Trespass. Part 1

Trespa.s.s.

by Rose Tremain.

For Richard, with love

Acknowledgements Extract from Salad Days Salad Days reproduced by permission of The Agency (London) Ltd 1954 Julian Slade. reproduced by permission of The Agency (London) Ltd 1954 Julian Slade.

Extract from Staying On Staying On by Paul Scott, copyright 1977 Paul Scott, published by William Heinemann. Reproduced by permission of David Higham a.s.sociates on behalf of the author. by Paul Scott, copyright 1977 Paul Scott, published by William Heinemann. Reproduced by permission of David Higham a.s.sociates on behalf of the author.

Drawing of mulberry leaf by Nicole Heidaripour.

The child's name is Melodie.

Long ago, before Melodie was born, her pretty mother had had a stab at composing music.

Melodie is ten years old and she's trying to eat a sandwich. She prises apart the two halves of the sandwich and stares at the wet, pink ham inside, and at the repulsive grey-green s.h.i.+mmer on its surface. All around her, in the dry gra.s.s and in the parched trees, crickets and gra.s.shoppers are making that sound they make, not with their voices (Melodie has been told that they have no voices) but with their bodies, letting one part vibrate against another part. In this place, thinks Melodie, everything is alive and fluttering and going from one place to another place, and she dreads to see one of these insects arrive suddenly on her sandwich or on her leg or start to tangle its limbs in her hair.

Melodie's hair is dark and soft. As she looks at the slimy ham, she can feel sweat beginning to seep out of her head. Sweat, she thinks, is a cold hand that tries to caress you. Sweat is something strange inside you trying to creep from one place to another place...

Melodie puts the sandwich down in the dusty gra.s.s. In moments, she knows, ants will arrive and swarm round it and try to carry it away. Where she used to live, in Paris, there were no ants, but here, where her new home is, there are more ants than you could ever count. They come out of the earth and go down into it again. If you dug down, you would find them: a solid ma.s.s of them, black and red. Your spade would crunch right through them. You might not even have to dig very deep.

Melodie lifts her head and gazes at the leaves on the oak tree above her.

These leaves are yellowing, as though it were already autumn. The wind called the mistral keeps blowing through the tree and the sun keeps moving and piercing the shade and nothing in this place ever ends or is still.

'Melodie,' says a voice. 'Are you all right? Don't you want your sandwich?'

Melodie turns to her teacher, Mademoiselle Jeanne Viala, who sits on a rug on the gra.s.s a few paces away, with some of the younger children hunched up near to her, all obediently chewing their baguettes.

'I'm not hungry,' says Melodie.

'We've had a long morning,' says Mademoiselle Viala. 'Try to eat a few mouthfuls.'

Melodie shakes her head. Sometimes, it's difficult to speak. Sometimes, you're like an insect with no voice, which just has to make a movement with some part of its anatomy. And everywhere around you the mistral keeps blowing and autumn leaves keep falling, even though it's a midsummer day.

'Come and sit here,' says Mademoiselle Viala. 'We'll all have a drink of water.'

The teacher tells one of the boys, Jo-Jo, (one of those who tease and bully Melodie and imitate her posh Parisian accent) to pa.s.s her the picnic bag. Melodie gets up and moves away from the sandwich lying in the gra.s.s and Mademoiselle Viala holds out her hand and Melodie sits down there, near the teacher whom she quite likes, but who betrayed her this morning... yes she did... by making her look at things she didn't want to see...

Mademoiselle Viala wears a white linen blouse and blue jeans and white canvas shoes. Her arms are soft and tanned and her lipstick is a bright, startling red. She could have come from Paris, once. She takes a little bottle of Evian water out of the c.u.mbersome bag and pa.s.ses it to Melodie.

'There,' she says. 'There you are.'

Melodie presses the cool bottle against her cheek. She sees Jo-Jo staring at her. Bully-boys' faces can be blank, absolutely blank, as though they'd never learned to say their own names.

'So,' says Jeanne Viala in her teacher-voice, 'I wonder who can tell me, after the presentations we saw at the museum, how silk is made?'

Melodie looks away, up, sideways, far away at the jumping light, at the invisible wind... All round her, the children raise their arms, bursting to tell Mademoiselle Viala what they know, or what, Melodie suspects, they have always always known, because they're part of this landscape and were born out of its earth. known, because they're part of this landscape and were born out of its earth.

Jo-Jo says it: 'Silk is made by worms.'

He, like the others, always knew it. Everybody learned about it from their grandparents or great-grandparents and only she, Melodie Hartmann from Paris, had never ever thought about it until today, until Jeanne Viala took the children to the Museum of Cevenol Silk Production at Rua.s.se...

'Right,' says Mademoiselle Viala. 'Don't all shout out at once. You You tell me, Melodie. Imagine you wanted to breed a healthy crop of silkworms, what would be the first thing you would do, once you'd bought the eggs?' tell me, Melodie. Imagine you wanted to breed a healthy crop of silkworms, what would be the first thing you would do, once you'd bought the eggs?'

The first thing. She looks down at her hands, which are dirty with sweat and dust with human mud. She looks down at her hands, which are dirty with sweat and dust with human mud.

'Keep them warm...' She whispers it. Her voice smaller than the voice of some tiny creature living between two stalks of corn, or underneath a tree root.

'Yes,' says Jeanne Viala. 'Good. And how would you do that?'

Melodie wants to say: I said my answer. I said it. I don't want to say any more of it. But she just keeps looking down at her muddy hands, clutching the Evian bottle.

'I know!' says Jo-Jo.

'We know!' say two girls, two inseparable friends, Stephanie and Magali.

'Go on then, Magali, you tell us,' says Jeanne Viala.

Magali's face is scarlet, puffed out with pride and embarra.s.sment. 'My Gran told me!' she explodes. 'You put them in a pouch and you stick the pouch up your knickers!'

As laughter breaks round her, Melodie gets up. Her legs feel trembly, but she walks as fast as she can away from the huddle of children.

Red-backed crickets jump and flit in her pathway. She snaps off a stick with a brittle seed-head at its tip, and tries to stop the insects from coming near her with this. She hears the teacher call to her, but she doesn't turn. Surely, Jeanne Viala knows... surely she does... that if you've lived your life in Paris ten years of it then you're homesick for the city, for a nice clean, carpeted room in a nice apartment, and you don't want to talk about worms writhing in a pouch under your skirt. Because it isn't as if Paris had been obliterated. It's still there. Your street is there. Your apartment. The room that was once yours. And it's only you who are never going back. Never. Because Papa has been given a 'great opportunity'. Papa has been offered a promotion. He's been made the Head of a Laboratory of Medical a.n.a.lysis in Rua.s.se. Head. Head. 'It's fantastic,' says Maman. 'You have to understand that it's a wonderful chance.' And all it means is... Paris has disappeared. Now there is a house made of stone, way out on its own in a shadowy valley. Mosquitoes whine in the dark, hot nights. The house is known as a 'It's fantastic,' says Maman. 'You have to understand that it's a wonderful chance.' And all it means is... Paris has disappeared. Now there is a house made of stone, way out on its own in a shadowy valley. Mosquitoes whine in the dark, hot nights. The house is known as a mas, mas, p.r.o.nounced 'ma.s.se'. In the crannies of its stones, where the mortar has flaked or fallen out, scorpions hide from the sun. And sometimes there is one, black and deadly, on the wall of your bedroom and Papa has to come and... p.r.o.nounced 'ma.s.se'. In the crannies of its stones, where the mortar has flaked or fallen out, scorpions hide from the sun. And sometimes there is one, black and deadly, on the wall of your bedroom and Papa has to come and...

...he brings a wooden mallet or a hammer. Blood comes to his face.

The blow of the hammer leaves a mark on the plasterwork of the wall.

'There,' he says, 'it's all right now. It's no more.'

No more.

No more walks home from school, past the optometrist's shop and the flower shop and the patisserie on the corner. No more winter afternoons when the Paris sky is electric blue behind the shoulders of buildings.

No more ballet cla.s.s, swimming club, violin lessons. No more. No more.

With her seed-head stick, Melodie flays her path through the gra.s.shoppers.

She opens a rusty iron gate and walks into a tussocky pasture, going towards shade, towards yellowing ash saplings, a place where she will be alone and drink her water. The teacher is no longer calling her. Perhaps she's walked further than she realised? The air is quiet and still, as though the mistral has died.

Melodie opens the water bottle. Not cool any more, but dirtied by her muddy hands and smelling of plastic. Not meant to smell of plastic, but smelling of man-made plastic only here, where Nature is so... determined... so... everywhere everywhere. Only here, where Nature fills the ground and the air and the sky. Where it fills your eyes. Where you can taste it in your mouth...

Halfway through gulping the water, Melodie hears a new sound.

People talking on the radio? One of those discussions, far off, about politics or about the life of someone famous? A conversation you weren't quite expected to understand?

She stops drinking and listens. No. Not people. Something gabbling softly like them, but not them... unless they're talking in a language Melodie has never heard before...

She looks down to where the pasture seems to end in a line of nettle-green, feathery-leaved weeds. The weeds grow in cl.u.s.ters, so close together it looks almost impossible to find a way through them. But Melodie is determined to discover the source of the new sound, so she makes her way towards them. She still has her stick. She begins to whip the weeds down. She thinks: This is the way to treat this place, this land of the Cevennes: you whip it! But then it fights back. The stick breaks. So Melodie begins kicking and stamping a pathway through the weeds with her white sneakers, bought in Paris, no longer white. She takes big strides. She feels the ground underneath her begin to slope downwards. One of the ash trees trembles between her and the sun, like a flimsy curtain drawn above her head.

She's invisible now. Neither the teacher nor the other children can see her any more. They, the others every single one of them knew about old women who incubated worms under their heavy skirts, white worms against the white flesh of their bellies, their thighs, but they didn't come here, didn't dare to come and whip the weeds and stamp them down and make a path towards...

...a curving beach of grey stones and sandy s.h.i.+ngle. And there, beyond the s.h.i.+ngle, eddying between huge boulders, a narrow sliding stream. Not a river. Still pretending pretending to be a river, to be a river, talking to itself talking to itself in the language of a river, but shrunk by the heat to a streamlet. Dragonflies darting above the high stones. Ash leaves flying off and riding on the surface of the water. in the language of a river, but shrunk by the heat to a streamlet. Dragonflies darting above the high stones. Ash leaves flying off and riding on the surface of the water.

Melodie crosses the s.h.i.+ngle to the stream's edge. She stoops and drenches her hand, was.h.i.+ng the mud away, loving the cool, the cold, the almost-ice of it. A thrilling feeling, suddenly. And here she is, invisible in the beautiful tree shade, invisible and safe, as though the dark green weeds had sprung up again behind her, cutting off her way back.

Almost happy, she walks along the little beach, following the stream to where it turns a corner. And she turns the corner and sees the water flowing unexpectedly into a deep, sea-green pool. She stares at the pool. A streamlet trying to be a river again! So even Nature could have a memory could it? just as she has a memory, of what she thought she was meant to become and where. For this is how it feels to her, that the stream longed for the pool. longed for the pool. It was embarra.s.sed by being a rill, a runnel. It might even have been sad, sorrowful, as she is, 'heavy of heart', as Maman calls it. But now that it's merged with the great, deep pool, it knows that it's come home. It was embarra.s.sed by being a rill, a runnel. It might even have been sad, sorrowful, as she is, 'heavy of heart', as Maman calls it. But now that it's merged with the great, deep pool, it knows that it's come home.

For a long time, Melodie stands still, observing. Then, she's overtaken by a desire to bathe her itchy, sunburnt body in the water. She looks behind her, half expecting the teacher to appear through the curtain of saplings. But no one comes.

Shoes. Jeans. T-s.h.i.+rt. She casts everything away except a little pair of red-and-white knickers, bought at Monoprix in the Champs Elysees. Then she begins to climb the first of the rocks that separate her from the pool. Agile now, she goes from boulder to boulder, towards the highest of them, which stands in mid-stream, and she remembers her instructor at her swimming club saying to the other children: 'Watch Melodie. This is how I want you all to be when you dive: like a bird, graceful and light.'

So she's going to dive now. She's positioning her bare feet on the edge of the white boulder. She's a moment from a neatly executed dive, a moment from the drenching, reviving cold of the pool, when... at the very corner of her vision, she sees something which shouldn't be there. At first look, she doesn't recognise what it is. She has to look again. She has to stare.

Then she starts screaming.

The tapestry ('French, late Louis XV pastoral, by Aubusson') depicted a gathering of stylishly dressed aristocrats, sitting on the gra.s.s in the shade of some broad-leaved trees. Approaching the group were two servants, an elderly man and a young woman, bringing meat, bread, wine and fruit.

A dog lay asleep in the suns.h.i.+ne. In the distance ('Some fading evident, texture of weave slightly hardened') was a flower-filled meadow. The border was intricate ('Formal frame pattern: escutcheons, roses and oak leaves') and the colours ('Reds, blues and greens on a neutral ground') soft and pleasing.

On a cold spring morning in London, Anthony Verey stood in his shop, Anthony Verey Antiques, Anthony Verey Antiques, warming his hands on a mug of coffee, staring up at this tapestry. It had been in his possession for some time. Four years? Five? He'd bid for it at a private sale in Suffolk. He'd wanted it badly enough to pay more than a thousand pounds over the reserve price of 6,000 and when it was delivered to the shop he'd hung it on a wall at the very back, opposite the desk where nowadays he sat all the time, pretending to do work of some kind, but in fact existing in a shallow state of reverie, keeping watch over his marvellous possessions his warming his hands on a mug of coffee, staring up at this tapestry. It had been in his possession for some time. Four years? Five? He'd bid for it at a private sale in Suffolk. He'd wanted it badly enough to pay more than a thousand pounds over the reserve price of 6,000 and when it was delivered to the shop he'd hung it on a wall at the very back, opposite the desk where nowadays he sat all the time, pretending to do work of some kind, but in fact existing in a shallow state of reverie, keeping watch over his marvellous possessions his beloveds, beloveds, as he called them and sometimes peering beyond them to observe the pa.s.sers-by on the Pimlico Road. as he called them and sometimes peering beyond them to observe the pa.s.sers-by on the Pimlico Road.

Once the tapestry was in place, Anthony found that he was dismayed by the idea of selling it. The sale-price he put on it 14,000 was intended to discourage buyers, but in fact this price only existed in Anthony's mind and wasn't written down anywhere. Sometimes, when people asked him about the tapestry, he told them it wasn't his, he was just looking after it. Sometimes, he announced that the sale-price was 'in the region of 19,000' and waited for dealers to wince. Sometimes, he just said baldly that the tapestry wasn't for sale. It was his: his own Louis XV Aubusson. He knew in his heart that he'd never part with it.

Anthony was a sixty-four-year-old man of medium height, with abundant grey crinkly hair. Today, he was wearing a red cashmere polo-neck sweater under a jacket of soft brown tweed. It was never very warm in the shop because the beloveds beloveds had a tendency to crack, bulge, fade or split in temperatures above 60 Fahrenheit. But Anthony himself was thin and he feared the cold. By his desk, he kept a heavy old oil-filled heater, which creaked companionably on winter afternoons. He drank a lot of very hot coffee, occasionally spiked with cognac. He wore thermal socks. Even scarves, sometimes, and woollen gloves. had a tendency to crack, bulge, fade or split in temperatures above 60 Fahrenheit. But Anthony himself was thin and he feared the cold. By his desk, he kept a heavy old oil-filled heater, which creaked companionably on winter afternoons. He drank a lot of very hot coffee, occasionally spiked with cognac. He wore thermal socks. Even scarves, sometimes, and woollen gloves.

He knew that this inconvenient palaver for the beloveds beloveds was eccentric, but he didn't care. Anthony Verey had no wife, mistress, lover, child, dog or cat. Across his life, at one time or another, in various pairings and combinations, he'd possessed all these things all except the child. But now he was alone. He was a man who had grown to love furnis.h.i.+ngs and nothing else. was eccentric, but he didn't care. Anthony Verey had no wife, mistress, lover, child, dog or cat. Across his life, at one time or another, in various pairings and combinations, he'd possessed all these things all except the child. But now he was alone. He was a man who had grown to love furnis.h.i.+ngs and nothing else.

Anthony sipped his coffee. His gaze remained on the tapestry, in which the aristocrats sat on the right with the trees behind them and the servants approached from the left. The dog's slumber and the happy expectation apparent on the faces of the people suggested a moment of undisturbed, hedonistic contentment. Lunch was arriving. The sun blazed down.

But there was something else. At the very edge of the scene, to the extreme right of it, almost hidden among foliage, was a sinister face, the face of an old woman. On her head was a black cap. She was directing towards the people a look of exceptional malevolence. But n.o.body paid her any attention. It was as though they hadn't seen her.

For long periods of time, Anthony found himself looking at this old woman's face. Had she been part of the original design? She seemed insubstantial: a disembodied face, a gnarled hand on her chin, the rest of her hidden by the trees. Had the tapestry weavers ('Probably from the atelier of Pierre Dumonteil, 17321787') alleviated the monotony of their work by adding this small but telling detail of their own devising?

Anthony drank the dregs of the coffee and was about to walk over to his desk, to make a half-hearted beginning on his weekly accounts, when something else caught his eye. It was a loose thread in the tapestry.

A nearby halogen lamp illuminated it. This black thread hung down over the old woman's brow, as though it might have been a lock of the crone's hair. Anthony put down his mug. He reached up and took the minute silk filament between thumb and forefinger.

The filament was less than a centimetre long. The feel of it was exceptionally soft, and Anthony kept his hand there, rubbing the little thread for a short s.p.a.ce of time which could have been a minute, or could have been three minutes, or four, or even seven, but which was in any case long enough for him to come to full consciousness of the shocking and incontrovertible fact about his life that it had suddenly revealed to him: when he died, not one shard or splinter from any one of his beloveds beloveds would he be able to take with him. Even if some afterlife turned out to exist, which he doubted, he wouldn't have with him would he be able to take with him. Even if some afterlife turned out to exist, which he doubted, he wouldn't have with him anything anything to console him, not even this black silk thread, less than one centimetre long. to console him, not even this black silk thread, less than one centimetre long.

The door buzzer sounded and woke Anthony from a trance which, in all the days and weeks to come, he would see as being of paramount importance. A man in a pinstripe suit and wearing a pink tie came into the shop. He looked around him. Not a dealer, Anthony concluded swiftly, not even an amateur collector, just one of the Ignorant Rich, looking first at this thing and then at that, not knowing what he's seeing...

Anthony let the ignoramus move towards the most expensive piece in the shop, a marble-topped giltwood console table ('The top a.s.sorted specimen marbles within verde antico verde antico moulded borders, first quarter 19th century, Italian. The gilt frames and supporting standing Atlas figures, 3rd quarter 18th century. Also Italian.'), then wandered slowly towards him. moulded borders, first quarter 19th century, Italian. The gilt frames and supporting standing Atlas figures, 3rd quarter 18th century. Also Italian.'), then wandered slowly towards him.

'Need any help, sir?'

'Yes,' said the man, 'I probably do. Looking for a wedding present for my sister. They're buying a house in Fulham. I'd like to give them something... I don't know... for the hall, I was thinking. Something everybody will... erm... notice.'

'Right,' said Anthony. 'For the hall. Well...'

He saw the man's eyes bulging in startled appreciation of the gilded Atlas figures, so he moved straight to the console table and caressed its marble top. 'This is a beauty,' Anthony said in a voice which still had about it an unfas.h.i.+onable English drawl he could no longer be bothered to suppress. 'An absolute dreamboat. But it needs s.p.a.ce to show itself off. How big is your sister's hall?'

'Haven't a clue,' said the man. 'Haven't seen it. But I really like the gold cherubs or whatever they are. Quite a wow-factor there! What's the... erm... price?'

Anthony put on his gla.s.ses and bent down, searching for a minute label taped to the marble plinth on which the Atlas figures stood. He straightened up and said without smiling: 'Twenty-eight thousand.'

'OK,' said the man, fingering his pink silk tie with a meaty hand. 'Let me have a wander, then. I guess I was hoping to find a bargain.'

'A bargain? bargain?' said Anthony. 'Well don't forget this is Pimlico.'

Pimlico.

No, not Pimlico itself. Still Chelsea. The westerly end of the Pimlico Road, London SW3, Anthony's home, his living, his life for the last forty years, the place where his knowledge, shrewdness and charm had once made him rich. Not only rich. Here, he'd become a star of the antiques world. Dealers said his name with awe: Anthony Verey; the the Anthony Verey. There had been no important auction, no private sale, no gallery preview to which he was not invited. He knew everyone: their place in the dealer or owner hierarchy, their weak spots, their failures, their maddening triumphs. He was like a spoilt prince in a small but opulent realm, courting Anthony Verey. There had been no important auction, no private sale, no gallery preview to which he was not invited. He knew everyone: their place in the dealer or owner hierarchy, their weak spots, their failures, their maddening triumphs. He was like a spoilt prince in a small but opulent realm, courting invidia invidia.

At the height of his celebrity, he'd been able to lull himself to sleep by counting one by delectable one the people who envied him.

And now, on this cold spring morning, he'd suddenly seen... well, what had he seen? He'd seen how alone alone everything was. Not just the man who'd once been a prince, once been everything was. Not just the man who'd once been a prince, once been the the Anthony Verey. But all the Anthony Verey. But all the beloveds, beloveds, too, all these wonders, made with such care, with such dedication... these things which had endured and survived for so long... even these were tragic in their separateness and solitude. All right, he knew this was a sentimental thought. Furniture couldn't feel. But you could feel for it. You could worry about that day when you had to leave it behind, to the mercy of other people's neglect and ignorance. Particularly now, in these times, when there was a universal letting-go of objects like these, seen as belonging to an old, irrelevant world. What awaited them? What awaited? too, all these wonders, made with such care, with such dedication... these things which had endured and survived for so long... even these were tragic in their separateness and solitude. All right, he knew this was a sentimental thought. Furniture couldn't feel. But you could feel for it. You could worry about that day when you had to leave it behind, to the mercy of other people's neglect and ignorance. Particularly now, in these times, when there was a universal letting-go of objects like these, seen as belonging to an old, irrelevant world. What awaited them? What awaited?

Anthony was seated at his desk now, on a hard Windsor chair, but with his still-narrow a.r.s.e carefully placed on a green silk cus.h.i.+on. This cus.h.i.+on, bought at Peter Jones, was moulded so perfectly to the shape of his bottom that he seldom dared to plump it up or shake the dust from it. n.o.body else came into the shop. Outside, the day was lightless.

Anthony took down his accounts ledger, put on his gla.s.ses and began staring at columns of figures. The ledger was old and thick and worn and was one of seven that contained all he had of a written history: every purchase, every sale, every tax payment, every expense. Ledgers 2 to 5 held all the dazzling figures. In Ledger 6, prices began to fall away and the volume of sales to diminish in a horrible descending curve. And now, in Ledger 7... well, all he could do, frankly, was to avoid looking at bottom lines.

He turned to the Sale Entries for the month of March: an undistinguished portrait ('English School, early 18th century. Sir Comus Delapole, QC, and Lady Delapole. Pastel with touches of watercolour'), a majolica jar ('Ovoid, Italian 17th century, decorated with large scrolling foliage cl.u.s.ters'), a George III silver teapot ('The circular body engraved with a band of anthemions and wrigglework'), and the only thing of any real value a Regency mahogany sofa table he hadn't particularly wanted to part with. These things had earned him slightly less than 4,000; barely enough to pay the month's share of the repairing lease on the shop.

Pitiful.

Anthony now vaguely wished that he'd tried harder to sell the peachy Italian console table to the man with the pink tie, who, in the end, had bought nothing and had been seen making straight for David Linley's shop on the opposite side of the road. He knew that not only the price of the table, but also his unconcealed disdain for this person, had driven him away, as it drove many customers away. But that couldn't be helped. The fact was that Anthony enjoyed being disdainful. Disdain born out of specialist knowledge, or what he thought of as secret knowledge secret knowledge was a habit perfected over forty years, and was now one of the few pleasures left to him. was a habit perfected over forty years, and was now one of the few pleasures left to him.

Anthony put his head in his hands. He clung to tufts of his hair. At least he still had that: he had hair. He might be sixty-four but his hair was fantastic. And of course what he liked most about it was the envy it provoked among his male friends the few that he had with all that pink head-shame they had to endure day in, day out. And he found himself admitting, as he could have admitted long ago, that the envy of others the blessed invidia invidia to which mankind is so ruinously p.r.o.ne had really and honestly been the thing that had kept him alive. This was an outrageous realisation, but a true one. Lovers of both s.e.xes and even one brief wife, Caroline, had come and gone, but the admiration and envy of others had stayed with him, moved with him through his work and his rest, fed and nourished him, allowing him to feel that his life had meaning and purpose. And now that, too, was gone. to which mankind is so ruinously p.r.o.ne had really and honestly been the thing that had kept him alive. This was an outrageous realisation, but a true one. Lovers of both s.e.xes and even one brief wife, Caroline, had come and gone, but the admiration and envy of others had stayed with him, moved with him through his work and his rest, fed and nourished him, allowing him to feel that his life had meaning and purpose. And now that, too, was gone.

Pity had replaced it. Everybody knew he was struggling, that he might even go under. They certainly discussed it round their dinner tables: 'n.o.body wants brown furniture any more. Interiors look completely different now. Anthony Verey must be in grave trouble...' And of course there were many who wanted him to fail. Hundreds. If the shop were to close, how triumphant certain people would be...

Bitter thoughts. Anthony knew that, somehow, he had to resist, had to labour on. But who or what would help him? Where could meaning any longer be found? It seemed to him that outside the confines of his shop, where the beloveds beloveds cl.u.s.tered round him, keeping him safe, now lay a heartless wasteland. cl.u.s.tered round him, keeping him safe, now lay a heartless wasteland.

His telephone rang.