In A Dry Season

“I’m not sure how deep it went, Ken. I’m beginning to think I believed what I wanted to believe, missed the signposts to the real world.”

“Whatever. All I’m saying is that when someone goes through what you’re going through, he either ends up angry at women for a long time or he misses what he had. Or both. If he’s angry, then he probably just shags them and leaves them. But if he misses the relationship, then he looks for another one to replace it, and his judgment is not necessarily in the best of nick. If he’s both, then he gets into another relationship and fucks it up royally all around and wonders why everyone ends up in tears.”

Banks pushed his chair back and stood up. “Well, thanks for the amateur psychology, Ken, but if I’d wanted Claire fucking Rayner-”

Blackstone grabbed on to Banks’s sleeve. “Alan. Sit down. Please. I’m not suggesting you do anything except be aware of the pitfalls.” He smiled. “Besides, you’re bloody-minded enough to do what you want in any situation, I know that. All I’m saying is think about what you want and why you want it. Be aware of what’s going on. That’s all the wisdom I have to offer. You’ve always struck me as a bit of a romantic underneath it all.”

Banks hesitated, still half ready to leave and half ready to punch Blackstone. “What do you mean?”

“The kind of detective who cares just a bit too much about every victim. The kind of bloke who falls a little bit in love with every woman he sleeps with.”

Banks glanced at Blackstone through narrowed eyes. “I haven’t slept with that many women,” he said. “And as for-”

“Sit down, Alan. Please.”

Banks paused for a moment. When he felt the anger sluice away, he sat.

“What does she feel about it all?”

Banks reached for a cigarette. He felt uncomfortable, as if he were in the dentist’s chair and Blackstone were probing a particularly sensitive nerve. He had never been good at talking about his feelings, even with Jenny Fuller, who was a psychologist. It was something he had in common with most of his male friends, and it gave him a special solidarity with Yorkshiremen. He should have remembered that Ken Blackstone was a bit artsy, read Freud and that sort of thing. “I don’t know,” he said. “I haven’t asked her. We haven’t really talked about it.”

Blackstone paused. Banks lit his cigarette. On a night like this one was shaping up to be, he might go over his allowance. “Alan,” Blackstone went on, “ten months ago you thought you had a stable marriage of more than twenty years’ standing, house, kids, the full Monty. Then, all of a sudden, the carpet’s pulled out from under you and you find you’ve got nothing of the kind. The emotional fallout from that sort of upset doesn’t go away overnight, mate, I can tell you. And believe me, I speak from experience. It takes years to get it out of your system. Enjoy yourself. Just don’t make it more than it is. You’re not ready to deal with that yet. Don’t confuse sex and love.” He slapped the table. “Shit, now I am starting to sound like Claire Rayner. I didn’t really want to get into this.”

“Why did you start it, then?”

Blackstone laughed. “God knows. Because I’ve been there, maybe? Bit of personal therapy? Like anything, it’s probably more about me than you. Maybe I’m just jealous. Maybe I wouldn’t mind sleeping with an attractive young DS myself. Lord knows, it’s been a bloody long time. Ignore me.”

Banks finished his pint and put the glass down slowly. “Look, I take your point, Ken, really I do, but to be honest, it’s the first time I’ve felt comfortable with a woman since Sandra left. Not comfortable, so much, that’s not the right word. Annie’s not a woman you necessarily feel comfortable with. She’s a little weird. Bit of a free spirit. Very private. Hell, though, it’s the first time I’ve really felt free enough to jump into something and say damn the consequences.”

Blackstone laughed and shook his head slowly. “Sounds like you’ve got it bad.” He looked at his watch. “What say we hit the fleshpots of Leeds and get irredeemably pissed?”

Banks smiled. “Most sensible thing you’ve said all night. Let’s do it.”

“And I’ve got a fine malt tucked away at home for afters.”

“Even better. Lead on.”

Winter finally gave way to a slow spring, with its snowdrops in Rowan Woods, then the bluebells, crocuses and daffodils. Brad and Charlie became our regular “beaux” and we saw far less of Billy Joe, who became very sulky after he found he had lost Gloria to a pilot.

The Americans always seemed more casual about rank, unlike the English. I suppose it is because our class system instilled it in us from birth, while Americans were all created equal, or so they say. It must be nice for them; it would probably be confusing for us. But it’s one thing for officers and enlisted men to eat, drink and billet together and quite another for a second Lieutenant to steal a mere sergeant’s girl.

I was worried that Billy Joe would start a fight, given his violent streak, but he soon found another girl and even started talking to us again when we met at dances and in pubs. He pestered Gloria on occasion to go back with him, or at least just to sleep with him again, but she was able to keep him at bay, even when she’d been drinking.

PX, of course, remained absolutely essential, so we made sure we still cultivated him. As none of us had actually gone out with him, anyway, we had no reason to think our new relationship with Brad and Charlie would have any effect on the friendship, and it didn’t seem to.

I won’t say that my affair with Charlie was a grand passion, but we became less awkward with the physical side of things as time went on, and he did become the first man I ever slept with. He was gentle, patient and sensitive, which was exactly what I needed, and I came to look forward to those times we spent in bed together at Bridge Cottage, courtesy of Gloria.

Our relationship remained more of an intellectual one; we passed books back and forth with abandon: Forster, Proust, Dostoevsky. Charlie wasn’t dull and dry, though; he loved to dance and was a great Humphrey Bogart fan. He took me to see Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon, even though he had seen them both before. He was also far more passionate about classical music than I was, and we sometimes went to concerts. Once, I remember, we went all the way to Huddersfield to see Benjamin Britten conduct his own Hymn to St. Cecilia.

In all the excitement we were probably guilty of neglecting the people who had been good to us in the worst days after Matthew’s disappearance, especially Michael Stanhope. We redeemed ourselves with him a little when he had an exhibition in Leeds. Charlie and I made a weekend of it and went to stay at the Metropole Hotel.

Charlie, who knew a lot more about painting than I did, praised the exhibition to the skies and I think Mr. Stanhope was rather taken with him. Even Gloria went to see Mr. Stanhope at his studio that summer and autumn far more often than she had before.

I tried not to dwell on the dangers inherent in Charlie’s job, and for his part, he never seemed to want to talk about them. The war receded into the distance during those hours we spent together reading or making love, though it was difficult to ignore the rest of the time. The Americans were carrying out precision daylight bombing raids over Germany, often without fighter cover, and their casualties were appalling. Instead of listening to the drone of the planes taking off after dark, I now heard them in the mornings. The Flying Fortresses were much louder than the RAF planes that had been there before. They would warm up the engines at about five o’clock, which was the time I usually awoke anyway, and I would lie there stealing an extra few minutes of warmth and imagine Charlie checking his maps and preparing himself for another raid.

Charlie told me that up around twenty thousand feet they were flying at temperatures of between minus 30 and minus 50 degrees Fahrenheit. I couldn’t imagine anything that cold. He had to wear long woolen underwear and electrically heated flying suits under his fleece-lined leather jacket. I had to laugh when he said it would take him half an hour to get undressed and into bed with me.

And so life went on. Books. Bed. Pictures. Dances. Concerts. Talk. Double summertime began on the second of April that year, giving us the long spring evenings to go for walks to pick wildflowers in Rowan Woods or idle down by the river. In May, when it was warmer, we would often sit on the banks of Harksmere and read Coleridge and Wordsworth out loud to one another. We had picnics of Spam- and potted-shrimp sandwiches on the terraces just off The Edge.

Mother liked Charlie, I could tell, though she didn’t say much. She never did. Matthew’s disappearance had taken most of the wind out of her sails. But Charlie brought her Lifesavers and Hershey bars, and she thanked him