by P R Johnson
Chapter 4
As unseen loudspeakers piped a mournful song of remembrance and the coffin inched towards the crematorium furnace, something was playing on Matthew’s mind. It struck him that it was only during her funeral service that he learned his grandmother’s name: Valerie Hamilton. It seemed strange that he had not discovered it before. All things considered, however, he realised that the woman had entered his life only two weeks before; scarcely time for formalities.
Once the final prayer had been spoken, everybody filed towards the chapel exit and accepted condolences from the lingering pastor. The family then proceeded to the courtyard, whereupon a crematorium official approached to enquire what was to be done with the ashes of the deceased.
‘Flush them down the toilet for all I care,’ Matthew’s mother answered as she continued to the waiting funeral car.
Matthew and his father, meanwhile, remained before the austere man.
‘You’ll have to excuse my wife,’ his father said meekly. ‘She’s a bit emotional ... you know how it is.’
‘Of course, sir,’ the official responded. ‘It’s just that, as you decided against a plot in our garden of remembrance, we assumed that you would be taking the ashes somewhere else.’
‘We hadn’t planned to. To tell you the truth, we were rather hoping the crematorium would dispose of them.’
The man nodded. ‘I suppose we could find a quiet corner where they could be respectfully scattered.’
‘We would be grateful.’
Not a word was spoken during the car journey home and as soon as they arrived, Matthew’s mother went to the cupboard beneath the stairs and retrieved an unopened bottle of gin. With the bottle tucked under her arm, she headed upstairs to the room where the old lady’s belongings had lain untouched since the body had been removed. Matthew’s father, meanwhile, grabbed a can of lager from the fridge and went into the lounge. Matthew followed him.
‘I’m glad that’s over with,’ his father said, sitting in the armchair and switching on the television with the remote. ‘I’ve never been a fan of funerals, strangely enough.’
‘Do you think mum will be all right on her own?’
‘I’d imagine so. I guess she wants to sort through the old girl’s things. Strike while the iron’s hot.’
‘Maybe one of us should be with her.’
‘It’s probably best that we leave her alone. Give her some space. She knows where we are if she needs us.’
As Matthew settled on the sofa and his eyes fixed on the television, he barely registered that a horse race was about to begin. ‘Don’t you think it’s a bit sad that we were the only ones at the funeral?’
‘Well, we could hardly go dragging people off the street, could we?’
‘Maybe we should have contacted some of her Traveller friends. They might have wanted to pay their respects.’
‘We had no idea who her friends were, let alone how to find them. Anyway, I think the last thing your mother needed at a time like this was to be surrounded by a group of rowdy Gypsies.’
On the television screen, the racing horses sprang from the starting gates.
‘Dad, I know this may sound strange, but do you think she knew she was going to die?’
‘Who, your grandmother?’ His father’s eyes remained on the television. ‘Quite likely, son. The amount of alcohol she used to put away, even when I knew her back in Forest Wake. Nobody can drink like that and expect their liver to take the strain indefinitely.’
‘She used to drink when you knew her before?’
‘Like a fish. Whenever you saw her she would have a tumbler of spirit in one hand and a lit cigarette in the other.’
‘OK, but do you think she knew she was going to die now, I mean?’
At last he faced Matthew. ‘Who’s to say? I reckon she had an idea every time she looked in a mirror. I saw her when they removed the body and she wasn’t wearing make-up. Her skin was so green and her face was so haggard that she must have known that something was wrong.’ His eyes flashed back to the television, and again he became distracted. ‘Come on, you old nag. Make it, make it.’
Anxious for something to occupy his mind instead of watching horses, Matthew went to the kitchen, made a cup of tea and took it to the pond at the bottom of the garden. Most of the time he sat staring at the water; occasionally, however, he would look at his bedroom window and think about his mother. Dark clouds soon gathered and he made his way inside, fearing rain. He desperately wanted to change out of his funeral clothes and ventured upstairs, ignoring his father’s advice.
When he poked his head round the door to his bedroom, he found his mother sitting on the floor, shoeless but still wearing the black dress of her supposed mourning. Her eyelids were smudged with mascara and the trail of a polluted tear snaked down the side of her face. Surrounding her were the scattered contents of the brown suitcase, with the bottle of gin – now a third empty – also close by. She looked at him, her head rocking, and smiled a lacklustre smile.
‘Hiya, son.’
‘How are you getting on?’
‘Me? Fine. Wonderful, in fact.’
Matthew glanced at the items strewn across the floor. Amongst other things, he could make out a dog-eared copy of The Bible. There were several piles of papers and a couple of pairs of frayed knickers. By his feet he noticed a black and white photograph of a young lady dressed in a ball-gown. He bent to pick it up, his eyes drawn to the low neckline of the lady’s dress. The woman in the picture, though clearly not his mother, bore enough of a resemblance that he did not doubt who she was.
‘I assume this is her,’ he said, turning the photograph towards his mother.
She gazed up, her eyes momentary spinning, and nodded.
‘She was a pretty woman,’ Matthew remarked.
‘She was a very pretty woman, once upon a time. I guess it’s easy to see why she was so popular with the men.’ She reached for the bottle of gin, unscrewed the lid and took a swig. Setting the bottle down, she dragged herself onto the edge of the bed and stared at the things scattered across the floor.
‘I know it’s a strange question,’ Matthew said, studying the picture again, ‘but what colour eyes did she have?’
‘They were the same colour as yours and mine. Why do you want to know?’
‘I was having trouble remembering, that’s all, and it’s difficult to tell from this photo.’
His mother looked at him and gave a forlorn shake of the head. ‘It pains me to say this, Matty, but I can see lots of your grandmother in you. You have the same colour hair, the same nose. There’s even something in the way you stand that reminds me of her.’
Immediately self-conscious, Matthew placed the photograph where he had found it and nodded at the items on the floor. ‘It doesn’t seem much to show for a lifetime, does it?’
‘Not really. She was probably too busy enjoying herself to collect souvenirs along the way.’ She reached once more for the bottle and suddenly her demeanour changed. ‘Matthew, would you answer me something truthfully? You don’t have to feel bad about your answer, I won’t be upset. Tell me, have I been a bad mother?’
‘Bad? In what way?’
‘I’m not sure. It’s just … sometimes ... I get this feeling, as though I’ve not been the best parent I could have been.’
Matthew shrugged, offering little reassurance.
‘Oh, don’t listen to me,’ she said and waved her hand dismissively. ‘It’s probably just the drink talking. They say that gin makes you melancholic. Alcoholic melancholy: the most pathetic kind.’ Leaning forward, she rested her elbows on her thighs. ‘I know I’ve made mistakes; Christ, every parent makes mistakes, but I’d hate to think that I’d screwed up as badly as her. It would tear me apart if you ended up hating me.’
‘Why would I hate you, mum?’
Her bleary eyes sought his. ‘You’re a good boy, you know that? Come and sit next to me.’ He did as instructed and she took his hand a
nd stroked it. ‘Listen, Matthew, I realise I’ve not been totally straight with you over the years. Things about my past, for instance. You’ve got to understand that my childhood wasn’t a happy time. I guess I was only trying to protect you.’
‘Protect me, from what?’
‘From history. From your own flesh and blood. Trust me, certain things can hold you back in life.’ Letting go of his hand, she reached for the bottle. She took a shallow swig and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, smudging her red lipstick. ‘Then again, I guess you’re not a child any more. You’re seventeen: nearly an adult. And it’s clear that secrets don’t do much good in the long run.’
‘Mum, what are you trying to tell me?’
‘Just things you ought to know, Matty.’ She took a deep breath as if to summon resolve and looked him in the eye. ‘Tell me, son, have you any idea why your grandmother walked out all those years ago?’
‘I guess the two of you didn’t get along.’
‘That goes without saying. But have you ever wondered what happened between us to cause so much bitterness?’
Matthew shrugged.
‘Let me put it another way,’ she went on, ‘how do you think she raised me on her own? How do you imagine we got by financially?’
‘I thought she was a fortune-teller.’
‘A fortune-teller, right. She used to do the clairvoyant thing, I’m not denying that. Only as a sideline, though, something to tide her over when no other money was coming in. There was a time when her work was far more – how can I put this? – far more hands on.’ His mother smiled, but the smile quickly dropped. ‘You see, son, I’m sure you’ll be delighted to learn that your grandmother, the pretty woman in the picture, was basically a cheap, dirty whore.’
His eyes widened. ‘What are you saying?’
‘Come on, Matt, don’t make me draw you a picture. She was a prostitute. A sister of the night; although, for her, any time was good so long as the money was paid in full.’
Taking another swig of alcohol, her tone became wistful as her tongue loosened further.
‘As far as I can make out,’ she said, ‘she was auctioning her body most of her adult life; almost as if it was a path she was happy to go down.’
Far from being a lowly brothel worker, however, she revealed that her mother had become the plaything of wealthy and powerful men. Back when she had lived in the capital, she had moved in circles where someone from her background had had no right to be. At the pinnacle of her career, she was rubbing shoulders – as well as various other parts of her body – with high society figures: from politicians and actors to business tycoons and minor royals.
Nevertheless, she went on, her mother’s fancy lifestyle came to an end, at the age of twenty-seven, when she fell pregnant to one of those high-flyers. Refusing to abort the pregnancy, she was forced to leave the capital after an attempt to blackmail a number of her clients backfired. She received a pay-off from one such patron, however, and fled to a run-down cottage left to her by a recently deceased uncle. It was in that very cottage, in the village of Forest Wake, that she gave birth to a daughter.
‘So, how does it make you feel, knowing that you’re descended from the gutter?’ She shook her head disdainfully.
Matthew shrugged, still absorbing the information. ‘How do you know all this, if it happened before you were born?’
‘Your grandmother was never shy in telling me how wonderful her life was before I came along. She never actually admitted that she was paid to be around those people, but it’s clear what was going on, especially considering what happened afterwards.’
‘And you really have no idea who your father is?’
‘Not a clue. But it’s likely that she didn’t know for sure. The list of candidates is probably as long as your arm.’
‘Wouldn’t you like to know who he was?’
‘Of course I’d like to know. I was hoping there might be something among your grandmother’s things, some admission. But I haven’t found anything yet.’ A wry smile appeared on her lips. ‘You know, the funny thing is, she always told me I was a bastard princess. I grew up thinking that she said it out of spite. For all I know, she could have been telling the truth.’
Matthew looked on as his mother took hold of the bottle.
‘Don’t you think you’ve had enough?’ he said sternly.
‘More than likely. Now I’ve started, I’m developing rather a taste.’ She took a swig and screwed the lid back on. ‘It didn’t take her long to get back on the game, you know, after she moved to the country. I guess she missed the company of men.’
It must have been a huge comedown for her mother at first, she admitted, the prospect of bedding rural folk when before she had been surrounded by the rich and famous. Nevertheless, in desperate need of money, she converted the spare room of the cottage into a modest boudoir and set about fulfilling the desires of local men.
When she herself was growing up, she said, although she was aware of her mother’s numerous ‘boyfriends’, she was oblivious to the true nature of events. It was not until she was eleven years old, and playground taunts began finding one easy target that the truth began to dawn. Rumours had been circulating the community ever since her mother had arrived, single and heavily pregnant. Yet, nobody had acted. The moment those rumours reached the playground, however, the backlash started. Alarmed by the things their children were hearing, a number of parents tried to expose the goings-on behind the cottage door, informing the authorities in the process. Nevertheless, despite the weight of local feeling, nothing was done; mainly because half the constabulary were themselves paying customers.
‘The police used to visit her, too?’ Matthew asked, trying to suppress a grin.
‘Many a time an officer would arrive and demand a private interview in the spare room.’
Continuing with the history, she revealed that even though the authorities failed to respond, the witch-hunt that followed had consequences. Her mother found herself shunned on the streets and abandoned by most of her clients. To ease her growing money troubles and general loneliness, she turned to alcohol for answers. Her rapidly aging mother was probably on the verge of drowning in booze, she said, when she stumbled on an idea to make ends meet. The woman had always been interested in horoscopes and mysticism, but when she saw how much cash people would pay for a glimpse into the future, she realised the potential of the trade. And so she acquired a pack of Tarot cards, placed an advertisement in the local post office window, and began learning the tricks of clairvoyance and sleight of hand that would hold her in good stead for the years to come.
‘To her credit, she certainly knew how to work those cards,’ she said with a nod of recognition. ‘In fact, I sometimes think she missed her calling: she should have been a magician instead of a prostitute.’
Indeed, she continued, her mother became so skilled with Tarot cards that within a short while her reputation for fortune-telling began to overshadow the scandals of her past. Before long, her band of spiritual followers even included some of the women who had been so vocal about her other line of work. At that particular time, the only person to voice concerns was the local church leader. Despite the fact he had not seemed bothered by the appearance of a brothel in his parish, he became a frequent visitor, trying to persuade her to give up her psychic meddling. But she ignored his pleas, claiming that she was not trying to interfere with God, but merely trying to understand his divine laws.
‘Right from the beginning, I think she almost believed the bullshit she spouted was true.’
While her mother gradually distanced herself from the past, she herself was unable to escape the stigma. Playground taunts continued, she said, and when the other kids were not making fun of her, they would ignore her altogether. Life at home was not much better. As her mother sank deeper into a whisky bottle, their relationship remained distant and cold.
‘Don’t get me wrong, she never once raised a hand to me,’ she said, gin
bottle cradled in her lap. ‘And as far as I know, she made damn certain that I was protected from anyone who used to visit. If one of her male customers had tried anything with me, I’m sure she would have hacked off their balls with a pair of garden shears. But that’s beside the point. What I had to put up with was far worse: The feeling that I was unwanted and unloved; being constantly reminded that I was the reason she had given up a fabulous life. Have no doubts about it, she held me responsible for everything bad that happened to her.’
The sound of a ringing telephone interrupted the flow of recollection and Matthew looked towards the door.
‘Maybe I ought to get that,’ he said.
‘I’m sure your father knows how to answer a phone.’
‘Yes, but I’m kind of expecting a call. I’d better go and see who it is.’
‘Fine, whatever. I’m not going anywhere.’ She looked down at the mess on the floor. ‘There’s still plenty to sort through here.’
While his mother remained perched on the bed, Matthew left the room and proceeded downstairs. By the time he reached the bottom, however, the phone had stopped ringing. He peered into the lounge, where his father was talking into the receiver.
‘Is it for me?’ Matthew mouthed, catching his attention.
His father shook his head and continued the separate conversation.
Disappointed, he headed to the kitchen. He opened the fridge and eyed the carton of orange juice on the shelf. His eyes then drifted to the three cans of lager on the bottom rack. He pulled one out, the cold tin sending a shudder up his arm and across his shoulder blades.
Beer can in hand, he walked back along the hallway and noticed that his father had finished the conversation and was watching television again.
‘Who was on the phone?’ he asked from the doorway.
‘Your nan. And not the one we’ve just cremated, calling from beyond the grave. The other one: your nan from Forest Wake. She wanted to know how the funeral went.’ His gaze drifted to Matthew’s hand. ‘Is that my beer you’ve got?’
‘There’s nothing else in the house. And as everyone else is drinking ...’
‘Fair enough. I’ll dock it from your pocket-money.’ His father paused and motioned to the ceiling. ‘Is your mum all right? I heard you go upstairs, even though I told you not to.’
‘She’s OK. It’s a bit of a mess up there, though.’
‘I can imagine.’
‘Anyway, I’d better get back to her.’
‘Call me if you need a hand.’
Matthew nodded.
When he returned to the bedroom, his mother was sitting on the floor, sifting through some papers. The gin bottle was three quarters empty by her side.
‘That was nan on the phone,’ he said, sitting on the edge of the bed, still warm from when he had last been seated. ‘Just making sure we’re all right.’
‘It’s nice to know you’ve got one decent set of grandparents. They’re good people. Your dad’s lucky to have them. And they’ve always treated me fairly, which is surprising, considering what their son married into.’ She set down the sheets of paper and her eyebrows furrowed. ‘He wasn’t the first man I fell for.’ Her intense eyes sought his. ‘Your father, I mean. Maybe I shouldn’t be telling you this, but before your dad came along there was someone else.’
That other man, she said, had been a young labourer who worked one summer in the apple orchard that backed onto the cottage. She was seventeen at the time, and every day she would see him, bare-chested and picking fruit. It was a scorching summer, and she would spend all her time in the garden, with one eye reading a magazine, and the other watching the boy as he worked. She became so infatuated that she even revealed her feelings to her mother, hoping that by making her thoughts known, the secret would be out and love would work its magic. Things did not turn out as expected.
One afternoon, she recalled, she was forced to return home from a shopping trip after suffering a nosebleed that could not be stemmed. She arrived at the cottage with a bloodied hanky held against her nose, only to hear muffled noises upstairs. Going to investigate, she realised that they were coming from the spare bedroom, unused since her mother’s days of whoring. Fearfully, she opened the unlocked door and found the young fruit-picker lying naked on the bed next to her mother.
Several weeks later, she continued, still reeling, she asked her mother why she had done it. And the old girl replied with a sentiment that had carried her through life: ‘Some offers are too good to refuse.’
Matthew snapped the ring-pull of the can of lager and took a sip. ‘I don’t want to sound crude, but dad never slept with her, did he?’
‘Your father?’ she snorted. ‘God, no. Mind you, she slept with so many people in our village that he’s probably in the minority. No, your father was my knight in shining armour. Who knows what would have happened if he hadn’t rescued me?’
‘Didn’t he use to work in the post office?’
‘Yes, at the time, his parents owned the shop. That’s how we met. I was in there quite a lot and one day he asked me out. One thing led to another and before I knew it we were engaged.’
‘It happened quickly, then.’
‘Very much so. I was so desperate to get away, I think I would have married the first man who asked.’
‘That sounds a bit cynical.’
‘Don’t misunderstand me, I love your father to bits. Always have done. But things weren’t all sweetness and light, especially not in the beginning.’
The wedding took place at the village church, she explained, and she was led down the aisle on the arm of her fiancé’s uncle, because they could not find anybody more suitable to give her away. On one side of the church sat the groom’s friends and family, while on the other sat her mother, weeping crocodile tears. It was during the reception, just before the newlyweds left for their honeymoon, that the old woman took them aside and gave them the news that many in the village had been waiting for since the day she had arrived: the news that she was leaving. Her wedding gift – and the final motherly act that she intended to complete – was to give them the cottage. She revealed nothing of her plans, where she would go or what she would do, but insisted that she had two decades of her life to recoup and intended to make up for lost time.
To her credit, she said, the old lady kept her word. When the newlyweds arrived back from honeymoon, the old girl was no longer around. Although she had taken a few of her personal effects, she had left behind the deeds to the cottage and all its history. The couple moved in immediately, but married life proved difficult from the outset. While Matthew’s father spent his days working in the post office, his mother was left to wallow at home, surrounded by reminders of unhappiness. The place was filled with her mother’s abandoned furniture and decorated like the cheap brothel it once had been. To make matters worse, there was the problem of the spare room.
‘I swear that no matter what we did to that room, we couldn’t get rid of the smell of rotting apples.’
Her state of mind was not aided, she conceded, in that difficult first year of marriage by the fact she fell pregnant. A new depression set upon her that neither she nor her husband could overcome. With their relationship stumbling from one crisis to another, it appeared their marriage was heading towards a premature end. Their troubles were forgotten, nevertheless, one summer evening when she was rushed to hospital suffering the pains of labour. She gave birth that night to a baby boy – Matthew – and as her husband cradled their son for the first time, they briefly resembled the happy family everyone thought they should be. Harmony was shattered a couple of hours later, however, when her mother appeared at the hospital, unannounced and uninvited. For thirty minutes she remained at the bedside, mollycoddling the baby and showing, in that brief time, more affection than she had ever shown her daughter. Then, just as suddenly as she had appeared, she departed, leaving behind rekindled bitterness.
‘I never found out how she knew about the birth,’ she said.
‘She told us she’d seen it in a psychic vision, but clearly somebody must have contacted her.’
‘I guess that’s how she knew who I was when she turned up the other day. I didn’t realise we had met.’
‘Yes, well, it’s hardly surprising you don’t remember. You were only a couple of hours old at the time.’
‘And was that the only time she visited?’
‘Until last week, yes.’ She nodded.
It was there in the hospital, she went on, that she realised what had to be done. For the sake of her marriage, she insisted that they move as far from Forest Wake as possible. The cottage was put up for sale immediately and her husband began scouring the country for a new home. It took a month of searching before he discovered Orchid Hill, a town where nobody knew their past; somewhere they could start afresh. The new house proved the new beginning they so badly needed. Leaving behind all her excess baggage, she was able to concentrate on being a proper wife and mother. She never went back to Forest Wake and refused point-blank to let her son near the place where both had been born.
‘The strange thing is,’ she said, unscrewing the bottle cap, ‘I always knew that, one day, your grandmother would come knocking at our door.’ She smiled, and this time it seemed a genuine smile. ‘And now it’s over. The past is dead and gone, and we’ve got a certificate to prove it. Anyway, here’s to us.’ She raised the bottle in a toast. ‘To you and me, son, we’ve survived. A little battered and bruised, maybe, but relatively unscathed. Congratulations.’
‘Cheers.’ Matthew raised the can of lager.
His mother swallowed the mouthful of gin that remained. In an hour and a half she had drunk a whole bottle’s worth. Yet, instead of swimming in the depths of intoxication, the mixture of alcohol and confession seemed to have cleared her head. With an easy smile on her lips and eyes shining with life, it was as though she were basking in a recent exorcism.
Reaching down to the sheaves of paper that she had been sorting previously, she retrieved a white envelope from their midst.
‘By the way, I found this.’
Matthew took the envelope and read his own name scrawled on the front.
‘What is it?’
‘I have no idea. You’ll have to open it to find out.’
He tore open the seal and pulled out a small piece of paper. Realising immediately that it was a bank cheque, he looked more closely and saw that it had been made out to him, Matthew James. The signature at the bottom appeared to be from V Hamilton. When he read the figure that was printed, a look of wonderment came to his face. He flipped the cheque and discovered on the reverse a message written in the same untidy scrawl. The message read:
‘The future is yours – open your eyes.’
PART TWO: Freefall