Making Things Better by Anita Brookner Read Free Book Online

Despite his mother’s efforts Josie still looked slightly unkempt, but Julius found this oddly attractive, and in any event without her clothes he thought her magnificent. She played her part; he would always be grateful to her for that. And she seemed pleased with her new life, pleased to have left the flat she shared with others in the same boat, pleased with the favours granted her, the love. Even the odd invasion of their privacy seemed acceptable; they had their own quarters at the other end of the flat, were not too much disturbed by the proximity of the Herz parents. Their marriage seemed the ideal solution for everyone.
    It was the move to Edgware Road that settled their fate. Here again Josie was invaluable. She commandeered the woman who cleaned the shop and got her to put the flat to rights. Without any authorization she removed several pieces of furniture from Hilltop Road and installed them in their new cramped quarters. She did her best to rally them, to keep up their spirits, though without much success. Their bedrooms were no longer separated by a substantial corridor. His mother’s former good humour faded, his father absented himself as much as he could, though he did not tell them what he did with his free time. Bijou Frank explained that she would no longer be able to visit so frequently, as the journey was now inconvenient. This distressed Mrs Herz, perhaps more than it distressed Bijou Frank, as his mother, always hypersensitive, observed. Their health, which had been so gratifying, began to suffer; again Josie complained of the lack of fresh air. Then his mother caught a cold and bronchitis developed, and it seemed as if Josie had become a nurse all over again. Their nights were more disturbed, by noises from the street, from the other bedroom. Julius was embarrassed by his parents’ night sounds, by their occasional arguments, and worse, by his mother’s appeals for help, for a remedy, for consolation. Josie would get up with a sigh, her good humour in abeyance. They would settle down again, but not for long. ‘Josie! Josie!’ would come the cry, the endless solicitation. It was love his mother wanted, and did not notice that that love was fast fading.
    And then it was gone. When Josie announced that she was leaving Julius could hardly blame her. He was tired of fielding his mother’s renewed complaints, saw that various incompatibilities were beginning to surface. He too wanted some peace, saw no alternative to reinstating the family as it had been before its brief renaissance. He would take care of them, since he had, as always, to make things better. And his father seemed ill, failing. And his mother had not quite recovered, would need his full attention. He almost wished Josie out of the house, in order to spare them all. ‘I love you,’ he said to her, as he watched her packing her cases. ‘Yes, well,’ she replied. ‘In other circumstances, perhaps.’ He kissed her goodbye: it was the most solemn moment of his life, more solemn than his marriage. She too was moved. It was that moment of genuine emotion that confirmed for him that he had been a married man and was one no longer.

4
    â€˜Salmon fishcakes! My favourite!’
    He smiled. He had ascertained that they would be on the menu when he had made the booking. After this he had felt a diminution of interest, as if, the preparations for the occasion once made, nothing more needed to be done. He would have been happy, indeed happier, to let the lunch go ahead without him. But that was the way of it these days: all the pleasure was in the anticipation, very little in the enactment. He thought that all old people must feel this, this slight sinking of the heart when the time came for social interchange, when the need to be ‘positive’ (Josie’s favourite word) imposed its iron rule on a nature more given to reminiscence than to normal human curiosity.
    An additional reason for his