Stanley and the Women Read Free

was speaking, but very briefly and
not at anything in particular that I could see. Otherwise he was completely
without expression, even when he said what he did about getting his head
together and I had been so sure he would remember he had said it before,
outside in the street, and would let me have some signal that he knew I was
thinking it was funny or awful of him to say it again. That was the worst part.
    Susan
said, quite rightly, ‘Do I gather you’re not seeing Mandy at the moment?’
    ‘Well,
you know, not much going for it.’
    ‘Is she
staying behind in Spain for a bit?’
    ‘Decide
what I’m going to do.’
    There
was another silence. I was very relieved when he got up, sprang to his feet in
fact with no sign at all of being tired any more, but then in another second he
had gone back to his lifeless, wrapped-up style. He muttered something about a
drink of water.
    ‘Of
course,’ I said, looking across to where we kept the tray with the bottles of
Malvern and Perrier, but it had gone downstairs with the rest of the stuff. ‘Sorry,
there doesn’t —’
    ‘It’s
okay, I’ll get it.’
    ‘What’s
the matter with him?’ asked Susan when he had gone out.
    ‘He’s
exhausted. He walked all the way from Victoria, or so he said.’
    As
though we had both been dying for the chance we had moved instantly into what
sounded like accusation on one side and excuse on the other. We kept it up
while Susan went on about why no bus or taxi — I came back with queues at the
station, why no phone-call — all his generation were like that, and why no
luggage — well, nothing much to say there. Neither of us turned anywhere near
fervent but it was odd just the same, especially since she had taken a lot of
trouble over Steve and they seemed to like each other. Perhaps not so odd on
second thoughts, merely a result of being a stepmother and a father and not one
hundred per cent cool. I stepped out of the pattern when she mentioned his
passport.
    ‘No,’ I
said. ‘I can’t believe he’s got it on him. Nor any cash either.’
    ‘Well,
you could …’ She stopped. ‘So he can’t have come from Spain. Where has he
been?’
    ‘I don’t
know. I think I’ll go and get a beer.’
    ‘I don’t
blame you,’ she said, meaning for wanting to keep an eye on Steve.
    When I
got to the foot of the stairs it was like being in a Channel steamer with the
drumming and shuddering of the water-system in the walls and all about. In the
kitchen the sound of the water itself as it hit the sink was more noticeable.
There were pools of it, not very large or deep ones, on the floor and on the
various work-surfaces near by. As I came in Steve was adding to them with what
was bouncing off the glass in his hand. This he seemed keen to rinse as
thoroughly as possible. Feeling ridiculously self-conscious I went past him not
too quickly to the refrigerator and took out and opened a can of Carlsberg
lager. He knew I was there, of course, but he took no notice of me, or perhaps
he did, because he turned off the tap and turned it on again just long enough
to fill the glass, which he drained and refilled the same way, all at top speed
as though he had taken a bet, and without any signs of pleasure or of anything
else. Obviously I had no way of knowing how many glasses he had drunk before I
arrived.
    By the
time he was starting the fourth round of the process I had got a glass for
myself, poured my beer and thrown the can away, so that from then on I was
hanging about. I tried to force myself to stroll out of the room. Perhaps I
ought to say something. I was sure I remembered reading somewhere that children
could actually welcome discipline.
    ‘Come
and have a spot of Scotch,’ I said, and tried to infiltrate lightness into the
way I said it. ‘All that water can’t be the best —He looked at me for the first
time. It was a glare that lasted less than a second. ‘Jesus fucking Christ!’ he
shouted, so loudly that I jumped. After a weird