All the Beauty of the Sun (24 page)

Chapter Thirty-two

G
EORGE SAID
, ‘W
ELL NOW
, Bobby, this has been an adventure, hasn't it? And before Grandmamma takes you home on the train, we shall have breakfast. Eggs and bacon and toast, how does that sound?'

He held Bobby's hand as they walked downstairs, leaving Iris to finish dressing. His own voice rang in his ears, too hearty, full of guilt. He held his grandson's hand too tightly; he had the shameful idea that he might at any moment sweep him into his arms and say, ‘You'll keep our secret, won't you, my darling boy?'

He had only intended to hold her, too aware of Bobby's presence to do anything else, and for a long while he had only held her, and the room became darker, Bobby's breathing more settled into sleep so that it became easier to forget about him; there was just the two of them, face to face, the necessary darkness and quiet kind to them both, slowing the time they had left together until it seemed that they had stepped outside time and there was nothing beyond themselves. When she moved against him, she was languid, so much time they had, after all, all night in the dark and quiet; she made him live every fraction of every second, made each breath and heartbeat keep time with hers; this was to last for the rest of their lives.

He paused on the stairs and lifted Bobby into his arms; he needed to hold him, feel his warmth and weight, his too-big-to-be-held awkwardness. George was too full of energy not to. She had sent this charge through him and it had nowhere else to go except to fuel his guilt; he needed to steady himself; this mania wouldn't do at all. He put Bobby down again at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Sorry, Bobby. Your granddad is a very silly old man.'

He went to the reception desk. The same man was there, as though he never left his post; he wondered if he could ask him if he had a home, or did he sleep here in the hotel, and what was it like to live and work in such a place? He should tell him that he was glad that the hotel existed, but perhaps it didn't exist; there was that trick it played with time, after all; he should ask this man how he stopped time like that. He said only, ‘Have you seen Mr Law this morning?'

‘No, sir.'

George nodded. He had already knocked on Paul's door, sensing he wasn't there. ‘If you see him, would you tell him I'm still here?'

‘Of course, Mr Harris.'

He was still here, waiting. He imagined waiting in this hotel for the rest of his life for Paul to come back, time expanding and contracting like metal bars heated in the sun, keeping him here as the world changed around him, because how could he resist pausing his life in such a way. He thought of Iris and the slow, careful way she held him, and how they would leave this hotel and go back to their old lives. They would be friends, she had said, as though nothing had happened between them at all, nothing they might be ashamed of.

He became aware of Bobby's hand pulling his. ‘Granddad. It's that man who bought me ice cream.'

There was a lounge tucked away like a secret place to be revealed only at the receptionist's discretion. The man had led them along a corridor and held open a door. ‘Here we are. Would you like me to bring you some coffee, perhaps some milk for the young man?'

‘Yes, thank you.'

This was a room of chairs and low tables, of tall windows looking out on to a walled garden. French doors were open on to a small terrace where a wrought-iron table and chairs warmed in a square of sun. Paul turned to him. ‘Shall we sit outside?'

The iron table and chairs were wet with dew and Paul wiped the seats with his handkerchief. ‘Is this all right? Not too cold?'

‘It's warm, Paul. Spring.' George sat down, the chair cold beneath him and rocking a little on the uneven flag stones. Bobby stood at the edge of the terrace, and he said, ‘Bobby, why don't you go and explore the garden whilst Francis and I talk? See what you can find.'

Paul watched Bobby run across the small lawn. Without taking his eyes off him he said, ‘Thank you for bringing him to see me. Thank you for staying.' At last he managed to look at him. ‘I'm so sorry, Dad. I've behaved very badly.'

‘You're here now. We won't say any more.'

‘Nothing more?' Paul watched his son chase a pigeon that landed a few feet away. The bird flew into the air in a panic of grey-blue feathers; Paul kept his gaze on Bobby, such longing on his face that George turned away. He heard Paul strike a match and smelt his cigarette smoke. He waited for him to speak, knowing that whatever he said himself would be wrong, too desperate or too brusque in an effort not to seem desperate at all. The smell of Paul's cigarette mixed with the damp smells of an English garden in late spring; he turned and there was a lilac tree heavy with white flowers, a little out of the sun, not warm enough yet to perfume the air too densely. He breathed in deeply: Paul's peculiar cigarettes and lilac, something else to remember him by.

Paul turned to him. ‘I was wondering how I might pretend to be Francis, for Bobby's sake. But I think that whenever I saw him I wouldn't be able to stop myself saying
I knew your father
and sometimes his father would be Robbie and sometimes he would be Paul, mixed up together, confusing …' He shook his head. ‘Even if I could keep quiet – just be
Francis
, the man who buys him ice cream, who imposes himself on his life, even then he'd only wonder what to make of me.'

‘He'd recognise you as he grew older –'

A waiter came with coffee, a basket of sweet rolls and a glass of milk. Paul stood up and walked towards Bobby. He held out his hand to him. ‘Bob, come and have some breakfast.'

Bobby hesitated and George willed him to take Paul's hand, willed the child to recognise him. It shouldn't take so much, after all, for Bobby to see that this was his father. George concentrated on pouring the coffee, on adding cream to his own cup, sugar to Paul's. From the corner of his eye he saw Paul swing Bobby into his arms and up onto his shoulders. Bobby was small for his age, as Paul had been small, but his father was strong now – stronger than he looked. He heard Bobby laugh, the first time he had heard him laugh so happily for days.

Patrick bathed; he brushed his teeth and shaved carefully then studied his face in the mirror. Practise an expression, he thought. One of mild, anything's-all-right-by-me acceptance, one that says
Stay in London longer, if you wish; go to Thorp if you can bear to; come home with me. Whatever you want to do
. Practise this nonchalant expression so that it stays on your face without any effort, no ragged emotion to give you away. No anger, no pleading, no fear. He only had to be careful, steady, contained: himself.

He went downstairs. The receptionist called to him, ‘Mr Morgan. Mr Law is here, sir.'

Patrick looked at him blankly. Who was this Mr Law? He leaned on the reception desk, afraid of how weak he had become.

‘Are you quite all right, Mr Morgan?'

‘Has Mr Law gone to his room? I'd knocked …'

‘No, sir. He's with another gentleman in the lounge.'

‘This other man …?'

‘Mr Harris and his son. '

‘Where? Where are they?'

‘Along the corridor to your right, sir. '

George had left them alone together and Paul held Bobby on his knee, both of them watching the London sparrows hop closer and closer to the table for the crumbs from the breakfast rolls. He had told him that in France bread like this was called croissants because they were shaped like the crescent moon, and where he lived they were called krachel and were flavoured with orange-flower water and anise. And the sparrows were a little tamer, expecting their crumbs each morning, payment for the poses they made.

He held him closer and kissed the top of his head. He thought of saying,
I knew your daddy and he loved you very much.
But saying this now would make him someone else. For now he was Bobby's daddy. He shifted Bobby's weight on his knee, no weight at all really; he was small and agile as Rob had been. He kissed his head again and Bobby looked up at him. ‘Will you come on the train with us?'

‘No, I have to go home.'

‘Back to where they eat the funny bread?'

‘Yes, back there, Bob.'

‘Nobody calls me Bob.'

‘No? I used to. Do you mind me calling you Bob?'

He shook his head and scrambled down from his knee to face him. ‘Bob's better. Bob's a grown-up's name.'

Paul thought of the grown-up Bob, how he might find him and ask for his forgiveness; he wondered if he would be brave enough. To be forgiven he would have to confess everything – how could he be fully forgiven unless all of his trespass was known? He would have to throw his most intimate self at his grown son's feet and it would be as though he felt some perverse pride in himself: see what he'd been up against? His very nature. Hadn't he tried so hard to be faithful? Forgive me, he would say, I really couldn't help myself.

There could be no confession, then; his pride wouldn't allow it; Bob would never know the truth and perhaps that would be best: best to keep away and not intrude on his son's life with his need to be understood. He would bear the consequences of his own actions, the grown-up thing to do.

They left the garden. Paul watched his son run along the corridor towards a man he didn't recognise for a moment because the sun was in his eye, a tall, powerfully built man who caught Bobby in his arms, holding him close before setting him down and taking his hand. Patrick, here to save him if he needed to be saved. For a moment he imagined walking past him, on, out into the London streets, not stopping until he had made his own life, something he had never done before. But his relief was too great, his need too great. He walked towards him, quickening his step.

Epilogue

Soho, one year later
F
RED SAID
, ‘S
HE WANTED
the wedding do here. Now I couldn't turn her down, could I, Matt?' He stepped down from the chair he'd been stood on to polish the mirror behind the bar. Susie had hung bunting everywhere; she had made a sign that read
Congratulations Mr & Mrs Hawker!
That exclamation mark surprised me; then I thought that perhaps Susie was being ironic.

Susie caught my eye and raised her eyebrows as if to say,
Well, could Fred have turned her down?
No; Fred was giving her away; I'd glimpsed through his open bedroom door his good suit hanging brushed and ready. Already Susie was wearing her new dress and an odd little hat: feathered and flighty and unlike her, another irony, perhaps. She said, ‘You've missed a bit, Fred – there, look, where it's smeary.' As Fred climbed on the chair again, she said lightly, ‘You coming to the church, Matt?'

‘Yes,' Fred said. He turned to me, duster still raised. ‘Come. There's to be a full mass.' He stepped down again, tossing the duster under the bar. ‘Bells and smells, Lawrence calls it. I don't think he's being disrespectful.'

‘No, I'm sure,' I said.

‘He's going along with it to keep her happy.' Fred began polishing glasses. ‘I think he'd do anything to keep her happy. Besotted.'

‘He loves her,' I said.

Fred laughed. ‘Who bloody wouldn't, eh? Gorgeous girl like that.'

Susie was watching me. I thought that her hat should have a veil, and then she could watch more discreetly. I smiled at her. ‘I won't come to the church.'

‘But you'll come down after and have a drink with us all?'

‘Perhaps.'

‘You'll like Lawrence,' Fred said. ‘Grand lad he is.'

‘Yes, I've met him. Would you both excuse me?'

‘Of course, you go and have a lie down. Rest.' Fred grinned at me. ‘I always say it's best to get your head down whilst you can.'

I went upstairs and lay down on my bed. My room is above the bar and I can hear Fred and Susie's bickering, their laughter and clattering. There are gaps in the floorboards so that if I have a mind to I can lift back the rug and spy on them. I know that's the kind of thing I am capable of, that I'm keeping a tight rein on. I am being very careful, as though I'm carrying a sleeping baby that might at any time wake and start to scream. Even when I'm alone I can never put the baby down; it's difficult to relax, to
rest
, as Fred says. He must see how tense I am; he must worry that asking me here wasn't the most sensible thing to do; only the kind thing, the charitable thing, although he would swear he doesn't think of me in those terms.

He came to visit me at Easter, when I was almost as well as I am now, and told me I could live with them. ‘You could maybe help us out behind the bar. I could often do with a strong lad like you backing me up.' Lad. I suppose I am a child when I'm in the hospitals. Not a man, anyway.

The bedroom Fred has made over to me is quite large; there is space enough for a desk and an armchair, space for my books; I am really quite self-contained and can be alone whenever I want to be, although there is always noise from the bar and from the street. I don't mind this noise; there is life going on around me, and this makes me feel connected. And I do serve behind the bar, and there are fights occasionally and sometimes the drunks weep on my shoulder. Sometimes Lawrence Hawker comes in; he sometimes buys me a drink –
whatever you're having
, he says. He keeps an eye on me rather as Susie does. They are both curious, both of them wondering what my next move will be; Susie knows that I love Ann; Hawker only has his suspicions that I'm not to be trusted.

During the war Hawker would've addressed me as sir. ‘Yes, sir, Major, sir.' A snappy little captain, not a bad officer to have under one's command, if a little wearing perhaps. Now he doesn't call me anything, only tosses off his
whatever you're having
, not looking at me as he takes his change from his pocket, only looking when he thinks I'm busy elsewhere. Once I caught his eye in the mirror behind the bar and he didn't look away; I had the chance to study him as he had the chance to study me. He looks as though he has lost something, someone, perhaps, and that he can't quite understand why he can't get over this loss, him with his bright future ahead. I imagine telling Ann not to marry him, but for all I know Hawker might be the best of our generation: who of us hasn't lost something, after all?

I imagine telling Ann that I am sorry. I rehearse my apology in my head. I would go into Hawker's gallery where she works behind a desk he set up for her, displaying her like one of his works of art. I would pretend to be studying one of the pictures or a sculpture perhaps, and she would approach me, not realising for a moment that it was me, just another customer to charm into a sale. When I turn to face her she would step back; I imagine her hand going to her mouth to stop her exclamation escaping. And then my imagination runs out; I can't think of the words I would use. Sorry really doesn't seem good enough. I do imagine how lovely she is, but also that Hawker has polished her so that she is almost unrecognisable from the girl I knew. Susie refers to her as the Queen of Sheba and Fred catches my eye and shakes his head as if I know all about women and their talk. ‘She's just a nice lass who's done well for herself,' he says. Not a queen, then, not the beautiful astonishing woman who comes to me night after night after night so that I wake in a fever of desire. A nice lass; it's what my father would have called her, and he would have been as wrong as Fred is wrong.

The walls of this room are papered in a busy pattern of trellised roses and ivy. I could paint over this pattern, plain white, Fred wouldn't mind; he says I should do as I like. Paul's pictures would look better on a bare wall. A few weeks after I came here, a picture arrived from him of a boy lying in a meadow. Buttercups grew around him, gold strokes of paint dashed amongst the greens of the tall grass. A peaceful boy, a self-portrait. The letter he sent with this picture invited me to his home, an open invitation, he wrote. He wrote,
Patrick and I would be so pleased to see you
. He writes this often, although I think he knows it's a journey I'll never make. Hawker has invited him back here, he wrote, there'll be another exhibition of his work. He'll come to me, then, just as he always has.

I must have fallen asleep, because when I woke there was gramophone music playing in the bar and the sound of people laughing and talking a little too loudly, rather as though they were relieved: this is what wedding parties sound like when they are released from church, I'd recognise the sound anywhere; I could even feel the slap on the back, the hearty handshake from a bride's father,
Thank you, Father, lovely service, will you come back and have a drink with us, Father?
Not wanting me there, not really, weren't they to have a party, an unloosening of ties and collars? Some priests would have loosened their own collars too and drunk the good health toasts. I was too young, I think, too fervent.

I got up only to stand, tense and listening; I felt like a chanced-upon thief with no escape open to him. I could hide in my room or I could go downstairs and face them. My help would be needed; there would be plenty of drinkers to serve.

I turned and she was there, standing in my doorway.

‘Matthew.' She was hesitant, afraid. She carried a bouquet of white roses, cloud white against her sky-blue dress; their perfume filled the air between us. She glanced back down the stairs, turning to me again as I stepped towards her. ‘Matthew.' Very quickly she said, ‘Forgive me?'

I wanted to hold her, to toss those flowers aside and crush her to me. I only gazed at her, and I could feel myself shaking my head; I heard myself saying, ‘I should get down on my knees to you.'

‘No! No …' She laughed as though she might cry. ‘No. Matthew …'

I heard him coming up the stairs; I saw him; he stood behind her and put his arms around her waist and pulled her to him gently, all the time holding my gaze. Then he kissed her shoulder; he said, ‘Come downstairs, my darling girl.'

‘Yes, yes. I will...'

There were shouts from the bar, the bangs of popping champagne corks. I said, ‘Go back to your guests.' I smiled, bright as could be. ‘The pair of you shouldn't be up here.'

She turned and left the scent of her roses, and a feeling inside me that I could put the sleeping baby down for a little while.

The End