there were certainties in the world.
For Peter the prospect of certainty was a kind of grail. His first wife—whom he married because she flatteredhis vanity—had delivered all certainty an almost fatal blow when she dismissed her own prenuptial declarations as, ‘the sort of things people say—of course I didn’t mean them!’ Odd as it may sound, the idea that people might say things they didn’t mean was a difficult one for Peter, though he himself could hardly be said to be always quite square with the truth. But the gap between what we are ourselves and what we want others to be is rarely measured, and a certain simplicity—naivety, almost—was part of Peter’s character. In fact this was one of the traits in him which Bridget later found attractive.
Bridget and Peter met at a café in Notting Hill in the days when Bridget was still running her stall in the Portobello Road. She was sitting at a table reading when Peter entered the café in search of some refuge against the sudden sweep of nauseous dizziness with which he was occasionally afflicted. Peter noticed at once the aura of calm which surrounded Bridget and which was to make up a strand in her attraction for him. He sat down, near her table, and tried to make out what it was she was reading.
In a moment of hilarity afterwards, Bridget suggested that it was usually women who resorted to such tricks; having failed to see what it was that so absorbed the handsome blonde that she had no mind to notice him, Peter made as if to get himself another cup of coffee at the counter, staggered, grabbed at the table where Bridget was sitting, and thus, finally, succeeded in drawing her attention.
‘I’m so sorry,’ he had said, dramatically impersonating the giddiness he actually felt, ‘let me get you another,’ for in the cafuffle he had engineered, her cup of tea had spilled.
The tea had penetrated the leaves of The Inferno andthe discovery of the name of the engrossing book had given Peter pause: he was not sure he was up to a woman who read Dante.
‘But it’s not a bit “intellectual”, really,’ Bridget had said, on the mirthful occasion on which the subterfuge had been acknowledged. ‘It’s full of sense. Just what hell would be like—if there was a hell. But then I was brought up a Catholic so I’m conditioned to notions like hell and purgatory.’
At this time Peter was not a Catholic himself. When later he became one we know he never let on to his wife. The cautious part of him feared a jocular response from Bridget—and caution is often a sound guide. It is likely that though Bridget would not have openly mocked him for adopting the religion she had fought to escape, her humour might have been too rough to bear without resentment—and instinctively Peter knew that resentment is an enemy to marriage.
Bridget nearly cried out when the sweep’s van came in sight of the long, low line of shining, shivering grey. She loved the sea: an ancestor had been a pirate and privately she liked to imagine that piratical blood flowed in her own veins. Perhaps, she had speculated as a child, the man had been hanged? Why, when the thought of hanging made her feel sick, was the idea of it in connexion with a relative so intoxicating?
She got out of the car rubbing her back which had seized up during the journey.
‘That’s the way down, there,’ Stanley Godwit pointed. ‘It’s pretty steep, mind.’
‘Damn!’ Bridget said, ‘I forgot to bring boots.’
But this proved no deterrent. ‘What size are you? Six, I’d say. You can use Corrie’s boots. She keeps them in the van—you and she’ll be about the same size.’
Cordelia—King Lear’s daughter—‘Choughs are those birds with red bills, aren’t they?’—there were choughs in King Lear .
‘Part of the rook family. Used to nest here common as gulls a couple of hundred years ago.’
When blind Gloucester, seeking to end his life, stands on the edge of the cliff which, even in
For Peter the prospect of certainty was a kind of grail. His first wife—whom he married because she flatteredhis vanity—had delivered all certainty an almost fatal blow when she dismissed her own prenuptial declarations as, ‘the sort of things people say—of course I didn’t mean them!’ Odd as it may sound, the idea that people might say things they didn’t mean was a difficult one for Peter, though he himself could hardly be said to be always quite square with the truth. But the gap between what we are ourselves and what we want others to be is rarely measured, and a certain simplicity—naivety, almost—was part of Peter’s character. In fact this was one of the traits in him which Bridget later found attractive.
Bridget and Peter met at a café in Notting Hill in the days when Bridget was still running her stall in the Portobello Road. She was sitting at a table reading when Peter entered the café in search of some refuge against the sudden sweep of nauseous dizziness with which he was occasionally afflicted. Peter noticed at once the aura of calm which surrounded Bridget and which was to make up a strand in her attraction for him. He sat down, near her table, and tried to make out what it was she was reading.
In a moment of hilarity afterwards, Bridget suggested that it was usually women who resorted to such tricks; having failed to see what it was that so absorbed the handsome blonde that she had no mind to notice him, Peter made as if to get himself another cup of coffee at the counter, staggered, grabbed at the table where Bridget was sitting, and thus, finally, succeeded in drawing her attention.
‘I’m so sorry,’ he had said, dramatically impersonating the giddiness he actually felt, ‘let me get you another,’ for in the cafuffle he had engineered, her cup of tea had spilled.
The tea had penetrated the leaves of The Inferno andthe discovery of the name of the engrossing book had given Peter pause: he was not sure he was up to a woman who read Dante.
‘But it’s not a bit “intellectual”, really,’ Bridget had said, on the mirthful occasion on which the subterfuge had been acknowledged. ‘It’s full of sense. Just what hell would be like—if there was a hell. But then I was brought up a Catholic so I’m conditioned to notions like hell and purgatory.’
At this time Peter was not a Catholic himself. When later he became one we know he never let on to his wife. The cautious part of him feared a jocular response from Bridget—and caution is often a sound guide. It is likely that though Bridget would not have openly mocked him for adopting the religion she had fought to escape, her humour might have been too rough to bear without resentment—and instinctively Peter knew that resentment is an enemy to marriage.
Bridget nearly cried out when the sweep’s van came in sight of the long, low line of shining, shivering grey. She loved the sea: an ancestor had been a pirate and privately she liked to imagine that piratical blood flowed in her own veins. Perhaps, she had speculated as a child, the man had been hanged? Why, when the thought of hanging made her feel sick, was the idea of it in connexion with a relative so intoxicating?
She got out of the car rubbing her back which had seized up during the journey.
‘That’s the way down, there,’ Stanley Godwit pointed. ‘It’s pretty steep, mind.’
‘Damn!’ Bridget said, ‘I forgot to bring boots.’
But this proved no deterrent. ‘What size are you? Six, I’d say. You can use Corrie’s boots. She keeps them in the van—you and she’ll be about the same size.’
Cordelia—King Lear’s daughter—‘Choughs are those birds with red bills, aren’t they?’—there were choughs in King Lear .
‘Part of the rook family. Used to nest here common as gulls a couple of hundred years ago.’
When blind Gloucester, seeking to end his life, stands on the edge of the cliff which, even in
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