Cooper Jilly - Emily

‘I didn’t, Marina,’ he said, as she ran forward and collapsed in his arms. ‘I swear I didn’t.’

‘Well, it’s my fault then,’ she sobbed. ‘I told Hamish to do it, I told him how much I loathed and hated him, how much he disgusted me. I goaded him into it. Oh, Rory, Rory, I’ll never forgive myself.’

I turned away. I couldn’t bear the infinitely tender way he was holding her in his arms, stroking her hair, and telling her everything would be all right. Suddenly there was an unearthly wailing: everyone jumped nervously, then we realized it was Hamish’s red setter howling with misery.

‘She was the only one,’ said Rory, ‘who gave a damn for the poor old bugger.’

I can’t really remember much of getting back.

Rory took me home; he was in a terrible state, shaking like a leaf. He came in and poured a stiff whisky and downed it in one gulp.

‘Look, I must go to her.’

I nodded mechanically. ‘Yes, of course you must.’

‘I’m frightened this will unhinge her; I feel sort of responsible, do you understand?’

‘Yes, I do.’

‘Do you want to come too?’

I looked at him for the last time, taking in the brown fur rug on the sofa, the yellow cushions, the gold of his corduroy jacket, his dark hair and deathly pale face, the smell of turpentine, the utter despair in my heart. I shook my head, ‘I’d rather stay here.’

‘I won’t be long,’ he said, and was gone.

So Hamish had loved Marina after all. What was it that Marina had said that afternoon — that she’d never hang around being a bore to a man who couldn’t stand her.

So the game had ended that never should have begun. I’m not a noble character, but I know when I’m licked.

For the second time in two months I packed my suitcase. I had no thought of going to Finn. Finn fancied me, but he didn’t really love me. Not as Rory understood love. And now I couldn’t have Rory, I didn’t want second best.

I left a note.

‘Darling,

Hamish has set you and Marina free, now I’m going to do the same. Please be happy and don’t try and find me.

Emily.’

Mist swathed the Irasa hills, the lochs lay about them like steel and silver medallions in the moonlight. A small, chill wind whispered among the heather. I walked the narrow track that twisted down the hill to the ferry. I caught the last boat of the day. There was scarcely anyone on it. I stood on deck, and watched the castle and everything I loved in the world getting dimmer and dimmer until they vanished in a mist of tears.

I shall never remember how I got through the next ten days. I went to ground in a shabby London hotel bedroom. I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep. I just lay dry-eyed on my bed like a wounded animal, shocked by incredulous grief and horror.

I toyed with the idea of going to see my parents, or ringing up Nina, but I couldn’t bear the expressions of sympathy, then the whispering, and later, the ‘I told you so’s’, and ‘We always knew he was a bad lot’, and much later — the ‘Pull yourself togethers’. Sooner or later I knew I would have to face up to life, but I hadn’t got the courage to get in touch with them yet, nor could I face the bitter disappointment I would feel if Rory hadn’t rung them and tried to contact me.

But why should he contact me? He must be blissfully happy now with Marina. The idea of them together rose black and churning. Sometimes I thought I was going mad. Even my unconscious played tricks on me. Every night I dreamed of Rory and woke up in tears. In the street I saw lean, dark, tall men and, heart thumping, would charge forward, shrinking away in horror when I realized it wasn’t him.

I hoped I would find it easier as the days went by, but it got much worse. What I hadn’t anticipated was going slap into the infinitely bosky lushness of a late London spring. Everything was far further on than it was in Scotland. Outside my bedroom window the new lime-green leaves of the plane trees swung like little cherubs’ wings, ice-cream pink cherry trees were dropping their blossom on the long grass. Huge velvety purple irises and bluebells filled the Chelsea gardens. Everywhere, too, there was an atmosphere of sexiness, of sap rising, of pretty girls walking the streets in their new summer dresses, of men whistling at them, of lovers entwined in the park, everything geared to ram home my loss to me.

‘He’s gone, he’s gone, and when thou knowest this thou knowest how dry a cinder this world is.’

The day of the opening of Rory’s exhibition came and went. With heroic self-control, I stuck to the hotel and didn’t hang around in the coffee bar opposite in the hope of getting a glimpse of him. I couldn’t face the anguish of seeing him with Marina.

But next morning I dragged myself up and went out and bought the papers, and crept back to the hotel to read them. The reviews were very mixed: some of the critics loathed the paintings, some adored them, but everyone agreed that a dazzling new talent had arrived. There were also several pictures of Rory looking sulky and arrogant, and impossibly handsome. The Nureyev of the Art world, the gossip columns called him.

I cried half the morning, trying to decide what to do; then the manager presented me with my weekly bill, and I realized I could only just pay it. Next week I should have to get a job.

I had a bath and washed my hair. I looked frightful, like one of those women that wait for the bodies at the pit head — even make-up didn’t help much. I can’t even make any money as a tart now, I said dismally — I’d have to pay them.

When I got to Bond Street, I felt giddy. It struck me I hadn’t eaten for days. I went into a coffee bar and ordered an omelette, but when it arrived I took one bite and thought I was going to throw up. Chucking down a pound I fled into the street. Four doors down, I went up the steps to the agency that used to find me work in the old days. How well I remembered that grey-carpeted, grey-walled, potted-plant world that I hoped I’d abandoned for ever. I started to sweat and tremble.

Audrey Kennaway, the principal, agreed to see me. She greeted me in an immaculate, utterly awful primrose yellow dress and jacket. Her heavily made-up eyes swept over me.

‘Well, Emily,’ she said in cooing tones, ‘it’s nice to see you. How are you enjoying your new jet-set life? Are you on your way to Newmarket or the Cannes Film Festival?’

‘Actually, neither, I’m looking for a job,’ I blurted out.

‘A job?’ She raised eyebrows plucked to the edge of extinction. ‘Surely not, but I thought your handsome husband was doing so well, he had such a success in the papers this morning.’ Her red-nailed fingers drummed on the table.

‘That’s all over,’ I muttered. ‘It didn’t work out.’

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. I’m not surprised, I could see her thinking, she’s let herself go so much. Her manner had become distinctly chillier.

‘There’s not a lot of work about at the moment, people are laying off staff everywhere,’ she went on.

‘Oh dear,’ I said feebly. ‘In my day, they were always laying on them.’

Audrey Kennaway smiled coolly.

‘You’ll have to smarten yourself up a bit,’ she said.

‘I know, I know,’ I said. ‘I haven’t been very well. I used to type a bit, do you remember?’ I went on. ‘And when I was thin, you sometimes got me television commercials or a bit of modelling. I’m much thinner than that now.’

‘I don’t think I could find you anything in that field at the moment. Let’s see if there’s any filing clerk work.’ Her long red talons started moving through the cards in a box on her desk. I felt great tears filling my eyes. I struggled to control myself for a minute, then leapt to my feet.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘I couldn’t do a filing job. I can’t even file my nails without setting my teeth on edge. It’s a mistake for me to have come here. You’re quite right, I couldn’t hold a job down at the moment. I can’t hold down anything.’ Bursting into tears, I fled out of the office, down the stairs into the sunshine. Two streets away was Rory’s gallery. Gradually, as though pulled by some invisible hand, I was drawn towards it. I went into a chemist’s to buy some dark glasses with my last pound. They weren’t much help, they hid my red eyes but the tears kept trickling underneath. Slowly I edged down Grafton Street. No. 212, here it was; my knees were knocking together, my throat dry.

There was one of Rory’s paintings of the Irasa coast in the window. Two fat women were looking at it.

‘I don’t go for this modern stuff,’ said one.

I entered the gallery, my heart pounding. Then, with a thud of disappointment, I realized Rory wasn’t there. I looked around, the paintings looked superb, and so many already had red ‘sold’ stickers on them. By the desk an American was writing out a cheque to a chinless wonder.

I wandered round the room, proud yet bitterly resentful that people should be able to buy something that was so much a part of Rory.

The chinless wonder, having ditched the American, wandered over.

‘Can I help you?’ he said.

‘I was just looking round,’ I said. ‘You seem to have sold a lot.’

‘We did awfully well yesterday, and we sold four more this morning — not, I may add,’ he whispered darkly, ‘through any assistance on the artist’s part.’

‘What do you mean?’ I said, startled.

The chinless wonder smoothed his pale gold hair.

‘Well, he’s talented, I admit, but quite frankly, he’s an ugly customer. Doesn’t give a damn about the show being a success.’

He put stickers on two more paintings.