endured it, but she had. And he had endured it too, thanks to her, and her alone. How could it be, he’d wondered, that he, the husband, was supposed to protect her, and there she was, sacrificing everything completely selflessly so that he, this worthless actor, of all things, could pull through?
Then he could hear her voice again, even clearer this time:
Peter, you are completely unaware of your own value. I expect that’s why I love you, and so do so many of your friends and colleagues. Can you not see? You must think more of yourself, darling, as we do. You do not need the backbiting and jealousy of the court of King Olivier. Your heart is not suited to it, and I know your enormous talent will out… You just need the right opportunity to come along, and it will… You must believe that too…
Once again he remembered her love and sweetness and once again he felt devastated. He teetered to the living room and collapsed in a chair.
Through the doorway to the hall he could see the pile of unread scripts and it reminded him of the single day of shooting at Elstree, just over a month earlier, on Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb , the eleventh of January, the day he’d had the phone call to tell him Helen had been rushed to Kent and Canterbury Hospital. His scenes had been hurriedly rescheduled but Helen had died of emphysema at home on the Thursday. There was no question of him returning to the production. The already-filmed scenes with Valerie Leon were scrapped and the role written for him, that of the Egyptologist Professor Fuchs, given to Andrew Keir. Quatermass replacing Van Helsing. The curse of an ancient civilisation: it seemed like ancient history now.
Yet clear as a bell was his memory of wandering out alone, all, all alone onto the deserted beach just after Helen had breathed her last from those accursed lungs of hers, the seagulls reeling and swooping and cackling, the gale force wind hard in his face, the waves that crashed on the shingle sounding to him like a ghastly knell, the thoughtless pulse of the planet. And he’d sung Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star . He thought he’d gone a little mad that night.
Up above the world so high
Like a diamond in the sky…
He’d then found himself, unaware of the passage of intervening time, back at 3 Seaway Cottages, running up and down the stairs repetitively, endlessly, far beyond the point of exhaustion. To an impartial observer this might have given the appearance of madness too, but was anything but. In those moments he’d known exactly what he was doing. He’d ran up, ran down, ran up again and so on in the vain hope of inducing a heart attack so that he might be reunited with her. He may have cursed God too, a little, that night under the stars. God didn’t approve of taking one’s own life, but damn God. He’d wanted to be with Helen and that was all he cared about. Then, racing up and down, up and down, he stopped dead as he realised the cruelty of it all. That, if he did commit suicide, he might find himself in purgatory, or in limbo, and separated from Helen forever. The crushing realisation had hit him that that Hell would be even more unbearable than this, and he crumbled finally, spent.
Helpless, he’d found himself sitting on the stairs gasping for air, wheezing as she had wheezed, his lungs filling like bellows as he wept.
When the blazing sun is gone,
When there’s nothing he shines upon,
Then you show your little light,
Twinkle, twinkle, through the night…
But God, as they say, moves in mysterious ways. And soon afterwards he had found the letter. Heard her voice as he’d read it:
“My Dear Beloved. My life has been the happiest one imaginable… Remember we will meet again when the time is right. Of that I have no doubt whatsoever. But promise me you will not pine… or, most of all, do not be hasty to leave this world…”
He had shivered then at the terrible thought that he might have, stupidly, done something so contrary
Then he could hear her voice again, even clearer this time:
Peter, you are completely unaware of your own value. I expect that’s why I love you, and so do so many of your friends and colleagues. Can you not see? You must think more of yourself, darling, as we do. You do not need the backbiting and jealousy of the court of King Olivier. Your heart is not suited to it, and I know your enormous talent will out… You just need the right opportunity to come along, and it will… You must believe that too…
Once again he remembered her love and sweetness and once again he felt devastated. He teetered to the living room and collapsed in a chair.
Through the doorway to the hall he could see the pile of unread scripts and it reminded him of the single day of shooting at Elstree, just over a month earlier, on Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb , the eleventh of January, the day he’d had the phone call to tell him Helen had been rushed to Kent and Canterbury Hospital. His scenes had been hurriedly rescheduled but Helen had died of emphysema at home on the Thursday. There was no question of him returning to the production. The already-filmed scenes with Valerie Leon were scrapped and the role written for him, that of the Egyptologist Professor Fuchs, given to Andrew Keir. Quatermass replacing Van Helsing. The curse of an ancient civilisation: it seemed like ancient history now.
Yet clear as a bell was his memory of wandering out alone, all, all alone onto the deserted beach just after Helen had breathed her last from those accursed lungs of hers, the seagulls reeling and swooping and cackling, the gale force wind hard in his face, the waves that crashed on the shingle sounding to him like a ghastly knell, the thoughtless pulse of the planet. And he’d sung Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star . He thought he’d gone a little mad that night.
Up above the world so high
Like a diamond in the sky…
He’d then found himself, unaware of the passage of intervening time, back at 3 Seaway Cottages, running up and down the stairs repetitively, endlessly, far beyond the point of exhaustion. To an impartial observer this might have given the appearance of madness too, but was anything but. In those moments he’d known exactly what he was doing. He’d ran up, ran down, ran up again and so on in the vain hope of inducing a heart attack so that he might be reunited with her. He may have cursed God too, a little, that night under the stars. God didn’t approve of taking one’s own life, but damn God. He’d wanted to be with Helen and that was all he cared about. Then, racing up and down, up and down, he stopped dead as he realised the cruelty of it all. That, if he did commit suicide, he might find himself in purgatory, or in limbo, and separated from Helen forever. The crushing realisation had hit him that that Hell would be even more unbearable than this, and he crumbled finally, spent.
Helpless, he’d found himself sitting on the stairs gasping for air, wheezing as she had wheezed, his lungs filling like bellows as he wept.
When the blazing sun is gone,
When there’s nothing he shines upon,
Then you show your little light,
Twinkle, twinkle, through the night…
But God, as they say, moves in mysterious ways. And soon afterwards he had found the letter. Heard her voice as he’d read it:
“My Dear Beloved. My life has been the happiest one imaginable… Remember we will meet again when the time is right. Of that I have no doubt whatsoever. But promise me you will not pine… or, most of all, do not be hasty to leave this world…”
He had shivered then at the terrible thought that he might have, stupidly, done something so contrary
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