The Men and the Girls (10 page)

‘What's happened?' she said.

Kate began piling plates to take down to the kitchen.

‘Stop that,' Christine said. ‘Stop fiddling about and tell me.'

‘I've got to leave James,' Kate said. ‘I'm doing no good staying. I'm going to hurt him soon, and I couldn't bear to do that. I've got to be on my own, I've got to live on my own. To sort myself out.'

‘Oh Kate,' Christine said, with a degree of exasperation. She too was a single parent, and she too lived with what she firmly described as a partner. She had met James. She liked him. He looked a loyal type, and, after her own experiences, Christine set great store by loyalty.

‘I'm not being neurotic,' Kate said. ‘This isn't self-indulgence. It would only be self-indulgence if I stayed.'

‘You haven't lived on your own for years.'

‘I'd have Joss. I wouldn't be quite on my own.'

‘Is this temporary?'

‘I don't know. I just know I don't have a choice.'

‘But if I'm going to offer you Susie's job I have to know it isn't temporary. I can't create all the upheaval just to have you turn round and say you don't need the job after all, you've sorted it out with James. I'm not saying I wouldn't like to employ you, because I would, you're much better than Susie in every way, but I'd have to have a commitment, Kate, I'd have to.'

Kate said, ‘I'd be happy to give you one.'

‘A year,' Christine said. ‘At least until next Christmas.'

Kate swallowed. It shouldn't be this easy, getting a job, it ought to be part of the punishment that getting a job should be difficult, miserable. ‘Thank you.'

‘It's long hours, Kate.'

‘I know.'

‘And no software salesmen.'

Kate shook her head, trying to smile.

‘Where will you live?'

‘I haven't sorted that out yet.'

‘You won't get even a room under forty pounds a week, you know. And that'll be a student sort of room. Dead grotty.' Christine thought of Richmond Villa, which she had visited several times. ‘You must be mad.'

‘Probably,' Kate said, ‘but insanity's preferable to guilt, any day.'

‘Why on earth do you feel guilty?'

‘Because I've changed. I've changed, for some reason, into someone I don't like at all, and while I'm like this I'm upsetting everyone.'

‘Too young for
the
change, I suppose.'

‘Yes,' Kate said, ‘I can't blame it on anyone but myself.'

‘What about Joss?'

Kate thought. ‘Poor Jossie. She's used to me, and she's nearly as impossible as I am herself. James will be thankful to see us go.' She picked up the plates and moved towards the basement stairs.

‘Don't you be so sure,' Christine said. She followed Kate down to the kitchen, where the chef was changing his blue-and-white-checked working trousers for jeans. ‘Sleep on it, Kate, sleep on it. We'll talk about it on Friday.'

‘She's coming out with me, Friday,' the chef said. ‘Aren't you, Katie? Going for something young and virile.'

‘That rules you out then, Benjie.'

‘You should see me,' the chef said, ‘when I gets going. I really gets going, Fridays.' He zipped up his jeans and reached for his leather jacket. ‘Bloody women. It's you what drives me into the arms of other blokes, you know. It's you bloody women.' He stopped to give Kate a garlic-breathed kiss. ‘Ta-ra.' The basement door slammed behind him.

An hour later, Kate followed him up the steps to the street. She and Christine had cleared up and laid the tables for the evening almost in silence, only speaking briefly about Christine's son, Justin, who might be good enough to get into the junior team to fence for Oxfordshire. When Kate finally took off her apron and put on her jacket, Christine said, ‘Now you think seriously and we'll talk again on Friday,' and Kate said, ‘You're a real friend.' Christine had smiled and said, ‘The sisterhood,' and they'd laughed. Then Kate climbed up the basement steps to the street, and sniffed the February dusk, and felt a sudden small lightness of heart, as if a burden was slipping from her.

‘Excuse me,' someone said.

Kate turned. It was a male someone.

‘I didn't mean to frighten you, but I've been waiting. For you, I mean. I couldn't get the hang of the days you worked here, so I've done a lot of loitering about, and it was always that other girl, the blonde—'

‘Susie,' Kate said. The street light, and the light above the restaurant's fascia board, revealed the young man who had come in with the sneering, flamboyant girl. He was wearing the same loose, dark coat, with the collar turned up.

‘Oh. Susie.'

‘Can I help you?' Kate said. ‘Did you leave something?'

‘Oh no. No. It was just that you were so kind—'

‘I don't think I was,' Kate said firmly. ‘I don't think I said anything. I was too surprised to say anything.'

‘You
looked
kind. It meant a lot. I was feeling pretty awful, as you can probably imagine.'

‘Well, I'm glad,' Kate said. She took her gloves out of her jacket pocket and began to pull them on.

‘It wasn't just that you were kind,' the man said. ‘It was more than that. I really liked the look of you. I do, I really do.'

Kate took a step away. ‘I've got to get home.'

‘Please,' he said, putting a hand out. ‘Don't be alarmed. I'm not a nutter, I'm just not doing this very well because I've never done it before. My name is Mark. Mark Hathaway. I'm head of the English department at a private tutorial college. Perfectly on the line, you see.'

‘Well,' Kate said, laughing, ‘how do you do, Mark Hathaway.'

‘And you?'

‘Kate.'

‘Kate what?'

‘Kate Bain,' Kate said.

‘May I walk you home, Kate Bain?'

Kate hesitated. Now that the evenings weren't pitch-black by four-thirty, Leonard didn't draw his curtains so early, but sat at his window, like an elderly heron, watching the street for incident.

‘I don't think so.'

‘Are you married?'

‘No.'

‘Then what is the harm in my escorting you home?'

‘This is all happening in the half-dark,' Kate said. ‘It feels peculiar.'

‘I think it feels exciting.'

She took a step away. ‘I'm going,' Kate said. ‘Thank you for your offer, but I'm going now. Alone.'

He followed her. ‘Please may I see you in daylight? Will you have lunch with me?'

‘No,' Kate said without conviction.

‘Coffee, then. Meet me for coffee. Please.'

‘I don't think so—'

‘Look,' he said, and he took her arm. ‘Please just look. I'm a straight bloke who happens to be charmed by your appearance and your manner. Meet me for coffee, just once, and if it isn't a success I will never trouble you again, cross my heart and hope to die.'

Kate removed her arm. ‘All right,' she said. ‘Just one cup of coffee.'

‘Thursday?'

‘Yes.'

‘I'll meet you at the entrance to the Golden Cross. Eleven-fifteen.'

‘Why aren't you teaching?'

‘I am. But I'm not at eleven-fifteen on Thursday.' He stepped back and the light from a nearby street lamp fell on his rumpled dark head. ‘Goodbye, Kate Bain, Miss. Till Thursday.'

When she reached Richmond Villa, having paused to buy chops for supper and collect James's only suit from the cleaners (who would collect his suit in future? He would, of course. Oh God. Don't think about it), Leonard was waiting. James had been in, and gone out again, with Hugh, for a drink, and Leonard was bursting with news.

‘Give you three guesses—'

‘What about?' Kate said. She looked round the kitchen. Mrs Cheng had left it as she usually did, with the floor and taps and surfaces gleaming, and all the room's intractable muddle of living piled in a reproachful heap on the table.

‘Mindless yellow peasant,' Leonard said, poking the pile. A small avalanche of opened letters slid to the floor.

‘Don't call her that. Not even as a joke.'

‘She doesn't mind. Adores me. Hide like a rhino. Guess what.'

Kate began to transfer little heaps of the muddle back on to the dresser and worktops, where it usually lived.

‘Can't possibly guess.'

Leonard craned forward on his stick. He'd had a lovely day, first three hours of Mrs Cheng, now a really first-rate morsel of gossip.

‘Old Bat Bachelor believes in euthanasia!'

Kate had paused to read part of a letter from Joss's school, saying that they were trying to arrange a student exchange with a high school in Kiev, and could they please have parental co-operation over this.

‘Euthanasia?'

‘Euthanasia, my dear, half-educated dimwit, is the term commonly applied to the direct painless killing of the incurably ill or insane.'

Kate looked up. ‘I know.'

‘James and Hugh took old Beatrice out to tea. Randolph, no less. I said to James, “What did you talk about?” and he said, “Euthanasia. She believes in euthanasia.”'

‘So what,' Kate said rigidly.

‘So nothing. Just thought you'd like to know.'

‘Why should I want to know?'

‘Just thought you'd like to keep tabs on James.'

‘Stop it,' Kate said furiously. ‘Stop it. I never have and I never will. What James does is no concern of mine.'

Leonard hesitated. He had gone too far. He craned towards Kate.

‘Marry him,' Leonard pleaded. ‘It's what he wants. It's what you want. Do it. Marry him.'

Kate turned away. ‘I can't,' she said.

‘Why? Why the devil not?'

‘I can't explain. You'd never understand.'

Leonard let his breath out in a windy sigh. Then he limped to the door. ‘In that case,' he said, as he creaked out, ‘you ought to leave. It's the only decent thing you can do.'

Late that night, sitting in the bath while James brushed his teeth at the basin, Kate said, ‘I gather you had tea at the Randolph.'

James spat and stooped for a mouthful of water from the cold tap.

‘I took Hugh to meet Beatrice. It was meant to be a distraction and actually it was rather successful. He's dreading his golf course.'

Kate began to wash one foot with exaggerated thoroughness.

‘Leonard said you talked about euthanasia.'

James peered at his teeth in the mirror above the basin.

‘They may all be my own, but they don't half look like it. Do I look sixty-one or a hundred and sixty-one?'

‘So you won't tell me about Miss Bachelor,' Kate said, starting on the other foot.

James turned to look at her.

‘What would you like to know?'

Kate glared. ‘Nothing.'

‘My darling Katie,' James said, ‘I'll tell you anything you want to know. You know that.'

‘I wouldn't have known about this tea party, except for Leonard—'

‘I didn't tell you because you've made it abundantly plain you don't want me to. There is nothing in the least furtive about my friendship with Beatrice, except your attitude to it. Yes, we had tea. Yes, we talked about euthanasia, and Hugh is now all fired up about a telly programme.' He came to kneel by the bath. He put out a hand and touched Kate's breast. She flinched.

‘Katie.'

She shook her head.

‘Why not?'

She turned her head away.

‘Oh Katie,' James said sadly, getting up. ‘How I wish you'd at least talk to me.'

Kate bowed her head. ‘I would if I could.'

‘You don't laugh. I haven't heard you laugh for weeks.'

‘No,' Kate said. She clenched her hands round the sponge until her knuckles gleamed white. ‘No. I've forgotten how.'

The Rapswell Golf and Country Club sent a car for Hugh, a Mercedes with a polite driver who asked diffidently for Hugh's autograph, for his daughter. Hugh had had a discussion with Julia, and then several more with himself, about what he should wear, and ended up in a blazer that he said made him look like a game show host.

‘Too many buttons. All I need is a toupee and a redhead in a backless dress.'

‘You look great,' Julia said seriously.

‘Where are your golf bats?' George asked.

‘I'm going to talk about golf, not play it.'

‘Don't you be so sure, Mr Hunter,' the driver said later. ‘They'll have you up to all sorts of stunts. They're a very lively crowd up at Rapswell.'

Hugh made faces of mock panic. ‘I couldn't hit a golf ball. I couldn't hit a beach ball at two paces.'

They drove peacefully through the north Cotswolds. Hugh, who had chosen to sit beside the driver in an effort to appear approachable (‘Good old pro,' he told himself), began to feel happier as the miles rolled by, less resentful and more as if he were approaching a performance. His feelings had also, without question, taken an upward turn after the extraordinary tea party in the Randolph Hotel, and he had spent much of the night after it planning a memo on a projected programme for a mate of his whom he could trust to be executive producer. He had no intention of telling Kevin McKinley, not, at least, until the programme was about to go out, and it was too late to halt it, to fuss about consulting the ITC, and risk having it stopped. He'd also thought a good deal about Miss Bachelor. He saw, now, why James had made a friend of her. You could say typical spinster of Beatrice, you could say she was dried-up, dusty, bookish, sexless, but for all that she had a powerful appeal, the appeal of someone with intellectual poise and the zest added by originality and by wit. ‘Why not indeed,' she'd said to Hugh about his proposal that she should appear on television. No fluster, no old-ladyish demurring and terror of being conspicuous. ‘Why not indeed,' she'd said. Bravo, Hugh thought, bravo, Miss Bachelor.