Read Dangerous Thoughts for Free Online Page B

reunion.

CHAPTER IV
    In the event, the shock was total. I have just said that I had no idea what to expect, but actually I must have had some idea, because I knew immediately that it wasn’t this.
    It was after lunch when the call came. Well, I call it after lunch, but actually I hadn’t had any lunch, I just couldn’t have faced food. My nerves were too much on edge, and also this was going to be my last chance of not bothering about lunch for goodness knew how long, so it would be a shame not to make the most of it. Anyway, it was early afternoon when the call came, and at first I didn’t even realise it was him. There was a lot of background noise, you see, snatches of loud music … a strident yap of laughter … a high-pitched female voice protesting “But I never said he said so, I only said …” and then, cutting its way at last through this undergrowth of noise, came Edwin’s voice. As I say, for a few seconds I didn’t realise it. So excited did he sound, so lit-up with happiness.
    Happiness ? Edwin ?
    “I thought you’d have seen me, darling,” were his first words — and it took me a moment to realise he was addressing me , so long was it since he had called me ‘darling’ — “we were on live ! You know, News at Noon. I was rushed to the studio straight from the airport. I thought you’d have … Didn’t they …?
    No, they didn’t. Nobody tells me anything , I joked. Well, I hope I made it sound like a joke, but actually it was a bit of a sour one, for in truth I was feeling extraordinarily hurt. The feelingwas extraordinary because, as I must have made abundantly clear by now, I no longer loved Edwin much at all; so why should I mind that he’d gone off to do a TV programme the moment he set foot in the country, without bothering to ring me first? Why should he ring me first, I ask myself? Here I was, dreading his arrival, dreading the impending return to our glum bickering life; what sort of priority does this entitle me to? On the other hand, dammit, I am his wife …
    Still, no sense in embarking on the said bickering right now. Rejoice, rather, that he seems to be in such a good mood, and pray that it will spill over into our home life, at least for this first evening. The fresh salmon, the vine leaves, the mushrooms, the white wine are going to have been a good idea after all. I had bought them with great trepidation, for should everything go wrong and a row develop within minutes of his arrival, then the meal would be a disaster. There is nothing worse than the combination of a quarrel with a celebration meal. I know, because it has happened to us, many times.
    So, no reproaches. Nothing to cloud his exuberance during these first hours. All the same, I couldn’t quite think what to say.
    “Where are you?” was the best I could manage. “Are you still at the TV place, or what? Shall I come and …”
    “No, no, darling,” came the hasty response (‘darling’ again? Who does he think he’s talking to?). “I’m not sure, you see … no, we’re not at the studio any more, we’ve moved on to … (a pause; I could feel his face turned away from the mouthpiece and directed towards the circumambient tumult) “No, well, actually it slips my mind, this chap’s name — but anyway, somebody’s jumbo-type flat, up at the top of somewhere, all sky and windows — you know. Acres of white carpet … the whole bit …”
    By now, I realised he was somewhat drunk, but what matter? He was happy , that was the wonderful thing. Happy ! If only he could stay that way.
    It wasn’t entirely true, I reflected at this point, that I didn’t love him at all. It was his bad temper I didn’t love, and his nerves, and his sulks and his insomnia; his needling of Jason, his faultfinding, his complaints and criticisms, his boredom, his restlessness, his endless fidgety presence, his mooning and moping and rooting for trouble …
    Well, that’s a lot to not love, isn’t it? It doesn’t leave