The Spring Madness of Mr Sermon (48 page)

^{"Look here, Sybil, let's stop behaving like a couple in a music-hall sketch! I love you and I need you more than ever! The kids have grown away from us and whatever the people round here mean to you I can replace them. We could be very happy down there and make a fresh start and that's something we could never do in this district. Let's give it a six-months' trial anyway!"}

^{As he faced her, detaining her by the shoulder, he yearned to be done with pleading and persuasion and break the deadlock between them by an embrace, by touching her lips and her hair. Suddenly he felt so much older and wiser than her, old enough and wise enough to lose face or appear to lose it. Because she made no attempt to break free he sensed the same will to compromise and extended his}

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^{hold by dropping his right hand to her waist and throwing his left arm round her neck. Then, as he was on the point of kissing her, he felt a stab of acute pain in his right hand and leaped back with a yell, whipping his hand to his mouth then lowering it and staring at a puncture that was already welling blood.}

^{"Good God!" he shouted, looking from the wound to the point of the nail scissors that she now held like an offered dagger, "why did you have to do that?" and when she continued to stare at him he threw aside reason and patience, surrendering to rage and frustration generated not only by pain but by all the disappointments that had emanated from this woman over twenty years, hurts that seemed now to find their vent through the bleeding stab in his hand. With a yell of wrath he swept her up and dragged her away from the window, collapsing on the littered bed with Sybil thrust sideways on top of him. In his fury he did not notice that she made almost no resistance, that immediately after seizing the scissors and striking them downward into his hand she had remained rigid, staring not at him but at the trickle of blood on his knuckles. He shouted:}

^{"You act like a child and by God I'll treat you as one!" and holding her firmly with his bleeding hand he used the other to jerk at the waist-band of her skirt, ripping it almost free of her with a single tug and proceeding straight away to follow her mother's advice.}

^{"Stop it, Sebastian . . . I'm sorry . . . sorry!" she cried, becoming a child again in the shrillness of her plea and a wild flailing of the legs, but he was resolved to trade smart for smart and in another second the black silk petticoat had followed the skirt, both garments becoming entangled in her high heels and reducing her cover to a pair of nylon briefs. For a fraction of a second he thought of following the old lady's example literally but with his injured hand he was finding it difficult to maintain his grip and in any case the briefs were totally inadequate protection as her yell testified the moment his hand descended. She gave a series of ineffectual heaves and her initial shout must have carried down the long garden and across to the tennis-courts in Cedarwood Close but, far from deterring him, her shout and struggles gave him the greatest satisfaction and five more times his hand came down before it brushed against a heaven-}

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^{sent instrument of correction, a sustantial rosewood hairbrush that was among the accessories she had thrown on the bed. He seized this with a fierce joy, renewing his grip and shifting his target and whacking away at her squirming bottom as though it had been a carpet on a line. At the fourth blow the brush snapped in two parts so he hurled the handle to the floor, intending to resume the work by hand and seemingly bent on continuing indefinitely, but suddenly he realised that her struggles and outcry had almost ceased and with a sharp sense of revulsion he loosed his hold so that she slid forward and rolled clear, finishing half-kneeling with her face pressed to the bed, one hand thrown forward, the other spread protectively behind her.}

^{Crouched there it was impossible to see her as a woman of almost forty, her hair and clothes disordered, her kneeling pose that of a scared adolescent caught out in some lie or piece of naughtiness. The illusion was so striking that he reached out and touched her hair, saying, "I'm sorry, but honestly . . . honestly . . . Sybil, you asked for it, you really asked for it," and he fumbled in his breast pocket, taking out a handkerchief and wrapping it round his hand which was now bleeding freely, soiling his new suit, the bedspread and the carpet.}

^{"You hurt me, Sebastian," she said, slowly, "you hurt me dreadfully!"}

^{He did not recognise a subtle change in her voice, its sharpness blunted, all its petulance and condescension drained away. There was no element of complaint in it. The words were said almost wonderingly, as though by someone who had been considerably astonished. He did not notice this because he was bowed under the weight of defeat.}

^{It seemed to him then that they had blundered from mistake to mistake, piling one upon the other until what little prospect there had ever been of a reconciliation was crushed flat under an accumulation of wrongs and grudges. What had begun so well had ended like the last act of a tasteless French farce, with him bleeding all over the carpet and her standing there rubbing her sore behind. What dignity had ever attached itself to their marriage had gone, punctured by nail scissors, drummed out by a hairbrush. He got up and smoothed his jacket.}

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^{"I dare say it did hurt," he said glumly, "but so did the scissors! You're quite right, Sybil, there's absolutely no sense in going on like this, we should probably end up by killing one another. I'm sorry I walloped you and I dare say you'll come round to being sorry about my hand. We'd best call it a day but you don't have to trail off to Portsmouth, I'll go back to the hotel and get a train to Kingsbay in the morning."}

^{"Let me look at your hand," she said briefly and without waiting for him to offer it she lifted it from his knee and unwrapped the handkerchief. It was not very much of a cut and had now stopped bleeding but the point of the scissors had penetrated a quarter-inch and it still throbbed painfully. "Wait, I'll get something for it!" and she kicked off her shoes, miraculously still on her feet and went into the bathroom, returning a moment later with some powdered alum and a tin of Elastoplast. She applied the astringent and he pulled a wry face at the smart.}

^{"Hi, that stings like hell!" he protested and this time she smiled openly.}

^{"So does my bottom but alum won't do it any good!" She pretended not to notice his look of amazement and stuck the plaster in place. "I forgot you were left-handed," she said, lightly, "I ought to have put that one out of action!"}

^{For a moment he was too astonished to shake himself free of gloom but watched her in silence as she moved about the room, straightening things, putting bottles and cartons back on the dressing table, picking up the two pieces of the hairbrush and inspecting them with interest. Finally he said: "You mean you don't want me to go? You don't care whether I stay?"}

^{"Yes, I care," she said, frankly, "I care very much whether you go!" She stopped tidying and stood in front of him. "I'm sorry I did such a stupid thing, Sebastian, genuinely sorry, but you don't have to be! I don't know of any other action on your part that would have shocked me into being sorry before it was too late, or before we enlarged our folly. I don't want us to part, God knows I don't and never did! I'm not making any excuses for jabbing the scissors into you but I think I've got a good one for treating you the way I have lately."}

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^{"You don't have to bother with excuses," he began, joyfully.}

^{"Yes, I do, Sebastian," she went on, cutting him short with a gesture, "because it's part of the whole pattern of our marriage. I wasn't in love with you when it began and I wasn't when we had the children. I don't think I even started being until you walked out of the house and stayed away all that time but I am now and in a way I find it difficult to tell you because you aren't the same man any more. You aren't the man I cheated by marrying on the rebound and you aren't the Sebastian Sermon who went away from here in the spring. I suppose that man would have satisfied most women but he didn't mean a great deal to me. Well, I've learned something too in the last few months, not so much as you perhaps but something, and because of that I at least owe you the truth, even if it costs all that's left to us now! That first child I had wasn't yours, it was Norman's, Norman Stephenson's, so you can guess how badly I needed a first reserve!"}

^{She paused, awaiting his reaction but there was so little that lack of it made her falter for a moment.}

^{She said, dismally, "I don't suppose you even remember Norman?"}

^{"Yes," he said quietly, "I remember him very well but I don't know why you should want to rake up ancient history at this particular moment." He thought a white lie would do no harm, so he added, "I was never sure whose child it was but I knew well it wasn't mine and I took you on the rebound terms anyway, so why should I be indignant about it after twenty years ?"}

^{She looked wonderingly at him and he noticed with a start that her eyes were wet and reached out, taking her by the hand.}

^{She sat down on the bed beside him, twisting her body round and laying both hands on his knee. "You . . . you don't care? You aren't upset by knowing ?"}

^{"I don't give a damn," he said cheerfully, "that is-not if you meant what you said just now about being in love with me. That's something I didn't know and something I was resigned to doing without!" and with a sudden movement he threw his sound arm round her, pulled her to him and kissed her on the mouth.}

^{Then he had another surprise, a far bigger one than that administered by her confession, for it was clear to him from the moment}

^{their lips touched that for some moments now she had been impatiently waiting some manifestation from him that did not involve excuses, explanations or even protestations. She not only returned his kiss in a way that had never happened before but launched herself at him with a lustiness that almost frightened him.}

^{They were still lying there when the heat went out of the evening sun and twilight hovered over the broken line of roofs in Cedarwood Close. He was sleeping but she was wide awake, musing with his head on her shoulder, his injured hand flung across her breast, and she thought as she listened to his regular breathing: 'Dear God, what fun we've been missing, the pair of us all these years! How long have we got to catch up ? He's forty-nine and I'm only ten years younger but can you measure vitality by a calendar? He's got plenty it seems and me? I've got far more than I thought I had that night he came in here rampaging after banging that boy's head against the water-pipes!' And then, as he stirred slightly, and she flexed her hand to rid it of pins and needles, she thought, 'What an odd sequel this is to having one's behind tanned by one's husband! Where did he learn to be so different? Selling antiques? Supervising beach amusements? Or at this new school he thinks so much about?' None seemed to her a likely source and she wondered if there had been a woman somewhere, the girl at the zoo, or someone she didn't know about? If there was she didn't care a hoot. She was as sure of him as any woman can be sure of any man.}

^{She turned her head slightly and looked down at him, noting the deep sun tan on his skin and his general fitness. He had changed physically as well. He not only seemed broader and taller but carried himself differently. His taste in clothes had improved and there was about him an air of decision that had eluded him all his life.}

^{Her left arm was numb and at last she was obliged to withdraw it so that he stirred and opened his eyes. She said, "One thing will have to be changed Sebastian, and that's it-the name-Sebastian. Maybe that was part of the trouble. Didn't anyone ever give you a nickname? Most schoolmasters get one, don't they?"}

^{He said with mild surprise, "Didn't you ever know what the boys called me?"}

^{"No, what was it?"}

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^{" 'Preacher'."}

^{She laughed, "Well, it'll do I suppose . . . 'Preacher' . . . Preacher Sermon!" and she savoured it in silence for a moment.}

^{"What time is it ?" he asked, presently.}

^{"About nine I should think but we aren't going anywhere, not until morning anyway."}

^{"I'm damned hungry," he said and she laughed again so that he noted how seldom he had heard her laugh in the past.}

^{"I'm not in the least surprised," she said. "Me too! Could you do with cold chicken, ham and salad ?"}

^{"By George I could! Then we'll make an early night of it," and he kissed her lightly on the ear.}

^{She got up, stretching, and as she glanced round the disordered room it struck him that a completely new and richly rewarding relationship had been bestowed upon them as though by magic, that this was precisely how he had always thought of marriage, an easy rhythm of passionate possession and relaxed companionship, with free and easy access between two minds and bodies. She went into the bathroom and he heard her humming. The sound, he thought, was as pleasant as her laughter.}

^{He sat up and climbed off the bed, giving himself a covert glance in the long mirror and at that moment she came back into the room.}

^{"That suit!" she said. "It's in a dreadful state and it's brand new, isn't it? Give it to me and I'll hang it up. Why on earth didn't you take it off?"}