Dead Ernest

by Frances Garrood

  “Sweetheart, relax. It’s okay to be quiet, you know,” Andrew said, trying to consult a map in the half-light. “We should be able to be quiet with each other and still be comfortable. You can have a nap if you want. We’ve still about half an hour to go.”

  “I don’t think I could sleep.”

  “No. I understand.”

  “Do you feel the same?” Ophelia asked.

  “I think I probably do,” Andrew said. He had expected to feel so happy, so excited, and all he felt was a dull nausea and something akin to fear. “Shall we put on some music?”

  “No. Not yet. I know! Tell me about Gran. She said she didn’t mind me knowing some of the things she’s been talking to you about. She’s not up to going through it all again, but she doesn’t mind you telling me. It’s not that I’m nosy,” she added. “It’s just that I really love Gran, and I know so little about her.”

  “It’s a long story,” Andrew said, turning on the headlights.

  “I’m listening.”

  So Andrew told her. He told her about the lively girl on the farm, and about the war and the tragedies which had overtaken the young Annie. He told of the untimely pregnancy and the hurried wedding and the difficult abusive marriage which had followed.

  He omitted the sexual abuse and Annie’s feeling about the infant Billy, as he suspected that, when Anne had had time to think about it, she might prefer that Ophelia should be spared certain things, but otherwise he told Ophelia everything he knew.

  When he had finished, there was complete silence, and for a moment he wondered whether Ophelia had gone to sleep after all. Then he realised that she was crying.

  “Darling! Whatever’s the matter?”

  “It’s Gran. Poor, poor little Gran. I’d no idea. No idea at all. I knew Grandad was difficult, but not that he was so cruel. How could he? How could he be so cruel?”

  “Well, there are always two sides to any story,” Andrew said carefully. “Try not to judge him too harshly. He didn’t have it easy either. I think he must have had a pretty hard time as a child, and maybe he found it difficult to love.”

  “He loved Dad.”

  “Yes. It seems that he did. But doesn’t that redeem him a little? It shows he was capable of love. He just married the wrong person. Like Annie. In a way, they were both victims. Victims of circumstances, and of the times they lived in. Nowadays, they would never have had to get married. They might have found happiness with other people. We’ll never know.”

  “Does Dad know?”

  “I don’t know. He certainly knows Annie was pregnant when she married, but I’m not sure about the rest. He must have been aware that they didn’t get on, but I think Annie protected him as much as she could. Ernest, too. I’m sure neither of them wanted him to suffer for something which wasn’t his fault.”

  “I suppose so.” Ophelia blew her nose. “How did Gran survive all those years?”

  “She’s a strong woman. Much stronger than she looks. And she had that dream world of hers. I think that kept her going. And once she’d resigned herself to life with your grandad, I think she stopped expecting much; expecting happiness. She just got on with it.” Andrew pulled off the road. “Look. I think this is it.”

  “It” was a small country inn. They carried their cases through the cheerful smoky atmosphere of the public bar, where horse brasses gleamed along low oak beams and several bucolic-looking locals were already propping up the bar. Their bedroom, situated at the other end of the house, was simple and clean, with whitewashed walls and hunting prints and its own small bathroom.

  “This is nice.” Ophelia sat down on the bed. “Which — which side do you sleep?”

  “I don’t mind. What about you?”

  “I don’t really know. I’m not used to sleeping with someone. I’ll stay on this side, shall I?”

  “Fine.”

  There followed a pause in which both of them seemed to be wondering what to do next. Andrew looked at his watch. Seven o’clock. A bit too early for dinner and not enough time for anything else. Usually when they were alone together, they couldn’t keep their hands off each other, but now they both seemed overcome by shyness. Andrew had imagined this moment so many times; had envisaged the passionate kisses and the tangle of discarded clothes and the longed-for feeling of Ophelia’s bare skin next to his own.

  “It’s not — not quite how we expected, is it?” Ophelia said, and her voice sounded forlorn.

  “It will be.” Andrew touched her cheek. “We just need to relax a bit and get used to being here together. Why don’t you go and have a nice hot bath, and then we can both change for dinner. We don’t have to rush things. We’ve got all night.”

  The bath seemed to improve Ophelia’s spirits, and she emerged from the bathroom flushed and cheerful and wearing a very obviously new and expensive-looking dress in a soft floaty material. Andrew thought he had never seen her looking so beautiful.

  Dinner was pleasant, and their tongues were loosened by the presence of other diners and the noise from the adjoining bar, but once again, Ophelia, perhaps anxious to avoid any awkward silences, began to chatter almost aimlessly. For a moment, Andrew wondered whether it was the wine, but when he looked at her, he saw in her eyes a kind of desperation he had never seen before.

  “Darling, stop. Please stop.” He reached across the table for her hand.

  “Oh dear.” Ophelia looked down. “I’m still doing it, aren’t I? I don’t know what’s got into me.”

  “What is it? What’s the matter?”

  “I don’t know. I just don’t know how to behave, I suppose. I’ve never —” she lowered her voice, “well, I’ve never committed adultery before.”

  “That’s what I love about you.”

  “What? That I’ve never committed adultery?”

  “No. Your directness. Your honesty. Your integrity, I suppose.”

  “This is hardly the behaviour of someone with integrity,” Ophelia said. “Oh, Andrew! I don’t think I like myself very much at the moment.”

  “Let’s go. Let’s go back to our room, and I’ll try to make you like yourself a bit more,” Andrew said, with more humour than he was feeling.

  Back in their room, he locked the door and took Ophelia in his arms.

  “You do know that I love you?” he said.

  “Of course.”

  “Well then.” He drew her down beside him on the bed. “There’s nothing to be afraid of, is there?” He tipped her face up towards his and kissed her.

  “No. I suppose not.” She returned his kiss. “Just — hold me for a moment would you?”

  They leaned back against the pillows and held each other, Andrew’s face against the softness of Ophelia’s cheek, her arms tightly round his body. I love her so much, he thought. So much, the pain is almost unbearable. As he felt her relax against him, he moved his hand down from her shoulder, allowing it to cup her breast through the thin material of her dress, and she turned towards him, kissing his face and neck.

  “Better?” Andrew asked.

  “Mm.” She began to unbutton his shirt, slipping her hand inside it and stroking his chest. “We’ve known each other all this time, and I never knew you had a hairy chest!”

  “Is that okay?”

  “Everything about you is okay.” Her fingers felt cool against his skin.

  As Andrew kissed Ophelia and felt her moving against him, he waited for the first stirrings of the passion he had been controlling for so long; for the urgent physical response which had so often almost overwhelmed him and which he had been saving up for this moment. But his body failed to respond. It was as though something within him had been severed; as though his mind and his body were no longer connected. He loved Ophelia now as he had never loved her before, and yet in that moment, he knew with absolute certainty that he wasn’t going to be able to do anything about it. That he would never be able to do anything about it.

  Very gently, he put Ophelia away from him and laid her back
against the pillow, then he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and put his head in his hands.

  “Ophelia. Ophelia darling. I — I can’t.”

  For a moment, there was complete silence, then Ophelia reached out and touched his arm.

  “I know.”

  “You know?”

  “Yes. I think in a way I’ve always known.”

  “Oh, darling. Sweetheart. I’m so so sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” She was sitting beside him now, holding his hand, like a mother comforting a child. “I don’t think we’re cut out for this sort of thing, you and I.”

  “It’s not that I don’t love you. Not that I don’t find you more beautiful than any woman I’ve ever met —”

  “You don’t have to explain.”

  That alone would have been enough to make him love her, Andrew thought, as he sat miserably on the edge of the bed. She really did understand. And, of course, that made it the more painful; that having found someone who understood him as no one else ever had, to whom he owed so much, who he felt was so much a part of himself, he was unable to consummate his love for her. The unwanted censor which was his body had denied him the ultimate joy of being entirely at one with Ophelia.

  They sat together for a long time, hand in hand on the edge of the bed. At one stage, Andrew turned off the light and drew aside the curtains, exposing a crescent moon dodging in and out between dark rags of cloud.

  “So it stopped raining,” Ophelia said at last.

  “Yes,” Andrew agreed.

  “It’ll be all right.”

  “Yes,” he said again.

  “I mean — this isn’t the end of the world, is it?”

  Andrew longed to cry out that yes, it was the end of the world; that he couldn’t imagine that things could have turned out any worse; and that while he knew he probably deserved some kind of punishment, did he really deserve this? Did Ophelia deserve this? But he bit his lip and gave her hand a squeeze.

  “No, my darling. It isn’t the end of the world.”

  They sat on, chatting about little things; silly superficial things; things about which neither of them cared in the least. Once or twice they even laughed; small, brittle, self-conscious laughs. Then they would lapse into sudden silence, as though afraid that a single word might spoil an evening which was already in ruins. After what seemed a very long time, they finally fell asleep, fully dressed, in each other’s arms.

  They slipped away early the next morning. Neither of them felt like facing the promised full English breakfast, and besides, Ophelia had to be back in time for work.

  “Will you be all right?” Andrew asked, as he dropped her off to pick up her car.

  Ophelia nodded.

  “I love you,” Andrew said. “If you remember nothing else, always remember that I love you.”

  “Me too.” Ophelia’s voice was shaky. “Will you be in touch?”

  “Of course. I’ll be in touch, as soon as I can.” He kissed her cheek. “Drive carefully.”

  Sitting in his car, Andrew watched Ophelia drive off down the road, and felt that she was taking with her all his hopes and dreams; everything he had ever wanted.

  Leaning on the steering wheel, he rested his head against his arms and wept.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  Annie

  “Well? How was it?” Annie had been waiting anxiously for Ophelia’s return from work, unsure what sort of state her granddaughter would be in after her night away. “I made a cake,” she added, gesturing towards a rather lopsided sponge bleeding pale pink jam onto a doily. “I thought it might help.”

  “Oh Gran. It was a disaster.” Ophelia dropped her case on the kitchen floor and sat down at the table.

  “Why? Didn’t you get on?”

  “Oh, we got on. We always get on. It just — it didn’t work, that’s all.”

  “Ah.” Annie wasn’t entirely sure what it was that hadn’t worked but she did know that further questions might seem intrusive.

  “We — well, we couldn’t. That’s all there was to it. We couldn’t. And now we never shall.” Tears began to pour down Ophelia’s face. “Oh, Gran! You’ve no idea how much I’ve been longing to come home. All day, my face has been aching with wanting to cry. I thought I’d never hold out. Maria kept asking me what was the matter, and I just said I was under the weather. But Gran, what shall I do? Whatever am I going to do? I can’t bear it. I simply can’t bear it. I never knew it would hurt this much.” Ophelia wrapped her arms round her body and rocked to and fro, her sobs coming in great gulps.

  Annie was at a loss as to what to do or say. She would like to have taken Ophelia in her arms, but being unaccustomed to demonstrations of affection — it was a very long time since she had hugged anyone, and she felt that she had almost forgotten how — she contented herself with stroking and patting Ophelia’s hand. She longed to do something to ease Ophelia’s pain, but she knew that this haemorrhage of grief had to run its course; that there could be no short cuts. Should she offer tea? Annie was a great believer in the healing properties of tea. Perhaps not the cake, though; not yet, anyway. Cake didn’t seem the right antidote to heartbreak. She gave Ophelia’s hand a final pat, and went to put the kettle on.

  “I always knew it couldn’t last,” Ophelia said, between sobs, “but I never thought it would be like this. I thought it would be worth it — that everything would make it worthwhile — but nothing’s worth this, Gran. Nothing.”

  Annie put a cup of tea in front of Ophelia and poured herself one, feeling that perhaps she had been spared a lot of heartache after all. She’d always regretted that she had never been in love, but if this was what it did to people, then perhaps she’d had a lucky escape.

  “Will you see him again?” she asked.

  “Oh, yes. Probably. But it’s over. It has to be. We can’t hack it; either of us. We haven’t actually finished it, but I think we both know. There’s so much in the way of us being together, I suppose we’re lucky to have had any time at all.”

  Annie wished she could think of something helpful to say but didn’t feel she had either the experience or the wisdom to make a contribution which would be of any comfort to Ophelia at the moment. She had never really encountered heartbreak, either personally or on the part of someone else. Billy had probably had his share — he had married late, and there had been many girls before Sheila — but he had never spoken to her about them. She suspected that sons didn’t talk about such things.

  “I’m sorry, Gran,” Ophelia said now. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Whatever for?”

  “All this hassle. It’s not fair on you, all this happening on your doorstep. You don’t need it, after the year you’ve had.”

  It took a moment for Annie to realise that Ophelia was referring to the death of Ernest.

  “That’s all right,” she said, patting Ophelia’s hand again. “It’s not been such a bad year, you know.”

  “Do you miss him?” Ophelia asked, after a moment.

  “Miss who?”

  “Grandad.”

  “Not really. I suppose I ought to, but life’s been much — well, easier, I suppose, since he died. Awful, isn’t it? I’d never have said that a few months ago, and there aren’t many people I can say it to now. People expect me to be sad still, so I have to pretend. I meet them in shops, and their faces go all serious and they say ‘How are you?’ in that special voice, and I have to pretend I’m miserable, when sometimes I’m feeling quite cheerful.”

  “You’re much braver than I am, Gran,” Ophelia said. “Andrew was telling me what you went through all those years. I don’t know how you survived.”

  “Not brave. More sort of numb. That’s how I got through it. I think I stopped feeling things a long time ago. After the baby died.”

  It was later on, when Ophelia had had a lie down and Annie had persuaded her to try some scrambled eggs, that Ophelia had her idea.

  “Shall we go away?” she said suddenly. “You and I
? We could just — go, couldn’t we? What’s there to stop us?”

  “What do you mean, go?” Annie said, alarmed. She had hardly ever “just gone” anywhere in her life, and certainly not like this, on the spur of the moment.

  “I mean just take off, travel, see a bit of the world.”

  “Oh.” The bits of the world Annie knew were limited, but they were safe and familiar; everyone spoke English, and you could get a decent cup of tea when you wanted one. Ophelia’s idea sounded altogether too adventurous. “Which — bit were you thinking of? Would it mean planes and things?”

  “It might mean planes, but it’s up to you, Gran. You choose.”

  “Goodness.” The idea of travel and just taking off was so alien to Annie that it was going to take some getting used to.

  “I know! We could take Grandad!” Ophelia said.

  “And scatter him?”

  “Why not? You’ve got to do it some time, and I said I’d come with you. He can’t stay in the larder for ever.”

  Annie was used to having Ernest in the larder, and she wasn’t sure whether she was ready to let him go yet. She’d enjoyed moving him about, taking him on little outings, having control over him. (She had once — secretly, guiltily — mixed a teaspoon of him into her tea, but he had floated to the top and she’d had to throw the tea away.) How would she feel if he wasn’t there anymore?

  “You said he liked mountains,” Ophelia continued. “We could find him a nice mountain.”

  “With snow?”

  “Definitely snow.”

  “Would we have to go up it too?” Annie asked fearfully.

  “Probably,” Ophelia said, “but you’ll be fine. I’ll look after you.”

  “Your grandad didn’t like heights. Said they made him dizzy.”

  “Then we could scatter him at the bottom of the mountain, but with nice views.”