screwed up again.’
‘Yes. I have to say I wondered. But it wasn’t that. No, it was … there’s been a car crash. Charlotte’s mum’s been killed, Chuck.’
‘Oh, my God.’
‘Yes. Can I speak to her, please?’
‘Trouble is, Mr Hollinghurst …’
‘Yes?’
‘Trouble is … oh, and I’m sorry. Real sorry. That’s a cunt of a thing to happen. Sorry. Bad language.’
‘Hardly matters under the circumstances.’
‘No. Quite. Trouble is, Mr Hollinghurst, I’ll have to tell her what’s happened or she won’t come to the phone. She’ll be so, Tell him to go fuck himself. Oh, sorry.’
‘No. I have a pretty good idea how she talks about me, Chuck. OK, Chuck. Tell her.’
‘Shit, man, I’m not looking forward to this.’
‘Take your time. I’ll wait.’
While he waited, James hurried over to his gin and Noilly Prat and took it back to the phone. He sat on the purple chaise longue and waited. The silence went on and on. It was awful to be so close to her and yet so far away. He longed to hear her voice. She was a woman now. How much would her voice have changed in five years? How much suffering would there be in it? How much evidence of … abuse, frailty, self-harm? He couldn’t face up to the word ‘drugs’ even in his thoughts. But nothing could be worse than her silence. Oh, Charlotte, my darling, speak to me, please.
‘Hi.’
He nodded sadly at the invisible Chuck.
‘Hi.’
‘No go, I’m afraid.’
‘Oh, shit, Chuck.’
‘I know. I know.’
‘How’s she … taken it?’
‘Floods of tears. Floods of tears, Mr Hollinghurst.’
James envied her.
‘Didn’t she say anything?’
‘She said to tell you she’s sorry.’
James felt absurdly pleased, and embarrassed at feeling so pleased. It seemed inexcusably self-centred at this moment. Even to be aware that he was being self-centred seemed self-centred. But he was always hard on himself.
Besides, what she had said, it was nothing.
But it was also everything.
He put the phone down very slowly. He decided that it would do him no harm to have just one more drink. Just Noilly Prat, though. No gin. He picked up the Noilly Prat bottle, looked at it with unseeing eyes and put it down again. Just gin would make more sense, because gin could be diluted with tonic.
He walked slowly back to the phone, taking a sip of the drink as he did so. He realised that he hadn’t done a very good job with the dilution. Diluting drinks had never been one of his strong points. And a gin, Noilly Prat and tonic just wasn’t quite right. What did it matter? What did the taste of a drink matter compared with … with the enormity…
He decided not to dilute it further. He would sip it slowly instead.
Who should he ring next? Helen? He still wasn’t ready for that. Someone on Deborah’s side? Have to be her sister. Couldn’t face that yet either. Couldn’t face being the messenger of such terrible news. A whole family, a close family, all in tears. Couldn’t bear the thought.
Couldn’t bear telling the terrible news, when to him it wasn’t terrible, that was what was so terrible.
Have to be Charles, his eldest brother, his hero, his mentor, his inspiration, his guide, his lodestone.
‘That’s the phone.’
‘Don’t answer it. Valerie, please. Don’t.’
‘I should. It might be somebody.’
‘It might be a call centre in India offering me free balance transfers. Don’t go.’
It was too late anyway. It had gone onto the answer machine.
‘Darling, I really want this meal uninterrupted. This oxtail is awesome. Awesome.’
‘I can’t believe you wanted oxtail in June, in a heatwave.’
‘Well, I did. I get salads everywhere I go. Thank goodness I’m not going to America this summer. I hate those salads as starters. So pointless.’
‘Can I at least go and listen to see if there’s a message?’
‘You sound as if you think you need my permission.’
‘I do when you’re like this. I do when your stomach’s involved.’
They were eating in the dining room. The mullioned windows were open, a light breeze from the east was wafting in, rippling Charles’s luxuriant beard ever so gently, and it was pleasantly cool in the dark elegant sixteenth-century room.
Valerie – Charles didn’t permit her to be called Val by anyone – was seated at the head of the table, with Charles at her left hand. The table was so large that to have each sat at one end would have been to risk seeming like a scene in a comedy, and Charles, for all his virtues, didn’t much like being an object of amusement.
‘Honestly, if it’s an emergency, they’ll ring back straight away. Go if you must, darling, I’m not stopping you, but I really don’t want you to. These next days are going to be a logistical nightmare, the oxtail is quite beautiful, these sweet young turnips are little poems, it isn’t just a question of my stomach, it’s a question of respect, Valerie. Respect for your wonderful cooking. Please. I need this evening.’
‘All right.’
Charles ate more slowly with each passing year, and every mouthful of this was worth savouring. The carrots were bursting with flavour, the meat clung gelatinously to the bone, the sauce was rich and deep. The thought of five concerts in six days in Europe, planned by a madman, faded. And then, three days’ holiday in lovely, much-mocked Belgium, in Ghent, which was Bruges without the crowds, the reflections of the spires and gables shimmering on the canals, the choice of cold beers, the marvellous food, French quality, German quantity. His first break for four months. He could hardly wait. Poor Valerie. She didn’t really like cities. Poor Valerie, she found his long meals tedious. She was still itching to listen to their message. He chewed even more slowly, and he was going to have seconds.
It wasn’t that he was cruel, but this was his day, his space, his renewal.
Valerie didn’t understand.
Deborah would understand.
Sometimes – how James would laugh if he mentioned it – he envied his youngest brother.
