The Spring Madness of Mr Sermon (33 page)

^{"I didn't get any letter," said Sybil stonily and he seemed mildly surprised.}

^{"You didn't? I posted one the day before yesterday, when did you leave?"}

^{"Yesterday morning."}

^{"Then it must have arrived by midday post," he said, adding rather ruefully, "I would have written before Sybil and I mean that but I}

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^{was very angry about the police calling. You shouldn't have done that, you should have known me better than that!"}

^{"Why
should I?" she was angry now and had recovered her composure. "Why should I know you any better? You stalk out of the house leaving me without an inkling of whether you're alive or dead! You wrote, you say, but even if you did it was after many weeks without a letter and now that I have found you, what are you doing? Superintending public lavatories-you-who were supposed to be so shy that you could hardly exchange a sentence with anyone I asked into the house. I can't pretend to understand what's happened to you or what's driven you to ... to humiliate me in this dreadful way. I can only think you must be ill ... or ... demented or having a breakdown of some kind." She looked at him closely, noting his strained expression and relented. "Of course, if you are ill it's quite a different matter . . ."}

^{"I'm not ill, Sybil, and I told you so in my letter. As a matter of fact I've never felt better in my life and I've never been happier either!"}

^{He saw from her expression that this angered her and added, "However, that doesn't mean I'd willingly cause you any distress but it's the truth. Whatever's happened to me since I left home has been good and in a way a great deal has happened, though I can't expect any of it to impress you very much."}

^{"I'm quite sure it wouldn't," she said. "And you can hardly expect me to congratulate you on your choice of profession!"}

^{"Well, that isn't quite what it appears," he said, smiling a little. "I was only using my initiative to help someone and after all, that's what I'm paid for, that and to keep an eye on the staff."}

^{"What staff? For whom do you work?"}

^{"For the Urban District Council," he said simply.}

^{"But why-why? You aren't penniless, are you?"}

^{"Not me!" he rejoined, with some satisfaction. "I left home with eleven pounds ten in my pocket and now I've got over two hundred, not counting the forty odd I paid out to Olga of course."}

^{' "y\l ->"}

^{^Olga?}

^{"Olga Boxall, whose house I rented but you must know about that if the bank told you of the cheque." "I was on my way there just now."}

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^{"You wouldn't have found anyone there, Olga is away."}

^{The information relieved her slightly but she thought it strange that he referred to his landlady by her Christian name.}

^{"Who is this Olga?"}

^{He looked at her calmly, hiding a smile. He was over his moment of panic now and surprised to discover that he still held the initiative. Not only had she come searching for him but she was concerned about the company he kept and this was something new in their relationship.}

^{"I've just told you, she's my landlady but she went off on a Mediterranean cruise soon after I got here. You see, Sybil, I've made lots of friends and that's something I was never able to do before. I run an antique shop on Sundays and the Town Clerk is delighted with me. I've become friendly with the Headmaster of a famous school near here and I go there on Saturdays. Yes, one way and another I suppose I've changed quite a bit."}

^{It made her feel absolutely helpless sitting there listening to his boasts as though she was his mother and he was assuring her that he had settled to a new routine, and that she was not to worry because he was a big boy now well able to look after himself. It was as though she wasn't talking to him at all but reading a long, egotistical letter, a wish-you-were-here from a bustling holiday centre and posted to a dull home town where nothing ever happened.}

^{She passed a hand across her brow and he regarded her anxiously. "You're feeling all right now, aren't you, Sybil ? I mean, you've been keeping well, you and the children? You look wonderful, I don't think I've ever seen you looking so young and attractive!"}

^{He spoke sincerely for she did look attractive and certainly nothing like her true age in a trim biscuit-coloured suit and spotted silk blouse, although privately he doubted whether the kind of hat she was wearing had ever been seen on Kingsbay's promenade.}

^{Her shoes, gloves and handbag were obviously very expensive accessories and he reflected that she had always been a woman of excellent taste, with an unerring instinct as to what suited her age and figure. The latter, he thought, had improved since he last saw her, for she seemed much slimmer and he wondered if she could have lost weight through worry. He felt a little ashamed' of the satisfaction}

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^{her presence here caused him, for there remained in him no trace of the rancour that had driven him from the house. Instead he was able to look at her with a steady, half-amused affection that would have needed very little encouragement to develop into something more demonstrative. He thought: 'It's very strange, but she's not in the least like the high priestess of the Wyckham Rise Operatic and Dramatic Society that I remember! Who would have dreamed she would come posting down here before she even received my letter? And who would have imagined that she would go to such pains to find me when she had every excuse for waiting for me to make it up ?' Then it crossed his mind that perhaps there was a more sinister reason for the sacrifice of her pride, perhaps she had sought him out for the purpose of putting an end to their marriage, and he made the rather surprising discovery that this would upset him very much- that the possibility of losing her depressed him more than he had any right to be depressed, particularly if Olga was taken into consideration. Yet even in her presence he felt no conscience prick regarding Olga, or for walking out on her that night, for it seemed to him that their future as man and wife now lay with Sybil rather than with him. He had initiated the change of direction and was resolved that such change must at all costs be maintained, yet, if she was prepared to adapt herself, their marriage might not only be saved but infinitely strengthened and with this possibility in mind he said, bluntly:}

^{"Look here, Sybil, let's go across to the cafe and have lunch together. It's quiet there and I can get the alcove seat. It's high time we had a talk about our future and I imagine that's what brought you here!" She made a gesture of refusal but he went on, "Dammit, we can't plan the rest of our lives on a Council seat and when you've had a meal we'll go back to my place and spend the rest of the day getting things straight if you wish. Where are you staying?"}

^{"At that big hotel over there, the Royal Albert, I think it's called. It's quite dreadful!"}

^{"Well, I know one thing, I don't want Jonquil in on this," he said, decisively. "She can kick her heels for a bit and we'll call her up later."}

^{Then she knew that despite the shock of meeting him again in these shameful circumstances she still wanted most desperately to come to terms with him but that this was not nearly so easy as she had}

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^{imagined it would be, for whereas she was by no means sure of herself, he was maddeningly self-possessed and had in fact acquired an entirely new personality during his brief absence, so that it was like two people walking the same path in the dark, one possessing first-class vision, the other near-sighted and conscious of faltering steps. As they moved off along the sea-front a ravaged old man in a blue jersey saluted Sebastian and growled: "Marnin* Mr. Supervisor!" and Sebastian returned his salute with a careless lift of the hand, like an officer crossing a parade ground. It was not, she reflected, the kind of salute ordinarily given by a man in charge of public conveniences.}

^{They entered the 'Wagon Wheel' cafe where a woman in blue overalls greeted him with restrained enthusiasm.}

^{"Oh, you're early, Mr. Sermon, but I've saved your corner," and she piloted them to an alcove made by a bow window at the far end of the room. As they ate Sebastian talked about the town and seemed to display enthusiasm for it.}

^{"You mustn't judge it on that barn of a 'Royal Albert'," he said earnestly. "That place is badly managed but Kingsbay as a whole has a very definite policy. It sets out to provide something quite different from the usual resort, to preserve what was calm and cosy about these kind of communities in the last century but attract a select type of visitor. You can call it stuffy if you like but it has a wonderful effect upon the nerves. Down here nothing seems urgent. People still give value for money and there's a dignity about life. It isn't a scurrying from point to point with an air of let's-get-all-we-can-out-of-'em-and-be-damned-to-'em, like most seaside towns in summer."}

^{"Do you intend making a career of this . . . this beach inspecting?" asked Sybil presently and he laughed.}

^{"Good Lord, no!" he said, "this is only a stop-gap! I was talked into it by Ben Bignall, the Town Clerk and promised to tide him over until September. They're getting a professional on the job next year but I haven't found the job difficult or worrying. Come to that I don t find anything very difficult nowadays. Six weeks ago, if anyone had asked me, I should have told them that the only way I could earn a living was as a schoolteacher but now I could earn enough to keep me any number of ways. I suppose I've developed confidence in}

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^{myself and, anyway, you remember how I always hated cities and suburbs."}

^{"You mean you intend to stay here? For good? In this town?"}

^{"Not necessarily here, but somewhere like it. Listen Sybil," he began to speak rapidly now as though he might lack the resolution to say what was in his mind if he paused to choose his words, "why don't you make a break too ? What future is there in the kind of life we were leading in that suburb ? All those people who lived near us, who shared our kind of life, what do they amount to, any of them ? They're all trying to be someone they've dreamed up and it isn't until you get away from them that you realise there's a whole world outside where most people accept life as it is and themselves for what they are. I became so absorbed in the microscopic life of a prep, school that I came to accept the spurious for the real and we lost contact with one another in the process. We never even talked like this, frankly and without regard as to what one ought or ought not to say. We could have been happy enough if we'd broken the circle but it never occurred to us to break it because none of the people around us did. I think I've reached a crossroads/Sybil, and at last I know where I'm going, the kind of things I want to do, and what kind of person I want to be in the time left to me. You can call it drift if you like but at least it's drift on a free range and not down a groove about two inches wide!"}

^{"How was I to know that you hated it all?" she asked, suddenly. "You didn't say so, you seemed happy enough at home. I didn't nag you into sharing my kind of life. I always let you follow your own inclination."}

^{"But don't you see, Sybil, that's no way at all for a married couple to live. We didn't mean anything to one another and all the time, without even knowing it, I was shrivelling into a husk of a man. You must see a difference in me now! I'm a different kind of person altogether!"}

^{"Yes, you are," she said, slowly, "so different that I can't even begin to understand you, Sebastian. All this talk about a change of air and scene and occupation doesn't sweep me off my feet however, I know very well that I couldn't go rural to please you or anyone else! And anyway, you're obviously content to lead a kind of vagabond}

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^{life, devoid of all social contacts. You can't expect me to share that at my time of life!"}

^{"Damn it, I'm not asking you to ... to cut yourself off from everything you like, Sybil. All I want is that you should break free of that bloody suburban set. Look, I could get a steady job down here, a job I enjoyed and could do well, a business perhaps, anything, but that isn't important because you don't have to live on what I bring home on pay days. And where we live isn't important either, so long as it isn't in a city or a suburb, like Wyckham Rise. I wouldn't ask you to move into an insanitary country cottage or anything like that! There are some first-class properties about here that people like us have spent a lifetime saving to buy. But this is beside the point too, the vital thing is we'd be starting fresh and free from clutter and if we built the kind of marriage I want to build we shouldn't need to rely on outside interests and acquaintances! I'd be very happy indeed to give it a go!"}

^{"Well, I wouldn't," said Sybil, "and I don't think that's unreasonable of me! Think what you're asking me to do. You're asking me to sell up, to leave a house and district I like, to turn my back on every friend I've got and lead an altogether different life in a place that may be nice enough for a week's holiday but wouldn't suit me at all as a permanent home. It's too big a change and too big a revolution. I like nearness to London, to decent shops and a decent hairdresser. I like my amateur work and the people it brings into my life. If you hate where we live as much as you say you do, I'd ... I'd be willing to compromise, I'd sell the house and look for another further out, somewhere like Thresham or Bickley or even Sevenoaks but certainly not here among the chaw-bacons! I'm not that kind of person and it would be silly to pretend that I am or could be. I value our marriage as much or more than you pretend to, Sebastian. After all, it was you who put such a strain on it by storming out of the house in the middle of the night and leaving me to trace you via a bank and a police station!"}