Brixton Beach (41 page)

‘I’m tired,’ she told Alice peevishly. ‘I don’t want anything to eat.’

‘But I’m just serving the rice, Amma,’ Alice protested.

‘No, no, Bee, I don’t want anything to eat. Good-night.’

And she disappeared into her room.

‘She called you “Bee”,’ Ravi said, not taking his eyes off the television.

‘Yes, I know. She hasn’t done that before.’

Alice found her later when she went in to check on her before going to bed. Sita’s eyes were closed. She was cold. Colder than she had been since the day, twenty years before, when she had left the tropics.

O
NE EVENING TOWARDS THE END OF
May 2004, at the moment between twilight and darkness, a man approaching late middle-age stood gazing out of the window of a first-floor flat in Kennington Park Road. The man was Dr Simon Swann, senior vascular consultant at St Thomas’s Hospital. Almost forty-five years old, he was the holder of what could be called a liberal, carefully compartmentalised life. In his quiet, focused way he had achieved most of those things a man of his age could want, with his teenage daughter Cressida and his wife Tessa of twenty years. It was a considerable achievement, given that this was post 9/11 with its rolling rogue wave of terror. It seemed only yesterday that Simon and Tessa had marched up to London, carrying one of Cressida’s WAR IS NOT THE ANSWER placards. It had been a rare moment of unity between the Swanns, who had seen eye to eye with a feeling akin to passion for the whole of that hot summer’s day. It hadn’t worked, of course. Neither the eye-to-eye business as a family nor, as it turned out, the nation’s desire to stop the war. Given the undermining clashes they suffered as a family, how could he be surprised by the subsequent decision of the government to invade Iraq? Simon merely lost a little more hope. For a while he saw the years ahead rattle like dead leaves. But then time had gently blunted his dismay, turned it into the more acceptable philosophical approach, shifted his melancholy a little. So that now, a year later, the whole sorry
mess was something one read about in the newspapers and occasionally shook one’s head over. For after all, what could anyone do? Realistically speaking, life had to go on. So in order to ensure this dreary fact, Simon continued to do the bit he had always done, and was good at: saving what life was put in his hands without discriminating between race or class or creed. Patients, those in the know, always asked for him.

The Swanns still had two houses. One an angular and efficient flat in town, close to the hospital where Simon worked, and another, softer, more faded house in the country, where the china was Eric Ravilious and there were Nicholsons on the walls and some wonderful Bloomsburyish and delightfully English curtains. Outside this house there were sheep, the cliffs and the sea. The beautiful Sussex coastline. Now, as he stood in the London flat listening to his favourite opera broadcast live over the radio, Simon Swann felt the approaching summer flex its green fingers, reaching upwards towards him through the open window. It was still light outside, the pure full light before twilight. He could see the park reflected in the windows. The air was pleasantly warm and the sky was stained pink with the remains of an unusually beautiful day. Tomorrow will be fine, he thought, watching the evening star rise above him. Below him, the traffic was flowing easily at last in the busy London street. The rush hour was almost over as the music he listened to began reaching its climax. As he listened, in a silent space inside him, muffled by his external life, he felt another self, marking time. Overhead the twinkling lights of a plane coming into land at Heathrow was followed almost immediately by two more planes hovering into view. The voices on the radio rose and fell, supported by a sweep of violins as he stared with blank eyes at the activities outside. However many times he listened to this final act of
Tosca
it never failed to move and remind him of another time, a lifetime ago now, when he had first heard it. So many years later it still sounded fabulous.

A tissue of memories floated along with the final moments of the opera, carrying him with it. He had been a young man then, sitting in the darkness of the Royal Opera House. The world had become a
different place since that evening, changed beyond recognition—9/11 had altered everything. The country he lived in was no longer what it once was. Terror had returned to Britain and it was here to stay, leaving the inhabitants of this small island xenophobic and fearful. Once we had an Empire, he often thought, wryly; now we just have the suspicions left by the Empire! Simon hardly ever played this recording, knowing he would remain possessed by low-level depression for hours afterwards. It was a foolish thing, this conjuring up of a fragmentary time from his youth for which there was no room in his life now. He had been at medical school, going to the opera as often as he could afford to, hiding from everyone else the passion that had no place in his mundane, hard-working, existence. The girl had been sitting in front of him, close enough for him to see her profile, close enough for him to see she was alone. When the lights went on at the end he saw she was wearing a red dress. Her hair was very long and black. Something made her turn her head and their eyes met. He was close enough to see the dark downward sweep of her lashes and the perfection of her teeth as she smiled before he stood up to let someone pass. When he looked back at her seat, she was gone. On an impulse, brought on no doubt by the music, he left the auditorium but could not find her anywhere outside. She was lost amongst the crowds. He had bought a book of cheap tickets for the season but, by the time he saw her again, he had given up looking for her. It was a different opera this time: Mozart. As soon as the first act ended he saw her stand up and, making up his mind he hurried out, determined to accost her. But once again she disappeared. It was the same in the next interval. Then at last when the performance ended he followed her out of the building until, as they were both hurrying towards the tube station, he managed to talk to her. It was nothing really, he would tell himself later, nothing worth making a fuss about. They had gone into a pub for a drink, she had looked anxiously at her watch, not wanting to miss the last train, and they had talked. She was training to be a schoolteacher, she sang a little, there was no one special in her life at the moment, she told him. They had talked without stopping for over two hours. She missed the last train and he had found her a black cab. She gave him
her phone number, scribbling it on a scrap of paper (why had he not given her his?) and he had promised to call her the next day. But carelessly, as he made his way home he had lost it. Perhaps it had fallen out of his pocket when he took his ticket out. Simon had gone back to Covent Garden, even though it meant he missed his last train and had to walk back to his lodgings. But although he had scoured the pavement he never found that piece of paper.

In the days that followed, he had looked everywhere in the street, going back again and again to the opera, queuing outside for returns. Paying far more than he could afford. Then, when he still did not see her, he had taken to waiting for the crowds to come out at the end of some of the performances, but to no avail. Cursing himself for his stupidity, he was unable to stay away from Covent Garden. Finding the girl had become a kind of obsession and for a time it was impossible to concentrate on anything else. His work began to suffer. A few months on, he met Tessa at a party. She had been surrounded by a group of people, mostly men. One man in particular appeared utterly infatuated with her, causing Tessa much amusement. Simon had noticed her derisive laughter and had been appalled. Unwisely, when she had come over to speak to him, he told her so. They had had a terrific row that had somehow ended with her going back to his place. She was not his type, their interests were very different, but a few weeks later he caught chickenpox and Tessa arrived to nurse him. One thing led to another. Too late, he saw what he had done. Fleetingly he thought of the dark-haired girl at the opera. But Tessa with her blonde hair and icy blue eyes had become his reality. Soon all their friends began to see them as a couple. Their mutual, hidden loneliness formed a cocoon around them both. It had been enough. He proposed marriage and she accepted without hesitation. Twenty years later here they were, with the life they had built together. Solid as a monument.

The music was over. Sensing someone had come into the room behind him from a waft of perfume, Simon turned. He picked up the invitation on the mantelpiece.

Drinks at six
, he read.
Followed by dinner. And please bring Tessa if she’s free! I haven’t seen you two together for ages
.

So that was what he was doing. And they were late because of the music. It was his fault, he knew. Even before Tessa pointed it out to him.

‘I’m on call,’ he warned her as they left. ‘I might have to leave early. You’ll have to get a cab.’

She nodded slightly.

‘You never know, it might be interesting,’ he said, knowing Tessa did not want to go but wanting to break the slightly frosty silence.

He knew she was annoyed and trying not to be. She hated it when he listened to opera, particularly this one, aware it did strange things to him. The opera was one of many bones of contention between them, he thought heavily, manoeuvring his way through the traffic. Another was that he played his music too loud. She didn’t understand you needed to hear everything as though it were a live performance. She just thought he was going deaf. The evening light was beautiful. The mild depression had settled over him, just as he had known it would. The music threaded through his thoughts, regardless, conducting a conversation of its own. He had never told Tessa about his foolish non-encounter at Covent Garden.

‘Meeting his new woman, I mean,’ he continued regardless, glancing at her sideways.

‘Nothing could be worse than his last,’ Tessa said shortly. ‘She was truly dreadful.’

And she shuddered delicately, making him smile inwardly, in spite of the fact he’d rather liked the last one. He stopped the car and they got out in silence.

‘Well, here we are, Ralph!’ he said too heartily as the host opened the door.

And then they went in.

‘Just orange juice for me,’ he said. ‘I’m on call tonight.’

He watched as a beautiful nineteenth-century glass was filled with wine for Tessa. Tessa was looking around discreetly for the new woman.

‘I’m Simon Swann,’ he said to the man standing near him.

He turned to introduce Tessa but she had been whisked away by Ralph. There were hungry, admiring lions waiting, he guessed, pleased for her.

‘On the wagon, then?’ asked the man next to him.

‘Pardon?’

‘Not drinking?’

‘Oh, I see. No, no, I’m on call at the hospital tonight, that’s all’

‘Really? Can’t have an inebriated doctor, I suppose!’

‘No, exactly.’

‘What d’you do? Stitch up drunks?’

‘Bit of everything really. Emergency surgery, on nights like these,’ he said, sipping his orange juice and surveying the room.

There were a lot of people tonight, mostly here out of nosiness, he suspected. It would certainly not be for the food, Tessa had remarked earlier, for the host was well known for his uncertain culinary talent. The man next to him was looking a bit green. Liverish, thought Simon, out of habit.

‘So they know, when they see you, what’s coming, eh?’

Simon smiled gently, not minding, knowing how people were about the subject: squeamish, not wanting to see what might be around the corner of their own lives. So he smiled.

‘They’re not usually conscious,’ he said mildly.

Excusing himself, he went in search of Tessa. Snatches of music filled his head like ghosts. He could see her talking to the host’s new woman with a look of intense curiosity. He hoped she was not disappointed.

The empty glasses were cleared away by the new woman in a proprietorial way. They went into dinner, and Ralph, himself a medic, served up the veal.

‘Vitello Brasato all’ Uve!’
he announced, holding it high above the table, raising their hopes and expectations, toying with their appetite only to dash it hopelessly, so that several guests would stop at the fish-and-chip shop on the way home, and snuffle down a double cone of chips, all salt and grease and warmth straight from the fryer, before they would at last feel sated. But that was later. For the moment he simply brought in this dish, conjuring up in their minds the beautiful early summer full of expectancy and colour and surprise, the grapes plump and softened in the wine, the warm tartness of the fruit against
the sweetness of the veal making a fine marriage. The guests waited with the fine claret in its cut-glass glinting ruby-red, and the candles in the polished holders glowed in the lit room, a token reference to bygone ages. The host placed his dish, rather as a conjurer would, on the mat on the high-gloss mahogany table to the soft sounds of appreciation around him. The women all wore black.

Tessa Swann glanced at her plate, her eyes glinting sharply. She’s in good form, thought Ralph, with the sharp eye of the psychiatrist. It did not stop him noting shrewdly that she had begun to wear the shadow of disappointment sometimes seen on the faces of once attractive women. She was not ageing well, he mused, chewing on his veal, frowning slightly with the effort. It wasn’t obvious to the casual observer yet, but Ralph wondered how conscious she was of the fact. Tessa Swann had always relied on her good looks, he decided, warming to his ruminations. But they had let her down now! Ralph imagined her forging ahead each morning with her brushes and her cover-up creams, unable to believe in her body’s betrayal. She had such an air of holding on. With a small frisson of excitement he began to think of her naked and in bed with him. Tessa smiled, aware of some approval on his part. Satisfied that his new woman wasn’t up to much, she relaxed. Triumph made her sharply defined, like a newly sandblasted statue. The host grinned. He felt a stirring in his elderly groin, a rising of what might pass for sap. He breathed in spring, when for him it was really autumn. It was a pity, but the new acquisition would have to go, thought Tessa, leaving the field clear for their continued, gentle flirtation conducted over many years and wholly undetected by Simon himself.

At the other end of the table Simon Swann was only half listening to a convoluted story told by the new woman. He had forgotten her name and was waiting for a pause in which to ask her it again. She was a long woman, he saw, with a torso that took up most of her frame, giving the appearance of a body stocking accidentally stretched in the wash. And, he observed mildly, she had a hypnotic manner. She was American and every subject that she raised—motherhood and adoption (she had tried neither, she told him), psychoanalysis and the
nature of the soul or literacy in Bradford—
every
subject discussed was washed with the all-consuming twanginess of her voice. How did she do it? marvelled Simon. She had a lot to say, mesmerising them all, so that even the veal became unimportant in the face of so much energy. When she began to talk about the war in Iraq, Simon felt his eyelids become heavier. He stifled a yawn; he had been working late just recently. The American’s voice seemed to be running down, like vinyl being played at the wrong speed. Or perhaps she had simply lost interest in him, for she was now addressing her remarks to the man on her right. The veal was inedible, a discovery that spread slowly around the oval table, but even this did not bother Simon too much as with professional instinct and courteous manners he pushed the congealed cream, like regurgitated sick, around his plate. And then, just at that moment, the woman to the left of him spoke.