The Book of Evidence by John Banville

of plug-ugly ponies out of which she had imagined she w o u l d m a k e a fortune to provide for herself in the decrepitude of her old age, the deluded b l o o d y bitch. There was as well the business of the girl Joanne. As I was leaving I paused and said, measuring my words, that I thought it hardly appropriate for a w o m a n of my mother's position in society — her position! — in society! — to be so c h u m m y with a stable-girl. I confess I had intended to cause outrage, but I am afraid I was the one w h o ended up goggle-eyed. My mother, after a m o m e n t ' s silence, stared me straight in the face, with brazen insouciance, and said that J o a n n e was not a child, that she was in fact 74

    twenty-seven years of age. She is — with a pause here for effect — she is like a son to m e , the son I never had.
    Well, I said, s w a l l o w i n g hard, I ' m h a p p y for y o u both, I ' m sure! and flounced out of the house. On the drive, though, I had to stop and wait for my indignation and resentment to subside a little before I could get my breath back. S o m e t i m e s I think I am an utter senti-mentalist.
    I g o t to W h i t e w a t e r that evening. T h e last leg of the j o u r n e y I m a d e by taxi f r o m the village. T h e driver w a s an i m m e n s e l y tall, emaciated m a n in a flat cap and an antique, blue-flannel suit. He studied me with interest in the driving-mirror, hardly bothering to watch the road ahead of us. I tried staring back at h i m hatefully, but he was unabashed, and only grinned a little on one side of his thin face with a peculiarly friendly air of k n o w i n g . W h y do I r e m e m b e r people like this so vividly? T h e y clutter my m i n d , w h e n I l o o k up f r o m the p a g e they are thronged around me in the shadows, silent, mildly curious — even, it m i g h t be, solicitous. T h e y are witnesses, I suppose, the innocent bystanders w h o have c o m e , without malice, to testify against m e .
    I can never a p p r o a c h W h i t e w a t e r without a small, involuntary g a s p o f admiration. T h e drive leads u p f r o m the road in a long, deep, treeless curve, so that the house seems to turn, slowly, dreamily, o p e n i n g w i d e its Palladian colonnades. T h e taxi d r e w to a stop on the gravel b e l o w the great front steps, and with the sudden silence c a m e the realisation — yes, Maolseachlainn, I a d m i t it — that I had no reasonable cause to be there. 1 sat for a m o m e n t l o o k i n g about me in g r o g g y consternation, like a wakened sleepwalker, but the driver was w a t c h i n g me in the mirror n o w 7S

    with rapt expectancy, and I had to pretend to k n o w what I was about. 1 got out of the car and stood patting my pockets and frowning importantly, but I could not fool him, his lopsided grin g r e w slyer still, for a second I thought he was g o i n g to wink at me. I told him brusquely to wait, and m o u n t e d the steps pursued by an unshakeable sensation of general mockery.
    After a long time the door was opened by a wizened little angry man in what appeared at first to be a bus conductor's uniform. A few long strands of very black hair were plastered across his skull like streaks of boot polish.
    He looked at me with deep disgust. N o t open today, he said, and was starting to shut the door in my face when I rubbing my hands slowly and smiling, playing the returned expatriate. Ah, I said, the old place! T h e great Tintoretto on the stairs, swarming with angels and m a d -
    eyed martyrs, blared at me its vast chromatic chord. T h e d o o r m a n or whatever he was danced about anxiously behind me. I turned and l o o m e d at him, still grinning, and said no, I wasn't a tripper, but a friend of the family — was Miss Behrens at h o m e , by any chance? He dithered, distrustful still, then told me to wait, and scuttled o f f d o w n the hall, splaying one flat foot as he went and carefully smoothing the oiled hairs on his