The Stranger's Child - Alan Hollinghurst [106]
He heard a voice and looked again through the shadows to the bright back lawn, where he saw a woman in a wide straw hat with a red flower on the brim talking to someone out of view as she moved slowly towards the house. She was a largeish figure, in a shapeless blue dress, and carrying a large tapestry bag. Could this be the disdainful Mrs. Keeping, mother of Julian and John? Surely too old. Mr. Keeping’s own mother perhaps, a friend or relative who was visiting. She stopped for a moment, as if stumped by what she’d just been told, and gazed at the ground, and then unseeingly along the side of the house, where she did in fact see Paul. She said something to the person—now Paul heard another woman’s voice—and when she looked back he raised his head with a slight smile and then waved weakly, unsure if he wanted to announce himself or efface himself. There was another exchange; she nodded distantly, not exactly at Paul, and then strolled on out of view behind the house.
Paul went to the front door to call goodbye. He felt he’d been placed now as a low-level intruder, a peerer through other people’s windows. A middle-aged woman with a wide pale face and black hair that was swept up and set in a stiff, broad helmet was coming towards him. “Oh, hello,” he said, “I’m Paul Bryant—from the bank …”
She gave him a practical look. “Did you want to see my husband?”
“Well, actually I’ve just walked here with him,” said Paul.
“Oh …,” she said, with an air of momentary concession. She had strongly drawn black eyebrows which made her look hard to please. “Was there something else?”
“Well, I don’t know,” said Paul; and feeling he shouldn’t be put in the wrong, “He just left me here.”
“Ah …!” said Mrs. Keeping, and half-turning she called out, “Leslie!” Mr. Keeping appeared at the end of the hall. “This young man doesn’t know if he’s been dismissed or not”—and she stared rather drolly at Paul, as if to say the joke was on everyone but her.
“Ah, yes,” said Mr. Keeping. “This is Paul Bryant. He’s just joined us from Wantage.”
“From Wantage …!” said Mrs. Keeping, as if this were droller still.
“We all have to come from somewhere, you know,” said Mr. Keeping.
Paul had grown up in the mild but untested belief that Wantage was a fine little town. “Well, sir, it was good enough for King Alfred,” he said.
Mrs. Keeping half-allowed the protest, and the joke. “Mm, you’re going back a bit,” she said. Though something else had occurred to her. She set her head on one side and frowned at his shoulders, his posture. “How strong are you?” she said.
“Well, reasonably,” said Paul, confused by the scrutiny. “Yes, I suppose …”
“Then I think I can use you. Come through,” a tiny glow of cajolement now in her tone.
“Paul may have other plans, darling,” said Mr. Keeping, but in easy surrender to his wife.
“I shan’t need him for long.”
“I’ve certainly got a couple of minutes,” said Paul.
They went down the hall and into the room at the end. “I don’t want my husband risking his back,” said Mrs. Keeping. The sitting-room was densely furnished, large easy-chairs and sofas arm to arm on a thick gold carpet, nests of tables, standard-lamps, and a pair of surprising Victorian portraits, very large in the room, a woman in red and a man in black, looking out over the stereogram and the teak TV cabinet that flanked the fireplace. On top of the TV were several framed photos, in which Paul made out two boys, surely Julian and John, in yachting gear. They stepped out through the open french windows on to a wide patio. “This is Mr. Bryant,” said Mrs. Keeping. “You can leave your briefcase there.”
“Oh … right …,” said Paul, nodding at the two females who were sitting in deckchairs. They were identified as “My mother, Mrs. Jacobs”—this was the old lady in the straw hat, whom he’d already seen—and “Jenny Ralph … my niece, yes, my half-brother’s daughter!” as if she’d just worked it out for the first time. Paul himself only pretended to do so, nodded again and murmured