music’s so faint it sounds as if it’s somewhere else, not in our house, and I wonder if they’re dancing. By ten o’clock the party will be over, Mrs Upsilla said, and then they’ll go off to different restaurants, or maybe they’ll all go to the same one, and some will just go home. It’s that kind of party, not lasting for very long, not like some Mrs Upsilla has known. ‘Here?’ Charles asked, surprised when she said that. ‘Here in this house?’ And she said no, not ever an all-night party here, and Charles nodded in his solemn way and said you’d know it. He’ll stay for an hour or so when everyone has gone, helping Mrs Upsilla to clear up. I’ve never been awake then.
Davie says it was some kind of game. Fun, he says, but Abigail shakes her head, her black plaits flying about. I don’t want to talk about it. A Wednesday it was, Mrs Upsilla gone off for the afternoon, Charles tending the flowerbeds in the square.
I try to think about Mr Fairlie again, having to make his bed, doing all the other things his wife did, but Mr Fairlie keeps slipping away. My mother’s dress was crumpled on the floor and I could see it when I peeped out, her necklace thrown down too. Afterwards, she said they should have locked the door.
The music is still far away. The noise of the people isn’t like people talking, more like a hum. I push the bedclothes back and tip-toe to the stairs to look down through the banisters. Mrs Upsilla is dressed specially for the party, and Charles is carrying in another tray of glasses. Mrs Upsilla goes in too, with two plates of tit-bits. Bacon wound round an apricot she makes, and sandwiches no bigger than a stamp. People come out and stand about on the landing. My mother and her friend are there for a moment, before she goes into the drawing-room again. He stays there, his shoulder against the wall by the window, the red curtains drawn over. ‘The child’s on to it,’ was what he said the day before my father came back.
I don’t want to go back to bed because the dream will be there even if I’m not asleep, Mrs Upsilla saying my father’s gone for ever, that of course he had to. When I look for it, the leather suitcase he takes on his travels won’t be there and I’ll know it never will be again. I’ll take out the Egyptian handkerchief and I’ll remember my father spreading it on the café table, showing me the pattern. ‘Our café,’ he calls it.
My mother’s friend looks up from the landing that’s two flights down. He waves and I watch him coming up the stairs. There’s a cigarette hanging from his mouth but he hasn’t lit it and he doesn’t take it out when he puts a finger to his lips. ‘Enough to make them drunk,’ Charles said when he saw the bottles opened on the kitchen table, and I wonder if my mother’s friend is drunk because he takes another cigarette from his packet even though he hasn’t lit the first one.
When he sways he has to reach out for the banister. He laughs, as if that’s just for fun. I can see the sweat on his face, like raindrops on his forehead. His eyes are closed when he takes another step. Slowly he goes on coming up, another step and then another and another. There’s a fleck of spit at the edge of his mouth, the two cigarettes have fallen on to the stair carpet. When I reach out I can touch him. My fingertips are on the dark cloth of his sleeve and I can feel his arm beneath, and everything is different then.
There is his tumbling down, there is the splintered banister. There is the thud, and then another and another. There is the stillness, and Mrs Upsilla looking up at me.
*
I watch them from my window, coming separately to the table they have chosen for breakfast in the garden of the hotel. They place their gifts by my place. They speak to one another, but I never know what they say in private. I turn from the window and powder over the coral lipstick I have just applied. On my seventeenth birthday nothing of my
Davie says it was some kind of game. Fun, he says, but Abigail shakes her head, her black plaits flying about. I don’t want to talk about it. A Wednesday it was, Mrs Upsilla gone off for the afternoon, Charles tending the flowerbeds in the square.
I try to think about Mr Fairlie again, having to make his bed, doing all the other things his wife did, but Mr Fairlie keeps slipping away. My mother’s dress was crumpled on the floor and I could see it when I peeped out, her necklace thrown down too. Afterwards, she said they should have locked the door.
The music is still far away. The noise of the people isn’t like people talking, more like a hum. I push the bedclothes back and tip-toe to the stairs to look down through the banisters. Mrs Upsilla is dressed specially for the party, and Charles is carrying in another tray of glasses. Mrs Upsilla goes in too, with two plates of tit-bits. Bacon wound round an apricot she makes, and sandwiches no bigger than a stamp. People come out and stand about on the landing. My mother and her friend are there for a moment, before she goes into the drawing-room again. He stays there, his shoulder against the wall by the window, the red curtains drawn over. ‘The child’s on to it,’ was what he said the day before my father came back.
I don’t want to go back to bed because the dream will be there even if I’m not asleep, Mrs Upsilla saying my father’s gone for ever, that of course he had to. When I look for it, the leather suitcase he takes on his travels won’t be there and I’ll know it never will be again. I’ll take out the Egyptian handkerchief and I’ll remember my father spreading it on the café table, showing me the pattern. ‘Our café,’ he calls it.
My mother’s friend looks up from the landing that’s two flights down. He waves and I watch him coming up the stairs. There’s a cigarette hanging from his mouth but he hasn’t lit it and he doesn’t take it out when he puts a finger to his lips. ‘Enough to make them drunk,’ Charles said when he saw the bottles opened on the kitchen table, and I wonder if my mother’s friend is drunk because he takes another cigarette from his packet even though he hasn’t lit the first one.
When he sways he has to reach out for the banister. He laughs, as if that’s just for fun. I can see the sweat on his face, like raindrops on his forehead. His eyes are closed when he takes another step. Slowly he goes on coming up, another step and then another and another. There’s a fleck of spit at the edge of his mouth, the two cigarettes have fallen on to the stair carpet. When I reach out I can touch him. My fingertips are on the dark cloth of his sleeve and I can feel his arm beneath, and everything is different then.
There is his tumbling down, there is the splintered banister. There is the thud, and then another and another. There is the stillness, and Mrs Upsilla looking up at me.
*
I watch them from my window, coming separately to the table they have chosen for breakfast in the garden of the hotel. They place their gifts by my place. They speak to one another, but I never know what they say in private. I turn from the window and powder over the coral lipstick I have just applied. On my seventeenth birthday nothing of my
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