Fearful Symmetry (5 page)

CHAPTER
7

V
ALERIE SCRAPED THE
remains of the children’s meals into the bin, holding the plates well away from her. She was dressed for the rehearsal, and a splodge of garlic butter on her jumper was not the effect she was looking for. She wouldn’t be having to do this at all if Andrew were here as he was meant to be, but she squashed her resentment, knowing that it sat ill within the new tolerant scheme of things. Instead, she tried to feel sorry for him, for having to work on with the Bevan enquiry instead of coming with her to the rehearsal. When he had telephoned he had sounded already weary of the case, and she had believed him when he had said that the day had not gone well, although they both knew that he would never tell her otherwise by telephone and that she had just been taking a polite interest. So she loaded the dishwasher while Nicola the babysitter stood and watched and failed to say,
Oh, leave those, Mrs Poole, I’ll see to them. Off you go, don’t spoil your lovely cashmere jumper
.

It was actually only lambswool but she had brushed it up to make it look a little like cashmere and she had bought it in a larger size which she thought made it look better made and more expensive. The dark colour was good with Valerie’s looks which were of that English kind which seldom ages well: nice hair which she now had to think of as dark blonde, and a pale, creamy complexion which, although still nearer to single than clotted, was yearly growing coarser. She was confident that the navy jumper with her big fake pearl earrings gave her the Hermès look, only without her having to buy the scarf, which would cost roughly the amount that she might spend on a winter coat. And the checked wool trousers and loafers added to the effect, because M&S were so good, these days, at doing things that didn’t look M&S.

As she drove round looking for a parking space close to Helene’s flat in the Circus, she wondered what Helene would be wearing. At the dozen or so rehearsals before the group had broken up for August, Valerie had still not seen anything twice, although Helene’s outfits all shared certain characteristics, like members of the same florid and slightly eccentric family. She went in for a lot of expensive knits, done in theatrical shiny yarns with bobbles and often with beads or ribbony bits, in colours like ‘taupe’ and ‘avocado’; sludge brown and slime green if you were feeling ungenerous. They were invariably two-piece ensembles: a skirt made of knitted flared panels and the matching, much-embellished top which would drape floppily over Helene’s boned underpinnings. Her shoes were high, usually decorated with gold buckles or monograms, and were too tight, so that the fronts of her feet swelled up like two pads of unbaked dough. She wore her dark hair loose and down to her shoulders in what she probably imagined were careless, tumbling locks, and although her jewellery was plentiful, large and inclined to chink, it was real, and added to the impression that Helene was really a prosperous, protein-filled gypsy rather than a retired opera singer. Valerie considered that Helene was doing well for fifty-five but not as well as she herself would when it came to it in fifteen years’ time, if she carried on doing the Rosemary Conlon video and stuck to her Nimble.

She parked in Queen Square and walked up Gay Street to the Circus, preparing the excuses she would have to give for Andrew and composing, partly for herself but mainly for the benefit of the other members of the Circus Music Group—Helene, Jim and Phil (Adele hardly counted in that sort of way)—the right facial expression for the patient, understanding chief inspector’s wife that she aspired to be.

‘No Andrew?’ Helene was swift to conceal the splinter of annoyance in her voice. ‘Oh dear, he is busy, poor man! Is it the woman in Camden Crescent? I saw it in tonight’s paper and just shuddered. Poor woman. But you’re here, Valerie, dear!’ Helene, splendid in lace-knitted teal flecked with bronze and with toning eyeliner, pulled her across the threshold. ‘Everyone’s here. Come on in.’

Valerie made her way along the hall towards the drawing room door with Helene following and talking rapidly to her back. ‘What a
dear
little jersey. You are lucky, you look so nice in simple things. I always look so dull in ordinary jumpers, but I expect that’s just years of being on the stage. One always thinks
costume
when one should be thinking nice sensible clothes for the colder weather! If only I could wear classics! Go straight in! There’s a surprise waiting!’

Damn her, Valerie thought, she didn’t even give me a chance to say it was cashmere. From the doorway she took in at once that there were extra people here. Not Adele, who would probably be down in the basement kitchen preparing coffee. Jim was sitting in his usual place in the small armchair by the gas fire; Phil also was perched in his corner of the deep sofa. But beside Phil sat a new couple who were looking up expectantly. The woman jumped to her feet and advanced. The man rose sluggishly and stood behind her.

‘Meet the surprise: our wonderful composer, Cosmo Lamb! This is Cosmo and this is his lovely Poppy,’ Helene gushed. ‘Poppy Thwaites. Cosmo is our composer-in-
residence,
I could say. They’re staying here for the duration, they’re almost family! This is our dear Valerie.’ She beamed round the room. ‘Oh, this is a moment! Isn’t it? Everyone? For the group? All of us, giving our talents, sharing the language of music. Joining together, giving whatever we can, whoever we are, that’s what I love about it!’

Valerie tried to smile but her lips pursed instead into a pink little cat’s bottom of disapproval. Helene was being at her most—
unreal
was the most generous way Valerie could think of it. In the face of exuberance like this something in Valerie invariably shrivelled up and refused to play along. A woman of Helene’s age should not be saying these things. Helene knew as well as Valerie did that you do not go through motherhood, in Helene’s case with its own very particular difficulties, and come out of it going tra-lah about anything much, not sanely or sincerely, anyway. Now the particular difficulty in person, Adele herself, was edging past with a loaded tray and shuffling over to the grand piano on the far side of the room. Valerie watched the girl’s serious face and the slightly tilted head as she stooped to deposit the tray on its closed lid.

Helene suddenly broke off from her eulogy and shrieked in a high-pitched sing-song, ‘No, dear, not
there
! Wait, dear, the cloth’s not down! Oh, goodness gracious, help! Someone? Cloth someone, cloth please!’

Quick-footed Phil darted at once to the piano stool where the folded cloth lay, whipped it out across the piano lid, took the tray from Adele and placed it down carefully, smiling at her uncomprehending face.

‘No problem, see?’ he said, smiling gently.

‘It goes there,’ Adele said, looking back at him seriously and talking at rather than to him. ‘Tray goes there. That’s where I put it.’

‘But Mama puts down the cloth first, darling,’ Helene said. ‘Cloth then tray, only Mama forgot this once. Cloth then tray. Try to remember.’

Adele turned away and with her head tilted busied herself with pouring coffee, saying to no one in particular, ‘No problem see tray goes there. No problem see tray goes there.’

Helene smiled wanly round and her eyes settled on Poppy, who returned the look.

‘That’s autism for you,’ Helene said to the room. ‘Her routines, you see. Poppy and Cosmo are quite used to it now, aren’t you? And she’s much better than she was. It’s a matter of the right kind of environment for her. She must be in a caring group.’ To Poppy and Cosmo she continued, ‘As you know I really started the music group for her. I mean, of course it’s for everyone, but with her in mind. As I’ve explained, she needs the right group. But you wait till you hear her sing. She has my voice.’

‘Oh, how wonderful,’ breathed Poppy, nodding. ‘Wonderful for you. Isn’t it, Cosmo? That gift. You must feel so
blessed,
I mean, despite the er . . . handicap. I mean not that it’s, er . . . but the voice,
gosh
.’

While Phil took round the coffee, Adele sidled up silently with the biscuits. Arranged perfectly on an enormous plate were three circles, each made up of two different biscuits in an alternating and overlapping pattern. The outer one was of garibaldis and chocolate digestives, the next Jaffa cakes and lemon puffs, and the smallest, inner circle was fig rolls and jammy dodgers.

‘Six kinds, three circles, two kinds each circle, one round, one square. Twenty-six. You can have a biscuit,’ Adele intoned to Poppy. ‘You can have a biscuit. You’re allowed a biscuit.’

Poppy simperingly took a digestive and said, ‘Oooh, scrummy. Thank you, Adele.’

‘Adele doesn’t mind you breaking the pattern.’ Jim had risen and joined them. ‘She used to mind a lot if any of her nice arrangements were upset, but she doesn’t mind so much now. Do you, Adele?’

Adele looked up at Jim and offered him the plate. ‘You want one. You’re allowed a biscuit. Twenty-five now,’ she said solemnly.

‘Thank you, Adele,’ Jim said, and took a garibaldi next to the space left by Poppy’s digestive. Then he gently shoved the other biscuits in the circle round a little way, so that symmetry was restored. He gave Adele’s shoulder a kind little squeeze. ‘Well done,’ he said.

Adele turned away with the plate and with the same tilt of the head made her way over to Phil, who appeared to be waiting for his biscuit.

Helene suddenly clapped her hands and waved everyone back into chairs.

‘To the task in hand, everyone!’ she called.

Valerie made her way quietly round the edge of the group, fetched her coffee from the tray and sat down on the piano stool to watch Helene resume her grip on the gathering. She judged that Helene, in broaching the question of Adele with Cosmo and Poppy, would have recited the same script as she had when Valerie, a new member, had come to her flat one afternoon for an ‘informal little chat’ about the group. The once-great Helene Giraldi had sat her down and confided her private tribulations to her, mere Valerie Poole. She had been flattered. Helene’s only child was severely autistic. Years of useless treatments and regimes had been endured before the correct diagnosis was made, by which time her marriage had collapsed. Helene had done everything a mother could, including giving up her own career to look after the child who could not show affection, who communicated only sporadically and painfully and whose destructive rages, sleeplessness, irrational terrors and obsession with routines had ruled the household. Helene’s handkerchief had come out at this point and her eyes had been dabbed, without disturbing her maquillage, in the unreal way that Valerie now recognised so well. And yet, and this almost made it worse, Helene had gone on, Adele had at quiet moments the power of total, absorbed concentration and displayed the most extraordinary gifts: an agile, pure, radiant soprano voice (she was her mother’s daughter in that respect) coupled with a bizarre memory for music. She could also draw beautiful, stylised patterns of unerring symmetry, disdaining as subjects anything as imperfect and untidy as people, animals or landscape. My little changeling child, Helene had said, twisting her handkerchief.

Valerie had also learned that Adele, now aged twenty-five, no longer tore wallpaper or screamed daily, although her obsessive need for order and symmetry could still sometimes get the better of her and bring on a tantrum. She still made odd collections of useless things from which, for as long as the obsession lasted, she would not be parted. She could speak, but not well, and was most often silent. She had learned many tasks but could carry them out only by rote, remaining unable to vary her actions to take account of varying circumstances.

Valerie looked over now at Adele standing next to Phil who was quietly talking to her. It wasn’t true what people said about Chinese people looking inscrutable. Phil was from Hong Kong but he had such a kind face. It was unusually patient, she thought, watching him speak, for someone as young as he was, no more than about twenty. Adele was looking somewhere past his shoulders, her face conveying nothing unless, perhaps, there was a sadness there behind the indisputably lovely blue eyes. With a slight movement she tilted her head to its usual angle and the light caught the gleam of the straight fair hair that poured down her slim back. She was beautiful, and Valerie was not sure that that did not make Adele’s narrow life seem even sadder. She would never have a professional singing career—or any other career, come to that—because although the voice was a glorious, superior instrument, and she would know lines of music by heart after one hearing, she would always sing like a mechanical doll. Whatever the song was about, it would be delivered in the same perfect tone, the words having no more significance than as vessels to carry the thrilling, singing liquidity of the gorgeous but meaningless notes.

Helene was back in charge. ‘I am so excited, everyone, that I can introduce to you this evening our real live composer! I heard from this young man less than three weeks ago and I told him right there and then on the telephone that we’d love him to come and do our opera with us. So he came straight down from London with Poppy. He’s got the most marvellous credentials but I won’t embarrass him by telling you all about him—he can do that himself!’

Cosmo looked furtively round the group, blushing unattractively.

‘And the super thing is that we’re to have Poppy, too. Poppy is to be our stage manager and will also oversee all the costumes and props, won’t you, Poppy? Poppy’s got a proper theatre background, haven’t you, dear? Although she’s been working in aromatherapy and massage more recently. And I know this will embarrass them but I’m going to tell you—that we’re getting both Cosmo and Poppy but they’re only accepting Cosmo’s fee, which I think is just
so
marvellous of them and what it’s all about, sharing and making music and not about money.’

Valerie, glancing over, caught Jim’s eye and exchanged a look with him which said:
Helene’s keeping the expenses down
. Valerie was grateful for Jim, whom she thought of as a sensible, organised kind of man, probably in his early sixties. He was a little too ex-navy to be exactly Valerie’s type and rather starstruck with Helene, which Valerie found unflattering to herself, but he brought a measure of bearded, modulated calm to the group which, under Helene’s sole direction, was inclined to flutter.