The Essence of the Thing Read online

  There were her boxes, just as she had left them; hanging from the brass rail above them, nothing. Nothing, nothing but black and empty space: not so much as a coat hanger remained in the belly of this great wardrobe which she had so admired. Here, it uncannily seemed, was the heart of the calamity which filled this room and beyond it the entire flat—here, and not—as might crudely have been assumed—the bed, which stood expressionless, passionless, neutral, in its place. No: here, in the darkness of the empty wardrobe, was the correlative of all their anguish. She took the boxes into the corridor one by one and left them near the front door, and then having cast one final glance from the threshold at the bereaved room, she quietly closed the door.

  She was mourning now, and knew it. The death was fully and finally acknowledged, the obsequies could begin. And what could she do, what should be done, in the way of a funeral rite for a creature so frail, so incorporeal, as the life she and Jonathan had shared? She should at least pay it a minute or two of candid and final farewell; she should at any rate sit once more on that sofa (they’d paid an arm and a leg for it, and joyfully) in the dazzling silence of that midsummer-sky-blue room. That much at least she should do. Nicola entered the room once more, and once more sat down on the edge of the sofa, and submitted to the stream of memories, impressions, reflections which began now to unwind like a film on the screen of her grieving consciousness.

  69

  ‘Oh—I’m sorry! I—’

  ‘No, I’m sorry—I thought you’d be gone by now, I would’ve—’

  ‘No, well, yes, I should’ve been, I was delayed—I’ll just—’

  ‘Look—’ he hovered in the doorway, as helpless as she: each as dreadful to the other as an apparition: now he took a few uncertain steps into the room. ‘As you’re here,’ he said, ‘as we’ve met like this—there was something I wanted to say to you.’

  She was speechless; she trembled.

  ‘I would’ve written,’ he said, ‘but—anyway—look—could we sit down for a moment?’

  And still trembling, still speechless, she sat down.

  He came hesitantly across the room and sat carefully down on the other end of the sofa. He made a helpless gesture. ‘I just wanted,’ he said, ‘to say that I’m sorry.’

  ‘Sorry,’ she repeated stupidly. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’m sorry for—everything. For what’s happened.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Do you understand?’

  ‘No. No, I don’t. I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘I’ve made a mistake. I’ve made a terrible, an absolutely terrible mistake.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’

  ‘I was wrong.’

  She couldn’t truly take this in. It was difficult for him to go on speaking, but she couldn’t help him.

  ‘I don’t understand how it happened,’ he went on. ‘I don’t actually truly understand what’s happened. It’s just—it was just wrong. I was wrong.’

  ‘You’re saying—’

  ‘I shouldn’t have sent you away. I shouldn’t have said that I didn’t love you. I’ve—I’ve just—screwed up. I mean—look—I’m just—’ and he started to cry. He sat there, crying: it was a dreadful sight: but she could do nothing.

  ‘Jonathan, don’t,’ she said; ‘don’t, don’t.’

  ‘No,’ he said, his tears ceasing. ‘It’s hardly reasonable, is it, after everything I’ve done.’

  There was an awful silence, black as night: they felt as if they were staring into the depths of an abyss. The silence itself seemed to echo, in that awful blackness.

  It was he who eventually spoke. ‘Can you forgive me?’ he said.

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t say.’

  It was too much to take in, in truth.

  ‘Please,’ he said wretchedly, ‘please—you must forgive me. I mean, you see—you see, if you can’t, if you don’t, then my life really won’t be worth living.’

  He was looking at her, his blue eyes not cold any longer but blazing: he was altogether serious; he truly believed that his life would not be worth living.

  ‘It’s too much to ask,’ she said, ‘that the worth of your life should depend on me, on an act of mine.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘One always asks too much.’

  But she dimly saw that it might be her life which would not be worth living were she not to forgive him.

  ‘I’ll do the best I can,’ she said.

  There was another silence; he was struggling for speech. ‘I—’ he began, ‘I hope—I was wondering if there was anything, anything whatever, I can do for you, now, or ever—you see, now, I—look— can I see you again? Will you let me see you again?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m going away soon, anyway.’

  ‘What?’

  She told him about Scunthorpe.

  He was devastated; he sat there, helpless, defeated. Then his spirits seemed just fractionally to rally. ‘You must take the car,’ he said. ‘You’ll need one, up there.’

  Here was something he could do for her, immediately.

  ‘No, I couldn’t possibly.’

  And it was quite a classy Renault.

  ‘Yes, you could; you must. It’s the least I can do. You can take it now if you like.’

  She explained that she had Susannah’s car.

  ‘I’ve probably got a parking ticket by now,’ she said. ‘I really must go.’

  But she sat there, helpless, disoriented. He looked out of the window. The sun still streamed into the room where they sat, amazed and fearful: while all the ghosts waited in the walls.

  He took her hand. ‘Could you just let me hope, for the moment,’ he said; ‘just let me believe, for the moment, that I can somehow repair everything? That I can—somehow—eventually—make it all right? Can you let me hope for that? At least for the moment?’

  She said nothing: what could she truly say? She looked at him. Who was this stranger?

  ‘I love you, Nicola,’ he said.

  He saw the look in her eyes, and let go of her hand.

  ‘No—yes—of course you can’t possibly believe this now, I do see that—’

  ‘Can you?’

  Could anyone, at any time?

  ‘We’ll see,’ he said. ‘I’ll show you. I’ll devote myself to showing you; I’ll find a way.’

  She fought down an impulse to say, don’t, please don’t. Suddenly she felt entirely depleted, as if at any moment she might herself begin to cry: and why should this be so? Then she remembered the keys; she took them from her handbag and gave them to him.

  He hesitated slightly before taking them from her. Then a thought seemed to strike him. ‘By the way,’ he said, ‘do you like rubies?’

  ‘Rubies?

  ’ ‘Yes, that’s right, rubies.’

  ‘I’ve never thought.’

  ‘I just wondered.’

  ‘I see.’

  Perhaps he was mad. Anything, she now knew, was possible.

  ‘Look, I really must go now,’ she told him. ‘Susannah will be wanting the car.’

  Jonathan made a shrug of resignation. ‘Give me your telephone number, will you?’ he said.

  She wrote it down for him, and then he helped her downstairs with the boxes.

  He leaned on the window frame and looked at her anxiously.

  ‘Drive carefully,’ he told her.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I’ll call you—oh! look, I almost forgot—you left that marmalade—’

  ‘That what?’

  ‘The marmalade my mother sent you, I’ll just—’

  ‘For God’s sake.’ She began to laugh.

  He looked bewildered; he tried to smile.

  ‘You eat it,’ she said.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Yes, I’m absolutely certain.’

  ‘Oh, thanks, thanks, I will then.’

  ‘Bon appétit!’

  She let in the clutch. She could hardly bear to look at his face, just at this moment: it
harrowed her. Then she waved briefly and drove away.

  When she reached Chelsea, she did not cross the river immediately, but parked near the Embankment, and went and hung over the wall, staring for a long time down at the water while the traffic roared dreadfully past her back, and wondering why she could not—just now—feel anything other than an all-engulfing, and quite unutterable, sadness.

  Table of Contents

  COVER PAGE

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT PAGE

  DEDICATION

  CONTENTS

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  36

  37

  38

  39

  40

  41

  42

  43

  44

  45

  46

  47

  48

  49

  50

  51

  52

  53

  54

  55

  56

  57

  58

  59

  60

  61

  62

  63

  64

  65

  66

  67

  68

  69