Thunder in the Blood Page 13

  A week before Christmas, for once in our relationship, we ventured out of the cave. It was Rory’s idea. His treat. He’d found a pub by the river, in the Thames Valley. We arrived after dark and the car park was already packed, but Rory had booked a table and there was already a bottle of champagne chilling in an ice bucket between our chairs. The food, as promised, was delicious and afterwards Rory relaxed with a cigar and a second glass of port. We’d been talking about the situation in the Gulf. Events were moving towards a climax. At Curzon House, we were now running a sweepstake on when, exactly, the war would begin. I’d drawn 10 January. Rory pulled a face.

  ‘No chance,’ he said.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘They won’t be ready in time.’

  ‘Who? The Americans?’

  ‘Aye. Powell was up at one of the House Committees yesterday. He’s saying mid-February at the earliest.’

  I looked at him a moment, surprised. General Powell was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Washington. When it came to the fighting, he’d be calling the shots. He thus had every incentive to keep the Iraqis guessing.

  ‘You believe him?’ I said. ‘You don’t think he’s playing games? Flying kites? Stringing us all along?’

  ‘No, I don’t. Logistically, he’s boxed in. Mid-February. At the earliest. A week or two of bombing. Then the big push. Months of fighting.’

  ‘Phooooey.’

  I laughed, tidying the remains of my brandy butter into a neat pile at the side of my plate. In almost exactly a year’s time, I was to remember this conversation, but now I didn’t give it a moment’s thought. When I glanced up again, Rory was still looking at me.

  ‘You’re a cynic, Miss Moreton,’ he said, ‘one hundred and ten per cent.’

  ‘You’re right.’ I smiled at him. ‘Goes with the job.’

  ‘Off-duty too?’

  ‘Of course.’ I smiled again, reaching for his hand, and reassurance.

  We drove back to Fulham. Ruth, it turned out, was away again, in Paris of all places. Rory stayed at the flat and we spent the night together in my narrow little bed, tucked into each other, like children.

  Next morning, by common consent, we opened each other’s presents. Afterwards we celebrated Christmas yet again, on the floor, by the sofa. Rory looked up at me. Moist and warm, I was still straddling him.

  ‘Your favourite position,’ I said. ‘Happy Christmas.’

  He smiled and revolved his eyes again, and reached up for me, cupping my breasts.

  ‘We’re having a party,’ he said, ‘Boxing Day.’

  ‘We?’

  ‘Ruth and I.’ He paused. ‘Your parents are coming. I know. Ruth told me.’

  ‘Ah.’ I nodded. ‘And me?’

  ‘Yes, please.’

  ‘Bit near the knuckle, isn’t it?’

  ‘Not at all. Season of goodwill. Old friends …’ He grinned. ‘What could be nicer?’

  I spent most of Christmas Day getting nervous. My parents and I shared a quiet meal around the table in Budleigh, and later we watched television. My father, for some reason, was quiet to the point of near silence, but after mince pies and clotted cream, my mother broke out the Martell I’d brought down from London, and he began to cheer up a little. We’d been talking about Ruth’s party, what it might be like.

  ‘You won’t have seen Rory for a bit,’ he said. ‘Been busy, I expect.’

  ‘Yes.’ I nodded. ‘Is he still at the MOD?’

  My father glanced up, a turn of the head that was just a fraction too brisk, and he looked me full in the eyes for a moment. Then he settled back in his chair.

  ‘Yes,’ he said quietly, ‘I gather he’s waiting for the balloon to go up.’

  The party at Rory’s was an all-day affair. My mother had been warned to get there about noon, before the vultures descended on the buffet, and we duly turned up in my father’s old Rover. Rory and Ruth had a house on the edge of a village called Topsham, upriver from the Commando Centre. It was a neat Victorian villa, red brick, with a double bay at the front and distant glimpses of the Exe estuary. Inside, the two rooms at the back of the house had been knocked into one and it was here that the party took place.

  There was a trestle table along one wall, covered with plates of food. There were boxes of wine everywhere and crackers galore and heaps of toys for the kids. Ruth met us at the door. She was dressed in black – tight jeans and designer T-shirt – and she was wearing a huge pair of Elton John glasses one of the kids had given her for Christmas. She had a drink in one hand and a small cheroot in the other, and her dark purple lipstick was already smudged. Used by now to the earnest, slightly dour Ruth of Rory’s description, I was astonished. Here, in front of my eyes, was a very different Ruth. She was laughing. She was natural. She looked really attractive. And when Rory appeared, funny hat, clown’s make-up, empty glass, she grabbed him by the hand and gave him a big hug.

  ‘Meet Coco,’ she said to my mother. ‘I’ve hired him,’ she winked, ‘strictly on approval.’

  I drank steadily through the afternoon. Most of the people at the party I knew already, old friends from my youth, instructors at the Commando Centre, the kind of conversations you pick up as if they’d never stopped. Twice, people asked me if I was all right and both times I nodded vigorously, favouring them with a big empty smile, steering the conversation away from the rocks, asking them about their children, or their new posting, knowing all the time that I was giving myself away, my eyes glassy with alcohol, following Rory around the room as he dipped into this conversation or that, a bottle in each hand, filling glasses, sharing jokes, chasing children, playing the fool, the perfect host.

  Once or twice he looked my way, risking a smile or even a wink, and much later, dark outside, we met in the kitchen, amongst the litter of empty bottles and paper plates. His daughter was on her hands and knees under the table teasing the family spaniel with a rubber spider from one of the crackers. Otherwise, for a moment or two, the room was empty.

  ‘Lovely party,’ I said flatly.

  ‘Enjoying it?’

  ‘Great.’

  ‘Truly?’

  ‘Truly. You’ve got a real flair for it. I’d never have guessed.’

  ‘Flair for what?’

  He beamed down at me, the deep green eyes behind the mask of circus make-up. On his cheek, very clearly, I could see the imprint of a pair of lips. The imprint was purple. Purple lipstick. Ruth’s lipstick. Her kisses. My man. I turned away, sickened with it all, with Rory, with his family, with myself. I’d got it all wrong. All these months, I’d got it wrong. Not one Rory. Not my Rory. But two. By the door, I felt his hand on my arm. He pulled me back, urgent, almost rough. Outside, in the hall, there were couples playing football with a balloon. Rory looked down at me. I realized, for the first time, that he was probably as drunk as I was.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ he said.

  I gasped at the question, at how crass it was, not caring any more. All I wanted to do now was to get out of the house, get back to Budleigh Salterton, put all this merriment and laughter behind me, take the train to London, to the warm claustrophobia of the life we’d called our own. Rory asked me the question a second time, his hand still on my arm, and I shook my head, trying to hide the tears, aware of his daughter looking up at us both.

  ‘I don’t know why you asked me,’ I muttered, ‘that’s all.’

  Back in London, the start of the New Year, I didn’t see Rory for nearly a week. We talked on the phone, endless conversations, me going through the argument time and again, him saying I’d got it all wrong. A party’s a party. His job was to be host. He was there to keep it all together, to get people pissed, to make sure the kids had a great time, to jolly things along. What had I wanted him to do? Cruise around looking shitty? Tell everyone the truth? Announce our engagement? The latter suggestion, in particular, stung me.

  ‘That’s cheap,’ I snapped. ‘I’ve never asked you for anything. Anything. Except to be straigh
t with me.’

  ‘And I’ve lied?’

  ‘No. Not in so many words.’

  ‘What then?’

  ‘It’s—’ I shook my head, angry and confused. ‘It’s just that nothing makes sense. It doesn’t, you know… tally.’

  ‘That’s intelligence talk. Curzon House bullshit.’

  ‘Wrong. It’s me telling you you’re better off where you are. You’re a great father. You’re probably a great husband, too, for all I know. And she’s probably a great wife, as well.’

  ‘You believe that?’

  ‘I believe what I see.’

  ‘Me and Ruth? After everything we’ve talked about?’

  I paused a moment, deep breath, starting again. I didn’t want all my bridges burned, not quite yet. I loved the man. I didn’t want to see him hurt. That’s partly why we were having the conversation.

  ‘No, my love,’ I said gently. ‘Not what we talked about. What you talked about. It’s you, sweet, you. You do the talking. You do the phoning. You’re the one who decides where, and when, and how often. You’re—’

  ‘We’ve been through all this.’

  ‘I know. I know. But I’m saying it again. Because I have to say it again. Because it’s true. None of it mattered very much until last week. Until last week.’

  ‘Fuck last week. Last week was Christmas. Christmas is a sham, a joke. Everyone knows that.’

  ‘No, my love, Christmas isn’t a sham. It’s not a joke. Neither are families. And that means wives. Rory, I have eyes in my head. I can see. Give me some credit. The woman loves you. She needs you, for Chrissakes. You must know that. Must do.’

  ‘Aye…’

  ‘Well, then. Spare me the rest, eh?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You heard.’

  I looked at the phone for a while, arm’s length, hearing his voice, a new note, uncertainty, contrition, then, very gently, I cut him off. I’ve never done it before, not to him, not to anybody, but I knew it was the only way to bring the thing to an end, and if I’d meant what I’d said, then it was my only remaining option.

  Rory appeared the following evening. I’d been meaning to go out, but I felt so ill I decided against it. He stayed for half an hour. He sat beside me on the sofa and told me that he’d been up all night thinking about what I’d said and he’d decided that I was right. He’d been selfish with me, a pig to his wife and irresponsible about the kids, and now was the time to try and put it all back together again. He wouldn’t be phoning any more and he wouldn’t be coming round again. The last six months had been the high point of his life, and he never expected anything like it to happen again. He’d loved me for years, he loved me now and he couldn’t see it ever stopping. But stop it must and now was the time.

  It was a curiously stilted performance, old-fashioned, awkward, not like Rory at all. At the end, he kissed me and held me for a while, and then he got up and left. I heard the front door closing, and I sat on the sofa for probably an hour, maybe longer, thinking about absolutely nothing. I wasn’t surprised. I wasn’t hysterical. I was just numb. Then the phone rang, my mother asking about tickets for a concert she wanted to go to, and we talked for a bit and then she said goodnight. I put the phone down and went out into the hall to bolt the door. On the mat, with its little curl of string, was Rory’s key. I looked at it for a moment or two. And then I wept.

  Of the next few months I remember very little. I did what I could at Charlie’s, forcing myself to turn up three or four evenings a week, but I was only going through the motions, listening to myself drone on about positive thinking and self-empowerment, wondering why none of it worked. The Gulf War came and went, video games on the television every morning, and by the end of February we appeared to have won. There was a major celebration in the office, loose talk about a new world order, speculation about closer ties to Washington and I shared a brief drink with Stollmann who told me we were bloody lucky Saddam had been so clueless. A lot of the gear he had was ours. Questions about British deaths from British-supplied equipment might, in some quarters, have been tricky to answer.

  Quite what to make of these muttered asides I never really new, but I’d recognized a face in the paper that morning, a mutual friend of ours who’d just been appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Trade and Industry. The promotion, according to the Guardian, had been carefully timed. The arsenals of the Gulf were virtually empty, and the pickings for the arms salesmen were very rich indeed.

  ‘Lawrence Priddy,’ I’d said to Stollmann, ‘who’d have thought?’

  Stollmann, at the mercy of a small glass of sweet sherry, had pulled a face and then looked quickly away, changing the subject when I tried to pursue it. I was doing a fine job in Registry, he’d said, and he held out great hopes for an imminent pay rise. He knew it wasn’t my first choice of posting, but I wouldn’t be shackled to the computer for ever and he’d try and sort something out. I’d looked duly grateful at this piece of news, but in truth I’d ceased to care. Neither the future, nor the present, had any meaning. I just lived from day to day, hour to hour, praying for the phone to ring, slowly realizing that it probably never would.

  I was wrong. Late September, summer gone, I was sitting in the flat, spooning Whiskas into a saucer for the cat. The cat was a good size, now. She had the sense to eat for both of us. I lifted the phone. It was Rory.

  ‘Hi,’ I said woodenly.

  ‘I’m at the end of the road. In a call box.’

  ‘You want to come up?’

  ‘Please.’

  I let him in a minute or so later. It was raining outside and his mac was soaking. He stood in the hall for a second or two, dripping on to the carpet. He looked much thinner. I gazed at him for a long time, then I shrugged and went to him and put my arms round him. I could feel him shaking. After a while, he produced a handkerchief and we shared it, drying our eyes. I led him through to the living room, and we sat down, our arms round each other. After a bit, my head on his shoulder, I sniffed.

  ‘Hopeless.’ I said.

  ‘You’re right.’

  ‘But better now.’

  He said nothing, his arms tightening around me. Then the cat jumped up, fat old thing, and we both laughed.

  Two days later, at Rory’s insistence, we took the night sleeper to Inverness. At Inverness, we changed on to another train, and clattered west, across the Highlands towards the Kyle of Lochalsh. End of season, we had the carriage to ourselves, and we huddled together by the window, gazing at the view, the stands of pine, the soaring kestrels, the ice-blue water of the lochs, the mountains mirrored beyond, their summits already capped with snow. We said very little, because there was no longer any need, and when we got to the Kyle, we stepped off the train and walked to the end of the platform, shivering in the wind. Across the water was the Isle of Skye and to the north, plainly visible now, were the Cuillin Hills.

  Since I’d met him, years back, Rory had talked about the Cuillins. They were, he said, the finest range of mountains in the world, the one occasion when God and geology had got it exactly right. As a youth, holidaying on Skye, he’d climbed them all. In various conversations since we’d come together, he’d climbed them again, choosing the hardest tracks, leading me by the hand, describing every step of the way. Most of these conversations had happened in bed, nose to nose, and the Cuillins had become our talisman, our private estate. One day, he’d always promised me, he’d take me there. And then we’d climb them for real.

  That first night, we stayed at a hotel in Portree, an hour on the bus from the ferry. The hotel, fittingly enough, was called Cuillin View, and we had a room at the front of the building, big picture windows, the last of the daylight expiring on the sea loch, the wind beginning to stir the pine trees, the mountains themselves already invisible behind a wall of cloud.

  The weather got worse. For the three days we’d managed to escape, it never stopped raining. Once or twice, on our hands and knees on the bedroom floor, we pored over the map Rory
had brought with him, convinced that the weather would improve, but it never did and we left Skye with the Cuillins unclimbed. We hadn’t once seen the sun and most of the cloud never left ground level, but we’d had some delicious meals, most of them in bed, and I’d been happier than I can ever remember. Walking down the little road from the hotel to the town centre for the bus back to the ferry, we wiped the rain from our eyes and joked about our paper assault on Rory’s precious mountains. One day, I told him, we’d be back. And then, in God’s good time, the buggers would fall. I squeezed Rory’s hand, watching the bus turn into the town square.

  ‘What’s a couple of years,’ I said, ‘between mates?’

  Back in London, three days later, I fixed for us to go to the movies. There was an Indian film on, Salaam Bombay. I’d read the reviews and I’d once spent a couple of unforgettable weeks in Bombay and after all the chatter about the Cuillins I wanted to treat Rory to some memories of my own.

  It turned up outside the cinema a minute or two early. I waited and waited but Rory didn’t appear. After an hour, worried, I phoned the MOD. The desk officer tried his extension. It didn’t answer. I frowned, replacing the receiver, wondering what I could possibly do next. I had his London phone number, the flat in Greenwich, but I was loath to use it. Since Skye, Rory had been planning to tell Ruth that the marriage was over. It wasn’t a conversation he relished having, and the last thing I wanted to do was interrupt it.

  I waited on the pavement another fifteen minutes, half expecting him to turn up. When nothing happened, I went back to the phone box. I dialled my own number, thinking Rory might have had the dreaded conversation and gone to my place forgetting about the cinema. When there was no answer, I waited a couple of minutes more. Then I phoned the number in Greenwich. It answered on the second ring.