Splitting (21 page)

Next time Jelly stood up, he slid his arms around her waist and hugged her and said, “I’d like to save you from all the horrors of the world.”

“You’re meant to do that for your wife,” said Jelly.

“I can do that for her as well,” he said. “There’s plenty to go round.”

But still Jelly refuses him. Angelica insists. Brian Moss has told Jelly that a woman trying to extract alimony from a man should be very careful not to be seen to be having sexual relations with another man. A nod and a wink between judges and lawyers can happen.

Less money if she’s still attractive and likely to catch a man; more money if she’s old, plain and likely to be alone for ever.

“That is a disgraceful state of affairs,” says Lady Rice. “Not particularly,” says Angel. “It makes sense to me.”

“It would,” says Angelica, scornfully. They’re all exhausted.

“We have to work out some system,” says Jelly, “of sharing this lady out. Supposing you three just go away for a time and leave me to run things?”

“That’s a fine system,” jeers Angel. “Everything for you, nothing for us.”

“Do you want to take over?” asks Jelly, crossly. Angel backs off at once: she likes a night on the town, but doesn’t want any responsibility. She says she’s too young.

The others compromise. Angel will stay with Jelly, who’ll keep an eye on her. Lady Rice and Angelica will back off for a time. Something has to happen. Nights have been disturbed. Angel is in the middle of an AIDS panic. Lady Rice longs as ever for temporary obliteration (and even admits to the others that, if it were not for them, she might well have sought permanent peace by means of pills and plastic bag). Angelica’s nerves are worn to a frazzle by anxiety, lest she be exposed by The Claremont’s management as a cheat and a thief. And Ram has to be out of the country for a month. That’s the clincher. Angelica and Lady Rice wave good-bye to Jelly and Angel and depart for a holiday from the intellect and the senses. Jelly frees her mind—the full content of which she has learned to conceal from the others—and hugs to herself the knowledge that if Brian Moss wants to fuck Jelly, he can. He just has to stop hinting and ask. All moral scruple, especially her own, has evaporated. And Angel won’t be interested in stopping her.

But that is Jelly’s idea of the matter, not Brian’s: let no woman if not a wife, and not even then, think she is ever unconditionally wanted.

T
ULLY WAS ON THE
phone again to Brian Moss. Sara’s grandmother, Lady Wendy Musgrave, aged ninety-six, and her husband Congo, seventy-five, had both been found dead of natural causes—failure of the heart. The bodies had lain undiscovered for a week. The one had died of shock, it was assumed, on finding the other dead. But which one first?

“They must have loved each other very much,” said Brian Moss sentimentally, trying to keep his breath even. Jelly knelt in front of him, her mouth round his member, sucking upon it as if it were a nipple. She enquired with her eyebrows whether she should stop, but he shook his head vigorously.

“Jesus!” said Tully Toffener. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

“Sorry,” said Brian Moss.

“I’ve had a word with the coroner,” said Tully, “but the man’s a fool. He says in lack of any other evidence it’s supposed that the older dies first. That affects the inheritance. No one can find the will: she may even have died intestate. That means everything goes not to Sara but to the husband and he’s left the lot to his niece.”

“That’s nice for the niece.”

“Christ, Moss, I’ll get you for negligence if it’s the last thing I do!” And Tully slammed the phone down. Jelly and Brian brought their joint activity to its natural end and Jelly said, “Brian, we can’t do this so often. It’s beginning to take up too much of your time and energy. It’s addictive.”

“I know,” said Brian. “And frankly,” said Jelly, “it isn’t altogether satisfactory for me.”

“But I can’t be unfaithful to my wife,” moaned Brian Moss. “You really think this doesn’t count?” enquired Jelly. “Of course it doesn’t,” said Brian Moss. “Oh God, what am I going to do?”

Jelly thought she heard a faint titter from the other three, but hoped she had not. She was sent by Brian to search amongst Sara Toffener’s papers—old Gerald Catterwall, who founded the firm, had at one time had Wendy Musgrave as a client—to see if by any chance the missing will was amongst them, and indeed it was, yellowed and tied with red ribbon. Wendy had left Lodestar House to her daughter Una, Sara’s mother, who had disappeared sometime in the 1950s; or in the event of her prior decease, to a cats’ home. Brian remembered old Catterwall telling him Una had been involved in the white slave trade—on the management side, not the victims’—and he had declined to keep her as a client, while continuing to look after little Sara’s interests.

“Those were the days,” said Brian Moss, “when we could afford to pick and choose our clients on moral grounds. I suppose I could try and find Una Musgrave, but I don’t think I will. Let Tully Toffener’s inheritance go by default.”

J
ELLY HAS OTHER REASONS
for wanting to be alone, free of criticism and comment from her sisters. Nightly, Jelly now fills her notebooks: scraps of fact, fiction, essay; written descriptions of what goes on in the world, what things look like, feel like; recording the numerous assessments the writer can make on paper about the nature of people, things and fate, as if only in the recording does anything ever become real. Yes, she believes, this defines her: she is a writer. Angelica, Lady Rice and Angel are content just to emote, and judge, and act; enough for them just to
be,
without any particular aspiration, other than to be happy and free of plaintive or passionate emotion. Jelly wants to recreate the world in her own image, and needs space in her head to do it: she wants to be able to reflect at leisure, and not have her spare time taken up with endless triangles and discussions. Just for a time, she tells herself; she will start missing them soon.

She keeps her stolen floppy discs and files in the back of the shoe cupboard and, staring at her shoes, is astonished. Their number has increased, yet she has no memory of buying them. Jelly herself favors little neat low-heeled court shoes, comfortable but smart. Angelica likes great clomping things, large heavy objects weighing down ethereal spirit, rooting her being. Lady Rice likes sensible brogues. Angel runs to black suede thigh boots jangling with gold chains. Six-inch platforms—how can anyone, walk in those? Yet they’ve been worn, walked-in, but when?

At night Jelly ties a cotton thread to her wrist and to the bedpost, in case one of the others cheats and the body is used overnight without her knowledge, but what’s that going to prove? She gives up and hopes for the best, which is also in her nature. Perhaps, when she allows them back in, they could all have some kind of therapy: but then, what are their conversations but co-counselling? It is pleasant in the meanwhile to be relieved of the running anxiety that blights Angelica’s existence: and the undercurrent of sorrow that Lady Rice provides; but Jelly does miss Angel—the half-delinquent, always exciting sense that adventure is just around the corner, and that if it doesn’t come running to meet you, you’ll stretch out a bangled arm and yank it back and by God confront it.

Jelly had a clear-out. She picked a mound of useless clothes out of the wardrobe and shelves: see-through blouses, metal belts, leather trews, purple velvet leggings, cloche hats with flowers, absurd knickers, crotchless tights, lacey suspender belts—unused, unworn mostly, with the price labels still on them—masses of cheap jewellery, expensive face creams gone sour and caked because they’d been inspected, not used, and the lid left off; cheap and cheerful cosmetics, hair curlers, wigs. She gave them all to the corridor maid, who did not seem particularly grateful.

With these out of the way, and nothing but the sensible skirts, pastel jumpers and warm coats left, she felt more herself, and that if the others didn’t have clothes and accessories they would not be so likely to try take-over bids. She and Angel got along just fine: Angelica and Lady Rice, she realized, were just too moral for their own good.

E
DWIN WRITES TO BRIAN
Moss to see if there is any legal way he can strip his wife of her title upon divorce. She betrayed him, insulted him, humiliated him in front of his friends, turned out to be a different person than the one he married—couldn’t he seek an annulment rather than a divorce, on this account? And then strip her of her apparent right to keep a title she had obtained by deception? Her use of the title shows her contempt for all things decent. Shouldn’t she be compelled to disclose her whereabouts? Jelly is. late one morning and Brian gets the letter.

Brian Moss writes back to say that the Courts are not likely to allow Angelica to go completely unmaintained. If Sir Edwin offers his wife a small suburban apartment and £1,000 a month, as a starting offer, it is likely that Lady Rice will withdraw her counter-petition, and his divorce can go quietly ahead and he can anticipate being married to Anthea before the year is out.

Jelly puts an extra zero on the £1,000, changes “small apartment” to “substantial house in a good central area,” prints out the letter, wipes out the changes on the computer and re-enters the original. When Edwin writes back saying that he will offer her half that sum and that he does not want his ex-wife living anywhere near him, she destroys the letter and substitutes for it one requesting Brian Moss offer his wife £5,000 a month, signs it, and gives it to Brian Moss to read. She changes Brian’s reply, omitting his expressions of surprise at the generosity of Sir Edwin’s offer.

At this point, Jelly allows the natural correspondence to flow untampered with. Any inconsistencies she can iron out as she goes along. She is good at Edwin’s signature; she keeps in her desk drawer sheets hand-signed by Brian Moss a-plenty. The important thing is that she is not late for work, or ill, so that Brian Moss doesn’t get to open his own mail. It seems to her that she can manage her life well enough without her sisters’ advice and intimate co-operation.

Jelly as Lady Rice speaks by telephone to Barney Evans, refraining from saying that if she had taken his advice and declined to counter-petition, she would not now be in so strong a position; she asks Barney to write to Brian Moss saying the financial offer made is ludicrously small, considering the length of the marriage, and Sir Edwin’s conduct; how about £7,500 a month. Brian Moss passes the message back to Sir Edwin.

Jelly kisses the back of the envelope before dropping it into the letter box. She is not sure why she does it. Perhaps Lady Rice surfaced again, stirred up by this almost-contact with Edwin? Jelly fears it might be so; Lady Rice’s enduring love for Edwin may infect the others by some kind of osmosis; more positively, it just is that the several personae have the need for money and comfort in common. But at least the letter gets posted. Jelly can make quick decisions—hardly ever seeing the need for decision, come to that: the right step is always so obvious—so it was as well it was she, not Angelica, Angel or Lady Rice, who did the posting. Or the letter would have stayed in the back of a drawer while she made up her mind. Or thus she persuades herself. She is quite a Pollyanna.

All is looking well for Jelly, until a letter arrives from Edwin asking Brian Moss to hurry the whole thing up, get everything settled, he wants to marry Anthea, they want to have babies.

Babies! Jelly, opening this bombshell first thing in the morning, has no immediate reaction. Oh yes, babies. Why not? But she begins to feel sick, has to go to the powder room, almost faints, recovers, begins to cry. No, she can’t cope. She calls her sisters back. They arrive, but can’t quell the tears.

“Bet Anthea wrote it,” says Angel, comfortingly. “If you can write Brian’s letters she can write Edwin’s. She may just be making it up.”

“Or it could be Edwin just twisting knives,” says Lady Rice. But Jelly won’t be comforted.

Jelly, now composite again, continues to cry and has to tell Brian Moss when he comes in that she’s allergic to the poppies on her desk. He flings open the window and tosses poppies, vase and all out, in a gesture which reminds her of Edwin, so she cries some more. Brian Moss clasps her and tells her tears in a woman always affect him: he’d like to make love to her properly there and then.

Jelly pushes him away, and says certainly not, this.is appalling sexual harassment. He says that weeping is its own form of harassment, but goes into his office and sulks for the rest of the day. Lady Rice is back in control: much weeping always revives her. It’s Jelly now who has to go into hiding, keep the company of Angelica and Angel. With Jelly there to control her, at least Angelica doesn’t spend so much time in the shops, and money is saved. And Angel is cheered up: Lady Rice gives Angel some opportunity to take over from time to time: but with Jelly so upset they’re making a dreadful mess of the typing. Brian Moss asks if it’s the time of the month and they say yes. Though it isn’t.

Ram’s back! But Lady Rice won’t let him stop off at the car-park. “I’m in the middle of a divorce,” she says. “I have to keep my nose clean,” and won’t let the others get as well, perhaps,” or “I daresay I’m being neurotic,” in at all. None of the usual changes of mind. Ram seems hurt: the back of his neck is rigid with upset. Lady Rice feels apologetic: she had not quite understood that Ram, too, had feelings—those have become things that women have and men don’t—but she won’t relent. Ram says to his friends he doesn’t understand women one bit: they lack consistency.

L
ADY RICE IS GETTING
better. She can think about other things than her distress. She is no longer suicidal. She considers the part of her that is Jelly, and comes to the following conclusion:

“It is not that I dislike Jelly: she just doesn’t inspire me. It’s she who makes me the boring company I think I sometimes am. Edwin certainly thought so, or he wouldn’t have preferred Anthea to me. It’s Jelly’s fault.”