Vacant Possession

CHAPTER 6

Breakfast time again. Sylvia slapped some diet margarine onto a minute square of toast and slowly spread it out. “Do you know what I read? I read that women of my generation had four children because that’s how many the Queen had. Subconsciously, you see, we looked up to her as a role model. What do you think of that?”

“I’ve never heard such a load of tripe,” Colin said.

His wife sat ruminating for a moment; for it was Point 9 of her 12-Point Diet Plan to eat at a leisurely pace and make each mouthful last. “But it might be true, mightn’t it? I mean, a couple of years ago what would Suzanne have done? Straight off for a termination. But now…fertility’s the in thing.”

“I see what you’re driving at. You don’t find Princess Di nipping off to the abortion clinic, do you? You don’t find her popping out for a quick vacuum extraction.”

“Exactly.”

“There could be something in it.” Strange, Colin thought, how the preoccupations of the sane reflect those of the insane. And vice versa, of course.

At the second phone call Jim had softened his line a little. He had stopped offering Suzanne the money to terminate her pregnancy, and told her to do what she bloody well liked. Suzanne did not repeat his exact words to her parents, or his sentiments, even inexactly. She was convinced that once Jim had got over the immediate shock, he would rally round and have a serious talk with his mad wife about an imminent separation.

On Tuesday morning, when Muriel arrived to clean at Buckingham Avenue, she stepped inside and found the atmosphere instantly familiar. The curtains were not drawn back properly, and the place was half in darkness. Upstairs, a long shadow slid across the landing. She heard a door slam shut. Sylvia sat at the kitchen table, slumped over a cooling cup of coffee. “Help yourself,” she said. “The kettle’s just boiled. The milk’s sour, though.”

“You’re drinking milk, Mrs. Sidney?”

“Why not?” her employer said. “What does it matter? We’re all getting old. I’m not going to keep my figure, I’m just fooling myself.” Sylvia looked away. Her mouth was set in a thin hard line. “My daughter’s pregnant.” She propped her elbow on the table and sucked despondently at a thumb nail. “Lizzie, you haven’t got a fag on you, have you?”

“Oh no, Mrs. Sidney, I never touch them.”

“Don’t you?” Sylvia’s voice was dull. “I thought you had all the vices, duck.”

“Which one is it, Karen?”

“Christ no, she’s only thirteen.”

“They say you can never tell these days.”

“It’s true, you can’t. Better get to the shops, I suppose. Need anything?”

“No, but thank you all the same for asking. What a good woman you are, Mrs. Sidney! It’s a privilege to wash down your fitments.”

Sylvia smiled weakly. How odd the woman was. “But how could you be any other,” Lizzie asked. “Now that you see so much of the Reverend Teller? Oh, and by the way…”

Sylvia looked displeased now. “Yes?”

The daily was fishing in the pocket of her apron. “I saw Mr. Sidney, God bless him, he was rooting through the dustbin. Is this what he was after?” She held out her palm. On it were the two halves of a photograph. “Picture of Mrs. Jim Ryan,” Lizzie said.

“What?” Sylvia stared down at it, horrified. “Picture of who?”

“It’s a lady called Mrs. Ryan.” I’ve seen her at the hospital, she was going to add, but bit it back in time. Her night job was another life, wasn’t it?

Sylvia’s fingers trembled. She took the photograph from Lizzie. She tried to fit the halves together; the girl’s face, dreadfully bisected, stared back at her. There was a knowing look in each eye.

“It can’t be. You’ve got the name wrong.”

“Oh no, madam, I’m acquainted with this lady, I couldn’t make a mistake.”

“You’re quite sure? You’re quite positive, are you, who this is?”

“On my mother’s life.”

“There’s no need to go to that extreme,” Sylvia snapped. Her mind groped, very slowly, around the possibilities. “I want to know if you’re quite certain.”

“I told you. The old girlfriend, is she? Well, love makes the world go round, Mrs. Sidney. There’s only one reason the gentlemen keep pictures.”

“Shut up,” Sylvia said. “That has nothing to do with you.”

“Mr. Sidney seemed upset. Frantic, he was, throwing the rubbish about, got all yoghurt pots over his feet. I knew he was after it, but—” she gave Sylvia a broad wink—“us girls have got to stick together.”

I’d like to sack you on the spot, Sylvia thought; except that if we’re going to have a baby on our hands, I daren’t. “Now listen,” she said. “You don’t mention this to anyone, right? Not to Mr. Sidney. Not to Suzanne. Understand?”

“Clear as day.”

“So watch it.”

At least she doesn’t know the whole story, Sylvia thought. She’s put a name to the face, but she doesn’t know about the complications. And I won’t tell Colin I know; not yet, anyhow. “Go and do the bathroom,” she said. She looked down at the photograph again. It seemed to swim before her eyes. A sudden pain lanced through her right eye, her nose, her jaw. She was going to have a crashing migraine, any minute now.

Going up the stairs with her sponge and her bottle of nonscratch scouring cream, Muriel felt an intense gratification. There was no need to connive with destiny; the family were managing nicely for themselves. The air was choked with tension and spite, and on the landing all the doors were closed; it was just like Mother’s day. The children were locked in their rooms, sniffing glue and crying. From behind the doors came the soft sounds of breathing. It was nothing now but a matter of time. There would be strange pains in the dark bedrooms, despair in the breakfast room where Mother’s kitchen used to be. Food getting cold, food getting bad; soon the lightbulbs would go, and no one would bother to replace them. The bills would go unpaid, and dirty milk bottles would stand in a row on the sink. Sylvia’s hips would grow to 44 inches, as was their nature, and she would waddle and roll about the house, and hide when the doorbell rang. Just as Colin’s athletic joints would swell and crack with rheumatism, so autumn moisture would crack and swell the plaster and brick of the new kitchen extension. He would take to drink, perhaps lose his position. Sanctimonious Flo would be found out in some lewdness, and Suzanne’s untended child would wail from the back garden, bleating for the peace of the clouded water from which it came. The evergreens would grow, blocking out the light at the back of the house; foul necessities would incubate in the dark. Soon cracks would appear in the walls, and a green-black mould would grow along the cracks and spread its spores through the kitchen cupboards, through the wardrobes and the bedlinen. Given time, the roof of the extension would fall in. Where the lean-to had stood, the house would be open to the sky. Rubbish would fester uncollected, and the rat would be back. The girls, ostracised by society, would fall prey to crippling diseases. Alistair would be taken away to prison. No member of the household would fail to see their lives and motives laid bare. Their trivial domestic upsets would turn soon to confusion, abandonment, and rage. Acts of violence would occur; there would be bodies. Could they prevent it? She didn’t think so. There was Resurrection, in various foul forms; but what came after? Now Muriel’s rules were in operation, and the Sidneys were entirely in eclipse.

When Suzanne came downstairs at last, driven by hunger, Lizzie Blank said: “Don’t take on so. It happened to me once.”

“Did it?” Suzanne looked at her; she was interested. “I bet you’ve led quite a life.”

“Oh yes,” said Lizzie Blank. “A devastated charmer like me.”

“And what did you do?”

“I got rid of it.”

“That can’t have been so easy, when you were young.”

“No, but I had my mother to advise me. She knew all about that sort of thing.”

“Did you have a good relationship with your mother?”

“In ways.”

“I wish I had a good relationship with my mother. She’s trying to push me into an abortion, you know, but Jim and I want this baby. Didn’t you ever regret it, Lizzie?”

Lizzie thought for a moment. “I suppose I did. Not at the time. But nowadays I miss it. I reckon we’d have been two of a kind. And I need company.”

“That’s so honest of you, Lizzie. You’re…such an honest person.”

“I’d have liked to give it an inheritance. A lovely house like this.”

“Do you think this house is lovely? I hate it. It stifles me.”

“You’ll be out of it soon enough.”

“I’m going to get a flat or something, just till I get things sorted out with Jim.”

“Jim your intended, is he?”

“Oh yes. But he’s got to go through the divorce, you know. These things take time to sort out.”

“So you could be on your own till the baby’s born?”

“I hope not. I’m going to find a place, and he can move in with me as soon as he makes Isabel see sense. I mean, there’s no point in dragging out a failing marriage, is there?”

“None at all. Mind, his wife will stop in the house, you’ll need furniture, all that. Door furniture and fire irons I can get for you cheap, I have a friend. But I expect you’ll need a cooker, you won’t be able to afford to go out to restaurants.”

“No.” Suzanne looked bemused. “I expect I’ll need a cooker.”

“I’ve got money put away, you know. I can always let you have a loan.”

“Oh, that’s so sweet of you, Lizzie. But I hope I won’t need it.”

“Well, I like to oblige my friends. You’ll have to look in the paper for a place to rent. I got mine out of a window at the newsagent’s. But it wasn’t easy.”

“I know. There’s not a lot of accommodation about. It’s the same in Manchester, until I got my place in Hall I had to sleep on somebody’s floor. But you can’t do that with a baby.”

“You could always stop with me a bit, until you sort yourself out.”

“Oh, Lizzie.” Suzanne burst into tears. “I’m sorry, I can’t help it. To think that you should be so kind, when you’re almost a stranger and don’t know me at all, and my family who’ve known me all my life should be so horrible.” Impulsively she threw her arms around the daily woman and kissed her violently rouged cheek.

“The offer’s there,” Muriel said.

The last days of the summer term were worse this year than Colin remembered. There was the usual rush and muddle, the disorderly behaviour on the corridors; and then there was his mood. For three days running he lost his temper before Assembly; the days went downhill from there. He was churlish in the staff room, and was seen kicking the stencil machine. He lost an entire stack of reports—Form 3C’s—and they were turned up at last by one of the cleaners, who would surely reminisce about it for a year or more. He stayed late, signing them, tidying his desk, then lurked about in the staff lavatories, butting his head at a square of ill-lit mirror, trying to spot grey hairs. He couldn’t wait for the term to be over; though what ease, what leisure awaited him at home, better not to speculate. Better not to think too far ahead. He was conscious of an almost physical revulsion, a shrinking away, whenever he tried to imagine how his tangled circumstances might be unknotted. Even when school was let out and his pupils were set free to run amok down the High Street, he paced the empty corridors warily—echoes, white tiles—as if expecting an ambush.

Sylvia flew about the house, bossing the daily woman, nagging the children; she jangled her car keys and sprinted down the path. He tried to corner her, scrutinise her expression, lead her into conversational byways which would perhaps reveal what she made of the situation. Nine years ago she had been obtuse. Now social intercourse had sharpened her wits. Weekly at the Bishop Tutu Centre she listened to tales of human improvidence, criminality, and perversion. Nothing shocked her, she said. Let her only enquire too far into current events, and she might have to swallow her boast.

“Colin,” said Sylvia.

“Yes?”

“You ought to go and see this man Jim Ryan, and find out what’s going on.” She turned away, so that he couldn’t see her face.

Colin swallowed. “Where, at his home?”

“No, not at his home, Colin. At the bank.”

“Oh, but the fuss…at his place of work…”

“Is there going to be a fuss?”

“Well…that depends on his attitude.”

“Perhaps you’d rather I go?”

“No,” he said hurriedly, “no, Sylvia, I wouldn’t want that. I’ll deal with it. I promise you. We need to give Suzanne a little more time to come to terms with the reality of the situation. Then if she still insists that this man is going to set up house with her, I’ll do whatever’s needed—only please, Sylvia, let me do it in my own way.”

“You’re sweating, Colin.”

“The topic makes me uncomfortable.”

“Yes, I suppose it would.” He searched her face. “Perhaps I could ask Francis to talk to her,” she said.

“You can hardly ask a clergyman to talk her into an abortion.”

“Oh, Francis has some very modern attitudes. He’s full of common sense, you’d be surprised.”

Here we go, the same sickening conversational merry-go-round. Why doesn’t she take off with Francis, if that’s what she wants? I won’t stop her. And Suzanne should have Jim. And I should have Isabel. Even if it is some other Isabel; I should marry her for a penance, and for the sake of her name.

I think I’m going mad, Colin thought. And not a bad idea at that. Have the summer in a padded cell somewhere, and come home when it’s all over.

Francis—the Reverend Teller—came round just after midday. Claire was in the kitchen, making one of her cups of tea for Brownie Tea-Making Fortnight. Colin and Sylvia were preserving, between them, a strained silence. Colin noticed how his wife’s face brightened at the sight of Francis passing the kitchen window. She looked alert and keen, like someone ready to tackle a major social issue.

“Cup of tea?” Claire said.

“Why thank you, Claire, that’s kind. I’d rather have coffee, if it’s no trouble.”

“I don’t do coffee. Only tea.”

Sylvia got up. “Hello, Francis. I’ll get it. Claire, come from under my feet.”

“Don’t put yourself out,” said Francis in his relaxed way, which somehow implied that he was used to people putting themselves out but would waive his rights on this occasion. He was a solid man of forty-five, with blunt features and short cropped hair; despite his pacifist outlook, he was given to khaki clothing of military provenance, to ribbed sweaters with elbow patches, to epaulettes and complex trousers with pleated pockets buttoned on the thigh. When he laughed he showed pointed teeth which were unmistakably carnivorous. His whole person, Colin thought, exuded contradictions which were just too deep for hypocrisy and just too common for clinical schizophrenia.

“Hermione’s got us on the old camomile tea,” he said. “Gets it at the health-food shop. Must say I get a bit tired of it. Cup of Nescafé, strong, black, that’s the way I like it. Got any sweeteners?”

“How about sugar?”

“Oh, of course we have,” Sylvia said. “Colin, do you have to embarrass me?”

The phone rang in the living room. Karen answered it.

“Mum, it’s for you, it’s Meals on Wheels.”

“All right, I’m coming.”

“Try this,” Claire demanded, blocking her path and proffering a teacup. “Excellent, very good, or good?”

“I’m going to the phone, Claire. Give it to your father.” Sidestepping her daughter, she gave Francis a sidelong glance as she left the room.

“Francis, you’re an intelligent man,” said Colin.

“Yes?” said Francis guardedly.

“I have to ask you something. No, not now, Claire, put it down. Do you believe in coincidence?”

“Coincidence?” The vicar took his pipe out and sucked it. “Funny you should ask me that.”

Colin understood that the vicar had made a joke. A forced tremulous smile was his response. “No, but really?”

“I say, this is jolly good,” said the vicar, tasting Claire’s tea. “Of course I believe in it. Otherwise, when you were out on the street, you’d never see the same chap twice, would you?”

“Yes, well, that’s coincidence at its most basic level—”

“Oh, very basic,” the vicar agreed. “I say, what do I do now, fill in this mark sheet?”

“But I think I mean coincidence as a force, as an organising principle if you like, as an alternative set of laws to the ones we usually go by.”

“Oh, Jung,” said the vicar. “Where’s a pencil? I see, so I put this little tick in here…Synchronicity, eh? The old acausal connecting principle. Arthur Koestler, old J. W. Dunne. An Experiment with Time.”

“Yes, I know all that. But what do you think of it?”

“Murky waters,” said the vicar. He took his pipe out of his mouth and indicated with it; Hermione did not allow him tobacco. “Look here, let’s pinpoint this, Colin. What exactly is it that you’re asking me?”

“I don’t know. Please, Claire, no more tea. My life seems to be falling apart, or rather—well, reorganising itself on some new principle entirely.”

“For instance?”

“Oh, you know how it is. You have hopes, they’re disappointed. You put the past behind you, find a modus vivendi. Suddenly it’s under threat. The past seems to be the present. I look at the faces about me, some familiar, some not so familiar, and I imagine I can see echoes—shadows, I suppose you’d say—of other faces. The air seems to be full of allusions. I look at people and I imagine them to be thinking all sorts of things. I don’t know whether it’s reasonable or not.”

“I wish you could give me a more concrete example.”

“Cup number 27,” said Claire. “The milk’s smelling a bit funny again, never mind.”

“Well, all this about my mother…it’s as if she’s come back from the dead. It’s so unnatural to see somebody sit up like that and speak for the first time in years…it’s deeply sinister, it’s predictive, that’s what I feel.”

“Predictive of what?”

“I don’t know. I wish I did know, if I knew I could prepare us for it. Our lives have been quite calm, all considered, for the past ten years, as calm as they can ever be when there’s a young family growing up…. But now there’s something hanging over us.”

The vicar smiled; comfortable little pads, like hassocks, appeared beneath his chilly eyes. “Oh, come now, Colin. A touch melodramatic, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

“Things happen…they seem to have meaning, but they don’t. A while ago I was mowing the front lawn. It was a lovely day. I was enjoying myself. Suddenly there was a set of teeth staring up at me.”

“Teeth,” the vicar said. “Human teeth, Colin?”

“Yes, human teeth. Claire, I can’t drink this. The milk’s off.”

Claire burst into tears. “You’re supposed to put down for the tea, not the milk. How can I get to fifty cups if nobody will drink it?”

The vicar said, “I’m afraid it sounds like a classic case of…something unpleasant.”

“I’m glad you agree,” Colin said.

“So have you thought of, you know, seeing someone? A chap?”

Suzanne phoned up Jim’s house. Her heart fluttered wildly when she heard the ringing tone. There was a dull pain in the pit of her stomach, her throat was closed and aching. She wrapped her hand so tightly round the receiver that the nails turned white. All day she had been steeling herself to make the call. Again and again she had pictured it, rehearsed it in her mind. To make it easier for herself she had invented some superstitions and pegged them around her fear. I shall let it ring twenty times, and if after twenty times she does not answer I will be reprieved, and I can put the phone down with a clearer mind because it will be a signal that ringing her was not the right thing to do.

Between ring twelve and ring thirteen, the baby has grown a little, added a few cells to the person it will be. She sees herself relaxing her grip, replacing the receiver, walking away and out of the room to climb the stairs and lie on her bed. She closes her eyes. At the nineteenth ring, the phone is answered.

“Hello?”

Her voice sticks in her throat; comes out as a shrill little gasp. “Is that Isabel Ryan?”

“Yes, who’s that?”

“Don’t you know who I am?”

“I’m afraid not. Who are you?”

“It’s Suzanne Sidney.”

There was a long pause. She had expected it. She waited. There was no answer, but she had not heard the receiver replaced. Perhaps she had laid it quietly on a table and gone away. She could not imagine Jim’s house. He had never described it. She did not know where the phone was, in the living room or in the hall; or perhaps Mrs. Ryan was lying on her bed, talking over an extension, and the receiver now suffocated in Jim’s pillow. But somehow she sensed that Mrs. Ryan was still there; breathing, breathing quietly, gathering her wits. When the silence had gone on for a long time she said, “Do you know who I am?”

“Yes.” The woman’s voice sounded very far away. “Yes, I remember, I know who you are.”

Suzanne waited. Then she said, “I think we ought to meet.”

“You want us to meet? Why?”

“I should have thought it was obvious. We have things to talk about.”

“I can’t imagine what things. Suzanne, how old are you now?”

“I’m eighteen. Don’t you know?”

“I couldn’t remember. I’m not sure that I ever knew your age exactly.”

“What do you know about me?”

“Not much.”

“Aren’t you curious?”

“Suzanne, is something wrong?”

“I’m pregnant.”

“I see, and are you…distressed about that?”

Mrs. Ryan’s voice had a strangely detached, professional note; as if the whole thing had nothing to do with her. What a cold woman she must be, Suzanne thought. Everything Jim has said is true.

“No, I’m not distressed.” She licked her dry lips, tasting their salt. “I’m rather proud, actually. I just need to talk the situation out with you.”

“Well…that’s all right, I suppose.” She sounded puzzled. “Have you talked to other people about this? Your father?”

“Oh, he thinks I should have an abortion. Nobody seems to understand.”

“You certainly should have proper counselling before you make your decision.”

“I want to meet you. Alone, or all three of us, it doesn’t matter. I think we ought to talk this out.”

“Suzanne—no, calm down now—I can’t think what to say, this has come upon me out of the blue. You see, how can I advise you? I don’t know you at all. I suppose he’s told you that I was a social worker…but really I can’t imagine what he’s told you.”

“He’s told me a lot. Everything that matters.”

“But there’s nothing left between us. It’s been over for years.”

“That’s exactly what he said.”

“Oh, so you think that an uninvolved person could help to sort out your problem?”

“You’re hardly uninvolved.”

“Look, have you tried the British Pregnancy Advisory Service? Their number must be in the book—”

“How can you be so callous? That would be very convenient for you, wouldn’t it, if I got rid of it? You don’t know how it feels, because you’ve never had any children.”

There was a silence. She sensed that Isabel was deeply shocked by her remark. Perhaps she had gone too far; though it was no more than the truth. After a long time, the woman spoke.

“Suzanne, listen carefully. Much as I regret the situation in which you find yourself, I don’t see how I can help you. What you do doesn’t matter to me, one way or the other. And even what your father thinks, that can’t matter now. I have troubles of my own.” She hesitated; a long hesitation. “Perhaps in some way I’m missing the point?”

“I think you’re missing it by a mile.” Fright made Suzanne aggressive. “You do know who I am, don’t you? You do know about our relationship?”

“We’re not related,” Isabel said. “What on earth do you mean?”

“Oh, very clever,” Suzanne said. Her voice was shrill with exasperation. “He did tell me about you, how crazy you were, how you didn’t give a damn for anybody but yourself.”

“He said that?”

“And more. He said he sometimes wished he’d never set eyes on you.”

Another pause. “Yes, I see. Well, I don’t really need to know this. Not at this juncture. Goodbye.”

Click. She had rung off. The bitch, Suzanne thought; the monster. Jim had not told her then. He had not told her there was going to be a baby. Unless she did know, and was trying to ride it out. There was something very strange about the woman’s attitude altogether. Perhaps she was just one of those people who never face up to anything until they have to. Immediately she picked up the phone again and rang Jim at the bank. She asked to be put through to the assistant manager. He answered at once.

“Suzanne? I thought we agreed you weren’t to call me at work?”

“Yes. We did.”

“I told you: let me call you.”

“But you never do, Jim.”

“No. Well…”

“I rang up your house just now.”

“That was silly.”

“Why silly?”

“I gave you that number for…emergencies.”

“Emergencies.” Suzanne digested the word. “I spoke to Isabel,” she said.

Jim swore softly. There was silence for a moment. The line crackled.

“Your wife…I’m not sure if she’s very stupid or very clever. She didn’t seem to know about the baby.”

“She does now, I take it.”

“Of course.”

“Suzanne, get off the line. The switchboard will be listening in.”

“All you care about are appearances.”

“Appearances are all I’ve got,” Jim said. “I’m ringing off now. I’ll be in touch.”

Suzanne put down the phone. She trailed upstairs.

Isabel lay on the bed, her head turned sideways on the pillow, watching the telephone as if it were alive. She felt sick; she didn’t know if it were the phone call, or what she had drunk that morning. It’s not often you get a call like that.

So that’s what Colin thinks of me. Why did he talk about me at all then? What combination of circumstances made him confide in that hysterical teenager? And how did she get my number?

Her mind moved slowly, very slowly, in smaller and smaller circles. One day I ought to call Colin, and ask him how the past is catching up. Compared to her, he had nothing on his conscience. Errors personal, errors professional…memory with violence. Like a series of snapshots, or outline drawings, flip them through at speed and watch them move…Daddy slinking home from the park, Muriel Axon with her idiot head lolling above her strange blue smock. She suspected, and didn’t let herself suspect; she had made connections, and tried to break them. She had punished herself; but of course that would never be enough.

She wasn’t joking when she said she had troubles of her own. She smoothed her hand down over her body. It was all most unusual. There was nothing inside her but her liver, getting harder and harder. It was a horrible death, people said; but then it was a horrible life, wasn’t it? She ought to be able to feel it, a tender mass expanding just below the margin of her ribs. Everybody knows what happens to people who harbour guilt; they get malignant diseases, and die. Not just little Suzanne who was pregnant. She had carried the weight around for ten years. Now it was becoming visible, that was the difference.

On Friday Suzanne went down to the Housing Aid Centre. She took some magazines to wile away her time, and a box of tissues, because she knew that she would keep crying every few minutes. She could no longer do anything about this; it was as if a tap had been turned on inside her head.

Yesterday she had told her mother that she saw no point in going back to university in the autumn. That had precipitated another row. She expected her father to see the sense of what she was saying because at least he knew something about education, and he could have confirmed how difficult it would be for her to go on studying. But her father seemed afraid of her mother nowadays. He didn’t want to offend her. Mum had said that she needn’t think she was going to mope about the house getting more and more pregnant, waiting for this man who was probably never coming. Claire had made her a cup of tea, and she had knocked it over in temper and fright. The atmosphere in the house was poisonous. As she ran upstairs again she had seen Lizzie Blank watching her; the look of speculation on the woman’s face had been quickly replaced by an expression of sympathy and concern, and immediately she bent down, scrabbling under the hallstand with her dustpan and brush. The vacuum cleaner had packed up, the tumble dryer had broken, and the iron was overheating; perhaps there was something wrong with the wiring? Wiring? her father said: I haven’t had the estimates for redecorating the kitchen yet, do you think I’m made of money? She began to cry again, at the look Lizzie Blank gave her, at this evidence of compassion from a total stranger.

At the Housing Aid Centre she sat for two hours in a waiting room surrounded by mothers with children. The women were pallid and harassed; each one of them was hung about by three or four plastic carrier bags. Although it was the height of summer, they wore great cardigans. She could not take her eyes off these cardigans; sagging and shapeless, hanging almost to their knees, or shrunken and felted and standing stiffly away from the narrow bodies inside them. Some of them wore jeans, others wore summer frocks with gaping plimsolls on their feet. Their hair hung in rat’s tails, they had spots around their mouths, some of them sported tattoos. They made her feel an uneasy guilt, as if she had somehow been transported to the Third World. Some were heavily pregnant, some had babes in arms; they all had a couple of toddlers, running about the room, sucking from bottles or trainer cups, crumbling biscuits in their sticky hands. Every few minutes the one called William fell over, bashing his head on the corner of the table which stood in the centre of the room. Their mothers watched them with lacklustre eyes, unable or unwilling to check them. They climbed over the women’s legs, snivelling and bawling; one of them took Suzanne’s Spare Rib and tore it apart like a circus strongman. Suzanne didn’t protest. She felt it was no use to her anyway. “Give over with that, Tanya,” the child’s mother said, “give it back to the lady,” but she didn’t move from her position, slumped forward on the metal stacking chair, her legs splayed in front of her and her eyes on the floor. No one spoke to Suzanne. She felt conspicuous. She should have padded herself with a cushion or something. The Centre’s workers scampered about with paper cups of coffee, light-footed and glowing in their seersucker flying suits and their rainbow-coloured trainers.

“So just let me get a note of this,” her worker said at last. “Lavatories two, bath, shower. Kitchen, lounge, breakfast room, utility, bedrooms four, okay?”

“But I can’t live there. That’s my parents’ house.”

“Well, it does seem to be the most viable option, I’m afraid.”

“I’ll take anything you have to offer.”

“But we couldn’t offer anything, you see, on the basis of what you’ve told us. Not unless they throw you out. And it’s no good colluding on that, we’d have to have proof, and unless you were actually out on the street with the baby, there wouldn’t be anything we could do.”

“I suppose I should have given Manchester as my address. I only had a room in a hall of residence, and I haven’t even got that now, so you’d have had to find somewhere for me.”

“In that case we’d have sent you back to Manchester. We’d give you your fare.”

“It’s impossible, isn’t it?”

The girl shrugged minutely.

“I mean, those women out there, some have got two babies, and they all seem to be pregnant again. Why do they have so many children?”

“Because for children,” the girl said patiently, “you get Points.”

Charge Nurse Toynbee was just going off as Poor Mrs. Wilmot reported for duty. “Cheerybye,” she said, snuffling. “Have a lovely weekend, won’t you?”

“What about you, Mrs. Wilmot? On the razzle?”

“Shouldn’t be surprised,” she said, wheezing and sniffing, laughing her soundless laugh. “Course with me knees I don’t go dancing, but I enjoy meself all the same.” She went off down the corridor for her metal bucket and her mop.

Standing in the recess by the patients’ bathrooms, near B Ward (Male), she watched Mr. Field’s visitors leaving. His daughter looked paler than ever, shocked and wary. Her clothes were disordered; she was wearing a strange red anorak, smeared with oil, that could have belonged to her husband. She strode down the corridor; her husband scurried after her, his expression abject. He too was pale; his eyes seemed unfocused, as if he had been drinking. But it was only just after seven. Mrs. Ryan swept open the firedoors and passed through. Her face was set; she was a woman who had been disabused of one monstrosity, only to be presented with another. In the corridor beyond she started to run. Her shoes squealed on the corridor floor. Her husband swore, and broke into a trot. At the other side of the firedoors he stopped. He turned, and looked back through the smeary plastic panel. He hesitated, then began to walk back uncertainly to where the cleaner was standing, a bucket and a bottle of Pine-O-Shine in her hand. “Who are you?” he said.

“Me?” the despondent greyish face looked up at him. “I’m Mrs. Wilmot. I do cleaning.”

“Do you know my wife?”

“Your wife? Oh no, Your Worship.”

“What?” said Mr. Ryan.

“I said, oh no, Your Worship.”

“She thought you were watching us. She said there was something familiar about you.”

“Familiar?” The old woman looked scared and aggrieved. “I wouldn’t be familiar.”

“She thought she’d seen you before.”

“Yes, course, sir, because I clean here.”

“Yes, of course you do. She’s got herself worked up, as usual. My apologies.”

Mrs. Wilmot blinked; a single rheumy tear began a slow path down her left cheek towards her chin. “Oh, look now, I didn’t mean to upset you. I wasn’t accusing you of anything.”

“You was.” Mrs. Wilmot’s voice quavered. “Theft, cheating, familiarity. Spying on you. I’ll tell the charge nurse. There’s tribunals. I’m entitled.”

“Look, no one’s accused you of theft, don’t be silly.” Looking uneasy, Mr. Ryan dug into his pocket and shuffled some small change into the cleaner’s palm. “Why don’t you…get yourself a cup of tea, or something?”

“Stout’s what I have,” said Mrs. Wilmot. “Sweet sherry.”

“Yes, I see. Please don’t upset yourself. Look…here you are.”

Mrs. Wilmot bit off a tearful wail. “Brandy Alexandras.” Mr. Ryan fled along the corridor after his wife.

“That dirty old Field’s son-in-law accused poor Mrs. Wilmot of spying on his wife,” said the Night Sister. “He accused her of stealing from his wife’s handbag. And being drunk on the ward.”

“Honestly,” said the student. “She’s only just got over her Sexual Harassment at Work. Poor Mrs. Wilmot, imagine. She ought to sue him.”

“Bloody relatives,” said Sister, “coming in here once a month and throwing their weight about. Salt of the earth, Poor Mrs. Wilmot. That blasted Field is a menace to womankind, if he pegged out tonight, I wouldn’t touch him, I tell you: I’d leave him for the day shift.”

“You do that anyway,” the student said, earning a dirty look. “Mrs. Wilmot,” she called out, “are you going to help us with the Horlicks?”

Mr. Field, his breathing stertorous, was propped up on a bank of pillows. “Another upset,” he said. “Stupid girl, my daughter, always whinging on about something or other, never listens.” He coughed hoarsely. “She’s had another row with that wimp she married, sounds as if he’s been getting a bit on the side. I was telling her what I wanted on my headstone, but she wasn’t taking it in.”

“Here’s your Horlicks. Looking forward to dying, are you?”

“If I don’t make arrangements, nobody will. I was thinking about a verse for the paper.” He leaned over to open the drawer of his bedside locker. The Reporter shook a little in his hand. “Here’s one I like:

We shed a tear although we know

Our dad is now at rest;

God wanted him for an angel and

He only takes the best.”

“You don’t really think you’re going to die,” Muriel said. She stood at the end of the bed, her colourless eyes fixed on his face. “You think you’re going to hang around for months, putting your hand up nurses’ skirts. You’d do it to your own daughter if she’d let you.”

“It’s not right,” the old man said. “I should have grandchildren to put in a verse for me. My daughter hates me. She wished me in hell. That’s not right, is it?”

“I could come and see your grave,” Muriel said. “Me and my little mite.” She approached the old man, peering down at him myopically. “I’ve got an idea about that. Just the bones of a scheme.”

“Or this one,” said Mr. Field, ignoring her.

“He went with ne’er a backward glance,

And ne’er a complaining sigh:

He knows he will see his dear ones again

In the heavenly bye-and-bye.”

“I’m a changeling,” Muriel said. “Did you know that, when you did it with me in the park? I’m not a human thing.”

“Whatever’s that?” said Mr. Field, coughing. “What’s a changeling when it’s at home?”

“It’s a substitute. It’s what gets left when the human’s taken away. It’s a dull-brained thing, always squawking and feeding. It’s ungrateful. It’s a disappointment to its mother.”

“How you talk,” Mr. Field said, showing his gums. “How about a kiss and cuddle?”

“Don’t you laugh. A changeling’s nothing to laugh at if you found one in your house. My mother didn’t have the wit to drown me. If you throw them in some water you sometimes get your own baby back, but she didn’t do that and so she had to put up with me. A changeling’s a filthy thing. It’s got no imagination.”

“Well,” Mr. Field said, “it must be an uncommon condition.”

“It’s not uncommon. You see them on the street. You have to know what to look for, that’s all.”

“Not much you can do about it, then?”

“A changeling’s a cruel thing. It likes its own company. It likes its own kind. I thought if I had my little changeling back, we’d suit very well.”

“Oh yes?”

“So I thought,” said Muriel, sitting down on the bed, breathing hard, “if I could get a loan of a baby, just an ordinary one, I could try the trick in reverse. Throw in the changeling and get a human; throw in the human, and get a changeling.”

“You’re touched,” Mr. Field said. “I’ve never heard of this before. It’s horrible.”

“A changeling can’t talk.”

“But you can talk. You’re talking now.”

“I learned it from other people. Everything I know, I learned from other people. I want to give my child a better life. Well, it’s natural.”

“Your child’s dead,” Mr. Field said in alarm. “That’s what you told me.”

“I don’t know if changelings do die. Anyway, there’s resurrection. Leave that to me to worry about.”

“Where are you going to get a baby? You’re tapped. You ought to be locked up. I’ve never heard anything so morbid. Get off my bed. I’ll ring for the nurse.”

“Nurse won’t come. Nurse never comes.”

“Look here,” Mr. Field said, “you wouldn’t do me a mischief, would you?” Suddenly he had turned cold; his eyes were glazing, he trembled a little, and dribbled from the corner of his mouth.

“Save me the trouble,” Muriel said indifferently. “Your nose is turning blue, old cock. I think your heart’s giving out. What does it feel like?” She waited. The room filled with his laboured breathing. “I’ll do you a verse,” Muriel said. “Our daddy’s life is ended, No use to wail and blub, Let’s toss him in his coffin, And all go down the pub.” Leaning forward, she knitted her fingers into the front of the old man’s pyjama jacket. “If God has called our daddy, We’d better come to terms, By squatting at his graveside, And cheering on the worms.”

Mr. Field gaped up at her, his mouth opening slowly. No sound came out. Muriel flung back the bedcovers and with one movement haled him out of bed and onto the floor. He landed with a dull thud, and lay looking up at her, his legs kicking feebly. For a few moments longer his mouth continued to open and shut. Muriel sank her thick neck into her shoulders, assumed a mournful expression, sniffed once, and walked out of the room, closing the door quietly. When the Night Sister did her rounds, Mr. Field was cooling rapidly: the surgical scissors she had armed herself with were not necessary. She summoned the student to help her heave him back onto the bed, and then left him as she had promised, to be laid out by the early morning shift.

Mr. Kowalski, too frightened now to keep to any observable routine, had given up his evening shift at the factory. He spent much of his day sitting fearfully by the stove, compiling his book of idioms. At night he took a turn round the block, keeping his eyes peeled. He was lonely, he said, and hungry for love. These sad nocturnal promenades were his only diversion. Mornings, he dozed off.

A letter came, pushed under the door. There was a rude message from the postman, saying would they please unseal the letter box, having regard to his bad back, who did they think he was, Olga Korbut? Muriel picked it up. It was addressed to one of her, to Lizzie Blank. Good thing Mr. K. didn’t see it. He’d have thought it was a letter bomb, or something. She sneaked it off upstairs.

After work that night she went off to Crisp’s to get into her Lizzie costume and meet her new beau. If she was a bit late, he wouldn’t have to bother about that; she would explain that she worked evenings and had been kept later than usual. She was fresh and spry for dancing, ten-pin bowling, whatever he had in mind; it wasn’t as if her work tired her. But would they hit it off? That was the question. Under her wig, under her make-up, she could guarantee that no one would know her from a human being.

But as it worked out, she was very disappointed by the young man from the dating agency. At the pub where he had arranged to meet her, he towered above the other customers; his height was all of six foot seven inches, and his long thin face was as morose as Poor Mrs. Wilmot’s. People made remarks as they ordered their round. Muriel thought they should have gone to the Rifle Volunteer, where she was known and known to be dangerous.

“Clyde’s my monicker,” the giant said. “What I always say is, Clyde’s my name, confectionery’s my game.” He laughed gratingly, but when he looked her over his face fell. “You’re not six foot two,” he said. “I’ve been done.”

“So?” Her voice was flat. “You want to make something of it?”

You could tell that Clyde was not used to threats. Distressed, he sat over his pale ale, cracking his knuckles in a thoughtful way. “No, I’ve thought it over, you’ll do,” he said at last. “I’m not that bothered about the height. What I really wanted was a bird with big knockers but they don’t give you a space for that on the form. Here, I’ve brought you something.” He thrust two enormous fingers into his breast pocket, and produced a shrivelled rosebud, its leaves curling and its head almost severed from the stem. “Single red rose,” he said. “It’s romantic. My last girl was always hinting for me to buy her one. They think you’re mean in the shop. They expect you to have a bunch.”

“Who was your last girl?” Lizzie asked. “Somebody from a circus?”

“Now don’t take on,” Clyde said. “Here, they’re calling last orders, and I’ve hardly wet my whistle. Your round.”

In the scramble for last orders, several customers tripped over Clyde’s legs. He cursed them horribly. “I may as well tell you now,” Lizzie said, “you won’t do for me. I like manners.”

“I’ve a good job,” Clyde insisted. “Fancy cakes to customers’ requirements. I’m highly thought of. Every year I do a butter sculpture for the Rotarians’ dinner dance.” Lizzie shook her head. “Well, we’re not packing it in yet. I’ve paid out hard-earned money for this introduction. I can see you’re just my type. I could really take a fancy to you.”

Lizzie was adamant. Clyde’s morosity deepened. “Have a heart,” he said. “You’re the first bird I’ve really had a chance with. It’s not good for me to be rejected, it gives me complexes. I’ll follow you,” he warned. “I’ll track you down. I’m very loyal. You’ll never shake me off.”

“If you follow me, I’ll call a policeman.”

“I bet you would,” Clyde said. “I bet some of them policemen are customers, eh? If you’re not a pro, why do you dress like one, eh? Women like you shouldn’t apply to agencies. You could be liable for it, you put down your wrongful employ. You put you was medical, bet you’ve never been near a hospital in your life. Except down the clap clinic.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Lizzie Blank said with dignity. “I’m leaving. You can drink my drink if you like.”

“Oh, come back,” Clyde said. “Come back. I really like you, you know.”

But Lizzie swung the door back in his face, and stepped out alone into the street.

It was Sunday teatime. Florence brought her shortbread round; and her thoughts.

“Girls manage,” she said. “Girls today are independent. There’s no stigma any more.”

“Nobody said there was stigma,” Sylvia said levelly. “Nobody mentioned it. But we’ve got to think about her future.”

“What about the baby?” Florence cried excitedly. “Isn’t that entitled to a future too? It may not be very convenient for you, Sylvia, it may not fit into your plans, but it’s a question of the sanctity of life.”

“If you say that phrase once more,” Sylvia said, “I’ll pick up this shortbread and force it piece by piece down your throat until you choke.”

“There’s no need for that,” Florence said composedly. “I’m entitled to speak my mind. And it’s no good telling me that I don’t know Life, Sylvia. We at the DHSS know all about hardship. From behind our counter we see human existence in the raw. You can’t tell me anything.”

“I can never understand it,” Colin said. “You people who are against abortion and euthanasia are always against artificial insemination and surrogate mothers as well. I don’t know what your position is. Do you want more people in the world, or don’t you?”

“I think you’re being just a teeny bit frivolous, Colin,” Florence said. “I’ve nothing at all against artificial insemination. For cows. The point I’m trying to make is that even if this young man doesn’t want to marry Suzanne—and she can hardly expect him to up and leave his poor wife—then there’s no reason why she shouldn’t have the baby and bring it up herself. Lots of people do it. They always have.”

“I wish you’d stop discussing me,” Suzanne said. “It’s my choice and I’ve made it. Leave me alone. I want to be on my own.”

“Do you?” Sylvia said. “I’ve got news for you. You will be, love—whether you want it or not.”

Colin went into the living room. He threw himself into a chair and switched on the TV. His daughter followed him. “Do you know what Jim says now?” she demanded.

“No, but I can see that you’re going to tell me.”

“He says he’s got to stay with Isabel because she’s on the point of a nervous breakdown. Her father’s just died and she’s gone all to pieces about it. She says she wished him dead so she’s to blame.”

“Her father?” Colin sat up. “What was he called?”

“How do I know? Dad, whenever I ask you for any help all you do is ask the most irrelevant questions. This woman Isabel, I could tell she was mad when I talked to her on the phone.”

“You talked to her on the phone? What did you do that for?”

“I thought we might meet and talk things over.”

“Did you tell her your name?”

“What do you mean? Of course I did.”

“What did she say?”

“Look, don’t get all excited, Dad, I know you think it was the wrong thing to do, but put yourself in my shoes. I told you, she sounded crazy. She didn’t seem to know what I was talking about.”

“Perhaps Jim hadn’t told her about you.”

“I thought that…but if he hadn’t, how would she have known my name at all? It was as if she knew me—do you know what I mean?—in another context entirely.”

Colin fell back into his chair and stared at the TV. It was an early evening variety show. To the accompaniment of facetious patter, a magician held up a burning spike and passed it slowly through the forearm of his studio volunteer. The audience applauded. The magician withdrew the brand, and held it flickering aloft. The volunteer’s face wore a set, worried smile. There was an expectant hush; a roll of drums; and then the magician, with great deliberation, whipped the flame through the air and poked it cleanly through his victim’s chest.