Just as well she doesn’t seem to know about Fenton’s car, as well,’ he murmured.

That evening Freddie put down the telephone and rubbed his hands, smiling. He rubbed them at the happy thought of the little celebration which was being arranged by Nichols & Co for next Tuesday, and also because it was damned cold in the flat. He didn’t like to run the heating too much, what with the cost and so on. Had to watch the pennies these days. That TV licence had been a bit of a shocker. They should let old people off that kind of thing. He must look into the business of paying by stamps that the girl in the post office had mentioned. No matter how carefully he budgeted for his rent and food, the money never seemed to stretch. Somehow that extra bottle of Scotch always crept into the equation. He tried to make a whole one last a week, but it never did. One had to have one’s little comforts. He blew on the shiny purplish skin of his long fingers and went through to the kitchen to boil the kettle. Bit of that instant mashed potato stuff that he’d recently discovered. That would go nicely with one of those little tins of ravioli.
Freddie tried not to think of the meals which he and Dorothy used to enjoy in the evenings as a matter of course. She’d been a damned good cook, always proud of her when they gave dinner parties. That game casserole of hers, the pork thing with apples and cream, steak Diane. His favourite had been that one with chicken breasts and asparagus sauce. No one could cook like Dorothy. And they’d had all those fresh vegetables from the garden. New potatoes sweet as nuts, all glistening with melted butter …

Freddie slopped the boiling water carefully into the dried heap of instant potato and stirred it with a fork, marvelling at the way in which the granules metamorphosed into a sludgy consistency in an instant. As he stirred he kept a careful eye on the pan containing the ravioli which was heating on the gas stove, bubbling lightly at the edges. He fetched a plate and emptied the ravioli onto it, and spooned the watery potato mess out next to it. Then he uncapped the bottle of White Horse – only a few inches left, must remember to pick up some more tomorrow – and poured a careful double measure into a glass, then added a little cold water. He took his plate, knife and fork, and watered whisky through to the living room and set them on the little table next to his armchair, near to the fax machine. The news of the little celebratory party in Upper Brook Street had quite set him up. There would be decent food, no doubt, plenty to drink, and the added pleasure of talking for as long as he liked about his pet subject, Lloyd’s. It was something they all talked about, incessantly, never tiring of it. And it would be so civilised, counsel and solicitors being polite and attentive, nodding and agreeing, listening, allowing one the illusion that one was still well-heeled, that things were still sound and investments profitable. An evening like that was something to look forward to, Freddie told himself, as he dug into his ravioli and instant potato. In fact, it had so cheered him up that he decided he wouldn’t watch
television tonight. That little bit of reminiscing in the kitchen had been pleasant. It wasn’t often that he felt robust enough to think for long about Dorothy, but this evening he would. When he finished his meal, he would have just another little tot of whisky and sit and think about her.

In the cramped dining room of their semi, Alison Carstairs was clearing away the plates from the evening meal. She clattered the unused cutlery from one place setting back into the drawer and turned to gaze stupidly out at the dark blankness of the window, wondering where Paul was. Half the time now he came in from school, changed, and then went out again, never bothering to return for dinner. She didn’t know who he hung around with, but she had a good idea. Last week, when she had challenged him about the amount of time he spent with those louts from the estate, he had simply looked at her sullenly and said, ‘First of all you get worried that I’m not making friends at school, and then when I do you don’t like them. I can’t win, can I?’ And he had banged out of the house. Of course she wanted him to have friends, but not those friends. She thought with a wrenching despair of those nice boys at Paul’s old private school, and that special friend of his, Wright, with whom he’d gone skiing the winter before last. Skiing holidays were a thing of the past. So were the holidays which they spent each summer at the villa in Tuscany. Paul used to enjoy practising his Italian on the locals. He didn’t take Italian now; they didn’t do it at the comprehensive. She had a sudden vivid, flashing recollection of Paul and Sophie and Anna, suntanned, laughing, splashing about in the pool at the villa. Who splashed there each summer now? she wondered. She sighed again. She and Lucy Wright had been quite good friends, too. They had just been getting to know each other, playing the odd game of tennis at the club, in the months before Lloyd’s had taken its devastating toll.

She turned on the tap at the sink in the kitchen, watching the water creep up the sides of the metal basin as she squirted the Co-op economy washing-up liquid into it, and remembered herself. It was not so very long ago, just over a year, and yet it was like looking at a picture of a different woman. She saw herself playing tennis with Lucy Wright, confident, poised, her skin lightly tanned from idle hours on the sunbed, her body elastic and shapely from sessions in the private gym. They had lunched together afterwards on the club veranda, Alison with her white sweater flung carelessly over her shoulders, sitting at a little round table under a green canvas umbrella drinking white wine spritzers, eating avocado and Parma ham salads which had cost twice what she spent in two days on food for the whole family now. They had thought nothing of the cost, just handed over the gold credit cards, laughed in the sunshine. Alison picked up the plates and dipped them into the sudsy water. She supposed Lucy Wright still laughed in the sunshine. The sunshine of a full bank balance, of children happy at their private schools, of a husband who still brought in substantial sums of money to support their easy lifestyle, to buy the holidays in the Caribbean, the cases of wine, the focaccia bread, the tiramisu, the riding lessons, the tennis club subscriptions. Yes, Lucy could still laugh. Alison had seen her in the village last week, as immaculately dressed as ever, the way Alison had once dressed, those stylish, expensive clothes from the chic, overpriced boutiques that she never went into now. But Lucy had been wearing her sunglasses – she still belonged to that breed of women who wore their sunglasses on a winter’s day – and had not seen Alison. Or had seemed not to.

Brian Carstairs came into the kitchen and switched on the kettle. He said nothing. He rarely said anything these days, and when he did it was to do with Lloyd’s. Alison could not stand to hear the name any more. She could barely look at her husband when he started to talk about this action, the possibility
that they would win, that they would deal Lloyd’s a telling blow and maybe recover something. As though anything he did or said would change things back to the way they had been. But it seemed to give him a reason for existing. He was obsessed with the litigation. She glanced sideways as he took a teabag from the box, thinking how thin his hands looked. Thin and nervous, red and sore at the ends from where he picked the skin. She hated the sight of them. Shall I mention Paul to him? she wondered, and then felt a heavy lump of despair settle in her stomach. There was no point. He could do nothing, he didn’t even care. He had retreated. They had all retreated from one another, they had let this wretched little house, the loss of all their money and precious possessions divide them, wreck their happy little family. It need not be like this, Alison thought. Other families lived on less and were happy. But then, those families knew nothing else. She watched her husband make his tea and leave the kitchen without saying a word. Then she pulled the plug from the sink, watched the scummy water run away, and fetched a cloth to dry the dishes.

When Rachel got home, Jennifer was wiping down Oliver’s high chair. The two women smiled and murmured ‘Hello’ to one another, and Jennifer told Rachel that Oliver had fallen asleep straight after his bath. Not even the solace of a cuddle with my baby, thought Rachel, as she opened the fridge and stared at the contents, trying to think of something to make for supper for herself and Leo. She took out some chicken which had reached its sell-by date and tried to think what to do with it. Her brain felt dead, her soul shrivelled up by this afternoon’s humiliating confrontation with Rothwell and Parr. She looked up from the chicken and watched as Jennifer rinsed Oliver’s bowl and spoon and placed them in the dishwasher, then bundled up the clothes which he had worn during the day and put them into the washing machine. All her movements were brisk and efficient,
springy with youth. A nice job, being a nanny, thought Rachel. The kind of job which would make you feel competent, needed, not reduce you to a quivering mass of insecurity and anxiety. Maybe that was what she should do. Stay at home and look after Oliver. And what then? More insecurity, more anxiety – the kind that led to a nervous breakdown. She’d had one of those before. No thanks. She picked up the chicken and put it back into the fridge. If Leo wanted supper, he could make it himself. She wasn’t hungry.

‘Right,’ said Jennifer brightly. ‘I’ve left a bottle in the fridge for his ten o’clock feed. Oh, and I’ll need a couple of quid to pay for the playgroup tomorrow. The kitty’s run out.’

‘I’ll leave some money out, don’t worry,’ said Rachel.

‘Thanks. And is it all right if I take your car tonight? Only I was going to go out with some friends after I’ve been to the gym.’

Rachel nodded. ‘Keys are on the hall table. Have a nice time,’ she added. She stood perfectly still in the kitchen, listened to Jennifer going up to her room to get her gym kit, heard her feet coming back down, the gentle slamming of the front door, the sound of the car engine. The house was utterly silent. Rachel left the kitchen and went upstairs to Oliver’s room, which was on the landing opposite the bathroom. He had a night light, a sort of globe which revolved slowly and threw dim patterns of stars and crescents onto the wall of his room. The air smelt of Johnson’s powder. Rachel went over to his cot and looked down at him as he slept, his small chest rising and falling rhythmically, his lips parted. He was wearing a white sleepsuit with blue and green rabbits on it, and as she gazed at him Rachel traced in her mind all the steps which she had not taken, the bath which she had not run, the laughing and splashing she had not heard, the soft skin she had not washed and patted dry. Jennifer had put his sleepsuit on him, had blown into his blonde curls as she fastened the poppers, had felt his fat hands on her neck as she
lifted him up and put him into his cot. She had said ‘night night’ to him. Rachel’s hands slid down the bars of his cot as she knelt down on the floor, pressing her head against the white painted wood. She closed her eyes. She had no idea what she was to make of her life. What was she, after all? She was not Leo’s wife – that was a sham, a joke. Rothwell and Parr had made it clear that she was very much in the second division when it came to being a solicitor. What hope was there of advancement, of making progress in her job, when faced with men like that? And as for being a mother – she wasn’t that, either. She didn’t know what Oliver did during his day, she didn’t watch him play, she didn’t bath him or shop with him, or feed the ducks with him. She paid someone else to do that. Overcome by weariness and loneliness, she leant against Oliver’s cot and wept and wept, softly so as not to wake him, feeling as though her body and mind were being drained by unhappiness.

She did not hear the front door close downstairs, nor Leo’s feet on the stairs. He paused outside Oliver’s room and heard the faint sounds of Rachel’s sobs. Hesitating, he pushed the door slightly further open with the tip of one finger and stood there, the dim glow from Oliver’s night light silvering his hair. He saw Rachel crumpled up beside the cot, her dark head bent, saw her body shaking with crying. He watched her for a few seconds and wished he could find within himself the approximation of love which he had once felt for her, wished he could go and hold her, make it better. Then he turned away, retraced his steps and went back downstairs. Rachel heard his footsteps as he went into the kitchen and lifted her head, knowing immediately that he had been there, that he had seen her crying and had gone away. Downstairs Leo opened the fridge and stared at its contents for a moment, then took out the pieces of chicken and put them on the table.