Miss Carter's War Page 30

  The incense, the candles, the soaring choir, knees on hairy hassocks, I believe in God, the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth and my lovely new dress and shoes, my Sunday best. Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.

  She was sure some priest, or the funeral vicar, or years ago, her mother, would have come up with a platitude about suffering or free will but she just wasn’t interested. Better to veto any possibility of help from above, and get on with it yourself. She was relieved.

  ‘Tony, I want you to know. I am now a fully paid-up atheist.’

  ‘Welcome to the club, petal.’

  As the months went by, she tried to restore in Tony his old zest for life, but any enquiry as to what he would like to do in their spare time was greeted by a shrug.

  ‘Whatever you like.’

  There were so many places that were out of bounds because of their association with Donald, practically the whole of London in fact, and some more, like Soho and Brighton, because of the scars from her relationship with Jimmy.

  ‘This is ridiculous, Tony. We can’t spend the rest of our lives avoiding.’

  ‘You’re a fine one to talk.’

  ‘Touché. But we are lucky to be alive. So let’s try and live, Tony. We’ve still got each other. We were blessed to have Donald. He was so completely and joyously alive. It’s a betrayal of all he was if we allow this loss to make us sad for evermore.’

  The first year passed agonisingly slowly for them both. To mark the first anniversary of Donald’s death, with Tony’s reluctant agreement, Marguerite organised a trip to Venice. Neither of them had ever been there. Marguerite hoped that they could recapture the pleasure of their Good Food Guide expeditions, before Donald came into their lives.

  Although it was February, and cold, the trip in the water taxi from the airport to their hotel was exhilarating. They stood at the back as the boat roared and crashed through the waves of the grey lagoon, the wind and spray lashing their faces. When it turned into a small inlet between decaying houses with their doors facing the canal, Tony shouted, ‘Good heavens, the streets really are full of water.’

  Both of them cried out when they turned into the Grand Canal. The faded colours, the crumbling grandeur of the palaces lining the water, the gondoliers actually wearing boaters and striped shirts were like all the pictures, but animated and quite noisy and ten times more beautiful than they had ever imagined. Like nothing, anywhere, either of them had ever seen before. Unique. Glorious. The taxi turned into another narrow canal; all was silent apart from the slowing engine. They drew up at the steps of their small hotel.

  They had decided to share a room as they had in the past. Their bedroom was the bridal suite. Frescoes on the ceiling, peachy ochred walls, a four-poster bed and terracotta-tiled floor, with a balcony, from where they could see people in the opposite windows sitting down to supper. They hugged each other with delight.

  ‘It’s as good as they say.’

  ‘Better.’

  Armed with their Links guide, which mapped out walks that took them into backwaters away from the tourists, Tony and Marguerite greedily devoured Venice. It seemed that every corner they turned offered new delights. Marguerite would barely allow Tony to stop for a coffee.

  ‘Hold on, Mags. I’m not as young as I used to be, you know. Venice may be sinking but it won’t go before we leave.’

  In her new role as militant atheist, Marguerite was unsettled by the plethora of Madonnas and dying Jesuses the artists had been obliged to paint.

  Tony was fascinated.

  ‘They were sort of interior decorators, weren’t they? It must have been fiendishly competitive. I bet they were well pissed off when Tintoretto got the whole of that scuola to do.’

  Marguerite could not help wondering what they would have painted had they not been forced to earn a living pleasing doges and rich merchants. They both began to notice what they decided were jokes in the paintings. Carpaccio managed to get a cheeky white pet dog in the centre of several of his pictures, even in one supposed to be a holy miracle by the Rialto Bridge. Cherubs were often quite larky, one even exposing his bum in the corner of a very solemn crucifixion scene.

  Their favourite angels were in the Frari at the foot of a breathtaking triptych by Giovanni Bellini of the Madonna and Child. Marguerite allowed Tony to sit with her in the chapel for a while and look at it. They were alone. It was breathtaking. So real was it, Marguerite would not have been surprised if Mary had stood up and handed her the naked baby to hold. Or the two cherub musicians had danced a jig.

  She risked saying out loud what both had been privately thinking.

  ‘How Donald would have loved her.’

  ‘Yes. But we’re loving her for him.’

  A change had happened. The picture had rid them of their fear of talking about their pain. They went to a nearby café and shared a shift in perception; an awareness that Donald lived on through the way he had taught them to see the world. They doubted if before they met him they would have sat looking at the Bellini for so long, or found the fun in the sacred art. He was there in their eyes and they welcomed him back.

  For the rest of their trip their conversation was peppered with ‘Donald would have’s.’ A running joke was that Tony was Dirk Bogarde in Death in Venice and Donald would have pirouetted around being that beautiful object of his desire. Marguerite was uneasy that Tony still harboured this image of himself as a sad raddled homosexual who was losing his looks, but she laughed on cue, and claimed the role of the red-coated dwarf in Don’t Look Now.

  On their last night, in high spirits, they went to a nearby campo, and had Venetian spritzers, a delicious ruby-red concoction of Campari and Prosecco, with a slice of orange and an olive. They sat watching the locals, out for an evening stroll, and only then did Marguerite dare to raise her glass.

  ‘To our absent friend.’

  Tony took her hand, and kissed the palm.

  ‘And to my dear, dear present one.’

  Chapter 42

  Returning to their separate flats, after Venice, was not easy. Tony insisted on keeping his exactly as it had been when Donald died. Marguerite had cleaned out the medicines and oxygen cylinders, but Donald’s clothes, pictures and books had to be left exactly as if he were still there. Nevertheless, Tony seemed in a more accepting frame of mind. He also appeared less concerned that his sexuality would be revealed.

  Trying to make something positive out of the anguish of Donald’s suffering, they involved themselves in the setting up, in the face of vitriolic opposition, of London Lighthouse, a hospice for people dying of AIDS. They were there when Princess Diana, now blossomed into a glamorous, vital young woman, challenged the prevailing fear by striding into the hospice in a brilliant red suit and sexy black stockings, and posing for press and television, sitting on beds, holding hands, and kissing the patients. The public, and particularly the press in view of Diana’s popularity, became a bit less antagonistic towards the gay community after that.

  Then Parliament brought in Clause 28 of the Local Government Act that decreed that it was wrong for local authorities to ‘intentionally promote homosexuality, or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality, or promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship’.

  Tony was incensed.

  ‘Well, thank you very much, Mrs sodding Thatcher. We’re right back in the 1950s. We can join the miners as “the enemy within”. Who else is going to be deemed “not one of us”? Not acceptable. They couldn’t have chosen their words better to show the contempt they feel. Another group to hate in this fractured fucking country.’

  Marguerite was pleased to see the return of Tony’s old political fury.

  ‘So, in the pitiful sex education classes we have, are we to ignore the poor kids cowering at their desks, who already realise they are “unacceptable”? That they mustn’t “pretend” they are ever entitled to a family life? They have to be
like me, do they? Spending their whole lives trying to be something they’re not. Living a lie. My love for Donald was central to my existence yet I can’t even tell my own mother. My father died not really reconciled to who I was. I can’t join in when the people I work with are gossiping about their bloody wives and girlfriends. Yet our relationship, our family, which includes you, Mags, our “pretended family”, is every bit as good as theirs.’

  Marguerite shared his anger, knowing that Tony and Donald’s relationship was as genuine as any heterosexual marriage. Had they adopted a child, as two of their gay friends in America had done, there was no doubt in her mind that they would have been better parents than those of some of her damaged pupils.

  ‘Well, that’s it,’ Tony continued, ‘I’ve had enough. There’s a march happening against the Clause. I’m bloody well going on it.’

  ‘Tony, be careful. This is going to get a lot of press attention. We’re teachers. We could be in serious trouble if the school governors find out.’

  ‘That’s not like you, Mags. It’s time to stand up and be counted.’

  ‘I’m not worried about me. But it’s more risky for you.’

  ‘We have to go. You know that.’

  She smiled.

  ‘Of course I do.’

  With a group of their colleagues from London Lighthouse they joined the 30,000 people converging on Whitehall. They were on the march once more. Despite its seriousness the event was fun; the anger was expressed with humour. Marguerite particularly liked a chant that didn’t greatly amuse the dour, accompanying police: ‘2,4,6,8, is that copper really straight?’

  There were silken banners, men in drag, girls defiantly kissing girls and men kissing men. There was music and dancing. The crowd was not just made up of lesbian women and homosexual men; there was support from many families and people from all walks of life including politics.

  Tony, who was helping to organise the march, yelled through his megaphone, showing his rather ungracious prejudice, ‘Will the fucking SWP get to the back?’

  After the excitement of the day, Tony and Marguerite put their feet up in her flat.

  Marguerite congratulated Tony on his part in the organisation.

  ‘Although the Clause is awful, it’s certainly united the gay community, hasn’t it?’

  Tony agreed.

  ‘There were people marching who’d never been politically active before, and some who hadn’t even come out of the closet.’

  ‘Like you have, you mean.’

  ‘Yes, at last. Pity I left it so late. It’s easier for the youngsters. They haven’t got the history. But Donald would be proud of me, wouldn’t he?’

  ‘He would, my darling, he would.’

  ‘I’ll try and make up for lost time.’

  There was a reckless quality about Tony’s new honesty that concerned Marguerite. Once, in the staff room at school, a homophobic diatribe by the deputy headmaster had him standing in front of the man and saying through gritted teeth, ‘I think you should know, mate, that I am gay, and if you don’t stop this bigoted claptrap, one of those “fairies”, as you call us, may well punch you on the jaw, and if what you have been ignorantly saying is true, you’ll probably catch AIDS.’

  Marguerite warned him to be careful. But he wasn’t. Sometime later he was summoned to the same deputy headmaster’s study. He had been seen in a café, talking to one of the boys, who then told the other boys that Mr Stansfield was queer. When he pointed out that, even if he was ‘promoting homosexuality’, it was not on school premises, he was reluctantly let off with a stern warning.

  Tony explained to Marguerite what had happened. Cycling back from school, he came across a group of pupils standing round a weeping boy, laughing and pushing him violently from one to the other. He dismounted and walked towards them. Seeing him, they all ran off, leaving the crying boy to pick up his scattered books and torn jacket.

  ‘What’s that all about, Geoffrey?’

  ‘I can’t say, sir.’ The boy looked terrified.

  ‘I tell you what, come into this caff and we’ll straighten you out and have a cup of tea.’

  After the boy had calmed down, Tony got him sufficiently relaxed to admit that the boys thought he was queer.

  ‘And I suspect he is. I recognised myself at his age. And said so. What could I do, Mags, tell him he was a dirty little sod and must stop having wicked thoughts?’

  ‘But then he went back and betrayed you to the others.’

  ‘He was scared stiff. I expect he hoped they’d stop bullying him if he snitched on me.’

  His laugh was rueful.

  Afraid that his depression would engulf him again, Marguerite said uncertainly, ‘It’ll probably all blow over. The kids are very fond of you.’

  ‘What a nasty world it’s become, Mags. For all our campaigning and shouting nothing seems to get much better.’

  ‘Nonsense. This is a tiny setback. They’ll repeal that stupid Clause with all this uproar against it. People power. That’s the thing. Look at the people pulling down the Berlin Wall. And the first missile has gone from Greenham. All those keening women made it happen. We’ve got to keep fighting.’

  ‘You’re right. That’s my girl. How I love you, my Half-Full Lizzie Dripping.’

  Chapter 43

  The incident did not blow over. It lit a fuse that was to burn uncontrollably. The rumour of Tony’s homosexuality spread through the school. Whereas, when Tony was on playground duty he was usually surrounded by youngsters wanting to talk and joke with him, they began to avoid him, and stand and stare from a distance, whispering and giggling. This behaviour culminated in Tony being asked to see the headmaster.

  That night he told Marguerite about their conversation.

  ‘He’s a good man. I felt sorry for him. He looked really embarrassed. He told me there has been a complaint. One of the boys said I touched him inappropriately.’

  Marguerite was aghast.

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘James Matthews’ father went to see her and said his son told him I interfered with him whilst teaching him to swim.’

  ‘In the public baths? In front of dozens of other kids?’

  ‘James said I held him in my arms.’

  ‘Of course you did. You were teaching him to swim. If you hadn’t, he’d have drowned.’

  ‘Anyway, he explained he had to be extra cautious because of Clause 28. He was obliged to suspend me, pending an inquiry by the council. He asked me to stay away from the school.’

  ‘What did you say?’

  Tony laughed.

  ‘I asked if I should wear a pink triangle.’

  She arrives in England and opens her father’s letter as he had instructed.

  Read this and understand why we have to stay and fight. It was written by Joseph Goebbels:

  There are differences between people just as there are differences between animals. Some people are good, others bad. The same is true of animals. The fact that the Jew still lives among us is no proof that he belongs among us, just as a flea is not a household pet simply because it lives in a house. If someone wears the Jewish star, he is an enemy of the people. The Jews have no right to claim equality with us. If they wish to speak on the streets, in lines outside shops or in public transportation, they should be ignored because they are Jews who have no right to a voice in the community.

  Marguerite, my darling daughter, we have to stay and rid your world of this hatred because we love you so very much.

  Papa

  For several months, Tony was not allowed in the school. Marguerite did her best to keep his spirits up and convince him that the case would be dropped. He began to drink heavily and she could not even persuade him to go to the cinema. He shut himself in his flat, reluctant to see her. On her sixty-fifth birthday, however, he invited her for a meal. He cooked her mother’s cassoulet and opened a bottle of very good wine. After a dessert of crème brûlée she felt relieved that he had made an effort,
even though he seemed abstracted.

  ‘That was lovely, Tony. Can I stay for a bit? Let’s talk. I miss you.’

  ‘I know, I have not been very good company lately, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Tell me what’s happening. Have you been told what the inquiry will consist of?’

  ‘Well, actually—’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘I had a letter yesterday. The father is not happy with the delay, and has threatened to involve the police.’

  ‘God, Tony. He can’t.’

  ‘Yes, that’ll be fun, I must say. Like the old days. They’ll probably look up my record. Homosexual, paedophile, what’s the difference?’

  ‘You must see a solicitor.’

  ‘Yes, yes, I will. But first I need a little break to get my head straight. And I have some business to sort out. I’m going away for a couple of days.’

  ‘Where? I’ll come with you.’

  Tony was adamant he needed some time on his own to get things in perspective. He would not tell her where he was going. He evaded her questions. In fact he seemed to want her to leave.

  As she got to the door, he said, ‘You do know I love you, don’t you?’

  ‘Don’t look at me like that, Tony. You’re frightening me to death.’

  ‘You – frightened? You’re the most courageous person I’ve ever met, my darling Lizzie Dripping. Give us a smile. Go on. Your lovely, lovely smile.’

  He kissed her on the lips and they looked long and hard into one another’s eyes.

  ‘No, Tony. Please.’

  ‘Hush, my love.’ He kissed her hand and gently pushed her through the door.

  She knew something terrible was about to happen, but for once she felt powerless to stop it.

  Three days later she received a letter:

  My dearest dear (thank you, Ivor, cue music)

  When I said goodbye to you, I think you knew it was over. Thanks for not trying to stop me. I am weary. I haven’t any fight left. I can’t inflict the shame of a police inquiry on my mother. Especially now she is so old and on her own. I can’t live with the guilt about Donald. I had the test, by the way, I’m positive. I can’t put you through that inevitable nightmare again. I have some very good pills from a sympathetic gay doctor and will be found in one of those hotels in King’s Cross. A note will tell the police to inform you. Please sell the flat and give the money to my mother. You can have the contents. I can’t imagine all that campery working in Oldham. You’ll find a will on my desk and hopefully I’ve left debts paid, and everything in order. I’ve written to my mother.