Читать книгу The Silence - Joss Stirling - Страница 22

At first, I wasn’t keen on Paul Whittingham. He never appreciated me in his youth, bringing his long-haired friends home to smoke spliffs in the snug and tell his mother that the smell came from the joss sticks. Employment sobered him. The hair was cut, a suit donned, and the city beckoned. He followed his father into Lloyd’s shipping. How his ancestor the admiral would’ve scoffed to see his flesh and blood sitting at a computer screen analysing the risks of going through the Suez or around the Horn. Go out there and see for yourself, he would’ve bawled in his voice that carried over the storm. But Paul was made for comfort. Not for him was life on the High Seas; he was born for riding a desk and drinking down the pub with his friends. They all grew soft, rounded faces and bellies, hair retreating, courage shrivelling. The irony is that the Eighties made these men out to be heroes. Insurance, as he told the woman he was wooing, is much more interesting than it seems.

He was lying to her, of course. All the men who brought their wives here have lied to them one way or another. All have had mistresses. Sometimes that mistress was a woman, more rarely a man, on occasion the sea. Best of all was when their first love was me.

I dismissed this new wife of Paul’s at the beginning, thinking she was too flighty for the flabby insurance broker. A dancer, he told his mother proudly. A prima ballerina. Or had been. Bridget Taylor had risen through the ranks of the Royal Ballet but, before she could take on any of the leading roles, she was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. She rejected the temptation of pushing herself beyond her body’s limits, resigned from the ballet and took to temping – quite a come down for one who had dreamed of her name in lights. And then Paul fished her from the typing pool. Needing a respectable date for the company Christmas dinner at the Savoy, his eye fell on the elegant secretary in her neat French suits. As the date turned into a relationship, he found he wanted to lose a few pounds, take up some active hobbies, even attend the opera with her if she so wished. They never went to the ballet. She didn’t ask and he never suggested. He learnt tactfulness in his middle years.

His mother was delighted her lacklustre son had polished himself up. She handed over the house and moved to Bournemouth where her sister lived. A Jack returning to the sea – none of us were surprised.

Paul went on one knee to propose under the lilac tree while it rained down bridal confetti. He offered his bride his love, his considerable income, a share in his pension, and a house. It was me that decided the lady in his favour. She liked him well enough, but her first love had been dancing and that had died on her. Rather than be a widow for the rest of her life, she settled for the pleasant prospect I offered.

They hoped for children to fill the empty rooms, but Paul was never the most virile of men. His wife languished, wondering what was wrong with her. It was only after his accident that she discovered what she was missing.