Part 12 (2/2)

'It's tedious, and sometimes it gets out of hand, but we accept it because he's brilliant.' Spence must have seen the scepticism on Archie's face, because he addeda 'Hitch really is that good, you know. Most people would tolerate far worse to work with him. For every stroke of genius the audience sees, there are two or three more behind the scenes.' He grinned. 'Anyway, I get off lightly because I'm almost as good as he is.'

'As modest as ever, I see.' Bridget sat down on the arm of his chair. She had changed into a sleeveless white linen dress, and her skin shone deep brown in the lamplight. From where he sat, Archie could smell the subtle scent of jasmine.

'What's wrong with that? I said almost.' Spence stubbed out his cigarette. 'We're all schoolboys at heart, I suppose. It's just that most of us try to hide it and Hitch chooses to make it a feature.'

It was the same line of defence that Archie had used with Ronnie but, now that he had seen Hitchc.o.c.k's sense of humour in action, he couldn't help feeling that she had been right after all: behaving like a schoolboy was a dangerous trait in someone who wielded that sort of power. He said nothing, though, and asked insteada 'Are you part of the big move?'

Spence shook his head. 'No. I have other plans.'

He didn't elaborate on what they werea and Bridget stood up. 'I'll get us some drinks. What will you have?'

'Not for me, thanks,' Spence said, gently moving the dog from his lap. 'I'd better be going. I'll catch up with you over the weekend.' He raised his hand to Archie and kissed Bridget's cheek.

'Let me know how you get on,' she said, and Spence nodded. On his way out of the door, Archie was sure he saw him wink. 'Ever the soul of discretion,' Bridget added wryly when he was gone.

'I'm sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt your evening.'

'You didn't. We just b.u.mped into each other in the woods. He was angry about something but that's always his way: he's got a terrible temper, but it blows itself out as soon as it arrives.' She peered out of the window. 'Let's hope this storm will do the same when it finally gets here.'

'Do you know him well?' Archie asked casually.

'Jack? As well as you can ever know someone like him, I suppose. We go back a long way. His family was part of the set that used to mix with Clough's, here and in London, so we met each other as kids and then ended up at the Slade together. I often see him when I'm here.' Archie felt someone nuzzle his hand, and he reached down to respond. 'That's Carrington, by the way,' Bridget said, and he was touched that she should have named her dog after the painter; their friends.h.i.+p stretched back to art school, and Dora Carrington's suicide in the early thirties must have devastated her. 'And this is Lytton.' She indicated the dog who had remained glued to her side. 'Ironically, he's a one-woman kind of chap. That would have made her laugh.'

'You must miss her,' he said, hoping that the tenderness in his voice would make up for the inadequacy of the words.

'Yes, every day. It was such a shock, and so inevitable.' She crouched down and scratched the dog's head, and he looked adoringly up at her. 'She was never going to carry on after Lytton died. It was a loneliness too far, and nothing had a point to it without him. Even painting was meaningless, because he wasn't there to see it. I can understand that. We all need someone to impress, someone who matters.'

He wanted to ask who mattered for her, but didn't trust himself to be gracious with the answer. In any case, he sensed she wanted to talk about something else, so he picked up their earlier conversation. 'I thought Jack Spence was only here because of Hitchc.o.c.k. Does he come back often?'

'Whenever Clough adds a new building. They're very close, those two. It took Jack a while to get back on his feet after the war, and Clough gave him some work to help him out. Architectural photography, mostly a nothing as glamorous as what he's doing now, but easier on the eye than the things he had to cover abroad. No dead bodies in sight.' Her voice took on the cynical, ironic tone that had become second nature to their generation as they struggled to find new ways to distance themselves from the horror of war. 'He photographed this headland as it was when Clough bought it, and he's recorded its transformation ever since. Not that he needs the work now, but I think he has a great affection for it.' Archie noddeda and she laughed. 'Don't look so uncomfortable. I told him you were coming, but I didn't expect you to leave your party so early.' She kissed him and let her hand linger on the back of his neck. 'I'm flattered. And wine, too.' She rinsed a couple of gla.s.ses in the sink and looked for a corkscrew among the debris on the table.

'I would have let it breathe but I wasn't quite sure about your a uh a system,' he said, amused.

Bridget ignored the comment, then found what she was looking for and made an expressive gesture with it. 'You have to leave your systems at the door with me, Archie,' she said. 'Surely you remember that?' He nodded and pa.s.sed her the bottle. 'Let's take it outside,' she suggested. 'It's hot in here, and we can keep an eye on the weather. I don't want to start that d.a.m.ned mural from scratch.' The back door of the cottage led to a private inlet with its own tiny rowing boat; there was a pretty walled area with a small table and chairs, lit by lanterns and well s.h.i.+elded from the public footpath. Bridget sat down and smiled at him. 'So how did you get caught up in Hitchc.o.c.k's foreplay?'

He laughed. 'That's an interesting description.'

'Jack's term, not mine. He senses worse to come over the weekend. Did Josephine's c.o.c.ktails go well or badly?'

'Well, but we were wrong-footed by the invitation after dinner. Hitchc.o.c.k's a hard man to refuse. Did Jack tell you about it?' She nodded. 'At least we weren't expected to take part, but it was bad enough as a spectator sport.'

'Jack said it was all about fear.'

'That's right. If it hadn't felt quite so voyeuristic, it might have been interesting. I'd never realised that what you're afraid of says so much about who you are.'

'So what are you afraid of? If it's not a professional sin for a policeman to admit to fear at all?'

'Being wrong.' She looked at him disbelievingly, and he tried to explain before she teased him for his arrogance. 'That's not as egotistical as it sounds. I mean being wrong professionally. There's too much at stake.'

'Accusing the wrong man, you mean?'

'Or missing the right one. People are badly served either way, and it's not a mistake you can put right.'

'I would have thought knowing that was half the battle,' Bridget said seriously. 'And from what I remember, you're not short of compa.s.sion or understanding. I doubt you're often wrong.' She grinned. 'Professionally speaking, anyway. If I were in trouble, I'd want you on my side. But isn't the law infallible?'

'Oh yes. Just like we learnt our lesson from the war, and this government will be more effective than the last.' His wryness matched hers. 'You'll be pleased to know that the older I get, the less faith I have in my systems.'

'Now that can't be a bad thing.' She raised her gla.s.s. 'To the wisdom of age. Shame we have to wait for it.'

'I'm not so sure about that. Hitchc.o.c.k talked about his greatest fear being a knowledge of the future. It was the most sensible thing he said all night, actually; knowing what's in store for you and not being able to do a thing about it would be terrible.' He drained his gla.s.s and watched as the first flicker of lightning split the sky across the water. 'A bit like having another war waiting in the wings, I suppose. It's hard to believe that it could have been worse, but the knowledge of what we were heading for would have made it so. This time, some of us won't have the luxury of ignorance.'

Bridget was quiet. He knew she was thinking back to that time in the hospital, when a with kindness, patience and understanding a she had slowly talked him back to sanity. 'You must have nightmares about going through it again.'

'Yes, and about what we might put up with as a nation to avoid it. But even on a day-to-day level, there'd be no point in hoping or striving for anything if you knew the future, no sense of discovery. You'd know how every painting was going to turn out before you picked up your brush. And as far as people are concerned, you'd miss out on all the joy, all the excitement, all the love, because you'd be obsessed with counting the days. You'd blunt your emotions to stop yourself getting hurt. Of course, some of us do that anyway.' Bridget looked at him curiouslya but he didn't give her the chance to ask. 'What about you? What are you frightened of?'

'Losing my . . .' She stopped and took longer to consider her response. 'Not being able to express myself, I suppose,' she said at last. 'Having a vision that I can't communicate, either because I'm not talented enough or because of some physical disability. You never quite get the painting you set out to create, but to have a sense of beauty and not be able to share it in some way, or a demon that you can't exorcise somehow through your work a that would be a form of madness for me, I think.' Her face had a childlike earnestness when she was trying to understand or explain something; with a smile, like the one she gave him now, it crinkled into life and was completely transformed. 'Of course, some critics would say I'm there already.'

He couldn't have explained it, even to himself, but Archie's curiosity about Bridget's life became suddenly more urgent. Impatient to chip away at the distance that twenty years had created, he askeda 'What about the good things? Are you happy?'

The question sounded absurdly simplistic but she didn't treat it that way. 'Yes, Archie, I'm happy. Most of the time, anyway. There's not a day goes by when I don't want to work, and how many people can say that? It hasn't always been easy being a . . . well, being a painter isn't the most secure of jobs. Unlike some people, we don't get promotion.' He smiled, and listened as she talked about Cambridge and her friends, noticing that she spoke generally rather than about one specific person. All those years ago, that was how their feelings had begun a unconsciously, as friends.h.i.+p. They had got to know each other slowly, without the urgency of love, but the discoveries seemed richer for being leisurely. She had expected nothing from him, had made it clear that he was to do the same a and, because their time together was free of the pain of love, he realised now that he had carried it with him happily. He thought of Bridget without bitterness, regret or any of those other small betrayals that a more intense attachment can breed. And for that reason, she held a unique place in his life. He tried to put his thoughts into words, but she stopped him almost immediately. 'You think I didn't love you?'

Archie was taken aback by the question. Bridget looked at him, half teasing, half serious, and he remembered how he had always struggled to work out what those eyes were saying a but he had never minded. Something in her calm, relaxed ability to accept life as it was and at the same time grab all it offered was the antidote to his own need for precision and direction, and, for a while, it had made his life richer. 'Of course I loved you, Archie,' she said, taking his hand. 'Just because I didn't want to make a lifetime of it doesn't mean it was less than that. People are so funny about love. It always has to lead somewhere, as if it's only the beginning of something and never enough in itself.'

The storm, which seemed to have been prowling around the headland, looking for a way through Portmeirion's defences, finally found its way ina and thunder cracked loudly above them. Bridget laughed as the first big drops of rain fell onto the table between them. 'Wonderful timing,' she said. 'Now I've got to go and secure that mural. It's not dry enough to withstand this yet.' She stood up and pulled him to his feet. 'You can come and help me while you think of something to say.'

4.

'You're angry with me, aren't you?'

'No, Hitch. I'm just tired. Don't worry about it.' Alma smiled unconvincingly at her husband's reflection in the dressing-table mirror and carried on removing her make-up. 'It's been a long day.'

'And you're angry.'

She sighed and turned to face him. 'I just don't understand why you do it.' He sat on the end of the bed, his face flushed from the wine and the heat of the room, and she could see from his expression that he didn't know either. She worried about his health more and more these days: his weight had always fluctuated but he was heavier now than he had ever been, and recently he had even begun to take short naps on set; it would only be a matter of time before someone mentioned this in an interview, and rumours would go round that his best was behind him. Alma recognised the streak of cruelty that entered her husband's jokes whenever he was undergoing a personal crisis. She had seen it several times already in the course of their marriage: when The Lodger was shelved, for instance, or when Blackmail failed to win over American audiences. This time, the intensity of it frightened hera and she had to make him see that. 'I think you went too far,' she said.

'Blame David. He invited them.'

'Only because you told him to. And sending him after Turnbull with a bottle of single malt doesn't suddenly make everything right.'

He looked defensive. 'How was I to know they were going to behave like that?'

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