containers sat congealing on the coffee table. The Christmas tree still bristled with black intensity, but its feet were covered in dust. The couch and chaise had slid away from their razor-sharp alignment and now sat askew on the rug, as dazed as Roger. “This place is a disgrace, Roger.”
“Don’t shout. Please don’t shout,” said Roger, covering his ears. “I think my ears are bleeding.”
“I am not shouting,” said the Major. “I don’t suppose you’ve had breakfast, have you? Why don’t you get dressed while I clear up and make some toast?”
“Oh, leave the clearing up,” said Roger. “I have a cleaning lady who comes tomorrow.”
“Does she really,” replied the Major. “My, how she must look forward to Mondays.”
When Roger had finished emptying the hot water tank and, from the smell of him, using some expensive men’s shower gel, no doubt packaged in a gleaming aluminum container of sporty design, he wandered, squinty- eyed, into the kitchen. He had put on tight jeans and a close-fitting sweater. His feet were bare and his hair combed back in wide stiff lines. The Major paused as he spread some thin toast with the last scrapings of a margarine substitute. “How come you have all these foreign designer clothes and yet you have no food and your milk is sour?”
“I get all my ordinary food and stuff delivered in London,” said Roger. “A girl comes and puts it all away in the right place. I mean, I don’t mind popping in the gourmet store for a browse around the aged Gouda, but who wants to waste their time buying cereal and washing-up liquid?”
“How do you think other people manage?” said the Major.
“They spend their whole lives toddling down the shops with a little string bag, I expect,” said Roger. “Sandy took care of it and I haven’t had time to get a system in place, that’s all.” He took a piece of toast and the Major poured him tea with no milk and cut up a small, slightly withered orange. “I don’t suppose you could pick me up a few things, say on a Friday?” he added.
“No, I couldn’t,” said the Major. “My string bag is quite at capacity as it is.”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” said Roger. “Do I have any aspirin in the cupboard?”
The Major, who had inventoried the cupboards and swept all the dirty dishes into the dishwasher before Roger had rinsed off his soap, produced a large bottle of aspirin and rinsed a glass for water.
“Thanks, Dad,” said Roger. “What are you up for so early for, anyway?”
The Major explained, in as vague a way as possible, that he needed to leave earlier on Thursday in order to visit a friend on the way to Scotland and that he would need Roger to be up with the dawn.
“Not a problem,” said Roger.
“Considering the difficulty I just had in rousting you from your slumbers at eleven o’clock,” said the Major, “I’ll need some more reassurance.”
“It’s not a problem because I’m not going to drive up with you,” said Roger. “Gertrude’s been asked to go up early and she wants me to go with her.”
“You’re going with Gertrude?” repeated the Major.
“You’ll be happy to know I ordered a whole picnic for the trip,” said Roger. “I’m going to whip out my hamper of cold mini pasties and duck confit on soft rolls with sour cherry chutney and seal the deal with a split of chilled champagne.” He rubbed his hands with anticipatory glee. “Nothing like a nice long road trip to advance romantic activities.”
“But you asked to ride up with me,” said the Major. “I was counting on two drivers so we wouldn’t have to stop.”
“You never did like to stop anywhere,” said Roger. “I remember that trip to Cornwall when I was eight. You wouldn’t stop for the bathroom until Stonehenge. I really enjoyed the searing pain of that bladder infection.”
“You always remember things out of proportion,” said the Major. “It cleared right up with the antibiotics, didn’t it? And besides, we bought you a rabbit.”
“Thanks, but I’ll take Gertrude and a duck leg and avoid kidney stones,” said Roger.
“Don’t you think it’s unconscionably soon to be pursuing another woman?” asked the Major. “Sandy only just left.”
“She made her choice,” said Roger. The Major recognized, with a rueful smile, that his son’s words sounded familiar. “I’m not going to let the grass grow,” he added. “Mark to market and move on, as we say about a bad deal.”
“Sometimes it’s a mistake to let them go, my boy,” said the Major. “Sometimes you have to go after them.”
“Not this time, Dad,” said Roger. He looked at his father with some hesitation and then lowered his head, and the Major understood that his son did not believe he welcomed awkward confidences.
“I would like to know what happened,” he said, turning away to wash dishes. It had always been easier to get Roger to talk when they were driving in the car or engaged in some other activity that did not require eye contact. “I grew to quite like her.”
“I screwed it all up and I didn’t even know it,” said Roger. “I thought we’d agreed on everything. How was I supposed to know what she wanted if she didn’t know herself until it was too late?”
“What did she want?”
“I think she wanted to get married, but she didn’t say.” Roger munched on his toast. “And now it’s too late?”
When Roger spoke again, his usual bravado was replaced with a note of seriousness. “We had a little mishap. No big deal. We agreed on how to handle it.” He turned back to the Major. “I went with her to the clinic and everything. I did everything you’re supposed to do.”
“A clinic?” The Major could not bring himself to ask more plainly.
“A woman’s clinic,” said Roger. “Don’t make a face like that. It’s absolutely acceptable these days—woman’s right to choose and all that. It’s what she wanted.” He paused and then amended his language. “Well, we talked about it and she agreed. I mean, I told her it was the responsible thing to do at this stage on our careers.”
“When was this?” asked the Major.
“We found out right before the dance,” said Roger. “Took care of it before we came down for Christmas, and she never told me she didn’t want to go through with it—as if I’m supposed to have magic powers of detection, like some psychic Sherlock Holmes.”
“I think you’re confusing two concepts,” said the Major, distracted by the metaphors.
“I wasn’t confused,” said Roger. “I made a plan and I stuck to it and everything seemed fine.”
“Or so you thought,” said the Major.
“She never said a word,” said Roger. “Maybe she was a bit quiet sometimes, but I couldn’t be expected to know what she was thinking.”
“You are not the first man to miss a woman’s more subtle communication,” said the Major. “They think they are waving when we see only the calm sea, and pretty soon everybody drowns.”
“Exactly, I think,” said Roger, and then he added, “I asked her to marry me, you know? On Christmas Eve, before the party at Dagenham’s. I felt bad about the whole thing and I was prepared to move our plans along.” He tried to sound nonchalant, but a crack in his voice betrayed him and the Major was suddenly flooded with feeling and had to dry his hands on a towel. “I mean, I told her maybe we could even try again next year, if I got promoted through this Ferguson deal.” He sighed and his eyes assumed a dreamy look that might have been emotion. “Maybe a boy first, not that you can really control these things. A boy called Toby and then a girl—I like Laura, or maybe Bodwin—and I told her we could use the little bedroom here as a nursery and then maybe build on a playroom, like in a conservatory.” He looked with confusion at the Major. “She slapped me.”
“Oh, Roger,” said the Major. “Tell me you didn’t.”
“I ask her to marry me and she acts like I’ve asked her to eat human flesh or something. I’m laying out my hopes and plans and she’s screaming at me that I’m so shallow a minnow would drown in my depths. I mean, what does that even mean?”
The Major wished he had known, coming upon Sandy in the darkened house that night. He wished he had said something at the dance, when Mrs. Ali thought Sandy seemed troubled. They might have really done something then. He wondered whether it was his fault Roger had the perceptiveness of concrete.
“I think perhaps your timing was not sensitive, Roger,” said the Major quietly. He felt, in the area of his heart, a slow constriction of sorrow for his son and wondered where or when he had failed, or forgotten, to teach this boy compassion.
