The Sweetest Dream Read online

  ‘All I know is she sits up there eating a finger of smoked herring and two inches of bread and drinking one glass of wine while we sit down here guzzling great meals. We could send up a tray, perhaps.’

  ‘I’ll ask her,’ Andrew said, and presumably did, but nothing changed.

  Frances made herself go up the stairs to his room. Six o’clock, and already getting dark. This had been a couple of weeks ago. She knocked, though her legs had nearly taken her downstairs again.

  After quite a wait, she heard, ‘Come in.’

  Frances went in. Andrew lay dressed on the bed, smoking. The window beyond him showed a blur of cold rain.

  ‘It’s six o’clock,’ she said.

  ‘I know it is six o’clock.’

  Frances sat down, without the invitation she needed. The room was a big one, furnished with old solid furniture and some beautiful Chinese lamps. Andrew seemed the wrong inhabitant for it, and Frances could not help bringing to mind Julia’s husband, the diplomat, who would certainly be at home here.

  ‘Have you come to lecture me? Don’t bother, Julia already has done her bit.’

  ‘I’m worried,’ said Frances, her voice trembled; years, decades of worry were crowding into her throat.

  Andrew lifted his head off the pillow to inspect her. Not with enmity, but rather with weariness. ‘I alarm myself,’ he said. ‘But I think I am about to take myself in hand.’

  ‘Are you, Andrew? Are you?’

  ‘After all, it is not as if it were heroin, or coke, or . . . after all, there are no caches of empty bottles rolling about under the bed.’

  There were in fact some little blue pills scattered there.

  ‘What are those little blue pills then?’

  ‘Ah, the little blue pills. Amphetamines. Don’t worry about them.’

  ‘And,’ said Frances, quoting, meaning to sound ironical and failing, ‘it’s non-addictive, and you can give it up at any time.’

  ‘I don’t know about that. I think I’m addicted–to pot, though. It certainly takes the edge off reality. Why don’t you try it?’

  ‘I did try it. It doesn’t do anything for me.’

  ‘Too bad,’ said Andrew. ‘I would say that you have more reality than you can cope with.’

  He did not say anything more, and so she waited a little, and got up to leave and heard as she closed the door on him, ‘Thanks for coming, Mother. Drop in again.’

  Was it possible he wanted her ‘interference’–had been waiting for her to visit him, wanted to talk?

  On this particular evening she could feel the bonds between herself and her two sons, but it was all terrible–the three of them were close tonight because of disappointment, a blow falling where it had before.

  Sophie was talking. ‘Did you know about Frances’s wonderful new part?’ she said to Johnny. ‘She’s going to be a star. It’s so wonderful. Have you read the play?’

  ‘Sophie,’ said Frances, ‘I’m not doing the play after all.’

  Sophie stared at her, her great eyes already full of tears. ‘What do you mean? You can’t . . . it’s not . . . it can’t be true.’

  ‘I’m not doing it, Sophie.’

  Both sons were looking at Sophie, probably even kicking her under the table: shut up.

  ‘Oh,’ gasped the lovely girl, and buried her face in her hands.

  ‘Things have changed,’ said Frances. ‘I can’t explain.’

  Now both boys were looking, full of accusation, at their father. He shifted a bit, seemed to shrug, suppressed that, smiled and then suddenly came out with: ‘There’s something else I’ve come to say, Frances.’

  And so that was why he hadn’t left, but had stood uncomfortably there, not sitting down: he had something more to say.

  Frances braced herself and saw that Colin and Andrew did the same.

  ‘I have a big favour to ask of you,’ said Johnny, direct to his betrayed wife.

  ‘And what is that?’

  ‘You know about Tilly, of course . . . you know, Phyllida’s girl?’

  ‘Of course I know about her.’

  Andrew, visiting Phyllida, had allowed it to be understood that it was not a harmonious household and that the child was giving a lot of trouble.

  ‘Phyllida doesn’t seem able to cope with Tilly.’

  At this, Frances laughed loudly, for she already knew what was bound to come. She said, ‘No, it’s simply not possible, it isn’t on.’

  ‘Yes, Frances, think about it. They don’t get on. Phyllida’s at her wit’s end. And so am I. I want you to have Tilly here. You are so good with . . .’

  Frances was breathless with anger, saw that the two boys were white with it; the three were sitting silent, looking at each other.

  Sophie was exclaiming, ‘Oh, Frances, and you are so kind, it’s so wonderful.’

  Geoffrey, who had after all been so long visiting this house that he could with justice be described as a member of the household, followed Sophie with, ‘What a groovy idea.’

  ‘Just a minute, Johnny,’ said Frances. ‘You are asking me to take on your second wife’s daughter because you two can’t cope with her?’

  ‘That’s about it,’ admitted Johnny, smiling.

  There was a long, long pause. It had occurred to enthusiastic Sophie and Geoffrey that Frances was not taking this in the spirit of universal liberal idealism they had at first assumed she would: that spirit of everything is for the best in the best of all possible worlds, which would one day be shorthand for ‘The Sixties’.

  Frances managed to bring out: ‘You are perhaps planning to contribute something to her support?’–and realised that, saying this, she was agreeing.

  At this Johnny glanced around the young faces, judging if they were as shocked by her pettiness as he was. ‘Money,’ he said loftily, ‘is really not the point here.’

  Frances was again silenced. She got up, went to the working surface near the stove, stood with her back to the room.

  ‘I want to bring Tilly here,’ said Johnny. ‘And in fact she’s here. She’s in the car.’

  Colin and Andrew both got up and went to their mother, standing on either side of her. This enabled her to turn around and face Johnny across the room. She could not speak. And Johnny, seeing his former wife flanked by their sons, three angry people with white accusing faces, was also, but just for the moment, silenced.

  Then he rallied, stretched out his arms, palms towards them, and said, ‘From each according to their capacity, to each according to their need.’ And let his arms drop.

  ‘Oh, that is so beautiful,’ said Rose.

  ‘Groovy,’ said Geoffrey.

  The newcomer, Jill, breathed, ‘Oh, it’s lovely.’

  All eyes were now on Johnny, a situation he was well used to. He stood, receiving rays of criticism, beams of love, and smiled at them. He was a tall man, Comrade Johnny, with already greying hair cut like a Roman’s, at your service always, and he wore tight black jeans, a black leather Mao jacket especially made for him by an admiring comrade in the rag trade. Severity was his preferred style, smiling or not, for a smile could never be more than a temporary concession, but he was smiling boldly now.

  ‘Do you mean to say,’ said Andrew, ‘that Tilly’s been out there in the car waiting, all this time?’

  ‘Good God,’ said Colin. ‘Typical.’

  ‘I’ll go and bring her in,’ said Johnny, and marched out, brushing past his ex-wife and Colin and Andrew, not looking at them.

  No one moved. Frances thought if her sons had not been so close, enveloping her with their support, she would have fallen. All the faces around the table were turned towards them: that this was a very bad moment, they had at last understood.

  They heard the front door open–Johnny of course had a key to his mother’s house–and then in the doorway to this room, the kitchen, stood a little frightened figure, in a big duffel-coat, trembling with cold, trying to smile, but instead out of her burst a great wail, as she looked at Fr
ances, who she had been told was kind and would look after her, ‘until we get things straightened out’. She was a little bird blown by a storm, and Frances was across the room to her, and had her arms round her, saying, ‘It’s all right, shhh, it’s all right.’ Then she remembered this was not a child, but a girl of fourteen or so, and her impulse, to sit down and hold this waif on her lap was out of order. Meanwhile Johnny, just behind the girl, was saying, ‘I think bed is indicated,’ and then, generally around the room, ‘I’ll be off.’ But did not go.

  The girl was looking in appeal at Andrew, whom after all she did know, among all these strangers.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll deal with it.’ He put his arm round Tilly, and turned to go out of the room.

  ‘I’ll put her down in the basement,’ he said. ‘It’s nice and warm down there.’

  ‘Oh, no, no, no, please,’ cried the girl. ‘Don’t, I cannot be alone, I can’t, don’t make me.’

  ‘Of course not, if you don’t want to,’ said Andrew. Then, to his mother, ‘I’ll put a bed in with me for tonight.’ And he led her out. They all sat quiet, listening to how he coaxed her up the stairs.

  Johnny was face to face with Frances, who said to him, low, hoping it would not be heard by the others, ‘Go away, Johnny. Just get out.’

  He tried an appealing smile around, caught Rose’s eyes, who did smile back, but she was doubtful, withstood passionate reproach from Sophie, nodded sternly at Geoffrey, whom he had known for years. And left. The front door shut. The car door slammed.

  Now Colin was hovering behind Frances, touching her arm, her shoulder, not knowing what to do.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, ‘come on upstairs.’ They went out together. Frances began swearing as she climbed the stairs, first softly, so as not to be heard by the young, then loudly, ‘Fuck him, fuck him, fuck, the shit, the absolute shit.’ In her sitting-room she sat crying, while Colin, at a loss, at last thought of getting her tissues and then a glass of water.

  Meanwhile Julia had been told by Andrew what was going on. She came down, opened Frances’s door without knocking, and marched in. ‘Please explain it to me,’ she said. ‘I don’t understand. Why do you let him behave like this?’

  • • •

  Julia von Arne was born in a particularly charming part of Germany, near Stuttgart, a region of hills, streams and vineyards. She was the only girl, the third child in a genial gentle family. Her father was a diplomat, her mother a musician. In July 1914 came visiting Philip Lennox, a promising Third Secretary from the embassy in Berlin. That fourteen-year-old Julia should fall in love with handsome Philip–he was twenty-five–was not surprising, but he fell in love with her. She was pretty, tiny, with golden ringlets, and wore frocks the romantic man told her were like flowers. She had been brought up strictly, by governesses, English and French, and to him it seemed that every gesture she made, every smile, every turn of her head, was formal, prescribed, as if she moved in a dance. Like all girls taught to be conscious of their bodies, because of the frightful dangers of immodesty, her eyes spoke for her, could strike to the heart with a glance, and when she lowered delicate eyelids over blue invitations to love he felt he was being rejected. He had sisters, whom he had seen a few days ago in Sussex, jolly tomboys enjoying the exemplary summer that has been celebrated in so many memoirs and novels. A sister’s friend, Betty, had been teased because she came to supper with solid brown arms where white scratches showed how she had been playing in the hay with the dogs. His family had watched him to see if he fancied this girl, who would make a suitable wife, and he had been prepared to consider her. This little German miss seemed to him as glamorous as a beauty glimpsed in a harem, all promise and hidden bliss, and he fancied that if a sunbeam did strike her she would melt like a snowflake. She gave him a red rose from the garden, and he knew she was offering him her heart. He declared his love in the moonlight, and next day spoke to her father. Yes, he knew that fourteen was too young, but he was asking for formal permission to propose when she was sixteen. And so they parted, in 1914, while war was coming to a boil, but like many liberal well-adjusted people it seemed to both the von Arnes and the Lennoxes that it was ridiculous Germany and England could go to war. When war was declared, Philip had left his love in tears just two weeks before. In those days governments seemed compelled to announce that wars must be over by Christmas, and the lovers were sure they would see each other soon.

  Almost at once xenophobia was poisoning Julia’s love. Her family did not mind her loving her Englishman–did not their respective Emperors call themselves cousins?–but the neighbours commented, and servants whispered and gossiped. During the years of the war rumours followed Julia and her family too. Her three brothers were fighting in the Trenches, her father was in the War Office, and her mother did war work, but those few days of fever in July 1914 marked them all for comment and suspicion. Julia never lost her faith in her love and in Philip. He was wounded, twice, and in devious ways she heard about it and wept for him. It did not matter, cried Julia’s heart, how badly he was wounded, she would love him for ever. He was demobbed in 1919. She was waiting for him, knowing he was coming to claim her, when into the room where five years before they had flirted came a man she felt she ought to know. An empty sleeve was pinned up on his chest, and his face was taut and lined. She was now nearly twenty. He saw a tall young woman–she had grown some inches–with fair hair piled on top of her head, held with a big jet arrow, and wearing heavy black for two dead brothers. A third brother, a boy–he was not yet twenty–had been wounded and sat, still in his uniform, a stiff leg propped before him on a stool. The two so recent enemies, stared at each other. Then Philip, not smiling, went forward with an outstretched hand. The youth made an involuntary movement of turning away, with a grimace, but he recovered himself and civilisation was reinstated as he smiled, and the two men shook hands. This scene, which after all has repeated itself in various forms since then, did not then have as much weight on it as it would now. Irony, which celebrates that element which we persist in excluding from our vision of things, would have been too much for them to bear: we have become coarser-fibred.

  And now these two lovers who would not have recognised each other passing in a street, had to decide whether their dreams of each other for all those terrible years were strong enough to carry them through into marriage. Nothing was left of the enchanting prim little girl, nor of the sentimental man who had, until it crumbled away, carried a dead red rose next to his heart. The great blue eyes were sad, and he tended to lapse into silences, just like her younger brother, when remembering things that could be understood only by other soldiers.

  These two married quietly: hardly the time for a big German–English wedding. In London war fever was abating, though people still talked about the Boche and the Hun. People were polite to Julia. For the first time she wondered if choosing Philip had not been a mistake, yet she believed they loved each other, and both were pretending they were serious people by nature and not saddened beyond curing. And yet the war did recede and the worst of the war hatreds passed. Julia, who had suffered in Germany for her English love, now tried to become English, in an act of will. She had spoken English well enough, but took lessons again, and soon spoke as no English person ever did, an exquisite perfect English, every word separate. She knew her manners were formal, and tried to become more casual. Her clothes: they were perfect too, but after all, she was a diplomat’s wife and had to keep up appearances. As the English put it.

  They started married life in a little house in Mayfair, and there she entertained, as was expected of her, with the aid of a cook and a maid, and achieved something like the standards she remembered from her home. Meanwhile Philip had discovered that to marry a German woman had not been the best prescription for an unclouded career. Discussions with his superiors revealed that certain posts would be barred to him, in Germany, for instance, and he might find himself edged out of the straight highway to the top, and find himself in places like
South Africa or Argentina. He decided to avoid disappointments, and switched to administration. He would have a fine career, but nothing of the glamour of foreign ministries. Sometimes he met in a sister’s house the Betty whom he could have married–and who was still unwed, because of so many men being killed–and wondered how different life could have been.

  When Jolyon Meredith Wilhelm Lennox was born in 1920 he had a nurse and then a nanny. He was a long thin child, with golden curls and combative critical blue eyes, often directed at his mother. He had soon learned from his nanny that she was a German: he had a little tantrum and was difficult for a few days. He was taken to visit his German family, but this was not a success: he disliked the place, and the different manners–he was expected to sit at mealtimes with his hands beside him on either side of his plate when not actually eating, speak when spoken to, and to click his heels when he made a request. He refused to go back. Julia argued with Philip about her child being sent off at seven to school. This is not unusual now, but then Julia was being brave. Philip told her that everyone of their class did this, and anyway look at him!–he had gone to boarding school at seven. Yes, he did remember he had been a bit homesick . . . never mind, it wore off. That argument, ‘Look at me!’, expected to cast down opposition because of the speaker’s conviction of his superiority or at least rightness, did not convince Julia. In Philip there was a place forever barred to her, a reserve, a coldness, which at first she ascribed to the war, the trenches, the soldier’s hidden psychological scars. But then she had begun to doubt: she had never achieved intimacy enough with the wives of her husband’s colleagues to ask if they too experienced this forbidden place in their men, the area marked VERBOTEN, No Entrance–but she did observe, she noticed a good deal. No, she thought, if you are going to take a child from its mother so young . . . She lost the fight, and lost her son; who thereafter was polite, affable, if often impatient.