The Wine-Dark Sea (19 page)

She stopped in the street for a moment. A more precise thought had struck her. Her cut finger was completely healed. Somehow she had even parted with the unpleasant bandage. She smiled, and continued homewards.

The boys stormed back, wolfed their food without a word to Millie, and stormed out again.

Millie washed up after the three of them; circulated round The Parade and The Avenue, shopping, meditating; put
together
two totally different evening meals; and then went upstairs to
lie on her bed, in order to prepare for another confrontation with Phineas. She must keep up the pressure or go mad, as Thelma Modelle had predicted.

Indeed, when Millie fell asleep, she found she was
dreaming
of Thelma’s establishment, where she, Millie, now appeared to have a job of some kind, as she was seated at the toilet table in what had been the rheumatism lady’s bathroom, and sorting through hundreds, perhaps
thousands
, of invoices in the desperate hope of finding her own. The invoices were on paper of different sizes and textures, and in many different handwritings, mostly illegible. Millie was amazed by the mental processes that must lie behind the ways in which many of the bills were laid out. Only those which had been drafted by Uncle Stephen were fully orderly. When Millie awoke, it occurred to her to wonder whether Thelma herself could write at all, or whether she relied mainly on bluff, as did Rodney and Angus though no one ever dared to mention it.

There was the noise of creeping about downstairs. Then Phineas’s voice floated up the stairwell: ‘Millie!’ She
shrivelled
. ‘Millie, where are you?’

It was far, far too early for his return. Could he have lost his job? That might be yet another burden which was not a burden entirely, but very faintly a forerunner.

Millie threw off the eiderdown, pulled on a jacket, and sauntered downstairs.

Phineas was positively prancing from room to room. It was impossible that he could have been promoted, because, in his position, there was no real promotion. His step seemed light and gay, as with the man in the ballad.

‘I’ve been adopted!’ cried Phineas, unable to contain
himself
until she had reached the ground floor, terra firma.

‘Whatever for?’

‘As Liberal candidate, of course. At North Zero.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘It’s in Cornwall and Andrew MacAndrew says I should have every chance.’

She had been perfectly well aware that Phineas was
frequenting
the local Liberal Association and bringing their
literature
home. It was one of various activities of his that resulted in her being so often alone with the boys.

‘Does the Party find the money for your deposit, or do you have to do it?’

‘I haven’t the slightest idea. I haven’t thought about it.’

‘Perhaps the boys can go down and canvass for you?’

‘They’re too young, as you can perfectly well imagine for yourself. I’m afraid I shall have to sacrifice much of my family life, and leave the boys more in the hands of their mother. I notice that you haven’t congratulated me, Millie.’

‘If it’s what you want, I’m pleased for you, Phineas. Provided, that is, that you find a new school for the boys before you set out.’

‘I haven’t been able to think much about that, as you can imagine. I feel it is something their mother can perfectly well do for them, if the necessity should arise.’

‘I can and shall do nothing of the kind, Phineas. Finding a school for boys like that is the father’s job. I mean it, Phineas.’

She was almost glowing with resolution. She realised that to display moral qualities demands practice, just as much as intellectual and manual qualities. She had never really attended when, down the years, such truths had been
hammered
into her. But she also knew that much of her relied upon the boys being out of the house.

‘I had hoped you might be pleased for me,’ said Phineas, entering the sitting room, and draping himself. ‘Could I have my lactose, please?’

‘It’s too early. It’s only just past teatime.’ Phineas eschewed tea, because of the tannin, which affected both his colon and his autonomic structure.

‘I’m going to get myself a cup of tea,’ said Millie. ‘And then I want to go on talking seriously.’

In her heart, she was not in the least surprised to find, when she returned, that Phineas had taken himself off.
Perhaps
he had gone out to look for the boys. He liked to delude himself that he could ‘join in’ their play, though Millie knew better, knew that he was accepted on the very thinnest of sufferance, for short periods only, and only for ulterior reasons. In the boys’ eyes, there was very little to choose between Phineas’s status and hers. She knew that, even if he did not.

Millie took her little tray upstairs, locked the bedroom door, took off her jacket once more, and wriggled beneath the eiderdown. She had brought up the Family Size packet of Playmate biscuits, really meant for the boys.

But, contrary to expectation, Phineas drifted back in no time. Elation at the thought of the new and more fulfilling life that lay before him had probably made him restless. Soon, he was tapping at their bedroom door.

‘Let me in, please.’

‘I’m having a rest. I’ll come out when it’s time for your supper.’

‘Where are the boys?’

‘In the wood with the dogs, as far as I know.’

‘It might be better if they were encouraged to stay more in their own home.’

‘That’s their father’s job.’

‘Millie, what are you doing in there?’

‘I’m lying down, and now I’m going back to sleep.’ She knew that by now there was not a hope of it, though she had spoken as positively as she could.

So positively, indeed, that there was quite a pause. Then Phineas said, ‘I might as well have my lactose now. I’ve had a lot to think about today.’

Grumpily, Millie emerged. Rest and peace had gone, as well as slumber.

‘Let me carry the tray,’ said Phineas. ‘It’s right that I should do these things when I’m here.’

He was not at all used to the work, and had to descend the stairs very slowly, like a stick-insect.

‘What is going to happen to your job?’ asked Millie, as soon as the tray was on the sink-surround, more or less in safety.

‘That must come second. In life, one has to make such decisions.’

‘Meanwhile, what pays the boys’ school fees? They won’t have them at the ordinary local school. You know that.’

‘I shall have my Parliamentary salary in the end, and shall of course make you an allowance for things of that kind. Could I please have my lactose?’

‘So you propose quite calmly to live entirely on me. On my little income from Daddy’s estate?’

‘Not if you do not wish it. You and the boys can do that, if necessary; and lucky we are that it should be so. I myself can apply for a maintenance grant.’

‘Do you mean the dole?’

‘Of course not. I refer to the Applecroft Fund for
supporting
Liberal candidates. I did not intend to approach them but I always can if you lack all interest in your husband’s career in life.’

‘Phineas!’ Millie tried to sound positively menacing. ‘I tell you again that I accept no responsibility for the future of the boys, financial or otherwise. They are out of my hands.’

‘Well, Millie, in the very, very last resort, that’s a matter for the common law, is it not? But there is no need at all for it to come to that.’

‘It would be bad for your chances, if it did.’

‘Not nowadays. Your notion of the world often seems antediluvian, Millie dear.’

‘The boys neither love nor want me. Not that they love or want you either.’

Quite unselfconsciously, Phineas smiled. ‘What boys feel for their father is something a woman cannot understand, not even their mother. It’s something that really is antediluvian, Millie.’

‘If you had any understanding whatever of what goes on around you, you’d know better than to talk such rubbish.’

‘No one is more concerned than I am about what goes on everywhere in the world.’

His eyes were filled with a need for his mission to be understood and appreciated; for the lactose that by now really was due.

Millie set about preparing it.

*

‘Where are the boys?’ asked Phineas, as the sun sank in unnoticed glory.

‘I expect they’re at the Lavender Bag, as they were last night.’ Millie looked at her watch; the boys having stopped the clock so often that it no longer seemed to her worth paying for repairs. ‘No. The Lavender Bag will have shut some time ago.’

‘Perhaps it’s some kind of special evening?’

‘They would have come here and gorged themselves and then gone back.’

‘Well, what
are
we to think, Millie? It really might be better if you took more interest in what your sons do. I shan’t be able to give so much time to it in the future. You must understand that.’

Millie went to the record-player and put on Honegger’s
Pacific
231.
The next piece on the record was Mossolov’s
factory
music. Before the record could reach Gravini’s
Homage
to
Marinetti
,
Millie turned the machine off.

‘Would you like your supper? I should like mine.’

‘I shall have to take more care over what I eat now that I have so much greater responsibility.’

But when, shortly afterwards, the moment came, he seemed to pick and niggle very much as usual. Her own appetite was undoubtedly the more disturbed of the two.

*

In the end, the police arrived, though not until it was quite dark. Most unusually, it was Phineas who unwound himself and let the man in. For this reason, Millie did not learn his rank: lacked the opportunity to glance at his official card. The man was not in his blues, but dressed overall by a multiple outfitter.

‘Good evening, madam. Do either of you know anything of two men named Angus Morke and Rodney Morke? They’ve given this address.’

‘They are our two sons, officer,’ said Phineas.

‘Indeed, sir? I should hardly have thought it. Certainly not in your case, madam. These two are fully grown men. In fact, rather more than that.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous, officer,’ said Phineas. ‘They are our sons, and we know exactly how big they are.’

‘I wonder if you altogether do, sir. If you don’t mind my saying so, madam. It took a whole squad to get them under any kind of control. And, even then, there are some very nasty injuries which the Court will be hearing about
tomorrow
, in addition to the other charges. The Sergeant is worried about whether the cells will hold them. The station isn’t
Parkhurst
Prison. It’s only intended for quiet overnight cases. But I mustn’t do all the talking. I’ve only come to make the usual routine enquiries. The two men – boys, if you prefer, madam – do really reside here, then?’

‘Of course they do,’ said Phineas. ‘This is their home.’

‘If you say so, sir. Now, how old would each of them be?’

‘They are twins. Surely you must have realised that? As far as I recall, they are rising sixteen.’

‘You mean that they’re fifteen, sir?’

‘Yes, I think that’s right. Fifteen.’

‘It’s incredible, if you don’t mind my saying so, madam.’

‘In the course of your work,’ said Phineas, ‘you must have realised that some boys grow faster than some other boys.’

It was high time for Millie to speak. ‘What have the two of them done?’

‘What are they
alleged
to have done?’ Phineas corrected. ‘If anything, of course.’

The officer made it clear that from now on, and whatever the rule book might say, he preferred to deal with Millie.

‘I’m afraid the charges are rather serious, madam. In fact, we’ve never before had anything to compare with it since the station first opened, which of course was when most of the houses like this one were being built. We haven’t had much violence in the suburb,
serious
violence that is; though of course it’s growing fast pretty well everywhere in the world.’

‘What have they done, officer? Please tell me. I’m
perfectly
able to face it.’ Again, the additional burden that could at the same time be a further remote prospect of freedom!

‘Remember,’ put in Phineas, ‘that it’s still only mere
allegation
. It is well known that the police exaggerate; sometimes very greatly. I speak as an adopted Parliamentary candidate.’

‘Do you indeed, sir? For somewhere round here, that is?’

‘No, not locally. But it makes no difference.’

‘Well, madam,’ said the officer, with professional
quietness
, ‘as for the charges, they include a long list of assaults, fifteen at least so far, and we are expecting more. Some of those we already have are very serious indeed. Not what we’re used to round here, as I have remarked. More like the Glasgow docks in the old days, I should have said. Then there’s a lot of damage to property. A lot of damage to a lot of property, I should have put it. Doors stove in and roofs ripped about and ornaments smashed. There are a couple of attempted rapes expected to be reported soon, from what the other officers say. A couple at least.’

‘In these times, there’s no such thing as
attempted
rape,’ objected Phineas. ‘It’s a rape, or it isn’t a rape, and most people are very doubtful about it even if it’s supposed to be proved.’

‘And that’s not to mention the injuries inflicted on the officers, which we don’t like at all, madam, especially in a quiet district like this.’

‘No,’ said Millie soberly, ‘I’m sure not.’

‘Now, if I could have a few details of the education these lads have had? Supposing them to have had any, of course. But it’s no matter for joking, all the same. It’s an offence too, not to educate a child.’

Millie realised that the night air was coming in through the front door which Phineas had left open: the night air of a hot summer. Phineas made no move, and Millie did not care to leave him just then even for a single moment. Besides, closing the outer door might lead to new suspicions.