Past Imperfect

My mother would not have approved, but my mother was dead and so, in theory, out of the equation, although I am not convinced we are ever beyond the influence of our parents’ disapproval, be they dead or alive. Of course, there was a chance she might have been mellowed by the afterlife, but I rather doubt it. Maybe I should have listened to her posthumous promptings, since I can’t pretend that Bridget and I had much in common. That said, she was clever and good-looking, which was more than I deserved, and I was lonely, I suppose, and tired of people ringing to see if I wanted to come over for Sunday lunch. Anyway, whatever the reason, we had found each other and, while we did not technically live together, since she kept on her own flat, we’d jogged along for a couple of years quite peaceably. It wasn’t exactly love, but it was something.

What amused me with reference to Damian’s letter was Bridget’s proprietorial tone when referring to a past of which, almost by definition, she could know little or nothing. The phrase ‘I’ve never heard you talk about him,’ can only mean that, were this fellow significant, you would have talked about him. Or, worse, you should have talked about him. This is all part of the popular fantasy that when you are involved with someone it is your right to know all about them, down to the last detail, which of course can never be. ‘We have no secrets,’ say cheerful, young faces in films, when, as we all know, our whole lives are filled with secrets, frequently kept from ourselves. Clearly, in this instance Bridget was troubled that if Damian were important to me and yet I had never mentioned him, how much else of significance had been kept concealed? In my defence I can only say that her past, too, like mine, like everyone’s in fact, was a locked box. Occasionally we allow people a peep, but generally only at the top level. The darker streams of our memories we negotiate alone.

‘He was a friend of mine at Cambridge,’ I said. ‘We met in my second year, around the time when I was doing the Season at the end of the Sixties. I introduced him to some of the girls. They took him up, and we ran about together in London for a while.’

‘Being debs’ delights.’ She spoke the phrase with a mixture of comedy and derision.

‘I am glad my early life never fails to bring a smile to your lips.’

‘So what happened?’

‘Nothing happened. We drifted apart after we left, but there’s no story. We just went in different directions.’ In saying this I was, of course, lying.

She looked at me, hearing a little more than I had intended. ‘If you do go, I assume you’ll want to go alone.’

‘Yes. I’ll go alone.’ I offered no further explanation but, to be fair to her, she didn’t ask for one.

I used to think that Damian Baxter was my invention, although such a notion only demonstrates my own inexperience. As anyone knows, the most brilliant magician in the world ca

‘Any time on any day will be convenient,’ the letter said. ‘I do not go out now or entertain, so I am completely at your disposal. You will find me quite near Guildford. If you drive, it may take ninety minutes but the train is quicker. Let me know and I will either arrange directions or someone can meet you, whichever you prefer.’ In the end, after my fake prevarication, I wrote back suggesting di

I looked about vaguely for some Eastern European holding a card with my name mis-spelled in felt tip pen but instead of this, I found myself approached by a uniformed chauffeur – or rather someone who looked like an actor playing a chauffeur in an episode of Hercule Poirot – who replaced his peaked cap after introducing himself in low and humble tones, and led the way outside to a new Bentley, parked illegally in the space reserved for the disabled. I say ‘illegally,’ even though there was a badge clearly displayed in the window, because I assume these are not distributed so that friends may be met off trains without their getting wet or having to walk too far with their luggage. But then again, everyone deserves the odd perk.

I did know that Damian had done well, though how or why I knew I ca

I do have some experience of it. As a moderately successful writer, one rubs up against what Na

The house he had chosen as a setting for his splendour was not a fallen nobleman’s palace but rather one of those self-consciously moral, Arts and Crafts, rambling warrens that seem to belong in a Disney cartoon and are no more convincing as a symbol of Olde England than they were when Lutyens built them at the turn of the last century. Surrounding it were gardens, terraced, clipped and criss-crossed with trim and tended paths, but seemingly no land beyond that. Damian had not apparently decided to adopt the ancient model of imitation gentry. This was not a manor house, nestling in the warm embrace of farming acres. This was simply the home of a Great Success.