But that was a couple of weeks back. This is now. Two bottles of Chilean wine with the dinner, a twist of weed which someone gave Mara for a birthday present…and which they’re not sure they’ll use. They’re happy enough as they are. Medical statisticians, in any case, do not favour the use of marijuana.
Henry owns a single e, which someone for reasons unknown gave him when Mara bought the Porsche, saying happiness is e-shaped. He keeps it in his wallet as a kind of curiosity, a challenge to fate.
‘You’re crazy,’ says Letty, when he brings it out to show them. ‘Suppose the police stopped you? You could go to prison.’
‘I don’t think it’s illegal to possess a single tablet,’ says David. ‘Only to sell them.’
He is probably right. Nobody knows for sure. Henry puts it away. It’s gone kind of greyish and dusty from too much handling, anyway, and so much observation. Ecstasy is what other people do.
Mara’s mobile sings ‘Il Toreador’. Mara’s mother has been taken ill at home in Cheshire. It sounds as if she might have had a stroke. She’s only 58. The ambulance is on its way. Mara, who loves her mother dearly, decides she must drive north to be there for her. No, Mara insists, Henry isn’t to come with her. He must stay behind to hold the fort, clear the dinner, make apologies at work on Monday if it’s bad and Mara can’t get in. ‘You’d only be in the way,’ she adds. ‘You know what men are like in hospitals.’ That’s how Mara is: decisive. And now she’s on her way, thrum, thrum, out of their lives, in the Porsche.
Now there are only Henry, David and Letty to finish the second bottle. David’s phone sings ‘Ode to Beauty’ as the last drop is drained. To open another bottle or not to open another bottle – that’s the discussion. Henry opens it, thus solving the problem. It’s David’s father. There’s been a break-in at the family home in Cardiff, the robbers were disturbed and now the police are there. The digital camera has gone and 180 photos of sentimental value and some jewellery and a handbag. David’s mother is traumatized and can David make it to Cardiff for the weekend?
‘Of course,’ says David.
‘Can I come?’ asks Letty, a little wistfully. She doesn’t want to be left alone.
But David says no, it’s a long drive, and his parents and the Down’s sister will be upset and he’ll need to concentrate on them. Better for Letty to stay and finish the wine and Henry will walk her home.
Letty feels more than a little insulted. Doesn’t it even occur to David to feel jealous? Is it that he trusts Letty or that he just doesn’t care what happens to her? And is he really going to Cardiff or is he just trying to get away from her? Perhaps he has a mistress and that’s why he doesn’t want to have a baby by her.
David goes and Letty and Henry are left together, both feeling abandoned, both feeling resentful.
Henry and Letty are the ones who love too much. Mara and David love too little. It gives them great power. Those who love least win.
Henry and Letty move out onto the balcony because the evening is so warm and the moon so bright they hardly need a candle to roll the joint. On warm days Mara likes to sit on this balcony to dry her hair. She’s lucky. All Mara has to do is dunk her hair in the basin and let it dry naturally and if falls heavy and silky and smooth. Mara is so lucky in so many respects.
And now Henry walks over to where Letty sits in the moonlight, all white silky skin and bare shoulders and pale-green linen shift which flatters her slightly dull complexion, and slides his hands over her shoulders and down almost to where her breasts start and then takes them away.
‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘I shouldn’t have done that.’
‘No, you shouldn’t,’ she says.
‘I wanted to,’ he said.
‘I wanted you to do it too. I think it’s the moon. Such a bright night. And see, there’s Venus beside her, shining bright.’
‘Good Lord!’ he says. ‘Think of the trouble!’
‘But life can get kind of boring,’ Letty says. She, the little radiographer, wants her excitements too. Thrum, thrum, thrum goes Mara, off in the Porsche! Why shouldn’t it be like that for Letty too? She deserves Henry. Mara doesn’t. She’d be nice to him. Letty’s skin is still alive to his touch and wanting more.
‘But we’re not going to, are we?’ he says.
‘No,’ says Letty. ‘Mara’s my friend.’
‘More to the point,’ he says, ‘David’s your partner.’
They think about this for a little while.
‘Cardiff and Cheshire,’ says Letty. ‘Too good to be true. That gives us all night.’
‘Where?’ asks Henry.
‘Here,’ says Letty.
All four have in the past had passing fantasies about what it would be like to share a bed and a life with the other – have wondered if, at the student party where they all met, Henry had paired off with Letty, David with Mara, what their lives would have been like. The fantasies have been quickly subdued in the interests of friendship and expediency. But Mara’s sheets are more expensive than Letty’s, her bed is broader. The City pays more than the NHS. Letty would love to sleep in Mara’s bed.
‘We could go to your place,’ says Henry. To elbow David out of his own bed would be very satisfactory. Henry is stronger and taller than David; Henry takes what he wants when he wants it. Henry has wit and cunning, the kind which enables you to steal another man’s woman from under his nose.
But Letty’s envy is stronger than Henry’s urge to crush his rivals. They agree to stay where they are. They
