Chapter 40: Hugh - The Golden Hours

It had been Jemima who insisted they rent the little mansion flat near the hospital, and with the money from the house on Ladbroke Grove they could afford it. Hugh had never lived in a rented place before, nor one with a lift. ‘I feel very modern!’ he said to her, pulling the clanking rattly door across, having waited for a moment in case it was somebody else’s job to do that. Jemima had also insisted on coming to every appointment with him, but sometimes tests had to be done in private, and took a while, so then he was able to persuade her to take a walk, or a comforting mooch about the shops, rather than waste these golden summer days sitting in a corridor or a waiting room. Today, Jemima had said she would come to meet him, but she didn’t seem to be here. He sat in reception, reading The Times, with his hospital bag at his feet. Pyjamas and pills, basically, in case they’d wanted to keep him in. They’d said he couldn’t leave on his own, so he didn’t. But really, he could just go out onto the Fulham Road and hail a cab. She’d be at home, probably. Or were she and Laura in Norfolk with Poll? He couldn’t remember. No, she’d said she was coming back. Anyway, she was late.

Well, never mind. There was nobody around. He’d just go home. It was a lovely warm evening. Twenty minutes in the cab, and Jemima would be there with supper for him.

* * *

The front door at Ladbroke Grove was open, which was as well because he didn’t seem to have any cash for the driver. Jemima would have some. But loud bouncy music was spilling out: a shrill little-girl voice calling and yelling about her boy lollipop. He’d heard the song before: young Buttercup had been singing it at Christmas. He was confused. Was this his house? Yes, of course. Ladbroke Grove was crowded, though. Lots of traffic, lots of people. Not the usual people. He remembered the summer when all the young men were fighting, when he and Jemima couldn’t go out.

‘I’ll go and get my wife,’ he said to the driver. ‘I’m most awfully sorry.’

Three grown girls were sitting on the top of the steps by the open door, long bare legs, drinking, smoking, laughing.

‘Excuse me,’ he said.

‘Hello, Grandad!’ one said. ‘Are you here for the party?’ and they cackled, leaning back, stretching out their legs and their necks. He was embarrassed for them.

‘This is my house,’ he said. Would they stand up? They did not. But they shuffled their bottoms sideways, and he leaned his hand on one of the white columns as he stepped up and into the hall.

‘Jemima?’ he called, but the music was loud and the hall seemed to be completely full of youngsters: jeans, hair, sandals, cigarette smoke, fragrant smells and empty bottles. He peered into the drawing room: people on the sofa; voices high, men barking, girls braying. He flinched from the volume. ‘Men and girls,’ he whispered. Who on earth are they? Why are they all here?

A very tall, very blonde girl, hair like candy floss, with white lipstick for some reason, approached him through the crowd. ‘Hallooo,’ she said, more inquisitive than welcoming. She had a proprietorial air and an accent he didn’t like. Slightly honking. ‘Are you looost?’

‘This is my house,’ Hugh said. ‘Who the hell are you? Where is Jemima?’

‘Chemima?’ said the blonde. Her expression was impertinent. Amused, almost.

‘Who is holding this party?’ he barked. This was too much.

‘Poppa, you are too old to gate crash!’ she said, putting an emphasis on ‘crash’ which had no business being there. He rather urgently needed to pee, too. But there was no way through the crowd, and this Valkyrie was blocking him. ‘You chould go away now, go oon,’ she was saying. And then he saw someone he knew: coming down the stairs in a wafty little dress, moony and bedraggled, a fat rough cigarette in one hand, leaning on a naked white male shoulder, the man’s red curls hanging down across both their faces as he bent down to kiss her. Practically eat her.

‘Laura!’ Hugh shouted, military.

The kiss broke, her face blanked. She leapt from the embrace and pushed her way to him.

‘Daddy, what are you doing here? Daddy! You look awful.’

Somebody was imitating her: ‘Deddy! Deddy!’ they shouted, in mockery. The music was now complaining loudly, repetitively, thumpingly, about how they couldn’t get no satisfaction.

Hugh couldn’t make sense of it. His chest was tight. Laura! Who is that young man? And what the hell is going on?

‘Get these bloody people out of the way,’ he said, and pushed for the downstairs lavatory, under the staircase. The relief of shutting the door on that chaos! He hooked the lock, and pissed sitting down. He sat for longer than he would normally need to. Then sighed deeply, and stood. He washed his hands, the familiar brush on the wall, glanced in the mirror – still there, old boy! – and reached for the door handle. As he turned, a great creak, a sudden surge of wrongness crossed his torso, inside him, and he heard the crash as he twisted and slumped against the door.

Hugh was vaguely aware that it was Neville who kicked the door in, looked down at him, and said, ‘Oh no, oh fuck.’ But he didn’t know that Laura, almost hysterical, called the ambulance, or that the red-haired half-naked man was the son of a pub landlord, and knew how to make people leave. ‘Time, gentlemen, please,’ he was saying, ‘Old Bill incoming,’ whispering in their ears, encouraging them to take their drugs with them, making them go round through the sitting room rather than try to step over the drama in the front hall. ‘Absolute bloody circus,’ he said, turning the music off. Laura was in tears on the floor, holding her father’s hand. The red-haired boy handed her a cup of tea, and kissed the top of her head before disappearing out the back, followed by a little dog.

Hugh was thinking about the communal gardens, remembering how he used to slip through the papery bushes of mock orange, the privet, the iron fence to climb over, the sweet scent rising.