An Irresponsible Age. Lavinia Greenlaw

office,’ she said. ‘I should be recording cargoes not collating mailing lists.’

      ‘Same thing,’ Jacob countered softly.

      ‘No it isn’t, it’s more like –’

      ‘We really ought to be getting over the river,’ said Carlo, offering an apologetic nod to Jacob.

      ‘We have to go and support … someone we know, who … sings a bit,’ Juliet explained.

      ‘Sounds great.’ Jacob was nodding at everything she said. He kept nodding until Juliet found herself nodding back, which he appeared to take as an invitation.

      Carlo began to walk towards the main road and Juliet wanted to follow him but was unable to turn away from Jacob, who was still nodding, smiling, staring.

      She stepped backwards, ‘It was nice to meet you at last,’ and then tripped and stumbled, which meant that he could catch her elbow, steady and steer her.

      Carlo looked resigned when Juliet appeared with Jacob, who had only just let go of her arm. She could not think of anything to say because the situation seemed so momentous, but also hilarious. Jacob raised his arm to hail a taxi and then dropped it again because Carlo spotted a bus, which took them as far as Waterloo.

      Crossing the bridge, they passed a girl huddled against the wall in a sleeping bag, who reached out and tugged at Jacob’s coat.

      ‘Got any change,’ she sneered. The styrofoam cup in front of her contained a few coppers.

      Jacob muttered ‘Sorry,’ without looking at her and did not slow down. Carlo appeared not to notice whereas Juliet paused, dug into her pocket and passed the girl some change. Jacob looked back, hesitated, patted his own pockets and walked on. He reached the next beggar first, a man who cradled a can of beer inside his leather jacket and did not look up but belched as Jacob dropped several coins in front of him without being asked. Juliet looked cross, even more so when the young man asked her if she had any change.

      ‘I only give to women,’ she announced and strode past.

      Going down the steps on the north side, they passed another beggar who was buried in his sleeping bag with one hand protruding, keeping a grip on his cup. Carlo threw something in, saying primly, ‘And I only give to sleeping bags!’

      Juliet guffawed and took Carlo’s arm, while Jacob hung back as if repelled by the force of her laughter, but he continued to follow the brother and sister through the streets and into Soho, where a weedy neon sign above some basement steps pointed the way down to The Glory Hole.

      

      The more he drank, the more Carlo swelled out of his chair. He leaned comfortably against his sister. ‘If he wants to keep buying the drinks, let him. Just be a good girl and give him a nice time later on.’

      ‘He’s married.’

      ‘He doesn’t look married. He doesn’t even look grown up.’

      Jacob was making his way towards them, holding three plastic glasses of colourless lager. A withered slice of lime clung to the rim of each.

      Carlo whispered, ‘Do you think he keeps that hat on in bed?’

      Juliet smacked his arm. ‘It’s only a hat.’

      ‘Oh no it’s not,’ he said, nodding at Jacob who was trying to squeeze the drinks onto the full table, ‘it’s corduroy.’

      ‘So,’ said Jacob, ‘what’s this band called?’

      ‘The Natural Fringe,’ Carlo replied.

      ‘Interesting, it suggests –’

      ‘They’re named after a haircut.’

      Jacob appeared about to laugh.

      Juliet explained: ‘Our friend, the singer – her mother used to cut her hair when she was a child and she had a thing against neatness. You should see the photos. The poor girl looked like a juvenile psychiatric patient.’

      ‘She was one, wasn’t she, after she walked on water?’ pondered Carlo.

      Jacob turned away, not listening.

      The DJ began to play some bebop. Carlo stood and hauled Juliet up after him. She shook her head and turned back to Jacob, who was tapping his foot and clicking his fingers in a limp, exaggeratedly offbeat manner. What could she say to him? She followed Carlo.

      The Glory Hole had been a jazz club, a discotheque and a punk venue, and in these indecisive times was something of each. Carlo pushed his way onto the kidney-shaped dancefloor. He grabbed his sister, reeled her in and then set off in a tight circle. Used to this, Juliet gave in and kept her balance as best she could, determined not to let Jacob’s presence embarrass her; only it did, terribly.

      The lights went down and a saxophonist began to play a few notes, then paused and played a few more. He played rushing trills and deep swoops, as if sticking to the edges of whatever piece of music he might have been playing. Eventually, a pianist joined him and their instruments fell into a dialogue in which nothing accumulated or added up. This kind of music annoyed Jacob as things do when they reflect your own nature.

      A woman made her way out from behind a curtain to stand between them. She was small and pale, and wore a long black dress that fell from her white collarbone to her white ankles. On her feet were a pair of apricot satin high-heeled sandals, which looked too big. Her mouth was red and her wide weak eyes were outlined in black. Her dark hair was pinned back in a knot. She started to sing: The cold begins to tell, outside a long long while … and the piano and saxophone fell into place behind her.

      Jacob was more interested in the band once the girl had joined them, even though she pushed the words out of shape as much as the musicians did the tune. She looked frail and disturbing, and her voice was so clear that her singing seemed to move meaning out of the way, leaving the air full of unanchored feeling. What song was it anyway? People stopped trying to work it out. They liked her voice; the details didn’t matter.

      The band finished, the audience began to clap, and the woman stepped forward and froze. She raised a hand as if about to reach out, only her palm flattened and her gesture became a sign, ‘Stop’. Then she was gone. There were one or two whoops and whistles, and a call for an encore, but the applause quickly faded. At this moment, Carlo and Juliet got to their feet and began to chant ‘Mary George! Mary George!’ and the rest of the crowd, encouraged or amused, joined in: ‘Mary George! Mary George!’

      

      A taxi pulled up in the sidestreet next to the Shipping Office and a woman in a fluffy blue coat and noisy heels got out. She marched round to the back of the gallery and banged on Jacob’s door. She rattled the handle and gave the door a kick, but Jacob was not there. He was at The Glory Hole, standing behind Juliet, his mouth inches from the back of her neck and his finger tracing, without touching, the shape of her large flat ears and the pattern on her nape where her cropped hair revealed its curl.

      Barbara Dart had gone to the Shipping Office in the middle of the night to take Jacob his post. Every envelope had been opened and some had been scribbled on. Barbara had no doubt about her right and need, a practical one, to know what was going on.

      As she expected, the padlock on his door was not quite in place. When she first met him, he had carried a knapsack full of books, cigarettes, fruit and beer, overloaded and loosely buckled, and whatever escaped had been left where it fell. She laid the post on his bed and began to flick through his papers: half an essay on Bob Dylan and the flâneur, the beginnings of a letter to his mother, an old-fashioned porn magazine, a list of what looked like payments and debts, a gift catalogue and other circulars to which Jacob paid so little attention that he did not even throw them out. Barbara opened every cupboard, box and drawer in Jacob’s room, not looking for anything in particular and finding nothing she wanted.

      The night Barbara realised that Jacob was not coming back, at least not for now, she had poured the contents of his study into binbags and left them here on his doorstep. Now they were