Secrets of the Heart

it?’

She plucked at the soft sleeve. ‘It’s warm and comfortable, and the weather is getting colder.’

‘Still, I miss your beautiful silk one.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ she burst out, ‘please don’t patronize me. As if it matters what I wear in bed.’

Julian was puzzled. ‘It’s always mattered before.’

She turned away and put up a hand to shade her face. ‘That was before.’

‘Kitty…’

‘Yes.’ The word was dragged out.

He sounded very, very weary. ‘What is going on?’

Kitty drew up her feet. Their years together had vanished entirely in a fog of mutual distrust and forgetfulness and she wanted to create a space between the two of them. She had gazed into the precipice, and perceived that there was no bottom, and said, ‘All right You win, I give up.’ He checked the pretty, elegant bedroom and noticed that it appeared emptier. Stripped. He indicated a dressing-table which, except for her hairbrush, was almost shockingly nude. ‘Kitty, where are all your things?’

Kitty clasped her knees tightly. ‘I’ve been getting rid of them. I decided that I don’t need them any more.’

He managed a smile. ‘That sounds rather serious.’

‘Does it?’ Discarding the frilled skirt of her youth and dressing in the colourless, concealing robe of the sadhu to wander the earth before death. Yes, I suppose that was serious. ‘I don’t need them any more.’

Silence. Kitty felt a heavy ache mass at the back of her throat.

He frowned. ‘And you don’t need me any more either? Is that what you’re saying?’

The lump subsided, and Kitty shook her head. ‘Isn’t it the other way round? You don’t need me. You have other… well, I don’t know.’

Julian cracked open the beer and took a mouthful. Kitty threw back the bedclothes and reached for her dressing-gown. Out of habit, she tied the belt extra tight around the waist to emphasize its slenderness. The gesture was not lost on Julian and, out of habit, he reached over to touch her but she stepped out of the way.

‘What is happening, Kitty?’ he asked quietly. ‘I thought we two had to make a go of it. That was why we had that ridiculous scene with Agnes.’ He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘As with a lot of things, you were right. If that is the case, it is important that we keep on trying.’

She knew that expression. It was Julian being kind, which he was being a lot these days. ‘It’s not just Agnes,’ she said. ‘She was the symptom.’

‘Perhaps we should leave her out of this.’

But she had seen the sudden quickening in his expression, which he strove to hide, and the worst of Kitty erupted. ‘It may suit you to do so, Julian, but I don’t think we should exclude the famous Agnes from this conversation. The minute you saw her, she took up residence in our lives. Agnes made you realize that you did not feel enough for me and our companionship was not…’ she struggled to continue ‘… was not strong enough to build it up again. But, don’t worry, I’m over that now. I tried. You know I tried hard, but even I can tell when I’m beaten.’

She waited for anything he might have to say, and when he remained silent, she extracted an envelope from the dressing-table drawer. ‘This is a statement of our financial arrangements, up to date. As from today, please will you stop anything else coming in from you. Everything is in order.’ She held it out. ‘Take it.’

He ignored it and said haltingly, as he digested the implications, ‘I wish you hadn’t done that. It wasn’t necessary.’

‘Why not? It was part and parcel of our relationship.’

She dropped the envelope on to the bed and sat down at a distance from him. ‘I was educated wrongly, Julian. Women aren’t like me any more. They’ve changed, and they do things differently. I’ve been left behind.’ She swallowed. ‘But I suppose, in the end, they will face what I’m facing.’ And in the act of liberating the words into the ether, Kitty’s heart grew lighter.

See? The prison bars are dissolving.

There was enough truth in what Kitty said to make Julian wince. ‘I’m sorry, Kitty.’ He felt he ought to say more: she was owed explanations but he did not seem capable of making them. ‘Shall I leave now?’

Sudden panic and the terror of what lay ahead almost choked Kitty. She remembered how well they had dealt with each other – in the early days – and what passion and love he had drawn from her. Perhaps she was wrong. Perhaps half a loaf was better than no loaf.

‘It’s so hard growing old,’ she burst out.

On that first meeting, ten years ago, she had been so aware of her looks. She posed no complications, was realistic yet properly appreciative of the erotic – and judged shrewdly that Julian was used to helping himself to the good things. She had seen to it that it had all been made to seem so natural.

Julian looked at the beer can. ‘Kitty, I should never have got you into this.’

She reared up from the bed. ‘Oh, no,’ she wept. ‘I don’t want you to say that or to suggest that it’s all been for nothing. But look!’ She tore at the belt of her dressing-gown, and wrenched off her nightdress. ‘Look at me. Look at me properly.’ White, curved and shadowed, she squared up to him like a fighter. ‘Now do you understand? Age. And it is time the prince rode off to find a younger trophy.’

Suppressing a shudder, he picked up the discarded dressing-gown and draped it around the small, delicate body. ‘You exaggerate. There’s nothing wrong with you.’

‘At least let’s be honest.’

But she knew that he knew better than to be honest. That much he could do for her. He moved over to the window and pulled back the curtain. It was impossible to see the sea from Kitty’s cottage and it was one of the reasons he had never liked it.

‘You love Agnes,’ she accused him from the bed, dressing-gown trailing awkwardly from her shoulders. ‘You can be truthful.’

There was no point in subterfuge any longer. Kitty had received, deciphered and read the message. ‘It is nothing to do with you, or how old you are, Kitty. It just is. That’s all.’

Kitty gave a gasp. ‘You never once told me that you loved me.’

‘No, but I should have done.’

While rehearsing this scene, Kitty anticipated the quality of the pain she might experience. She had considered its thrust and sharpness, and trusted she would come through on the other side. But she had misjudged. The pain was, literally, making her breathless.

‘Will you let me explain, Kitty?’

She could see that he wanted her to allow him to justify himself but her curiosity had died. Or, rather, her curiosity had shifted away from Julian and was directed at herself. A different Kitty was pushing her way through an unlit, constricted passage towards the circle of uncertain light at the other end, and she was consumed by impatience to get there.

As a birth, it was quite different from anything she had ever imagined.

Julian finished the beer. ‘You’ve got foam on your lip,’ she informed him, and he wiped it away. Kitty continued, ‘I think it’s time to stop talking. Some things can’t be explained. I will never, never understand why you couldn’t have married me but I have to accept it.’ The old Kitty drove her to add, ‘Once I worshipped you, body and soul, and a punishing God you proved, Julian.’ The new one added, ‘But it was not your fault.’

Julian abandoned the window and picked up his keys. ‘What can I say?’

Kitty sat down at the dressing-table. ‘Theo and I agree that most of the time we travel on the main road but, occasionally, you stop and take breath in a lay-by. Maybe that’s what you need to do.’ For all her determination, she was terrified that she was going to cry but fell back on habit. She picked up her brush and swept the hair from her forehead. Obediently her reflection followed suit – not bad, not so very bad. ‘ Please go now.’

He slid his arms down her shoulders, tracing the old pathways of desire with his fingertips.

She permitted him this last latitude. The bad Kitty rose, fought and conquered her better intentions. ‘You may love Agnes,’ she said, ‘but you might not get her.’ In reply, Julian bent and kissed her neck – in the way that she had loved. Under his touch, her flesh stirred and her pulse quickened. He looked up and caught Kitty’s gaze in the mirror.