The Summerhouse

(published 1988 Century Hutchinson)

That’s a nice dress. You ought to dress up like that more often.’

It was June 1973. Marianne had changed in the office prior to going out with Simon and Tony in the evening. She had removed the scarf in which her hair had been tied all day and Mags had hardly recognized her when she had re-emerged back into the office from the ladies with her hair rippling in a pre-Raphaelite mass, having unwound the tiny plaits into which she had put it the night before. Now, she was standing in a silk crepe navy blue dress, a fifties model that emphasized her slenderness, her delicacy, and the navy blue make-up she had put around her eyes, like kohl, had brought out strange lights in them. She had a red silk camellia in her hair. Mags was not fanciful, but she thought that Marianne looked like a mermaid, she thought that she looked lovely.
‘So who’s the lucky man?’
‘It’s just Simon and Tony. We’re going out to eat.’
‘You haven’t been short of outings since they went to live with you. Tony going back to Ireland yet?’
‘No, no. I think he’s decided to stay on a bit longer.’ She felt distanced from Mags, from the office, even the excitement of Mags’s wedding, the disappointment when the place the couple were going to live in at Ilford fell through so they had to put up at Mags’s parents, all that now seemed remote. The summer evening was calling outside the office window. A soft breeze was blowing in. The hem of her crepe dress was gently rustling round her legs. She could smell the scent of the summer air in her nostrils. She could feel the breeze softly touching her skin. She moved and her silver bracelets jangled as she lifted her arm to push back the now thick rippling hair.
‘Hmm. Men don’t always stick with their girlfriends you know. Out of sight out of mind.’ Mags thought Marianne vague enough, unaware enough, to miss out where opportunity was obviously presenting itself. She wasn’t at all bad done up like that, in fact Mags suspected she had no idea just how good.
‘Oh, it’s not like that between us.’ She suddenly felt sorry, sorry she had to hide the truth from Mags. ‘I hope you have a nice evening as well.’ She smiled, turned on the heel of her delicate shoe and left the room. As she emerged out of the office building into the City street she stood poised one moment, motionless, breathing in deep gulps of freedom. The summer evening air and even the petrol fumes, mingling into the pink sky of evening, reeked of adventure, of excitement, of myriad unknown worlds that beckoned.

 

‘ ba ba, ba ba, ba…’

The old sixties song ‘I saw her standing there’ blared through the huge cavern of which the club consisted. It was underground, like a vast cellar, with shadowy pillars framing the wide, stone- flagged dance area. Niches interspersed the pillars and in their half-gloom blase men lounged, sat, drank, talked, flirted, observed, or surveyed superciliously the dancing couples. Round the edges of the dance floor solitary men prowled or posed against the pillars, young men in the main, beautiful men, and even those who were not beautiful in this setting appeared to be so. It was partly the candlelight in the recesses, hidden whispers and bursts of mocking laughter, dim silhouettes in the alcoves which only identified themselves on close approach. It was partly the flares contained in the thirties-style, shell-shaped wall lamps attached to the pillars, the only decorative touch in that cavelike meeting ground.

The flares cast flickering lights on the sand that had been sprinkled on the floor, illuminated for a moment the profile of one of the dancers, shot long dark shadows up over the vaulted stone roof like elongated, clutching fingers. They gave a witchy feel to the echoing cavern, as though damp drops would form and fall from the fingertips of those dark shadows, turning to dagger-like stalactites, thick as a wrist, hundreds over the whole dim ceiling. Then suddenly the stalactites would be let down, attached to an iron mesh grill, and pierce the hearts and entrails of the dancers, leaving them maimed and groaning on the cavern floor, as Nero had suffocated his guests with rose petals. They were like rose petals, these dancers, these guests. They were indeed more beautiful, more imaginative in their dress, in their style, in their gesture, than most young Englishmen of the time. There was a sensuality, a sense of gathering roses before the hand of time plucked them first, the grim reaper struck them down.

Stalagmites would rise from the earth on the deserted cellar floor in years to come and green lichen cover the base of the pillars where rivulets of damp ran down. The young ghosts of men now old, some dead, some eking out the end of their lives in lonely Bayswater flats, forgotten, alone – the young bodies of these men still dance in the cavern, condemned to dance for ever to that same, unchanging music, but the music that had led the dance of sex is now the music of death, the danse macabre, for all is static, unchanging there. Only on closer observation does one see that the bodies which have never lost their flexibility, their elasticity, their energy, are transparent. They glide through the stalactites as they dance, and on their shoulders sit grinning skulls. Death the grim reaper.

That old man you see, his pocket handkerchief, too carefully, too precisely placed, displayed, that old man who takes his solitary walk, leaning on his stick, with impeccable regularity every day and sips his cup of coffee in a cafe in one of the streets off the Bayswater Road, watching the world go by, that old man danced in the cellar. Now his eyes are too dim and his routines too stifling and physically painful for him to remember the club other than in occasional glimpses, as of a memory of someone other than himself, so distanced is it now by time. Yet still his young self dances there.

To the song ‘You’re so vain’ Tony was dancing, his head flung back from the throat, his arms raised before him. He was dancing with Marianne, but really he was dancing alone, dancing to his own beauty, his youth, dancing to defy the hand of time of which he was more aware than either Marianne or Simon. He would drink of the pink champagne, effervescent, evanescent moments, while they lasted. This mattered far more to him than sex. He was to be desired to the ultimate whilst he was still desirable. The last pink dregs in the silver chalice would run down his throat, for this was his genius and he knew it. His strongest asset in the dance of life was to be desired and to hold entranced those who desired him. The light from one of the flares fell on the gold hints in his hair, on the loose, white, fine cotton shirt, on his natural dancer’s movements. He was hypnotic, at one with the music, the dance, the self-display, the thorned crown of pink roses placed on his head.

Marianne could not keep up with him. She returned to their table in the alcove. Simon was sitting bolt upright, his tight black t-shirt throwing into contrast the ivory pallor of his skin and the dark hair and eyes.

Marianne chatted and then fell silent, she and Simon watching the dance floor. He thought how elegant Marianne had looked this evening, how beautifully the crepe dress had hung and how fetching was the camellia in her hair. He thought she should be lying on a bed of crushed rose-petals, the scent and blossoms drifting over her, dreamlike, lambent, the sleeping princess.

There were only two other women in the club, which was packed with at least a hundred men. He could not imagine a more perfect woman for him and Tony to live with than Marianne, charming, delicate, unobtrusive, pretty, and though she had her moments against Tony, they adored each other – too much so he sometimes thought, but he did not feel threatened by it, knew Tony too well, had no illusions despite his love for him.

He and Tony did not see the world in the same way. Simon’s world was essentially the ancien regime with all its mores and its beliefs. His attitude was religious, passionately moral, but laid little store by the individual, placed far more importance on the higher order of things, the wider sphere, and his love of ancient music was like listening as of old to the singing of the spheres. Though he saw Tony as an individual, very clearly and shrewdly, without illusions, yet it was almost the symbolic content of Tony with which he was impassioned, the archetypal quality of the perfection of his beauty. It made no difference what the characteristics of Tony’s personality were. These had their own puzzlement and fascination to be sure, but acted at times as a deflection from the deeper significance of Tony, of what he stood for.

Tony was aware that his significance to Simon was of deeper import than Simon’s significance to him. But then Tony would have said of himself that he used his charm, his mind, his movements, to evoke that very response, to be the symbol of desire, the one who was loved. He was very fond of Simon, loved him as much as he was capable of loving any man but at times he felt deep concern, almost guilt, at the depths of Simon’s feelings towards him. Simon had not really said how he felt, but Tony knew. He had guessed. He knew he did not invest the relationship with the same importance, or rather the importance of the relationship was different for him. It was perhaps more ephemeral, not so permanent in his mind, though he had never considered leaving in the future. He had not really worked out the future.

As Marianne watched Tony dance she realized that he was dancing unto himself, individual, self-contained, but above all free and for the first time she wondered if he ever felt constricted by the set-up. Previously, she had been too dependent on it, too terrified it would let her down, disappear, to have the detachment for this to occur to her. Now she wondered. She looked at Simon sitting next to her, silent, upright, watching Tony. She could not gauge what he was thinking and it suddenly struck her that he was very alone.

 

‘Want to dance?’
They were there again at the club a month or so later, Simon and she sitting together at a table. The stranger was remarkably good looking. She thought he must be teasing her.
‘Oh no,’ she laughed.
‘I mean it. I think you’re lovely. Come and dance.’
She shook her head, smiling. But he was so charming she regretted it an instant later. Perhaps he had not been joking.
Tony raced up from the dance floor, a fluster of feathers.
‘Who was that? What did he want?’ Suspicious, edgy.
‘He wanted to dance with me.’
Tony laughed, visibly relieved. Clearly, despite his lone dancing, he had kept a watchful eye on Simon. He was not going to have him snatched from under his nose. ‘You should have. You might have enjoyed it.’
She stuck her tongue out at him and they all laughed, but she felt hurt that he hadn’t minded, hadn’t felt threatened by the possible loss of her. Suddenly she felt excluded by them, the single person with the couple. She suddenly felt insecure.

 

We’re moving into another house.’

It was October and Mags and she were spending Mags’s last afternoon in the office before her leaving drink, chatting. Mags was leaving earlier than intended because the baby she was carrying had nearly been lost and she was suffering from high blood pressure. Marianne had been really surprised. One had somehow assumed Mags was bound to have an easy, straightforward pregnancy. It did not seem to fit with this healthy young woman, would have been more in the line of expectation for herself. She had realized for the first time that nature played odd tricks in this way. A slip of a girl could bear a child with ease whilst a stocky woman reminiscent of Brueghel’s painting of a peasant dance could prove infertile. It was a mystery and one she had brooded on initially. But her life was too exciting at the moment, too much a whirl for her to brood on anything for long.

She was still on a high from her summer holiday, which had been the peak, the highpoint of the relationship between the three of them. She had not yet faced the reality of moving out of her marital home, of dragging up her roots. It was like the convolvulus in her garden with its white fluted flowers; though it strangled the new green shoots and briar roses, she had refused to allow the men to touch it. Whenever doubts and fears did assail her she pushed them to a corner of her brain. For she was, after all, giving up her domestic security, flawed as it had been. She would be leaving behind her house and the marriage it had meant. A buyer had not yet been found for the house because of the structural flaw – a deep crack in the front facade – and they expected to make virtually no money from it. She was giving up this and going for a year to a borrowed house, to live in a situation many would have seen as strange, and with no knowledge of what would happen after that year. Her mind always blanked when she came to that point, to the concept of after the house. She could not see beyond it.

Over the last few weeks she had drawn back from telling Mags about the house. Time must not be allowed for closer questioning. In a way she was relieved that Mags was leaving because of this fear, but simultaneously felt guilty about it. She did not want to have to explain, prevaricate, evade, lie. There was something wondrous in it all, in the fantasy, in the bubble of her present life, it should not be questioned, categorized, held up to the light of common day. For it was not about that. She could not explain.

‘Where is the house?’ Mags was surprised, thought it odd that Marianne was telling her on her last day, but then she could no longer keep track of Marianne’s life at home. It never occurred to her that Marianne lied, she liked her too much, but she did feel that Marianne moved in circles she could not place, that something about it made her slightly uneasy. She had understood her better when they first met.

‘Hampstead.’ Marianne felt embarrassed, withdrawing. She knew how it sounded. Mags had only just found a rented flat with her husband. They could not afford to buy now. The husband’s two-man business was not doing well.

‘Hampstead? You’re coming up in the world.’ Her eyes were curious but she looked pleased for Marianne, glad she had something, for she saw her own life as so much more fulfilled than Marianne’s. She wouldn’t mind the glamour, there was no denying it, but there were more important things. She had the husband and the baby coming and Marianne was on her own – imagine a life with no kids.

‘It’s only for a year, not for long really. It’s just been lent to us.’ She was trying to mitigate it, but really to her the life of glamour seemed to stretch years ahead. She was impatient for it.

‘What’ll you do afterwards?’

‘I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it.’ She was relieved that one of the other women had walked in.

‘Come on Mags, we’re all waiting to start on the drinks. Come and get your presents.’ In the laughter and chat and flushed cheeks her piece of information was covered over.

She was shaken by having divulged it. Somehow a febrile edginess had been engendered in her by letting out the information, as though it could be spoiled by the touch of common knowledge, of making it accessible. So nervy did she feel that she was almost glad when Mags finally took her leave, red hair glowing, arms filled with baby paraphernalia.

‘Keep in touch, do,’ said Marianne, but she knew Mags would not. With the portals of the office building closed behind them and the City street in front their common experience ended. The gaps were too wide outside. Like prisoners sharing the same cell, once let out and returned to their previous lives, even though they lived in the same city their paths would never touch. They might as well have lived a thousand miles apart.

They hugged each other and Marianne watched Mags’s red head disappearing with the crowd down the street towards the Underground. It was dusk. The street lights had been turned on. Marianne turned to walk the other way and – still seeing in her mind’s eye Mags returning to the warm, lit council flat, the gifts for the baby in her arms, her mum bustling out to help her carry them up the three flights of stairs — she did not know whether it was merely the fine specks of rain that had started to fall through the gathering night sky that were wet on her cheeks or whether her own tears were mingled with the drops.

 

Later that night she realized how much she would miss Mags, how isolated she would feel at work. She wished they could have seen each other again, wished lives did not have to part like that. But she knew Mags had seen it as being as inevitable as she had and Mags would miss her less. The one who moved on always did and the job had only ever been a means to an end for Mags. Mags’s life, though financially hard, was full of emotional securities and known faces. She would soon forget. So what did the job mean to Marianne? It was only a job for her too but she had really enjoyed those afternoons with Mags, chatting, gossiping away. It had all felt very safe, very secure.

It did not occur to her that she had no other women friends. She turned the pages of her book, restlessly. She was lying on her back on her bed, the curtains open to the dark night sky. She put the book away from her and, lying motionless, thought that she would change her job soon.

                                                           **

One old house she had lived in as a child was in the depths of the countryside, with fields around it and one bus a week from the village. She and her brother Harry walked to the village school. There were only two classes, but he was in the top one. After lunch the children could play on the heath near the playground, not straying too far, but her brother would not play with her or even recognize her at these times. In the summer evenings, however, they would play together outside in the long grass in front of the house. It was supposed to be a lawn, and the house lay long and low behind it, but it had been neglected. The owners had been abroad for years. The grass was as high as her waist and she would make a den in it, hiding from her brother, the stalks pricking her bare legs, smelling the grass with pleasure. They would race through it like young zebras, kicking their heels, the sun sinking into the evening. The mother never made them come in until they were tired. At the back of the house was an orchard, running to seed. They would eat the odd hard pear or crab-apple, willing each other and themselves to enjoy it. The father put a swing in the tree for them and she would sway back and forth for hours, until her brother in a fit of boredom came and pushed her off. In her bedroom there were cherries on the white curtains and she would lie in bed watching them blow in the wind.

At the side of the house was a big barn, used as a garage, filled with old prams, broken bicycles and other wonders. The long drive, leading past it and in a wide curve round to the front of the house, was full of broken stones and once her father had sworn because he had punctured a tyre on them. A photograph taken at that time showed her parents beside an old limousine in front of the decaying house. You could see the tall weeds and grasses growing among the gravel and the broken stones. The picture had been taken by her brother, he was ten it the time, and was at a very odd angle so that father, who was anyway a man of great style, seemed to have tremendously elongated legs in his grey, chalk-stripe suit as though he was a more modern man with stacked-heel boots on underneath. His hair was parted smoothly on the side, his silk handkerchief protruding exactly the right amount from his top pocket, and dazzling white shirtcuffs, which were always fastened with silver cufflinks, appeared above his long, rather delicate hands.

Her mother was wearing a velvet housecoat. Part of the hem had come down and the light in the photograph reflected on the wornaway parts of pile. Her hair looked dark in the photograph but in reality was a pale blonde. Her limbs were slender and the hair turned under in a heavy pageboy on her shoulders. She had fine, plentiful hair like silk. The housecoat had once been a model morning coat but by this time the velvet was rubbed and the remaining diamante buttons hanging by threads. Her mother was frail and beautiful, more beautiful than Marianne, one of those faded, delicate Tennessee Williams blondes, not a modern woman. She had come from a wealthy diplomatic family and had married for love. Marianne’s father was an actor. The mother’s parents had not helped her after the marriage. She still had fluttering chiffon evening dresses, silk negligees, ridiculous shoes. Marianne had a whole trunk of these cast-off clothes to play with, as they were no longer suitable for her mother’s life. She still wore some as an adult.

When cousins came to stay in the long summer holidays, after the initial strangeness was overcome, she took the girl cousin, who was about her age, eight, up to the attic and the girl had gaped with pleasure when Marianne had drawn one dress after the other out of the old cabin trunk, which was still covered with the labels from past sea voyages. They had spent all the late summer long up there, appearing only briefly for meals or for the odd obligatory breath of fresh air that her mother made them take when she woke from her absorption long enough to notice that they were dustily cooped up at the top of the house. During the meals and walks, however, they were present like ghosts. The prosaic world of the adults could not compete with the rich fantasy that lay above. They played fantastic roles in their costumes, teetering in high-heeled shoes. Sometimes they made up from her mother’s old lipsticks and rouge pots and tottered out to the orchard in fantastic hats. One old apple tree with a gnarled, green-lichened bark was their favourite perch, and emboldened by her cousin she would shout insults down at her brother, the two females taunting the male. He, who usually took so little notice of her if there was other companionship available, was intrigued by the happenings in the attic. His once taken-for-granted sister was now out of his reach. He was piqued by her ability to do without him, but they barred the door and denied him entry and he had to play with the male cousins who kept a pony in the field next to the house and did daredevil tricks all the summer, like riding bareback and trespassing on farmers’ fields.

She never forgot that attic with the sun slanting through the dusty window and chinks between the tiles of the roof onto the net and satin spilling from the trunk and an abandoned shoe. From the window high up they could see the boys playing in the orchard below, remote and unreal because their voices could not be heard, slightly blurred because the pane was dirty, and in the far off distance the greenness of the unbroken countryside. She was very lonely after the cousin left, and the attic no longer seemed the same. She gradually went up there less and less and then forgot about it and spent her days pouring over illustrated encyclopaedias in the library.