Trespass by Rose Tremain Page B

of fucking everything is a fucking tree-house?’
    ‘No, I’m not saying that. I’m just saying . . . I’m just saying . . . all I’m saying is I was very happy when I gave the tea party for Ma.’
    ‘What tea party?’
    ‘Just listen. You’re not listening to me.’
    ‘I am listening.’
    ‘I gave a tea party in my tree-house. I invited Ma. OK? I had Mrs Brigstock bake some stuff: malt loaf and brandy snaps. And I got everything ready. Table. Tablecloth. China etcetera. Chairs.’
    ‘Who’s Mrs Brigstock?’
    ‘Mrs Brigstock is Mrs Brigstock, Lloyd. The cook-housekeeper Ma had at the time.’
    ‘OK. OK. Keep your wig on! How was I meant to know? And how did you get a ruddy table and chairs up into a ruddy tree-house?’
    ‘I carried them. Up the ladder. I wanted everything to be spot-on for Ma.’
    Lloyd was unable to stop himself from breaking out into another spasm of laughter at this point in Anthony’s story and when this, in turn, was accompanied by another warm seepage into his pants, he stood up, and bent over, holding his napkin in such a way that Anthony wouldn’t see the area of wet on him, and tottered towards the door. ‘Back in a jiff,’ he said. ‘I want to hear the dénouement ! Truly, I do, Anthony. This is as gripping as Winnie-the-Pooh.’
    In the charming toile de jouy cloakroom, Lloyd relieved his aching bladder and attempted to dry his underpants with wads of apricot toilet paper.
    The snakewood and mahogany vitrine flung back at Lloyd his own unsteady reflection. This little wetting business had sobered him up slightly, but not so much that he wasn’t still enjoying the evening, enjoying both Anthony’s company and, at the same time, the realisation that his old friend was in some kind of mental turmoil. This turmoil, which – yes – Lloyd was actually enjoying, appeared to be connected not only to Anthony’s finances, but to something else, some existential something he didn’t seem able to express.
    In years gone by, when Lloyd had told people he was a friend of Anthony Verey’s, he’d often had to suffer – time after predictable time – their star-struck reactions and he’d always felt the unfairness of this in relation to himself. Because, year by year, he’d made more money than Anthony, probably far more money. But he’d made it quietly, away from the glare of notoriety. People ‘knew’ Anthony Verey because he was seen at glamorous exhibition previews and gallery openings, often among a coterie of flamboyant actors and artists, and because he had his name on the sign of a smart shop in Pimlico, which no amateur collector dared to enter. He understood a hell of a lot about furniture and pictures, Lloyd had to admit, but he, Lloyd, understood a lot about global markets. Why had art turned Anthony into ‘ the Anthony Verey’ when making money in the city had never turned him into ‘ the Lloyd Palmer’?
    Lloyd stood swaying there. The toile milkmaids and their lovers danced on, ageless, on the wall. The lavatory bowl choked up with apricot paper.
    Time was getting to everybody of his generation now, Lloyd mused. Even to Benita, whose beautiful upper arms had lost their firmness and sheen. But it was getting to Anthony Verey in a satisfyingly lethal way.
    Left alone in Lloyd’s dining room, Anthony soon became aware that his cigar had gone out. The paraphernalia of relighting it suggested itself as being beyond him at this particular moment, so he laid it down in the heavy glass ashtray and sat very still, doing nothing except stare at the room in all its opulence and grandeur.
    Indistinctly, he caught sight of his own face in the giltwood overmantel (‘Second quarter 19th century, flower and scroll carved frame with asymmetrically carved cartouche crest’) and discovered this face to be wan-looking, rather small , more crumpled than it usually appeared. He heard himself sigh. He didn’t want to look small and crumpled, when Lloyd was so huge and loud,