The Editor's Wife Read online

  ‘What’s the matter? Are you ill?’ I asked.

  ‘I won’t be wanting any food,’ he said, without looking at me. ‘I’ve just eaten a bar of soap.’

  8

  THE MORNING AFTER my trip to London, instead of calling the insurance company, or looking in the public appointments section of The Times, or dusting off my CV, I rang Alex Canning to arrange a meeting.

  Since it was now term time I tried the number at the university. The phone was picked up on the first ring.

  ‘. . . that’s not the only castration metaphor. Hello?’

  ‘Hello,’ I said, refusing to be thrown. ‘Can I speak to Dr Canning?’

  ‘Speaking. Could I possibly call you back in twenty minutes. I’m teaching.’

  ‘Yes, of course. My name’s Christopher Flinders and—’

  ‘Oh, well, in that case, hang on, I’ll talk to you now.’ There was a fumbling sound of a hand on the receiver and then a door closing. ‘Hello? Are you still there?’

  I confirmed that I was.

  ‘Thank you so much for getting back to me,’ she said. ‘I’m not supposed to take calls when I’ve got students. Very unprofessional. But I’ve had such trouble tracking you down.’

  ‘I’ve moved a few times over the years,’ I agreed.

  ‘I think it was your brother I spoke to,’ she went on. ‘He wouldn’t give me your current address.’

  That figures, I thought.

  ‘Did he forward my letter?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ I said. ‘But I got it eventually.’

  ‘Oh good. So you know what this is about.’

  ‘Owen Goddard.’

  I hadn’t spoken his name aloud in over twenty years, and I had to swallow hard to dislodge the pebble of remorse and guilt that instantly lodged in my throat.

  ‘Yes. I assumed from the contents of the letter I’ve got from you to him that you knew each other quite well.’

  ‘I wouldn’t say that, necessarily,’ I said. I still wasn’t sure how much I wanted to tell her. Not everything, by a long stretch.

  ‘Have you any other correspondence from him dating from that time? It would be incredibly helpful to have copies.’

  ‘I might have. I’d have to have a rummage. There wouldn’t be much. I’m not a great hoarder.’

  ‘Is there any chance that we could meet?’ she went on. ‘I don’t know what part of the world you’re in.’

  ‘I live about twenty miles north of York.’

  ‘Oh that’s no distance. I could drive up one morning. Is there a particular day that suits you?’

  I glanced at the Cheese-lover’s Calendar that Carol had given me for Christmas: apart from a dentist’s appointment some months hence it was blank, the empty, jobless days unrolling ahead of me. ‘I’m not too busy at the moment,’ I said. ‘You can pretty much name your day.’

  As soon as I had put the phone down, having agreed a time the following week, and given directions to Hartslip, I went straight up to the loft – a tiny hatch above the landing, reached by a nylon rope ladder. It is impossible to climb a swinging rope ladder while carrying anything substantial – a powerful disincentive to hoarding – and not much had been deemed worth the journey, so it didn’t take long to find what I was looking for. A zip-up canvas holdall that had moved unopened with me from place to place over the years.

  I carried it down to the sitting room and unpacked it in front of the fire. Unzipping it released a puff of twenty-year-old air, piercingly redolent of my old bedsit in Brixton. It was a combination of cigarette smoke, Chanel pour homme, and that cannabis and fried chilli smell that had soaked into the very fabric of the building. I was assailed by a nostalgia that verged on panic: when I closed my eyes and breathed in the scent so particular to that time and place I was almost afraid to open them again in case I found myself back there, and all the years in between just a dream.

  I took out the artefacts one by one. A black cashmere sweater, worn almost to mesh at the elbows. A gold and aquamarine pendant, still in its velvet box, unworn. Eight hardback copies of The Night Wanderer by Christopher Flinders (Swift & Deckle 1987) First edition. Unread. A ring binder of 150 handwritten pages. A Christmas card. An invitation. Two letters.

  From this haul I selected just the invitation and one of the letters to give to Alex Canning. The other letter – a model of brevity – I put back.

  On the agreed morning, and punctual to the minute, Alex Canning came bumping down the muddy track to Hartslip Cottage in a rusty hatchback that belched clouds of blue exhaust. The driver’s door was so badly dented that it no longer opened and she had to shuffle across to the passenger side to get out. The rest of the car’s bodywork bore the untreated dimples and scrapes of past skirmishes.

  It was a cold morning, with a hard frost and a weak January sun, so I had lit a fire early to let the room warm up. I had spent the hours leading up to the appointment tidying the place, excavating the table from beneath cliffs of paperwork and clutter, wiping layers of dust from every horizontal surface, and beating some life back into the depressed cushions of the couch. Since the defection of Patty, my occasional cleaner/lover, standards had slipped somewhat, and it was only the threat of visitors that stirred me to action. It was always worse in winter, with the open fire puffing out clouds of ash and soot, and mud from the farmyard being traipsed in on the soles of my shoes. Anyway, the sitting room looked quite presentable and homely when I’d finished, and not nearly so much like the habitat of a solitary middle-aged man with few friends. While emptying the waste-paper basket (a wedding present from Gerald), I turned up my watch, which I’d thought lost for ever and had already successfully claimed on insurance.

  I could tell I was anxious about the meeting, as I kept walking from sitting room to kitchen, apparently on tidying-related errands, and then forgetting why I was there. My mind was preoccupied with how best to manage the evasions that would soon be necessary. Alex Canning had sounded rather charming on the phone, which was a pity. It would be so much easier if she turned out to be objectionable.

  I watched her ease herself out of the passenger seat, with considerable effort, and I wondered if she was disabled in some way. Then she straightened up and I could see that she was: even her chunky coat and scarf couldn’t disguise the vast bulge of advanced pregnancy. I could see now why Gerald had mentioned this detail. It was hard to overlook.

  I had forgotten the dogs, of course. Richard’s three collies came bounding over to her, barking and threatening to spring, and she stood rooted to the spot holding her leather bag like a shield, until I got my shoes on and ran outside to rescue her.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said, waving the dogs away and escorting her to the safety of the conservatory. ‘I should have warned you. They don’t bark at me any more, so I forget they’re there.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ she said, still looking rather white. ‘I was bitten by an Alsatian when I was young and I’ve been a bit nervous with big dogs ever since. It seems to have got worse since I was pregnant.’

  ‘That’s understandable,’ I said, casting a sympathetic glance at her stomach. Having helped her out of her coat and scarf I showed her into the sitting room, and as her eyes darted about, taking everything in, I had that unsettling experience of seeing my surroundings through a stranger’s eyes and feeling myself evaluated. But all she said was, ‘What a lovely view of the moors,’ before being drawn towards the hearth and holding pink, chapped hands to the flames.

  Meanwhile I was doing some evaluating of my own. She was younger than I had expected – mid-twenties, by the look of it, with muddy-blonde hair which hung in corkscrew curls halfway down her back and quivered when she moved. She wore no make-up, but had the sort of clear creamy skin that looks better unpainted. Her eyes were lively with intelligence: it shone out of them, and it gave me a pang to think I would soon have to lie to her.

  ‘You’re not from round here originally?’ she was saying.

  ‘No. Neither are you, by the sound of it.�
� She spoke with a South London accent on its best behaviour.

  ‘No. I’m a southerner by birth. But I’ve been up here for seven years now, first as a student and now as a lecturer. I couldn’t afford to go back if I wanted to.’

  ‘Nothing would make me go back,’ I said. ‘I’ve got a house in London – half a house – and I can’t get rid of it fast enough.’

  She asked if she could use the bathroom, and while she was gone I went into the kitchen to make coffee, remembering too late the croissants which I’d put in the oven to warm some half an hour earlier.

  ‘Look at that,’ I said on her return, showing her their charred remains. ‘That was supposed to be elevenses. Sorry.’ I flipped them into the bin, where they lay, curled, like fossilised seahorses amongst the garbage.

  ‘That’s OK,’ she said, as I came in, carrying two mugs. I had told her to make herself at home, an invitation which she had interpreted as permission to browse my bookshelves. ‘I had a truckers’ breakfast before I left. Bacon, eggs, fried bread, the works. I’ve only got five more weeks of eating for two, so I’m making the most of it.’ She gave me a quick, wide grin.

  ‘That’s not long,’ I said, as she installed herself on the couch and unpacked a folder, pen and miniature tape recorder from her bag.

  ‘That’s why I’m trying to get as much done now as possible. I know it won’t be easy when the baby’s arrived.’

  ‘Why Owen Goddard, of all people? He’s a bit obscure.’

  ‘Obscurity’s the new celebrity. Didn’t you know that?’

  ‘But how did you come across him in the first place?’

  ‘I did my PhD on Ravi Amos.’ Her eyes slid to my bookshelves, where several of his works were displayed. ‘I came across some interesting correspondence.’

  ‘I see, yes, I suppose there would have been.’

  ‘Which brings me to this letter.’ From her file she produced a folded A4 sheet of thin typing paper, embossed with the distinctively uneven Courier font of my old Imperial typewriter, the descenders all amputated, and the full stops almost piercing the page. Below the few lines of text was my name, in the large flamboyant scrawl of someone practising for the day he’ll be signing autographs. She passed it across.

  Dear Owen and Diana

  Thank you so much for the cheque. It’s incredibly generous of you.

  I remembered labouring over the phrasing. I had absorbed the idea from my parents that in thanking someone for a gift of money it wasn’t the Done Thing to mention the exact sum involved. This was one of many strange edicts, like never eat out on a Monday, which I internalised over the years, without ever really understanding.

  I only hope that some day I’ll be in a position to return some of the kindness you’ve shown me. In the meantime, all I can do to prove my gratitude is WORK HARDER.

  Your friend

  Chris

  ‘Does it ring any bells?’ Alex asked.

  ‘Oh yes.’ My head hadn’t stopped chiming since she’d made contact.

  She put down her empty coffee cup and picked up the tape recorder. ‘Do you mind if I use this?’ she asked, her thumb on the switch. ‘I can’t do shorthand, and my notes always look so sparse when I come to look over them later.’

  ‘Whatever’s easiest. Like I said, I haven’t got masses to tell.’

  She squeezed the button and put the machine on the table between us.

  ‘I first met Owen when I was twenty-three,’ I said, self-consciously, one eye on the microphone. ‘Or was it twenty-four?’ Already I was fluffing my lines! ‘Nineteen eighty-five, anyway. I sent some pages of a novel I was working on to Kenway & Luff, and Owen sent me a nice, encouraging letter back. Which I’ve got here.’ I handed it over.

  ‘Oh great.’ She scanned the contents quickly. ‘Is it OK if I get it copied? I won’t lose it.’ I nodded and she put it in her plastic folder and snapped the popper shut.

  ‘No hurry. I don’t know why I’ve kept it all these years. Sentimental. I suppose it was the first bit of encouragement I’d ever had.’

  ‘So did you arrange to meet at that point or later?’

  ‘More or less straight away, I think. I was desperate to get my toe in the door of a publisher’s. I hadn’t even finished the book then. I went to his office at Kenway & Luff in Bloomsbury.’

  ‘What was it like?’

  ‘Untidy. Chaotic. Piles of papers on the chairs, stacks of manuscripts and proofs everywhere. It was a very old-fashioned, dusty sort of place.’

  ‘What was your first impression of him?’

  ‘I liked him straight away. He was very friendly and genuine. Intelligent and well-read, obviously, but modest with it. And polite, too, to absolutely everyone. Unlike Herman Kenway, who owned the place. He was rude and obnoxious to everyone.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve heard that from several sources,’ Alex smiled.

  ‘He asked to see the rest of my novel when it was ready, and gave me lots of encouragement, without making any promises. And then we talked about books and stuff – Ravi Amos mostly. I was a big fan, and Owen was his editor. You know that already. Anyway, a while after that he asked me to dinner to meet Ravi Amos.’ I handed her the invitation, written on a postcard. ‘Exhibit B.’

  ‘Did you think that was unusual?’

  ‘I didn’t know what was usual or unusual. I hadn’t a clue about the literary establishment. I didn’t have that sort of background. I was working at a fish warehouse at the time. Or was it a bookie’s? Something menial anyway.’

  ‘Who else was there?’

  ‘His wife, Diana. And some fashion journalist called Leila Ferris. I think she was a college friend of Diana’s.’

  ‘Oh. She was there. That’s interesting. What did you think of her?’

  ‘I found her a bit intimidating. Whereas Owen and Diana would do everything they could to make you feel at ease, she seemed to enjoy making people feel uncomfortable.’

  ‘Did Owen and Diana seem happy to you? Happily married, I mean?’

  ‘Yes, of course. They were a perfect couple. Devoted to each other.’ I stopped, aware that the clichés were piling up.

  ‘Where does this cheque come into it?’

  ‘I was living in a bedsit in Brixton, doing various casual jobs to make ends meet. Owen knew I was hard up – he’d seen what a hovel I was living in, and—’

  ‘So he’d been to your place?’

  ‘Yes. I went to hear him give a lecture at the Powys Society, and he and Diana gave me a lift home afterwards.’

  ‘The what society?’

  ‘John Cowper Powys. He was Owen’s favourite writer, I think. One of them.’

  ‘I never knew that. I’ll have to read his stuff. Sorry. The cheque.’

  ‘Oh yes. Well, he turned up one day out of the blue with a cheque for two grand. He said it was a gift, no strings attached, so that I could give up working for a few months and get the book finished.’

  ‘You mean it was from him personally, not Kenway & Luff?’

  ‘No, it was nothing to do with Kenway & Luff. It wasn’t an advance or anything like that. It was his own money. His and Diana’s. He made it very clear that it wasn’t a loan and I mustn’t feel under any obligation.’

  ‘So it was pure philanthropy?’

  ‘Absolutely. He was a genuinely kind person.’

  ‘It seems incredible. Was he in the habit of giving handouts to struggling authors?’

  ‘I don’t know, but it wouldn’t surprise me.’

  ‘Would it be fair to say he had quite an impact on you?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, that would be fair,’ I said evenly, quailing inside myself at the memory of the ‘impact’ I had had on him.

  While this conversation was going on I had gradually become aware of a low growling noise, which turned out to be Alex’s stomach rumbling. Remembering the burnt croissants, and my manners as host, I offered to buy her lunch at the Crown in Hutton. She had the air of someone busy and efficient, whose day would be carefully p
arcelled out, not a time-waster like me, so I was surprised and pleased when she accepted. It would be nice, I thought, to walk into the pub with a woman for a change.

  Hutton was postcard-perfect against the Blue Wintry sky. A stream ran down the village street between neat stone cottages; sheep cropped the grass verges beside the road, and plump, glossy hens patrolled the car park. They scattered as Alex’s beaten-up hatchback came bouncing over the potholes towards them. I had agreed to go in her car – somewhat against my instincts – since she had boxed mine in, but her driving wasn’t nearly as bad as the state of the bodywork seemed to indicate.

  ‘What a beautiful place,’ she said, when she had finally levered herself out of my side of the car. ‘Do you realise how lucky you are?’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Until someone points it out.’ I indicated her belly with a tilt of my head. ‘Do you?’

  Patty and the man from Ceroc were at the bar, two pints of Guinness and a full ashtray between them. I didn’t wave in case he was the type who was retrospectively jealous, and she gave me a covert nod of acknowledgement, her eyes flickering over Alex’s stomach.

  While we ate, Alex told me about her work at the university, teaching post-colonial literature, and her husband’s job as a research chemist with a large pharmaceutical company. They were in the middle of trialling a new treatment for clinical depression, and he was away a lot, currently at a symposium in Minneapolis. He was coming home three weeks before the baby was due. They had just moved into their first proper house, on the outskirts of York, and were doing it up themselves, room by room, starting with the nursery. I remembered those early days of my marriage to Carol, when whole weekends would be spent deliberating over Dulux colour charts and curtain material, and the hot, dirty work of wallpaper stripping would be followed by hot, dirty sex on the pasting table. That was all in the past: I hadn’t picked up a paintbrush for years.

  ‘You haven’t got any children, have you?’ Alex was saying, polishing the bottom of her soup bowl with a wad of bread.