by Jane Johnson
I brush the sand off my bare feet, put on my trainers and walk back towards the earth steps. And that’s when I see it: another gate made of iron bars set into the cliff at the back of the bay. I crunch up the shingle and see that behind the gate is a cave. I press my face to the rusty bars, but the darkness beyond is forbidding. It must go right under the road. Maybe even under the house. Perhaps there’s a secret entrance from the cellar? All manner of fantasies fill the darkness beyond: smugglers and pirates, excise men and revolutionaries. Echoes of Moonfleet, Jamaica Inn and Poldark.
I expect the gate’s latch to be fused by rust but it rises smoothly and I step into the cave. As my eyes adjust to the darkness, I make out rock walls a metre or so apart, a sandy floor. Using my hands to guide me, I move inside. The chill strikes through to my bones.
Further in there is a pinch point, then the cave widens again. It’s dark this far in, but I can feel barnacles to waist height so the sea must come in this far. I will just go a little further, I tell myself, see if the cave comes to a natural end. The cave begins to slant uphill. I pass my hands up and down the rock walls as I go and soon come to a point where I find no barnacles. Well, at least I won’t drown, I think, only half amused. I shuffle carefully, but rock strikes my shin. Reaching down, I find a void above it, then more rock. Steps? I stand up on the first step, find the level of the second with my hand and the riser of the third. Reaching overhead to make sure the roof of the cave won’t brain me, I move up again, and again. The steps seem to go up for ever. I think about turning back.
Come on, Becks, you wanted an adventure!
Do I, though? Life has not been very encouraging lately, and it is so dark. Anxiety bites but I am curious to find out where this tunnel ends. On I go. At last, the ground levels out and I reach an obstacle. Flattening my hands against it, I find a substance warmer than the surrounding rock. Wood? A door? I pass my hands carefully from top to bottom, feeling indentations, regular and sharp, but no handle. This is frustrating. I will have to come back with a torch.
I retreat slowly, hands braced against the cold, rough rock walls: better not slip and knock myself out here where no one will find me. No one knows I am here, except the old man – Jem – who will probably just think I’ve abandoned my ruined clothes and gone home.
Suddenly, dark thoughts threaten. Might it not be for the best? they whisper. Remember the phone call. Just think what’s awaiting you in London. Maybe the best way out would be simply to let the sea take you. Then it will be your choice and you won’t have to go through it all again: the tests, the hospital, the tubes and the poison; and Eddie’s disappointed face: ‘Not again, Becks, not again…’
My legs start to tremble and for an instant I feel as weak as I was after surgery, when I hobbled up the high street for the first time, overtaken constantly by octogenarians, convinced I was going to black out at any moment.
Stop it, darling. My mother’s voice is so strong it almost echoes. Concentrate on this moment, right now. It’s all we ever truly have.
Forcing the dark thoughts away, I retrace my path back along the tunnel to the pinch point – where I hear lapping water. The tide has crept in!
Abruptly I feel oppressed by the weight of rock above and around me. It feels like the grave. Splashing through the water, not caring that I am soaking my jeans and my trainers, I blast out of the cave and at last stand with the sea swirling around my knees, sucking in the cold, salty air, feeling the sun’s welcome warmth on my face. It is shockingly, beautifully bright.
That’s my girl. One battle at a time.
From the earth steps that lead up to the sea gate and then the house, I look back at the cove. It seemed so serene, a gift offered only to me, but maybe it is a place of guile and secrets, of gifts extended with one hand, then taken away with another.
*
Closing the front door of the house behind me, I hear noises. And a smell too – unmistakable. I make my way down the light-dappled corridor to the kitchen, where I find a figure prodding a pan on the stove: a dumpy woman in an outdoor coat and a hat jammed down over her hair, like an elderly Paddington Bear. I clear my throat, and she turns, her front view hardly dispelling the image. ‘Brought a bit of breakfast for you.’
Bacon sizzles in the pan and my mouth runs with saliva. ‘Thank you so much. You must be Jem’s wife?’
‘Yes. Call me Rosie.’
She tucks her frizzy ginger hair behind her ears. Her face is pale and nondescript: it’s hard to judge her age. When she smiles I am shocked by the brilliant evenness of her teeth. These are not the stained and gappy teeth of an elderly woman, but of a Hollywood starlet. Veneers? But that would have cost a fortune. I think of Jem and his scuffed brogues and broken umbrella: must be dentures, then.
I get two teacups down and place them beside the teapot that is warming. Rosie picks one of them up – printed with fading forget-me-nots – and puts it to one side. ‘Don’t use that one. That’s Miss Olivia’s!’ she tells me sharply. She fiddles around in the cupboard and extracts another, decorated with buttercups.
We sit at the table under the disapproving eyes of the portrait, eating bacon and eggs. ‘I shouldn’t really,’ says Rosie, patting her stomach. ‘I already ate with Jem.’
‘I couldn’t eat all this on my own.’
‘You’re no more than a stick.’ She gets up to clear away the plates, says over her shoulder, ‘Jem said you come down to see Miss Olivia about a letter?’
‘Yes, she wrote to ask for my mother’s help.’
‘Oh? What were that about, then?’
‘I’m not sure. I was hoping to go and see her at the hospital to get a better idea of what she had in mind.’
‘Don’t know what help she needs, old besom. Jem and I do everything for her, always have,’ she grumbles.
‘I’m sure you do, and I’m sure she’s grateful.’
Rosie barks out a laugh. ‘Grateful? Not that one. Well, if you want to see her I’ll drive you in. Got to go visit Jem’s dad anyway.’
‘Oh, is he in the same hospital?’
She gives a noncommittal grunt. ‘Them poor nurses… I said to Jem if I ever get that way you just put a pillow over my face.’
‘Oh dear. Is he a bit of a monster then?’
‘I meant Miss Olivia.’ Rosie puts the plates in the sink and pours hot water from the kettle on top of them. ‘Dementia, poor old soul. Better pack your things and bring them with you – once you seen her you’ll be wanting dropping at the station so you can get the train back home.’
*
The hospital is an hour’s drive away, a rambling sprawl of low-rise utilitarian glass and concrete fronted by a crammed car park. Rosie drives her enormous boat of a Mercedes round and round, making me wince as she misses wing mirrors and bumpers by millimetres. There has already been a bit of a misunderstanding at the Chiverton roundabout which provoked a symphony of horns, and now there is a standoff with a disgruntled driver whose space Rosie just shot into, grazing the passenger side door. ‘Ah, bugger it!’ she groans. ‘They make these spaces too darn narrow.’ She opens her own door wide and grumps her way out, oblivious to the furious gesticulations of the other driver.
I crawl over the gearstick and follow Rosie out of the driver’s side, dragging a carrier bag of grapes, chocolate and magazines with me.
‘She won’t thank you for any of that nonsense.’ Rosie reaches into a bag behind the driver’s seat and takes out a small Thermos. ‘But she’ll thank me for this.’
‘What is it?’
‘Her special tea, just the way she likes it. She complains something awful about the weak stuff they give you in this place.’
‘That’s kind of you.’
Rosie stands there for a moment as if remembering something, then tucks her necklace inside her blouse. ‘Hands,’ she says, cryptically. ‘Come along, then.’
*
‘Wake up, Miss Olivia. You got a visitor.’ Rosie plonks herself on the bed at the end o
f the geriatric ward. I look down at the woman in the chair beside the bed, shoulders rounded, head hanging down, pink scalp showing beneath the strands of white hair. Slack skin falls in a slump of folds and wrinkles that so engulf her features that she resembles a half-melted waxwork. She looks so frail, nothing like the owner of the blustering voice that bellowed out of the letters, and my heart sinks. Surely Jem was right: she won’t be strong enough to go home.
‘Cousin Olivia?’ I say timidly.
The old lady does not stir.
This is the moment I could just walk away. I am shocked by the thought, but before I can act upon it her head comes up, the black eyes open and she fixes me with a merciless stare and I am pinned, like a trapped butterfly, to my fate.
‘Who are you?’ She looks me up and down. ‘No uniform? Not a nurse?’
I shake my head.
‘God-botherer? Can’t stand God-botherers. If you’re one of those you can just bugger off. Try to get a nap and bloody God-botherers come and disturb you just as you’re drifting off. Blasted nuisance.’
‘I’m not a God-botherer. I brought you these,’ I say, offering gifts as if appeasing a volatile minor deity.
Olivia peers into the carrier bag. ‘Fruit is for birds and magazines are for idiots. You can leave the chocolate on the side.’
Rosie rolls her pale eyes. ‘You see?’ she says to me. To Cousin Olivia she says, ‘Now you be civil to this girl. She’s come a long way to see you. Says you wrote to her ma in a state of panic. What did you go and do that for? Don’t we look after you, me and Jem?’
The old woman narrows her gaze. ‘I know exactly what you do for me, Rosie Sparrow. Now why don’t you just bugger off?’ The black regard, as beady as Gabriel’s, is malicious and I am reminded of the portrait in the kitchen, the eyes that follow your every movement.
Rosie pushes herself to her feet. ‘Be like that, then.’ To me she says quietly, ‘Don’t believe a word she says.’ She taps her temple. ‘I’ll see you back in the car park in an hour. Don’t be late or I’ll go without you.’
She trundles off through the ward, stopping to pass the flask to a woman wheeling a tea trolley.
Olivia tugs my sleeve. ‘We must be quick.’
‘Sorry?’
‘I’ll need a coat. Yours will do. There’s twenty pounds in my handbag. We’ll get a taxi.’ She shuffles her saggy old body into a more upright position, takes hold of her bound and plastered leg, resting on the footstool, and lifts it till the heel of the foot is on the ground. She wriggles her toes and gives a satisfied nod. ‘Right, you cause a disturbance and I’ll nip past you when they’re not looking. I’ll meet you by the lift. Now, where’s my stick?’
‘I, ah…’ I look around, alarmed, and at that moment one of the nurses comes past.
‘Planning your escape again, are you, Mrs Kitto?’
‘Miss Kitto,’ Olivia growls.
The nurse grins at me. ‘Don’t let her lure you into her schemes! We’ve already caught her sweet-talking the volunteer reader and trying to sneak out past the night staff. Luckily the lift was out of order, wasn’t it, Mrs Kitto?’
Olivia gives her a death-stare, which just makes the nurse’s smile wider. ‘Oh, she’s a character.’
‘Fuck off.’
The nurse sighs. ‘Luckily I do have some nice, polite patients to see to.’ She wags a finger at Olivia. ‘Now, you behave yourself.’
Olivia watches her go on her way, then swings her gaze back to me. ‘Interfering creature. Now, who are you and what are you doing here?’
I gather myself. ‘I’m Rebecca, Geneviève’s daughter. You wrote to her – do you remember? Asking for her help?’
Olivia frowns. ‘Her daughter, you say? That letter was a jolly long time ago. So rude not to reply at once, but I suppose it’s better late than never. Where is she, your mother?’
‘She’s—she’s…’ Still so hard to say it. ‘She died a couple of weeks ago. I found your letter at her flat and came down to offer you my help in her place.’
Olivia cocks her head. ‘Well, that’s extremely inconvenient. I always thought our family had a bit more gumption.’
Gumption? I feel my cheeks flush. ‘She had cancer.’ The vile word slips out, leaving my mouth dry and bitter.
The old woman subsides as if air has been let out of her. ‘I can’t believe it. Not Jenny.’
Only those who knew Mum well called her Jenny. It was always the full Geneviève, though Dad sometimes called her Vivi or Vivien.
‘But she’s far too young. Are you quite sure?’
How could I be unsure if my mother were alive or dead? I nod miserably.
There follows a long pause, then Olivia says, so quietly that I almost miss it, ‘I loved her so. How much more must I lose?’ Her gaze becomes rheumy, and she turns her head sharply away and rubs her face as if to erase the pain. She blinks several times then turns back and grasps my arm. ‘How is Gabriel? Is he well? Is he eating? I miss him terribly: he’s all I have left in the world.’
‘He’s fine,’ I reassure her. I do not mention the ruined carpet, the shit-stained furniture, the stench. ‘He had a good peck at the apple I gave him earlier and was very well behaved about it.’
Gabriel had flown to the lamp to get a good vantage on the offerings I brought, then had alighted on my forearm, making charming little cooing noises designed to assure me of his peaceable intentions. I had stood mesmerized, but also touched by the bird’s trust, watching him peck greedily at the apple, feeling his weight on my arm. Occasionally, he would cock his head and give me a disconcertingly intelligent look: You see? We can get along famously. But if you try anything underhand… The nictitating membrane had come down over the beady eye like a wink.
Olivia grins, showing dark yellow teeth. ‘Gabriel is an excellent judge of character. If he likes you, you must be trustworthy. Sit here on the bed and let me have a look at you.’
I sit down.
‘You don’t look much like Jenny,’ she says after a moment. ‘Put your hair up. Such a mess like that anyway. Let me see your face properly.’
So rude! Still, I catch my hair up with one hand and gather it into a ponytail with the elasticated hairband from my coat pocket. It does feel rough: sticky from saltwater. I will have to find a way to wash it.
‘Better. Lean towards me – my eyesight is wretched these days.’
Olivia takes hold of my chin, tilts my head this way and that. ‘Hmmm. Good bones. I can see your mother in you now. Your face has character, young lady.’
The nurse is back, wheeling a machine. ‘Time to check your blood pressure, Mrs Kitto.’
Olivia ignores her, but lets go of my chin. ‘I think it’s time to leave, dear. Where are my shoes?’ She gazes at the plaster on her leg as if it has appeared overnight by magic. ‘What’s this wretched thing doing here? Well, that’s a blasted nuisance. Still, I’m sure we shall overcome.’ She turns to the nurse. ‘If you’ve got some scissors on you we can cut one leg of my trousers and I can get dressed. Come on, girl, be useful. Then my young relative here can drive me home. You’ve brought a car, haven’t you, dear? Or do you have a driver?’
Oh dear, I’m beginning to see what Rosie meant.
The nurse grins at me. ‘Very inventive.’ She raises her voice. ‘You’re very inventive, aren’t you, Mrs Kitto?’
‘Miss Kitto,’ Olivia rumbles back softly but the confidence has gone out of her. She lets the young woman cuff her arm and take her blood pressure. When the nurse wheels away the machine, she says to me, ‘They can’t imagine how anyone my age never married, these young chits. Things were different in my time. I survived a war, you know!’
‘You must tell me all your stories. I’d love to hear them.’
She swings her head around to gaze at me suspiciously. ‘Why? What have you heard?’
‘Nothing,’ I assure her. ‘I don’t know anything at all.’
‘Well, that’s quite clear. Now then… if you’re not going
to help me out of here at least you can be useful. I’ll dictate – do you have a pen?’
*
Half an hour later I am back in the car park, my head spinning, glad to have escaped the confines of the hospital with all those familiar hospital smells of disinfectant, urine and grief. There is a list of instructions folded in my coat pocket: Cousin Olivia has been exigent in her demands. In my handbag is her cheque book, with the first three cheques blank but signed and dated and the fourth one made out to me for a thousand pounds. ‘For your expenses,’ Olivia had said, as if I were her employee. Do cheques even work any more? Apparently, social services have decreed that she’ll need a fully equipped indoor bathroom complete with grab rails – ‘Grab rails, I ask you! Namby-pamby nonsense.’ – wheelchair access to her downstairs rooms and a proper bed before she can be released to her own home. That, or she’ll have to go into care. I can see that all this makes sense, given the state of Chynalls, and is in her best interest, but it does seem rather intrusive, and entirely overwhelming.
Rosie is sitting in the front seat of the Mercedes, finishing the nub end of a pasty. She makes no move to open the passenger door for me and hardly seems to notice the trouble I have getting in. ‘See what I mean?’ she says indistinctly with her mouth full.
‘She is certainly quite a character.’
Completing her meal, she opens her window and throws the paper bag out. I open my mouth, but she presses the car’s ignition button so that the engine roars to life and drowns my protest.
‘And how is Jem’s father?’ I ask when we are out on the main road.
By way of an answer Rosie forces the car into an unwise overtaking manoeuvre that causes me to shut my eyes.
I force myself to think. The list Olivia has given me would take weeks – months – to carry out. How can I stay here all that time? And do I even want to? But duty presses upon me: I am her last surviving relative, daughter of her beloved ‘Jenny’. If I run away I will feel I am letting down not only this batty old relative, but also Mum. But what will Eddie say? And what about my own life? Shouldn’t I go back and submit myself to the consultants? What they have seen on the scan may be nothing, after all. But if it isn’t nothing, then it is everything, the end of everything…