The Secret Intensity of Everyday Life Read online

  Henry brings up the rear. His shoulders hurt. He feels sweat form on his brow. A long train of men and women in evening dress, all similarly burdened, runs before him towards the red brick hulk of the opera house. This time of effort, the carrying of the picnic, a rite of passage in the Glyndebourne experience: the males of the tribe dragging the day’s kill to the home fires. Or perhaps – a rather different historical echo – they are a stream of refugees fleeing a fallen city, Paris in 1940, their worldly goods in their battered leather suitcases. And he is in his own way a refugee, fleeing his own life.

  Nearer the gardens there are clusters of chauffeurs among the parked cars, smoking and talking in low voices. The chauffeurs do not carry the picnic. The essence of the evening is grandeur at play, formality on the grass, déjeuner sur l’herbe. Every time Henry comes here, and courtesy of his parents-in-law he has been many times, he marvels at its magnificent eccentricity. All it takes to complete the absurdity is rain, and rain is forecast.

  ‘Jaysus!’ says Roddy, already pink in the face. ‘I always forget how far it is.’

  Diana stares sternly at the massive lead-clad fly-tower that rises above the opera house.

  ‘I’ve never understood why they had to make it so ugly.’

  ‘Oh, don’t you like it?’ John Kinross, the one-time engineer. ‘I think it’s grand.’

  ‘John admires grain silos,’ says Anthea.

  ‘I like things that do their job.’ John is unoffended, his self-esteem amiably armoured by the millions for which he sold his company.

  The remark is not addressed to Henry, but as he struggles behind with his burden he hears once more Aidan Massey’s angry retort: ‘You don’t know your job.’ The failure is not of knowledge, he thinks. The failure is of desire.

  Has Laura ever loved me as she loved him? Not the kind of question you can ask.

  They troop over the gravel, past the glass-fronted Mildmay Hall. The tables within are already filling up with people securing their places for the long interval.

  ‘They all think it’s going to rain,’ says Anthea anxiously. ‘The terraces will be full.’

  By the time they reach the canopied bar Henry is suffering.

  ‘I’ll take the lift,’ he says.

  ‘But it’s so slow, Henry. You’ll be there for hours. It’s the slowest lift in the world.’

  ‘I don’t care. You go ahead.’

  He stands in line behind a party of old ladies all of whom are wearing long floral-patterned frocks, like armchairs in the lounge of a provincial hotel. They are talking about bladder control.

  ‘I can cope with Mozart. But Handel – remember, Janet, that Theodora with all the funny hand-wagging? – that was very trying.’

  ‘Then don’t even think of Wagner.’

  By the time he joins the others on the wide brick terrace above the bar they have squeezed a pitch between earlier arrivals and have set up the table and chairs. All round them elaborately-dressed people are struggling with folding furniture and uncorking wine. John Kinross has encountered a friend who shares his back trouble. The friend, a heavily-overweight elderly man, unbuttons his dress-shirt to reveal a species of inner cummerbund.

  ‘Magnetic belt,’ he says. ‘Trust me. It works.’

  ‘I have a special light-weight support I take on planes.’

  ‘Waste of time. Once your spine is buggered, it’s buggered.’

  Diana greets Henry with a shrill whine.

  ‘Where have you been, Henry? We’re all dying for a drink.’

  Henry’s bag contains the glasses. They are made of polycarbonate and claim to be unbreakable. Roddy pours champagne. It’s half-past four in the afternoon.

  Laura whispers to Henry. ‘Try to cheer up.’

  Henry sips his wine and pretends to cheer up, but he feels detached from the proceedings. It’s been coming for days, ever since he stood before the mirror in the bathroom and thought: I’m not living the life I meant to live.

  I want you to know that not one day has gone by in which I haven’t thought of you. The truth is we have never parted.

  He has this sensation he’s on the point of falling and there’s nothing he can do to stop it. Nor is he sure he wants to stop it. He’s watching himself, half-fascinated, half-afraid, to see how far he’ll go.

  Walking on walls and below only sky.

  Their seats are in Row AA, Foyer Circle, Blue side. They command an unimpeded view of the stalls below.

  ‘Wonderful seats, John.’

  ‘They should be.’

  John Kinross became a Founder Member when the new opera house was built six years ago, and has bought privileged access for life. Seat prices on top, of course. The tickets for himself and his guests will set him back £780 tonight.

  Anthea has her own cushion. The lightly-upholstered blond plywood seats are too hard for her. The programme book has been appropriated by Diana.

  ‘Oh, it’s Richard Hudson. We met him at David’s, remember, Roddy?’

  ‘No. Who is Richard Hudson?’

  ‘The designer.’

  ‘All David’s friends are designers. I can’t tell them apart.’

  Behind them a man is telling his party in a booming voice, ‘John Christie used to say you wear evening dress out of respect for the performers, and when it’s over you applaud for five full minutes!’

  Henry gazes over the sea of heads in the stalls below. Then he looks up at the faces leaning out from the balcony seats, tier upon tier. Right at the top, just under the concrete dome, a closed walkway runs from side to side. How strange it would be to be up there, high above stage and audience, seeing nothing. Suppose you were taken there blindfolded, and left there to listen to the sounds. Would you ever guess where you were?

  The lights go down. The conductor takes his stand. The overture begins.

  The curtain rises on a pale cream set dominated by a statue of a horse. A giant radiator stands against the rear wall. A tailor’s dummy hangs on a cord, wearing a long white dress. A number of wood-framed gauze screens and doorways form insubstantial walls to notional rooms. Figaro and Susanna are in modern dress.

  The familiar music, the warmth and darkness of the auditorium, the brilliance of the lit stage, cause Henry’s eyelids to droop. He doesn’t actually go to sleep, but from time to time he finds his head lolls forward and he has to jerk it up again. He does not achieve full attention until the entry of Cherubino. Cherubino’s innocent sexual promiscuity enchants him. Is it because he’s young, or is it because the part of a man is played by a woman? When she sings her first aria Henry is gripped.

  Ogni donna mi fa palpitar. ‘Every woman makes me tremble.’

  The overwhelming physical impact of sexual desire.

  Then a little later comes the other side of the coin, which is sexual betrayal. The Contessa sings Porgi, amor. ‘Give me back my loved one or in mercy let me die.’ Her loved one is the Count, a calculating and heartless lecher. How can she long for his love? And yet when she sings the emotion is authentic. The music trumps the plot.

  Henry glances round at the faces on either side, and sees only placid enjoyment. It strikes him that he alone comprehends the bitter tragedy that is unfolding on stage. This the greatness of opera, the emotions generated by the music broad enough for each listener to appropriate in his own way. The singers’ lines, half heard, half understood, snatched from inadequate sur-titles, become passwords to our own secret hopes and fears.

  Give me back my loved one or in mercy let me die.

  The loved one is Laura. The loved one is myself in love. Give me back a time when I was overwhelmed by love. A time when every woman made me tremble. Give me back the Laura who loved me. Somehow, without knowing it, I have left the room of life. I am on the other side of the pane of glass. I tap on the glass but no one hears.

  The lights come up for the long interval. The audience emits a collective sigh and rises and stretches. Ninety minutes of good food and good wine lie ahead. No London nonsens
e of gobbling at six or starving till ten. The eager shuffle to the dinner table begins.

  ‘What was the radiator about?’

  ‘There was something very odd going on with the costumes.’

  ‘You should have seen Roddy’s face when they dressed Cherubino up as a girl. He went all pink.’

  ‘She is a girl, for heaven’s sake! She’s an Italian mezzo-soprano.’

  ‘My God, those seats are bum killers!’

  ‘I think the idea is the costumes are being created as the opera goes along. Did you see how the coats in Act Two had the tailor’s stitches still in them?’

  ‘Yes, but why? I mean, it’s so distracting.’

  ‘I loved the gardener.’

  ‘Everyone always loves the gardener.’

  ‘Look, it’s not rained after all!’

  ‘Did you see Ted Heath? He was right below us in the stalls.’

  ‘I could murder a glass of red.’

  ‘Maybe we should move the picnic out onto the grass.’

  ‘Are you completely mad? The table’s laid on the terrace. We’re all starving.’

  Roddy turns and says to Henry with an air of sleepy surprise, ‘Perky little thing, that Cherubino.’

  The first floor terrace is already crowded, picnic tables and chairs squeezed into every space. Some hardy souls have even settled on rugs spread over the brick floor. A bright buzz of voices rises from the bar below.

  ‘This is a ’95 Pommard. Should be tasty.’

  ‘We’re starting with smoked salmon. Shouldn’t we be drinking white?’

  ‘There’s more champagne if you want.’

  Henry drinks red wine and tries to enter the spirit of the occasion. Just fancy dress really, the trick is to enjoy it. Beautiful people, beautiful music, the green hills of Sussex. Of course it’s all absurd, but who am I to sneer?

  Like nausea, like car-sickness, the sensation of misery returns.

  ‘The Contessa has the most heavenly voice.’

  ‘Roddy, you’re dribbling.’

  ‘Laura, I want to know if Nick’s still gorgeous. Does he still do it for you?’

  ‘Oh, Diana. That was all twenty years ago.’

  ‘You remember the Ardmores? You do, Mummy. That dull little man who talked to you about burglar alarms. Well, it turns out he’s been poking the nanny.’

  ‘John, you can start cutting up the beef now.’

  ‘Isn’t that Billy Holland? My God, he looks terrible.’

  ‘You know Celia left him.’

  ‘That was ages ago. Surely someone’s tidied him up by now.’

  ‘Henry, do something with the starter plates, will you?’

  The table’s unstable, it shudders every time anyone moves, it’s far too small for six. Plastic plates, plastic glasses, all part of the uncomfortable picnic experience. At least we don’t have to sit on the ground as we used to, now we can perch on little dark-green folding chairs instead, official items from the Glyndebourne shop. These are all social signifiers, the flags of our tribe, and why not? Football fans wear their club colours.

  We are the spectators and we are the spectacle.

  For Christ’s sake cheer up and enjoy it.

  ‘Now come on, Henry. Tell us some dirt. Is Aidan Massey a genuine fuck-bunny?’

  ‘A fuck-bunny?’

  ‘Is he up for it with anyone and everyone? That’s what I hear. Serena says she had sex with him standing up in a loo in the BA lounge at Heathrow.’

  ‘He must have stood on the loo seat.’

  ‘Henry!’ Diana treasures the flash of malice. ‘I shall repeat that.’

  So much effort. Clothes bought, jewels uncased, hair sculpted, wines selected, food cooked, furniture hauled across gardens and up stairs, money paid out, time wasted, passion spent. So much effort. A thousand over-dressed men and women holding above their heads a giant mirror-glass sphere in which they see themselves magnified, distorted, swollen-headed. Why not let it fall, smash, shiver to tiny crystals?

  But who am I kidding? It’s not Glyndebourne, it’s me.

  Came to see you but you’re not here. If you come to see me I’ll be there.

  The sensation of misery returns. Somewhere along the way I took a wrong turning. This is not the life I meant to live.

  ‘Tell them about Scott, John.’

  John Kinross passing round slices of cold pink fillet of beef. Help yourself to the salsa verde, the new potatoes, the French beans. Don’t rock the table.

  ‘Ah, the noble Scott. My personal trainer. An individual of sterling virtue.’

  ‘He gives John exercises for his back.’

  ‘Scott never touches alcohol, never watches television, never eats meat, never shops at Tesco. He makes me feel like a spoiled child, which I expect I am. Anyway, to redeem myself in his eyes I told him I’d made a small contribution to charity—’

  ‘Not so small.’

  ‘Inspired by Bob Geldof.’

  ‘Listen to this. This is priceless.’

  ‘Well, Scott positively choked. It turns out he despises Bob Geldof. It seems Geldof provides an escape valve for our guilt.’

  ‘John gave £10,000.’

  ‘To be fair, I didn’t tell Scott the sum.’

  Henry listens without comment. Is that admirable, to give £10,000 to charity when you’re sitting on millions? Diana told Laura that Roddy earned close to a million last year. How can this be? And yet this is today’s aristocracy, these are the patrons of the arts, this year’s production of Figaro made possible by the generosity of Citibank, Salomon Smith Barney, Prudential, EFG Private Bank. They sit round me on folding chairs drinking from polycarbonate glasses, the men whose wives and children don’t understand what they do, but we all understand what they get, because what they get makes what we get look stupid, and we feel stupid, and we are stupid, but here we are feeding on the leftovers. Mozart a prestige buy along with the Pommard, the wild salmon, the fillet of beef, the private schools, the flat in town, the house in the country.

  Face it, I’m going to have to talk to Laura’s father, which means I have to talk to Laura first. Five thousand would cover present needs. God knows John never grudges the money but it embarrasses him, he gets it over with as quickly as possible.

  Oh, you know. Money.

  ‘Did you make this, Mummy?’

  ‘Of course I did, darling. The redcurrants may be too tart. That’s why I made the crème Chantilly.’

  Fuck money. Don’t let it poison me. That’s not what this is all about. I’m not jealous of John, or Roddy, or Nick for that matter. Wouldn’t have their lives if you paid me. But I have my own life and I’ve taken payment for that.

  There’s a gap between who I want to be and who I am. Christina got it wrong. I’m not the real thing. Roddy is the real thing. He knows what he wants, and is willing to pay the price to get it. Even Aidan Massey is the real thing. He wants something enough to bully and cheat for it. He’s a fuck-bunny who has sex in toilets.

  Every woman makes me tremble.

  You too, Laura.

  And me? I do nothing. I’m on the wrong side of the glass.

  ‘So when will your programme be out, Henry?’

  ‘Some time in the autumn. October, most likely.’

  ‘October! It’s amazing how long it takes to make one television programme. So what will you work on after that?’

  ‘Nothing definite yet. Various possibilities.’

  ‘That must be so frustrating. Never knowing when the next job will come up. I know if it was me I’d be wetting myself.’

  ‘You get used to it.’

  Thanks to Daddy’s money. Or not. Without it this life I lead would evaporate. Maybe that would be better. A terraced house in Lewes, Carrie at the primary down the road, Jack at the comprehensive. It’s not as if we’d be badly off, just careful with the money, given that I can’t be sure how long I’ll ever be between contracts. We’re not exactly talking noble poverty, the writer who gives his life for his ar
t. The fix went in long ago. If I’ve sold myself to television, why not to my father-in-law too? Whose virtue would I be protecting if I dashed that cup from my lips?

  ‘Isn’t it wonderful, Mummy? Henry has a programme coming out at last.’

  ‘Actually I think I’ll take a walk round the gardens.’

  ‘Don’t you want any coffee?’

  ‘No. Wonderful picnic, Anthea. As ever.’

  ‘Wait, Henry. Others may want to stretch their legs too.’

  ‘I’ll be by the lake.’

  Get out. Tread between the half-eaten dishes of asparagus and poached trout, down the concrete stairs to the bar, out past the Elizabethan mansion onto the double border where the giant alliums brush my face. Down the steps onto the wide lawn that runs to the ha-ha beyond which sheep graze, parodying the rain-defiant picnickers on their rug-islands, most of whom have now reached the stage of after-dinner mints.

  Henry is in a dangerous state. He has become separated from the world he inhabits. It’s been coming for days, he has fended it off with pressure of work, but now in this oasis of absurdity it has him surrounded. The misery is closing in.

  He passes the champagne tent and joins the path round the lake. Here, under cover of trees, he can walk unobserved. At the far end of the lake, by the ornamental bench, he starts to cry.

  Give me back my loved one or in mercy let me die.

  What right has the music to be so true and the story so false? Fuck Mozart. Why this misery? That letter was written twenty years ago. It’s not as if Laura’s leaving me. I have all a reasonable man could desire. If I’m fucked up then so is everyone else here. I’m not going down alone. I’m taking you all with me.

  Misery morphs into anger. Break something – but what? Kick over the picnics, scatter the opera-goers, stampede them into the lake. Lob grenades onto the double borders, spray the lawns with machine-gun fire. Slaughter in the Urn Garden, blood on the croquet lawn, screams that scare the sheep and shock the green hills.