Such Visitors (16 page)

She wanted to clear up fast, concentrate on the chicken Kiev for dinner, think about the proper discussion which must take place.

‘I hate the things,' said Oliver.

Catherine continued on her way to the dining-room. As she scraped chocolate cake from plates, she heard a succession of quick bangs. She counted. Ten. Perhaps Oliver was going through a mid-life crisis, she thought, gripping the table to stop herself shouting. That must be the explanation for his curious behaviour of the last twenty-four hours. The male menopause, of course. Must be dealt with gently. She'd read enough articles about it. Catherine picked up a forgotten cat mask, licked jam from its nose, and put it on. Then a purple paper crown. Male menopause being the explanation, the first
thing to do would be to make Oliver laugh. She'd always been able to do that, at least.

There was a final bang. Louder. The front door.

Masked, purple crown askew, Catherine carried the tea-tray to the front hall. The bunch of balloons was now a bunch of rubber ribbons hanging limply from their strings. Life, tension, air, gone from them. Unable to chase her any more. Next year, she would get one of those pumps to blow them up … no need for the chicken Kiev, now, was there?

Catherine moved automatically to the kitchen, set down the tray, vision impaired by the cat mask. Perhaps, though, she should still cook it. It was more than likely Oliver had just gone down the road for more cigarettes. Scraping the parsnips would give her time to think. Calmly, rationally. The party over – and, heavens, it had been a good party, Timothy had loved it – her mind uncluttered at last, she could work out whether this little
fracas
was serious, and Oliver meant all he had said last night. Or whether it was merely one of those moods of no importance that sometimes come to ruffle even the most companionable of marriages.

Frederick, who by now was quite inured to Lizzie's looks of hopeful anticipation, decided to take matters into his own hands and surprise her when she least expected it.

They were standing around in Lizzie's small sitting-room, drinking glasses of sherry in front of the spitting gas fire. Frederick did not like sherry, as Lizzie well knew. But she considered a choice of drinks, at this point in their affair, a luxury she could not afford. Cautious by nature, she could not bring herself to invest in so much as a bottle of whisky until she knew the chances of permanency were high. But a full tray of every drink a man could desire was the promise she held before Frederick: her frequent hints as to her future generosity, should things ‘change' between them, were not lost on her lover. He pondered upon them sometimes, when there was nothing else to occupy his mind, and wondered if, even accompanied by a galaxy of whiskys and gins, she was the girl for him.

This evening was to be as many other evenings: an argument about parking, a film, another argument about parking, dinner in a cheap Turkish restaurant, and a final argument about in whose flat they should spend the night.

The drinking of the abominable sherry was the lull before the friction, and Frederick took advantage of it to break the news.

‘I've been thinking,' he said, ‘of sending round my sideboard. How does the idea appeal?' With a vague wave of his free hand, he indicated the stretch of wall between gas fire and corner, only occupied by a nasty early sixties chair with spindle legs.

Lizzie, stunned by all the implications of the question, could not answer for some while. It was a funny way to approach
Matters, she thought, but then Freddie always had his own style of doing things. And if he cared to send his sideboard on ahead, before moving the rest of his effects and himself – that was fine with her.

‘You mean
here
– there?' she said at last, following his gaze.

‘There. Precisely.'

‘Would it fit, Freddie? Wouldn't it be too long?'

‘By my calculations, it would fit very nicely.'

‘And of course it would be useful. I mean, I – we – could put things on it, couldn't we?'

‘Quite,' said Frederick. ‘We could put things on it.'

To be honest, he wasn't at all sure that this characterless North Kensington sitting-room, devoid of sun at all times, was worthy of his handsome sideboard. But that was not the point. The sideboard's real function, as always, would be to act as a kind of inanimate outrider testing what might lie ahead. If it and Frederick, alike, seemed unhappy in their surroundings, then it and Frederick could leave together. The exit of one, it followed, made the exit of the other so much easier.

‘But wouldn't you miss it in
your
room, Freddie?' Lizzie was asking, feeble with consideration. ‘I mean, you're so used to it there.'

‘It's a sideboard that comes and goes, actually,' answered Frederick mysteriously. ‘Besides, I shan't miss it much if I'm here … ahem, a little more often, shall I?'

A little more often
being but a small step, surely, from
for ever.
Lizzie's joy overflowed.

‘Oh, Freddie,' she cried, already seeing in her mind's eye the new
tone
the sideboard would bring to her room – quite apart from the happy relief more of his own presence would bring to her. ‘Have it delivered next week. I can hardly believe it.'

‘Tomorrow,' said Frederick, thereby inadvertently winding her pleasure to further heights by his impatience. ‘It will be your responsibility to furnish it with spirits

‘Of course, of course, dear Freddie.' Quite faint with the prospect of so much good fortune, Lizzie dabbed her eyes with a grubby paper handkerchief pulled from a grubby sleeve, and finished her sherry with more of a swig than a sip.

The sideboard was delivered – a fine piece of Victorian
mahogany of elaborate design, with carved flanks and wide drawers that smiled across its highly polished façade. In the small room of utility furniture it stood like an ambassador surrounded by common folk of his kingdom – benign, and yet superior. The gleam of its wood outshone the reckless colour of Lizzie's carpet, its unquestionable solidity emphasised the inferiority of her mean chairs and table of simulated oak.

‘Doesn't look at all bad, there,' said Freddie, lying with conviction.

Some days after the arrival of the sideboard he turned up with a trunk of clothes.

‘No point in having empty drawers,' he explained, and set about filling them with piles of silk shirts, socks and underwear. Lizzie's delight, at such manifestation of his intentions, once again bubbled. Already she had invested in several bottles of drink (albeit
half-bottles).
Now, further to show her appreciation, she made no comment when Frederick parked in his usual arrogant fashion on a double yellow line. But despite these measures of compromise – improvements, he grudgingly supposed they were – once Frederick was installed almost permanently in Lizzie's flat (allowing himself just two nights a week at home) he could not deny that all was not well within him.

It was not that Lizzie failed to be appreciative. Of both him and his sideboard (which he had reason to believe she secretly polished every day when he was out) she expressed constant, wearying appreciation. But repetitive praise is no substitute for intellectual stimulation or even, from time to time, a small carnal thrill, if that is what a man is after. And Frederick could not help noticing – for all his attempts to ignore such matters -that since the arrival of the sideboard Lizzie's desire for fun had waned. Perhaps its presence personified to her a gesture of commitment which meant that in certain areas she could now relax: no longer did she nightly offer her demure body in its pink flannelette nightgown. Several times a week the deep sleep of a contented woman overtook her even before he had time to join her in the bed.

But it was just such defects, that could well develop into serious disadvantages should a state of marital relations be
negotiated, that the outrider sideboard was employed to detect.

‘It's time to move on,' thought Frederick to himself one evening, patting his piece of furniture, not long after the dramatic installation. ‘I believe neither of us would be happy in any surroundings designed by Lizzie, ever. But it was only fair to try.'

It occurred to him, as he sat waiting for Lizzie to finish preparing for their evening's adventure at the Odeon, that with the increasing costs of removal men these days his method of future life-testing was a little extravagant. But then Frederick had always prided himself on his skills in matters of diplomacy, and a system that was to work well would naturally be expensive. Comfort lay in the fact that plainly his system
did
work, for he and his sideboard had left with their reputations unharmed many times. Each exit had brought its disappointments, but had failed to impair Frederick's hopes that one day the perfect placing of sideboard and self would be found.

Fired, as always, to act quickly once a decision had come upon him, Frederick braved Lizzie's bewilderment and announced he was no longer tempted by an evening at the Odeon. To temper this blow he hurried out and bought a half-bottle of champagne – no point in making the girl feel uncomfortable with a whole bottle. This he opened with the elaborate flourishes of a man struggling with a jereboam, and filled two miniature sherry glasses before breaking the news.

‘Well, Lizzie, I've been thinking. It was a mistake bringing the sideboard here, don't you think? A bit out of place what? I had my doubts all along, you know …'

With incredulous eyes Lizzie gazed at him, never for one moment guessing that his feelings about his sideboard were precisely akin to his feelings about herself.

‘Perhaps you're right,' she said, not wishing to argue with a man who brought her champagne – besides which she was a girl of obligingly malleable opinions.

‘And so I think I shall take it back.'

‘Oh, Freddie. Well, of course. Though I shall miss it.'

‘One doesn't miss
furniture,'
he said, so scathing of such a
sentiment that Lizzie dared reveal nothing further of the dismay in her heart.

The process was reversed. First the shirts left in the trunk, then the empty sideboard. After that Frederick allowed Lizzie a few days of his company during which time he was forced to comment on the lack of furniture in her room, and Lizzie was bound to agree. They reverted to their old pattern of arguing about parking near the cinema. Other things, however, were not as before. Perhaps under the illusion that it was only his sideboard that had left her, Lizzie saw no reason to tempt Frederick further with the nightly contortions that had previously caused her so much effort.

Then one day Frederick said, ‘Think I shall have to be off, Lizzie. Be at home more. A man can't be parted from his things, really, can he?'

He left Lizzie for good that very evening. All that remained in his memory was a tray of half-drunk half-bottles, now top-heavily placed on Lizzie's inadequate little table. She mourned him for a while in her own quiet way, but, being of a reasonable disposition, after several nights of uninterrupted sleep, she was able to see her departed lover's point of view. Indeed, she was grateful to him: for a man to leave on his own would mean rejection that might be unbearable. But a man who left to accompany his sideboard showed loyalty, perception, and a rare sense of priority – qualities a girl could only admire.