Darkness Visible (17 page)

He shouted.

“How’s your father?”

“My father?”

As she said that, the beat stopped—stopped more suddenly than Gerry was able to—so that his reply was shouted into the silence.

“The bloke you were with the other night—the elderly gentleman in the lounge suit!”

When he heard himself he clapped both hands over his ears but took them away at once.

“Oh my God! But what’s a girl like you, etc.? There—they’re off as the monkey said. We fit like the hand and the glove.”

“Mm?”

“Consummate.”

“Well of course.”

“Promise?”

“Necessary?”

“Still. Bird in the hand, you know. No? Not tonight Josephine?”

“It’s not that. Only—”

Some sort of necessary preparation. Wash Roland off me. Wash them all off me.

“Only?”

“Not tonight. But I promise. Faithfully. Cross my heart. There.”

So they sat and he gave her his address and they sat and at last Gerry said he was falling asleep and they parted for the time; and only when they had parted did she remember they had no special date for meeting. A black man followed her back to the house so she rang the bell since the door was not only locked but bolted. After the briefest of pauses Mrs Garrett unlocked and unbolted and let her in; and glanced across at the black man loitering on the other pavement. After that she followed Sophy up to her room and stood in the doorway, not leaning against the doorpost but upright this time.

“You’re learning, aren’t you?”

Sophy said nothing but looked back good-humouredly at the eyes gleaming so liquidly in their charred cups. Mrs Garrett licked her thin lips.

“It’s one thing with Roland. Boys will be boys. Men, I mean. And then, he’ll settle down. I know things are different nowadays—”

“I’m tired. Goodnight.”

“You could do worse, you know. Much worse. Settle down. I wouldn’t say anything about him.”

“Him?”

“The nig.”

Sophy burst out laughing.

“Him! But after all—why not?”

“Why not indeed! I’ve never heard—”

“And then—I
do
like to be able to see what I’m doing.”

“You like to
see
!”

“Just a joke. Look. I’m tired. Really.”

“Have you and Roland had a tiff?”

“He went to the hospital.”

“He never! Why? On a Sunday? Was he—”

Sophy scrabbled in her shoulder bag. She found the little knife and took it out. She began to laugh but thought better of it.

“He got cut. With my fruit-knife. Look. So he went to get a what d’you call it. Anti-tet.”

“Cut?”

“He thought it might be dirty.”

“He always was—but what was he doing with a thing like that?”

The words
peeling
fruit
of
course
formed in Sophy’s mind and rose to her lips. But looking at those liquidly glistening eyes she understood suddenly how easy it was to deny them anything—any entry. They could not look in. All this Sophy in here was secure. Those eyes in Ma Garrett’s face were no more than reflectors. All they saw was what light gave them. You could stand, allowing your own eyes to receive and bounce back the light; and the two people behind, each floating invisibly behind her reflectors need not meet, need give nothing. Need say nothing. All simple.

But then, still looking, she saw more. In immediate contradiction, whether it was from knowledge of the world up to that moment, whether it was to be read in the subtlest changes in the woman’s stance or in her breathing or in the arrangement of her face, Sophy saw more than those twin reflectors intended. She saw the words approach Ma Garrett’s lips,
You’d
better
leave,
and hang there, inhibited by other thoughts, other words,
What
would
Roland
say,
she
might
just
do,
and
if
he’s
hooked
on
her
—

Sophy waited, remembering simplicity. Do nothing. Wait.

Ma Garrett did not precisely slam the door, but closed it with such an elaborate absence of noise it was just as good an indication of anger. After a moment or two, listening to quick steps on the stairs, Sophy let her breath out. She went to the window and there was the nig still standing on the other pavement and looking across inscrutably at the house; but as she watched, he glanced to one side then ran away round the corner. A police car cruised down the street. Sophy stood for a while, then undressed slowly and remembered the fullness, the clearing out of want and urgency like the fall of a great arch; and it was easier to give the credit for it not to Roland at all but to nameless masculinity. Or if it must have a name, give it Gerry’s name, Gerry’s face. There was tomorrow.

All that day it seemed to Sophy that nothing could be sillier than having to tell people what it would cost them to fly to Bangkok or how to get to Margate from Aberdeen; or how to get from London to Zürich with a stop-off somewhere, or how to take a car to Austria—not only silly as could be but more and more boring as the day dribbled away. When the job was done she hurried back to the house and watched the clock till it was just possible the disco would be open and away she went. Every now and then she ran a few steps, as if afraid she would be too late rather than too early. But Gerry wasn’t there. And Gerry wasn’t there. And Gerry still wasn’t there. At last she danced a bit and fended off mechanically with a smile like on a statue. She saw it was all intolerable, all quite, quite impossible too; and short of being weird—how the old thoughts could come back!—if a man won’t be where you want him, there is only one thing to do.

Next morning, instead of going to work she went straight to the address that Gerry had given her. He woke, late and frowsty, to hear her at the door. He fumbled to let her in with eyes half-shut. She edged in sideways with her load of belongings in shopping bags. She had an apology for her own untidiness on the tip of her tongue but abandoned it when she saw the room and smelt it.

“Phew!”

Despite himself he was ashamed.

“Sorry about the mess. I haven’t shaved either.”

“Don’t shave.”

“You want me without or with?”

It was a hangover. With a kind of automatic libidinosity he reached out at her but she swung a carrier bag in the way.

“Not now, Gerry. I’ve come to stay.”

“Christ. I must go to the loo. And shave. Oh hell. Make some coffee will you?”

She got busy in the dirty corner where the sink was. It could be considered a flat if you shut one eye and—she thought this as she cleared a space for the kettle—if you could shut your nose. They said men were less sensitive to smells anyway.

Gerry himself cleaned up astonishingly well. When he was dressed as well as shaved, she sat on the chair and he sat on the unmade bed and they looked at each other over the mugs of coffee. He was satisfactorily taller than she was but on the slight side and loosely put together, with a head and face that in daylight was—well, pretty was wrong and handsome wouldn’t do either, so why bother? Rhythm—and as if he saw the word in her head, having looked in right past the reflectors—he began a sort of toneless whistling, the sketch of a tune and one finger beat on the side of his coffee mug—rhythm was everything to him, which was why—

“Gerry, I’m out of work.”

“Sacked?”

“Left. Too boring.”

The sketched tune stopped, to be replaced by a whistle of surprise that did achieve some tone. Overhead, a brief argument flared and there were a couple of thumps then comparative silence.

“Desirable neighbourhood. Hang on a moment.”

Gerry put down his coffee, pulled out a cassette player and switched it on. The air swingled. Relieved, he took up the rhythm, nodding his head, eyes closed for the time being, ripe lips pursed; lips that would—that would avoid the four-letter word which she never used herself so that this could not be pair-bonding as with ducks, was it?

“What bird were you with, then.”

“No bird, dear thing. Chap I know.”

His eyes flicked open, large, dark, and he smiled at her round them. What girl could pass up that smile, those eyes, that dark hair with its forward flop—?

“Yeah?”

“Fairly thick night.”

“Is that all?”

“Word of an officer and gentleman.”

“So
that
’s—”

“That’s. Care to see my commission? Once you have it, you have it even when you’ve declined a posting. Second lieutenant. Imagine being shot at in Ulster. Paff!”

“Have you been shot at? Really?”

“Well. I would’ve been if I’d stayed in.”

“I wish I’d seen you in uniform.”

He pulled her to the bed and hugged her. She hugged him back and kissed him. His gestures became more intimate.

“Not now, Gerry. It’s too early. I wouldn’t be fit for anything later.”

“There’s nothing to do later. Not till they open.”

All the same he took his hands off her.

“Look, dear thing. You’ll have to sign on for social security. But I was looking to you for the occasional hand-out.”

She doted down at him in recognition of what they shared right from those first few seconds; the complete acceptance of what each was; or what each thought the other was.

“We’d better not let on we’re living together.”

“Oh. So we’re living together are we?”

“Sheer gain, mathematically.”

“And you could always earn a bit on the side.”

“Mm?”

“Red lamp in the window.”

“Too much like work. I’ve—well. What about you?”

“Dodgy market. Know any rich old ladies?”

“No.”

“Used to be loads of them. We were talking about it last night. Nowadays they’re all poor old ladies. Unfair to junior officers. No, dear thing. It’s social security or paff paff.”

“Paff?”

“Mercenary. Make you at least a captain if you can produce evidence of being an O and G in herself’s forces. Loads of lolly.”

“That’s all very well for you—”

“Oh is it my God? Not so hot if you get wounded or captured. Time was, you used not to get wounded or captured. Nigs had a decent sense of who was who. Now you get shot like those poor bastards. Then again, I’ve got prospects, sort of—no. I’m not telling you, sweet thing, chubby prattler.”

She took him by the arms and shook him.

“No secrets!” 

“You trying to get rid of me? You need my social security as much as I need yours.”

She collapsed, giggling on his chest. The words popped out. “Thank God I don’t have to pretend any more!”

For a day or two, what with the Employment Exchange and trying to make Gerry’s flat habitable for two people, she had some time away from him and spent it thinking about him. No indeed, they did not, must not use that four-letter word, the many-splendoured, but all the same, when you are young and have told yourself what nonsense so much is, you cannot help an occasional glance at the current situation and say to yourself—is this it? You examine the curious fact that this twin, this discovered twin, could outrage and yet not annoy. There were those moments when a funny struck them both and they fell towards each other, hugging and giggling and not needing to say anything—also those moments when a smile round those big eyes, or fall of a lock of hair on his forehead could be a sweetness in the stomach—oh, he was sweet!

And there standing at the pigeon-hole, with the faceless servant of the unemployed public behind it, her soul said aloud, “You are sweet!” only to come plummeting down as the face flashed into an amazed smile then blushed scarlet. Moreover, she thought, as she handed in the completed form, moreover I know he doesn’t work because he can’t work, it’s not in him. How can a child work? Now he has all of me and my body, he is waiting without knowing it for the box of bricks or the train set—

The fourth night, Gerry told her about his friend Bill.

“Quaint character. He was shot at as it happens. They got his C.O. so he opened up and knocked off half a dozen of them.”

“He really shot people?”

“So they slung him out! Imagine! What in hell do they think soldiers are for?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“He said it was tops. Smasheroo. Stands to reason, doesn’t it? All those millions—wouldn’t be done if it wasn’t natural to do it. For God’s sake. Christ. I mean!”

“Oh you—yes, yes!”

“Bloody silly the whole thing.”

“This friend of yours, Bill—”

“He’s a bit thick mind you. But then you don’t want privates to go thinking, do you? Perfect other rank, I’d have said. End up in a red coat at Chelsea. And then they go and chuck him out!”

“But
why
?”

“Didn’t I tell you? He enjoyed it you see. He likes killing. The natural man. So they told him he didn’t ought not to have done it, as he put it. Said he supposed they thought he should have had tears in his fucking eyes. Pardon his French.”

“He sounds like Uncle Jim. Was he an Aussie?”

“British to the backbone.”

“Fun to meet him.”

“Well you will. He’s not a handsome chap like me, my sweet, but remember whose doggie you are.”

“I bite.”

So she did.

They met Bill in a pub. He had some money, only just enough for the three of them and he was vague about the source. He was much older than Gerry but treated him with awful respect and even called him “sir” once or twice, which made Sophy smile. He was physically rather like Gerry, but with less forehead and more jaw.

“Gerry’s told me about you.”

Bill sat very still. Gerry broke in.

“Nothing you’d mind old sport. That’s all over—”

“Of course he doesn’t mind, do you Bill?”

“She really all right sir, Gerry?”

“What’s it like, Bill?”

“What’s what like Miss, Sophy?”

“Killing people.”

There was a long silence. Gerry gave a sudden shudder then took a long drink without stopping. Bill surveyed her, stonily.

“They give us ammo.”

“Bullets, you’d call them, dear thing. Live rounds.”

“I mean—was it sort of led up to? Was everything arranged, so that when you did it, it was like finding a stone ready for throwing—kind of?”

“We was briefed.”

Now it was her turn to be silent for a while. What do I want to know? I want to know about pebbles and the hissing in the
transistor and the running down, running down, endless running down!

“I’m sick of all the things they say. Pretending life is what it isn’t. I want—I want to know!”

“Nothing to know, dear thing. What is. Bed and board.”

“That’s right sir, Gerry. You got to look at the facts.”

“And what happens?”

“Bill. I think she means when you knock one off.”

Then there was more silence. Staring at him, Sophy saw a faint smile come in Bill’s face. The direction of his gaze altered. Slid over her body, came back till he glanced at her eyes again. Then he looked away. She knew, with a tiny prickle of the flesh, what was happening. She said the words inside her head.
He
fancies
me!
Oh how much he fancies me!

Bill was looking at Gerry.

“Tarts is all the same.”

He looked back at her with the faint smile of his awareness round the mouth.

“You squeeze, see? Pip! He falls down.”

“All fall down, dear thing. Nothing to it. Ringa ring.”

“Does it hurt? Does it take long? Is there any—is there much—”

The smile widened into one of more accurate comprehension.

“Not if it’s a neat shot, see? One wriggled. I give him another. Finee.”

“It’s a highly technical matter, Sophy dear. Don’t trouble your pretty head. Leave it to us splendid male beasts. Yours not to reason why.”

Bill was nodding and grinning into her face as if they understood each other. Oh how he fancies me; and no you don’t, she said to herself, not with a bargepole as they say, you dumb animal!

She looked away.

It soon became evident that the two men had not met merely to drink. After a certain amount of allusive talk, they stopped, with Bill looking at her again. Gerry patted her shoulder.

“Honeybunch. Wouldn’t we care to go and powder the little nose?”

“Powder your own, dear thing!”

“Haw,” said Bill with his best imitation of a debby voice. “Powdah your own. Sorry, miss. Sophy, I mean.”

But she went, for all that, because it didn’t much matter and she smelt a secret to be worked out later.

The next day Gerry said he had a date and he was very excited and shivering a bit. That was when she found out that he was on pills, tiny black things that could be hidden under a thumbnail or lost in a crack between two boards. He came back very late at night. He was white and exhausted and she made a joke of it, saying it must have been some bird,
some
bird he’d been with. But she knew what it was all about when he slipped a gun, real or model, back in the drawer. She had sex with him and ended in their single bed with his head on her naked breast. All the same, he was Gerry again next day and produced a wad of notes he said he’d won at the dogs, having forgotten, apparently, that she had seen the gun. So it all came out. He and Bill did a job now and then. They had a high old time for a day or two. Once they met Bill and his current girlfriend. She was a card, Daisy, a punk, six-inch heels, cheap trouser-suit, dead white face, dead black eye make-up, straw hair like a rick, plastered down on one side and sticking straight up on the other. It seemed to Sophy that one meeting was enough, but it turned out she had something to do with Gerry’s black pills.

Gerry took her to another party with no Daisy and no Bill, but some very odd types. It was a party in a real flat with several rooms. There was much music and chat and drink and they went just the two of them, as Gerry said Bill’s face wouldn’t fit. He meant her to be debby and straight because of the man he was contacting, but things went wrong in a very odd way. Somehow as the noise increased into a party roar some of the people began playing a silly game with a piece of paper with a blotch of ink on it. You had to say how many things it was like and some of the answers were wonderfully dirty and witty. But when Sophy had her turn she looked at the black shape in the middle of the paper and nothing happened at all. Then without any kind of intermission she found she was lying on the sofa and staring at the ceiling and there was no party roar and people were standing round and looking down at her. She got up on one elbow and saw the woman who was giving the party standing by the open door of the flat and talking to someone who was outside it.

“Nothing my dear Lois, nothing at all.”

“But that dreadful screaming and screaming!”

Gerry took her away, explaining that she had fainted from heat, and it was a day or two before she worked the whole thing out and knew why her throat was sore. But that night, after they had left the party, Gerry said they needed some calm. So the next evening they sat, drinking quietly in a pub, and watching the telly that was fastened high up in one corner. Indeed, Sophy, puzzling over the darkness inside her, began to find it a bit too quiet and suggested they should move on. But Gerry said to hang on. He was watching the box intently and smiling.