The View From The Bus

We went across for Sunday lunch today. They – my mother, my grandmother and my partner, Bet – talked about my father and how well his funeral had gone. As they were talking – how many were there, the number of eulogies, the kindness of the weather – I wondered if these things ever went badly. I didn't ask the question, of course. It would have seemed impertinent in the circumstances. But I could imagine how my father's send-off might have gone awry.

We were on the west side of Grover, in the Old Powers district, where the money lives. But from Monday to Friday my father, the now late William Bussey, stayed in the city of Bellenberg, about 170 miles to the north. He was a defence lawyer and that was where he had chambers. And he was not just any defence lawyer; he was one of the best and worked on some of the biggest cases in the country. His obituary in The National said he had one of the greatest forensic minds of this or any previous generation. He could, according to The Bellenberger, convince a jury that the pope was an atheist. He was so much in demand that there were times, like during the Pastor Billy James trial, when we saw more of him in the newspapers and on television than we did at home.

Family history has it that he and my mother met just as he was starting out in the legal profession and she was at the Bellenberg Medical School. They married and bought the apartment in Grover – the one in which we were having lunch – Grover being my mother’s home town. In their first four married years, they had three children; first me, then my sisters who are twins. My mother never returned to medicine. By that time, my father was providing enough and more.

It seems that as he got more work, it became difficult for him to keep pace with his briefs, travelling such a distance every day. So, he bought himself a small apartment

in Bellenberg, not far from his chambers and the main court. The routine was this: at six on a Monday morning, a cab would take him to the station in time for the sixtwenty straight through. He would ring at five-thirty each evening and the twins, Moya and Francine, would fight for who got to speak to him first and longest. Usually, he would return to us in Grover at about eight on the Friday when my mother would have his favourite meal waiting – rib-eye steak, French fries and a half bottle of red from his cellar. My sisters would sit with him in the kitchen while he ate, firing questions at him, and answering his questions of them. Growing up, I never knew any other routine; he was mainly a weekend father, but he did his best the times we did spend with him.

For instance, when I started to get interested in sports – which he had no care for – he would accompany me to the Sunday games at the Grover Stadium. And although he didn’t really know what the hell was going on, in there among 60,000 crazy people, he would pretend to be enthusiastic just so we would both feel part of the same thing. And when the game finished, we would stroll back through the English Park and stop at Solomon’s Café for a beer and a lemonade and a hot-dog each. I loved it, just the two of us, because at home my sisters commanded far more of his time. And I think he liked it also; boys’ time, he would call it, away from the attentions of the women.

We usually saw more of him in summer. Then, we spent time with his parents on their farm in Brown Valley, about ninety miles west of Grover, and he would come across for a few days whenever he could get away. He was their only child and they kind of held him in awe, the kid who had gone away to university and was now referred to in the news. They called him Willie which, every time we heard it, my sisters and I thought was hilarious. To everyone else he was William but to them, and to the neighbours who would call in when they knew he was there, it was Willie. And they, the parents and the son, looked and sounded as if they came from different worlds. He had lost his country accent – presuming that he once had one – and even though it was only a two-hour drive at most, his parents had only been to Grover once, and that was for my parent’s wedding.

And the way his mother fussed over him also killed us. She always made a shepherd's pie on the first night he was there because, although I cannot recall it ever being made back home, that was his favourite meal as a kid. She would sit by him to make sure he finished it too. ‘Eat it all up, Willie,’ she would say. ‘You need to keep your strength up.’

‘Don't fuss over the boy,’ his father would say.

For a while after each visit my mother would fuss exaggeratedly over him and call him Willie, tell him to eat all of his food up.

His father was also William, and everybody called him William. He was a large and friendly man who read bedtime stories to my sisters. But there was an awkwardness about him. He seemed to be all too aware of the distance his son had travelled from his upbringing, and there was no way of covering the territory that now lay between them. His mother's way was to draw him back to his childhood again, to pretend that things were as they always had been, that her boy had stayed with them on the farm.

After his father died, which was when I was about sixteen, and when it became obvious that she could not run the farm alone, they persuaded my grandmother to move in with us. At first, she refused. In her sixty-two years she had barely been beyond Brown Valley, but eventually she faced reality, sold the farm, and came to the city. Our apartment was plenty big enough to accommodate her without much inconvenience to anybody. And even though they came from different worlds, she and my mother, bound by a love of my father, got along tolerably well. And once she started getting the hang of the city, she seemed to make a decent life for herself; at least I never heard any complaint from her.

Later, Bet and I moved into a place in the north of the city. By then, I was working as a data analyst for the Grover Institute and we were studying the effects of low incomes upon the crime rate. You might think that those effects would be pretty obvious to anybody who gave a thought to these things, but the people who commissioned the research – that is, The North Bellenberg People’s Collective wanted a clear demonstration to back up their case for a minimum wage. So, every few weeks I went up there for a meeting with the Bellenberg people.

Although he had taken me to his apartment once or twice when I was younger, it never occurred to me to call in on my father. Although I was never in doubt as to his affection and concern for me, I also had the feeling that a spontaneous visit would not be greatly appreciated.

On this occasion, I was upstairs on the 202 from the station to the campus. It was a pleasure which remained from childhood, the front upstairs bus-seat with the 180degree view. Because from when my mother thought I was old enough and responsible enough – which would have been when I was around the nine or ten mark – I would go down to the main station and buy day-passes for the Grover network; and at the soonest opportunity, wherever I chose to go that day, I would

get the front upstairs seat. From there I could look out and down on all parts of the city, and the outer suburbs – many of which I had never heard of - and some of the farming country beyond. Some of the journeys from central Grover took three and four hours and I took sandwiches with me, eating my lunch as I was driven slowly through the city. Apart from school, it was the first look at life I had which was not dictated by my family in one way or another. So even as an adult, that 202 ride from the station to the campus gave me that same feeling, just me looking out at the world and making of it what I would.

This time there had been an accident and the bus was diverted. We turned off the usual route and into a wide curving street which, like the streets of Old Powers, spoke of money; porticoed entrances, panelled doors, big windows and balconies. It was a slow crawl, the street was not used to heavy traffic; horns sounded, voices were raised, and pedestrians stared.

When the bus came to a standstill, I looked up from my newspaper and gazed idly into one of the apartments; it was difficult not to, those windows invited voyeurism. It looked like an expensively furnished place and I noticed that one of the pictures on the wall was an Andrew Wyeth print, the same as we had in our apartment. There were two kids in there, a boy and a girl, and they must have been around seven or eight. The girl was showing something, maybe a drawing, to a seated man who was also reading a newspaper. Straightaway he reminded me of my father, same striped trousers, same dangling braces, same disordered hair.

Then, a woman, looking not dissimilar to my mother, walked into my line of vision and gave him a cup. When he turned to take it, there seemed to be no doubt. The man was my father. He was William Bussey. But – and this was a huge but - that wasn't his apartment; his apartment was a smaller affair close to his chambers on the other side of town. And even had I allowed the idea that it might be his apartment, who was the woman? Who were the children?

The bus moved on. I didn’t look into any of the other apartments.

‘You ok, Matt?’ one of my colleagues asked during our morning meeting. ‘You’re miles away.’

‘Yeah, yeah sure,’ I said. ‘Sorry, where were we?’

I was miles away. About five miles away to be precise, looking into that apartment. I tried to persuade myself I was mistaken. I told myself that my father must have a brother I hadn't heard of; or that I might need to get my eyes tested; or my head.

At three, I made an excuse and left. I found the street again, and the apartment, opposite which stood the Rott-Siskin Library. I went into the library, took down a book at random and found a table from which I could look out at number twelve Raglan Crescent. At five-thirty, a cab drew up and a man got out. He paid the fare, and let himself into the building. There was no doubt. It was him. The man was my father.

I replaced the book – which for some reason I recall being The Birds of the Custer Hills – and caught the train back to Grover. I didn't say anything to Bet. It sounded too crazy; she would think I had lost my mind. I didn’t say anything to anybody for the same reason.

The following Sunday we went across to Old Powers for lunch as usual. My mother was a good cook and my father liked to play the host. There would always be at least two bottles from his cellar. Invited by Bet – and despite my asking her not to encourage him - he liked to tell tales of his famous cases, often recounting word-forword passages from his closing speeches.

It was our habit after lunch for my father and I to do a couple of circuits round the big lake in the English Park while the women cleared away. We rarely had much to say, but for me at least it was a connection to my time with him as a kid, walking back from a Grover game, or taking a rowing-boat out. This time, though, there was something to say. I just didn't know how to say it.

He must have guessed there was something on my mind.

‘What is it, son?’ he said. ‘You look serious. You and Bet ok?’

‘Yeah, we're fine, I said. ‘It's just...’

‘Just?’

‘It's just that I happened to be in Bellenberg last week.’

‘And?’

‘And I happened to find myself on Raglan Crescent.’

‘I see.’

He looked away from me, as if something had caught his attention over on the other side of the lake. And we remained silent for a good while. I had hoped that he might lie; tell me a story which, though improbable, we could both live with.

‘We find ourselves in a delicate position, son,’ he said. ‘A position which may require your assistance. Your acquiescence at the least, if the people we love are to remain unharmed.’

We did three circuits, during which he told me.

She - the woman in the apartment - was called Mirrin Lincoln. They had met at law school. At the end of their studies they did not maintain contact but met again some years later when she happened to be instructing him during a six-week murder trial.

‘I was getting lonely up there,’ he said. ‘And one thing led to another.’

We fell to silence, and thinking that might be the end of the conversation I prompted him.

‘And?’

‘And by that time, I was married to your mother, whom I love as dearly now as ever, and we had three young children.’

‘Couldn't you have just ended it?’ I said. ‘Given your circumstances.’

‘I was about to,’ he said. ‘Then we discovered that Mirrin was pregnant. So, I did what I thought was the right thing and set her up in the apartment in Raglan Crescent. Then the present routine developed and we had another child.’

We became silent again. It was a bright afternoon and the park was busy. He was in the middle of the Bailey Three trial which was all over the news, and some of the people we passed stared at him, thinking that they recognised him.

‘Well, Richard,’ he said. ‘Now you know. My secret is a secret no more.’

Richard? He rarely, if ever, called me Richard. I was his son and that was how he referred to me – son. Richard suggested a change in status, suggested a person separated from my relationship to him, a person who might be man enough to bear the weight of what he was telling me.

‘I cannot apologise enough,’ he said. ‘Your mother knows nothing.’

‘And the other woman?’ I couldn't bring myself to say her name.

‘Mirrin has always been fully apprised of the situation. She knew from the start that I had my family in Grover, whom I loved and could not abandon.’

‘Lucky us.’

‘Richard,’ he said, with a tone of mild rebuke.

‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘It’s just...’

‘I know.’ He gripped my forearm. ‘An appalling burden for you. I’m sorry.’

After a further silence, he said, ‘Did I ever tell you about the Scobie case?’

Had he waited for an answer, the answer would have been no.

‘James Scobie was a bigamist, two families in two different and distant cities, neither of whom had knowledge of the other until, when he could not live with the strain of his deceit any longer, he told them and turned himself in. He was wealthy, as he would have to be to maintain the several children scattered thus, and visiting both families as if they were exclusively his. He was an inarticulate, ill-educated, and objectionable little man. And not detecting any legal source, I was certain that his wealth was accrued nefariously. But my curiosity in that regard was blunted by the fact that he paid his considerable bills promptly, thus contributing to the education of my own children.’

‘Of which it now seems there are five,’ I said.

‘Indeed. Anyway, following his instructions, I argued that his deceit was motivated not by malice, and certainly not by hopes of enrichment or self-advancement, but by love with an admixture of human weakness and folly. Shall we?’ he said. We were approaching Solomon’s Café. I had not been in there for many years and neither, I’m fairly sure, had he.

‘Why not,’ I said.

We sat at one of the sunlit tables and he ordered a cold beer for both of us. It was Burl Solomon himself who served us and they remembered each other and chatted amiably for a while.

‘So?’ I asked, when Mr Solomon left us. ‘Scobie?’

‘Ah, Mr Scobie. I have defended many sinners. In fact, I have argued for the acquittal of many sinners of whose guilt I was fairly certain. But there is difference between the fool and the sinner. The fool is not wilful, he has not the desire to harm, only the misguided desire to please. That, and maybe for one of the few times in his wretched life, was Mr Scobie's desire, and it has been my desire also. His is the only case I recall in which I argued from the heart rather than the head. The argument of a fool.’ My father was not a man to invite pity, but at that moment I felt sorry for him.

‘How have you borne this for so long?’ I asked.

‘Look,’ he said, and pointed. Five swans were gliding down onto the lake. ‘Isn't that a magnificent sight.’

We were mainly silent as we walked back through the Sunday streets.

‘What happened to Mr Scobie?’ I asked, as we approached the apartment.

‘Four years.’

We found ourselves laughing quietly.

‘What have you two been up to?’ my mother asked. ‘It’s nearly five.’

‘So it is,’ he said. ‘Time for a whisky, I think. Son?’

‘Why not?’ I said.

The Sunday lunches were strange affairs after that, and at first I often made an excuse not to go over. When we did go, he never showed any sign of discomfort. Apart from one occasion. About a year after his revelation, we had eaten lunch and were sitting out in the garden. ‘You look tired, Willie,’ his mother said. Not for the first time she asked why he could not work in Grover. ‘It must be killing you,’ she said. ‘You should be with your wife at the end of the working day. Not all those miles away with no one to feed you.’

He gave me the briefest glance, the only time my complicity in his arrangements was acknowledged. ‘We all have our cross to bear, mother,’ was all he said, and the matter was not pursued.

And eventually we continued our post-lunch circuits of the lake. And I would allude to his situation by asking how things were in Bellenberg, to which he would respond by saying, things are quite well in Bellenberg thank you for asking, or words similar. And I had the feeling that he really did mean it when he said thank you for asking.

He was fifty-seven when he died. He had been on his feet for over two hours in the Bellenberg Central Court, defending a priest charged with duping rich widows out of their stash. In mid-sentence, he sat back in his chair. They cleared the court, but he was gone.

Although it took place near the old farm in Brown Valley, the mourners overflowed into the small car-park and into an adjoining field. At his burial, the woman and the two children, whom I hadn't noticed at the service, were seated on a bench about fifty yards from the crowd around his grave. They were seated, I was pretty sure, in order to minimise the attention they might have drawn to themselves had they stood like everyone else. And I guessed too that, had they seen them, those accompanying my father to his final place would suppose Mirrin and her children, whose names I still do not know, to be early for a party not yet arrived.

Only they and I knew that we were saying the same farewells.