An Experiment in Love: A Novel

‘Oh, I think she should have the baby.’ I studied the prayer on the wall. ‘I think maybe you should do what your body wants, while you can.’

I thought of the jelly blob sealed inside Sue’s body, quivering with its own life: watery, warm, budding. I thought of the jaundiced cavities of the skull on our shelf: vacant, stony and null. I was at some point in between: in transit. I shuddered.

In the drawing-room, under a bright chandelier, the warden dispensed sherry – tepid – in specially small sherry glasses. ‘Miss McBain!’ Her voice was cheery. Her eyes descended, ran down to my waist, then more slowly climbed up again. ‘How extraordinary,’ she said.

‘I made it myself.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You certainly couldn’t get it in the shops.’

Julia and Lynette were both wearing boots, as if they might need to whistle up a horse and make an escape; they exchanged glances that suggested this. Julia’s were comfortable, scuffed, baggy boots with stacked heels; Lynette’s were her guardsman’s boots, tall and correct and burnished. Lynette wore a sweeping skirt of indeterminate darkness, and a soft mohair sweater the colour of charcoal; on her left hand, a huge emerald. She twisted it apologetically about her finger. ‘Grandma’s,’ she said. ‘I thought I’d flash it. At our guest, because after all, didn’t I read she married a millionaire?’

The Secretary of State put forth fingers, and accepted a glass of sherry from the warden. Her eye was bright and sharp and small; she tilted her head, the better to see. Her dress was of the shape that is called ageless, and of a length that is called safe; it was sewn all over with little crystal beads. Her pale hair lay against her head in doughy curves, like unbaked sausage rolls.

When we came into proximity, Lynette began to laugh politely into her hand; some of her sherry came out through her nose. ‘Very nice cocktail dress,’ she spluttered. ‘My mother had one of those, but she gave it to a charity shop.’

The warden surged up to us, to give us our designated places at table. I felt that these had been changed, at the last minute. ‘Miss McBain,’ she said, staring hard at my chest and waving me away to the last place on a wing. ‘Miss Lipcott . . .’ She banished Julia – whose medal bounced over her left breast – to an equally remote spot.

We took our places. Soup was served – non-standard soup – and rolls which were hot and definitely not yesterday’s. At our highish table, we didn’t have to prise out the frozen tiny chippings from their foil; we had butter shaved especially for us, curled into glass dishes.

Just as the guests were putting down their soup spoons, Sue rose from her chair, as if it were time for the speeches. She looked wildly up and down the table; then, holding her napkin to her mouth, she bolted. ‘Fifi!’ Julia cried.

For a micro-second our guest looked up. Lynette smiled down at me from High Table; I nodded, rose and slid unobtrusively into Sue’s place near the Secretary of State. The warden glanced at me and nodded, as if she believed some breach in etiquette had been mended.

And really, it would have looked bad, an empty chair so close; as if we were expecting Banquo. Our guest was not eating, even though she had been served with a voluminous chicken breast; her knife toyed with it. She was leaning over the table, talking urgently to the warden and to the section of High Table on her right. The crystals on her dress seemed to quiver; so did her voice, with the effort of restraint. She spoke slowly; she spoke as if she knew everyone except herself was stupid. She leant forward and smiled, and her hair moved with her, as if it were not just hair but a hat made of hair.

I imagined leaning forward, taking her wrist. Put your cutlery down, please. Turn and study this. I wanted her to see my sweater, examine it, envy it. See these flowers! My mother would be proud.

She turned her head in my direction; she opened her lips to speak, and shards of glass fell out.

That night I dreamt of the food I used to eat when I was three years old, when my grandmother was alive: food with the tint and the perfume of living flesh and skin. I dreamt of the rich dark smell of nutmeg that rose from rice pudding, the straw-coloured sweetness of long-baked milk: of sponge rich as egg-yolk, and the trembling speckled surface of baked custard.

I dreamt that I was dead and that I had become a ghost, and that I sat in my grandmother’s kitchen and ate honey from a spoon. I saw my ghost spindle legs dangling down in front of me, and I felt the metal handle of the spoon press against my stripped fingerbones.

‘At least she wasn’t sick on the Guest,’ Julia said. ‘I wonder will she ever know how lucky she was.’

nine

January passed. A man sailed the Atlantic single-handed. A woman didn’t.

At breakfast I sat with Karina, after the others had left. We took discarded toast from the racks, and avoided each other’s eyes as we chewed it. ‘Karina,’ I said, ‘do you remember when I used to do dumb insolence?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You got away with it.’

I looked at her in surprise. How could she think that? I’d had to live ever since with the knowledge of my own temerity; I’d had to live up to it, and find new situations to test it out. Didn’t she know that the winner of one game simply goes on to another, harder game?

‘ “Do you remember?” ’ Karina said. ‘That’s all you ever say to me. You wish you didn’t know me.’

I was startled. ‘No – I’ve never wished that.’

‘You’ve always wished it. When we were at school.’

‘But I used to sit next to you. Don’t you remember?’

‘I don’t mean then. I mean when we were at the Holy Redeemer. You know when I mean.’ Her voice was even. She wiped her fingers on her napkin. Long greasy marks appeared. ‘Don’t you think it’s dirty?’ she said. ‘Having to roll up these napkins and put them in rings?’

‘Yes,’ I admitted. ‘Paper would be cleaner.’

‘I embarrass you,’ she said. ‘You wanted to get in with Julianne and that set. Oh, pardon me. Julia, I should