Whistling still, he got out and hurried down the stairs to get his breakfast. He hadn’t planned anything for the day, but since it was sunny outside, he’d felt inclined to take one of his horses for a long ride to the seaside. Or maybe he could convince his mother to play a bit of golf with him, or perhaps he could jump in his rowing boat for a bit of fishing on the lake. He was on his way to the conservatory, thinking about his diverse possibilities for fun, when one of the maids came out of the library to call him.
“Sir? There’s someone on the telephone for you,” she said with a curtsey, her expression timid.
“Who is it, Martha?” he asked, taken aback. He didn’t expect any calls. Most of his friends surfaced out of bed a lot later than that. Still, perhaps it was one of them after all, calling to invite him to a party or a card game somewhere.
“I do not know, sir. It’s a gentleman calling from Wales.”
Charles gave the girl a curt nod, then rushed into the library, his face animated with apprehension. They never call this early! He picked up the receiver to hear the voice of one of the doctors at the sanatorium. Just as he feared, the news was bad. Nothing else mattered now; all his plans for fun had to be cancelled. He decided to even skip breakfast.
“Get me James at once! Tell him it’s an emergency!” he told the maid as soon as he rushed out of the library. He ordered her with such urgency that the maid nearly dropped the vase she had picked up to dust. She put it back down on the low table and ran to the staff rooms below. Charles paced up and down the carpet while he waited, hoping James hadn’t already left to pick Laura up for her rehearsal at the Society.
***
That same morning, Laura had a hearty breakfast. It was a pleasant novelty, now that the bouts of morning sickness had somewhat subsided, allowing her to enjoy breakfast again. When Maggie left for work, Laura washed the dishes and poured herself a second cup of tea, then went to the telephone in the living room to call her mother before going to the Society for yet another rehearsal.
She was in a cheerful mood that day, feeling gratitude for everything, including her precious telephone, a rare commodity for people of her social status. But Charles, eager to be able to talk to her whenever he wanted, had brought her the telephone as a surprise one day. He’d had it installed for her and still paid the bill in a timely manner.
As she waited to be patched through, she allowed her mind to empty of all worry about the future, as she watched a flock of wild pigeons fly in circles and impressive sweeps across the sky.
“Hello, how can I help you?” came a stranger’s voice from the other end of the line, claiming her abruptly but pleasantly out of her reverie. She sounded very professional, just like all the staff that picked up the telephone each time.
“Good morning! I’m calling from Brighton,” said Laura.
“Good morning, madam! How can I be of service?”
“Could I please speak to Mrs Mayfield?”
“Mayfield? Mrs Ruth Mayfield?” she asked, her voice losing its enthusiastic quality. By the end of her response, it had been reduced to an apprehensive whisper.
“Yes, that’s right,” answered Laura. She had registered the uncertainty in her tone and thought that perhaps the lady was a new member of staff, who didn’t know the patients well yet.
“Erm, could you hold the line please, madam?”
“Yes, of course.” After a few moments, Laura heard the familiar voice of Dr Williams and felt relieved. She was very competent and helpful and would, no doubt, put her through to her mother at once.
“Hello, Mrs Mayfield. I understand you’re calling to speak to your mother,” the doctor said when she came on the telephone. For the first time, Laura felt a pang of uneasiness clutch at her insides. There was something ominous in her tone. It was unmistakable.
“Yes, Dr Williams, I am. But if she’s unavailable, I could call back,” she offered, her eyes tightly shut, as she silently wished for the doctor to put her mind at ease, to prove the awful premonition wrong.
“Miss Mayfield,” said Dr Williams, exhaling loudly in a way that it sounded like an exasperated sigh. The pause that followed was unbearable to Laura. The doctor was stalling. She had something to say and it wasn’t easy.
“Is there a problem, Doctor?” she dared ask, her voice trembling.
“Yes, there’s been a problem here at the sanatorium—”
“What? What do you mean?”
“May I ask, when was the last time you spoke to your mother?”
“Ah, last Saturday I think. Five days ago . . . why?”
“I’m afraid that we’ve had a severe case of the flu sweeping through the wards recently.”
“Yes, I know! Is that all?” interrupted Laura sighing with relief. Her exhaling breath came out rushed and hot.
“No, I fear that’s not all, Miss Mayfield. We’ve had quite a few patients falling ill.”
“Yes, I know. My mother had a bit of a cold when we last spoke. But she said she was better than she’d been two days earlier. She said she was on the mend. Isn't she back to normal yet then?”
“Mrs Mayfield . . . Uh, I don’t know how to say this . . .”
“Well, what is it?” demanded Laura, letting herself sink into the armchair next to the telephone. The apprehension carried on, and it had started to weigh on her, making her feel weaker by the second.
“Well, the virus came galloping through the wards despite our best efforts to quarantine the first patients that developed the flu. But sadly, the virus was of a complex nature . . . and very tough. It has caused a series of complications to a few of our patients. Some of them developed serious chest infections—”
“Oh, my God! Is my mother one of them? Her lungs are very poorly!”
“I know that, Miss Mayfield . . . and I assure you, we’ve done the best we could,” said the doctor, her voice breaking when she swallowed hard.
“What is it exactly you’re trying to tell me?” asked Laura, her voice thick with panic.
“We’ve had a couple of fatalities, Miss Mayfield, I’m afraid your mother was . . .” A dreadful pause ended the sentence abruptly. Dr Williams just couldn’t find the heart to do this over the telephone.
“Was what?” whispered Laura, clutching at straws now, refusing to believe that the unthinkable could be confirmed simply by a few more words down a cold telephone line. As she waited for the dreaded response, she cradled the receiver between two trembling hands.
“I’m so sorry to deliver such devastating news over the telephone, Miss Mayfield. But your mother was one of our fatalities. She passed away early this morning just after dawn. I assure you, we have tried everything that was humanly possible in order to save her, but it was inevitable.”
“No! It can't be . . .” mumbled Laura, but she never heard the apologetic response from across the miles, or the mention of the various treatments they’d tried in vain in the last couple of days. The sunlit room started to spin around her in fast swirls. Oddly enough, as she started to lose the world around her, she spared a thought about the carefree birds she had enjoyed watching just minutes earlier. They had seemed so free, so blissful, and she had felt envious of them again. Sadly, as was the case often with her, the world had once again fallen on her shoulders. As she fainted, she fell back on the armchair, the receiver landing on the carpet with a soft thud.
She came to a while later to hear frantic banging at the front door. She could hear the dialling tone from the receiver but didn’t bother to pick it up. Feeling like she was stuck in a dream, a terrible nightmare where her mother no longer existed, she stood up and started to move along the carpet despite herself, as if she didn’t command her body any more.
She reached the front door an unfathomable period of time later, having stopped at the kitchen tap to drink some water and to splash some more on her cheeks, willing herself to wake up from the bad dream, but it seemed, to no avail. She opened the door and saw Charles facing her with open arms, and then before s
he knew it he was holding her behind the closed door. He knew. They had called him. Of course, they had his number, not hers. And he was there with her now. He had come at once. He said he wished she hadn’t found out like that all by herself, that there was something he could do to bring her mother back, to make it all go away. And he held her so lovingly. He told her he would take care of her now.
Suddenly, she felt so sad for her mother. She had wanted more than anything to see her daughter married to Charles. She had been so happy to hear over the telephone that they were together now and expecting a baby. But she would never get to see her grandchild after all. She would never attend Laura’s and Charles’s wedding. She was destined to die far away from home, alone, instead. Poor mother! None of the things you ever wished for, you got to have in the end. Perhaps it’s a curse that runs in our family . . . And that was Laura’s reasoning, in the private haven of her devastated mind, as she cried desperately in Charles’s arms.
***
Charles had been wonderful with organising the return of Ruth’s body back to Brighton. By the middle of the following week, everything was ready for the funeral, which was a quiet ceremony at the chapel by the cemetery. It was reserved for a handful of people, Laura’s very few friends and acquaintances around town. She hadn’t even made a list for people to call. Whoever called in to offer their condolences or whoever expressed them to Maggie to pass them on, got invited on the spot to come to the funeral.
This included Ian, Laura’s only friend from the Society, Mr Mills and Mr Thornton, Mr. Fern from the tea house and even Mrs Beesley from next door, who, aside from being a gossiping bore, turned out to be terribly sympathetic and supportive at this difficult time. It is funny how tragedy brings people together. One afternoon, Laura answered the door to find Meg and Paul standing there holding a tin of biscuits and a condolences card ready for the offering.
Laura didn’t think twice before embracing them both and taking them back into her life, just like that, despite the way they had shunned her earlier on for her choices. On the day of the funeral, everyone who cared for her was there at the chapel to join her in saying goodbye to her beloved mother.
The eulogy was short but heartfelt and was delivered by none other than Maggie, who chose to speak of Ruth’s kind heart, her love for gardening, her tendency to feed all the stray cats that frequented their garden, and her generosity in sharing with many of her neighbours, her amazing cakes.
Standing between Charles and Maggie, Laura listened to the priest as he addressed the congregation with a few last words by the open grave. As four men lowered the coffin, she spared a thought for Christian. It wasn’t an apt moment but she couldn’t help it. She had heard that he and Eric had already quit their jobs and left Brighton. And yet, she couldn’t help wondering about one thing: had he not left, would he have bothered to be here today? And then, she turned to Charles, and he squeezed her shoulder as he held her, willing her to take courage.
Laura looked away and this time wondered if Charles would have allowed Christian to come close to her, had he come to the funeral. Would he allow her the luxury to exchange a few words with Christian and to take courage from the mere look in his eyes and the touch of his hand? Tears flowed from her eyes then, and she raised her handkerchief to her face once more. Charles held her closer to him and thus he also held on to the pretence he was all she needed that day, despite the large hole that gaped open inside her soul, waiting still for the one man she still yearned for in order to feel complete. But sadly, it seemed, he was now gone forever.
Across the distance, hidden behind an ancient oak tree, Christian wiped his own tears, as he watched Laura from afar. He saw her shoulders shudder with sobs as Charles held her. The sting of pain hurt him madly. But he couldn’t bring himself to go to her. What was the point anyway? He only had minutes to spare. Eric was waiting in the car.
He had asked him to lie to everyone, even to Maggie, that they had left town already. He had asked Eric to wait just for a couple of days so that he could see Laura one last time and say goodbye. And that was it. From where he stood, as he watched his darling girl, he whispered his goodbye to the wind and turned to go.
His shoulders were hunched and the hem of his long black coat billowed behind him like a banner of mourning as he walked away. He knew well he was defeated. He had no choice any more but to let her go, to leave her behind and let her live the life she had chosen, no matter how long it would take for him to love again, if ever.
Laura noticed a young man walking alone on the far end of the cemetery and thought how merciful God was. Although it was impossible to see Christian that day, God had brought before her eyes the next best thing: a man who looked like him from a distance. A wistful smile formed on her lips, as she watched the stranger walk away and disappear through the cemetery gates. It was all there; it might as well be him: the dark fringe that fell over his eyes, the long purposeful strides, and the way he held on to the collar of his coat as he walked against the cold wind. She slid her fingers between the two top buttons of her coat and caressed fondly the brown scarf that she wore secretly underneath. Little did she know, when she’d first laid eyes on Christian that evening on the Pier, that one day the very same scarf he wore then, would serve her as a lifesaver of comfort; being the only trace of him she now had left.
Chapter 20
One week after the funeral, Laura delved into the world of theatre, body and soul. The upcoming show gave her something to look forward to. Once the rehearsals started at the Pavilion, working hard was all she could do to distract herself from the memories of happy days on the Pier with Christian.
When Christmas came, Laura declined Charles’s invitation to lunch at Lakeview. Although he was disappointed, he understood that having recently lost her mother, she wasn’t up to making merry. Still, New Year’s Eve became a night of partying and celebration for her, following the tremendous success of the premiere that same evening.
Laura had looked radiant in her expensive costumes, a dazzling vision of rhinestones and sequins, silk and pearls. To look at her during the show and at the after party, you could never have imagined what she was going through inside. After the party, alone in her house, she stared out into the gloomy night sky from her bedroom window for quite some time before going to bed, thinking of the last time she’d gone out on New Year’s Eve. It was a shock to realise how tremendous the changes of the past year had been. On that same night just a year earlier, she’d been at the Concert Hall with Christian, where he’d sung ‘Cheek to Cheek’ in her ear as they danced.
She turned away from the window, then caressed the small bump on her tummy as she lifted the bed covers to get into bed. Surely, it wasn’t only Charles to blame that Christian and she were now apart. They’d both made wrong decisions. Some were down to misjudgement and others were due to pride and insecurity, not to forget the cruel hand of fate. Her mother didn’t have to fall ill to start with, let alone die. And if Laura hadn’t got pregnant, perhaps she would have fled the town with Christian to be in Devon together, too far for Charles to harm them any more. But the Fates had been cruel, and it was no use lamenting any longer.
Christian was gone, so was her mother, and there was nothing she could do about all that. Above all, there was a new, innocent life growing inside her now that couldn’t be blamed for all this mess. She owed it to the baby to stay with Charles and do the right thing. As for losing the one she loved, she felt she had to accept her share of the blame and move on with her life.
***
“Good morning, dear! Happy New Year!” said Susan Fenshaw when her son entered the conservatory to join her for breakfast.
“Happy New Year, Mother.” He kissed her cheek. “Hasn’t Father surfaced yet?”
“Oh, no.” She gave a dismissive wave. “He has a bad hangover; I’ve had a cup of tea sent up to his room. He probably won’t be up for ages.” She gave a loud chuckle and took a sip from her tea.
Charles mirrored her am
used expression, then cocked his eye at her. “Did you come back really late last night then?”
“Yes, it was in the wee hours of the morning. You know how the Slawsons like to party! What about you? When did you come in?”
“Just as late.” He raised his brows as he spread jam on his toast. “I left Laura home around four a.m. and then came straight back here.”
“Oh, our dear Laura,” mused Lady Fenshaw with a dreamy expression on her face. “She was simply marvellous yesterday. Thank you for taking me along, Charles, I really enjoyed the show!”
“It was a pleasure, Mother; shame that Father didn’t wish to join us too,” he said, a hint of regret in his voice.
“Bah, you know him, not a big fan of musicals! He was quite happy to wait for me to come home so we can visit the Slawsons together. Oh, wasn’t Laura just breathtaking? By the way, do you think it would be all right to ask Mr Mills to send me the music sheets for the new songs? Or would it be too audacious?”
“Oh, what nonsense, Mother! I’m sure he’d be happy to oblige you. I’ll ask him for you.” He grinned and offered his mother a refill from the fine white porcelain teapot.
“Do you think we could persuade Laura to sing for us again during one of our forthcoming parties?” she asked, as she buttered a delicious-looking scone.
“Oh, Mother, I have news to tell you about Laura . . . if you side with me and help me out, I’m sure she will be around a lot from now on.” He winked and gave a bright smile.
“Side with you? Whatever do you mean? I’m intrigued!” she replied goggle-eyed, grabbing his arm.
“Laura and I . . . well, we’re going to have a baby, Mother!”
“Good heavens! I say, that’s wonderful!” she cried out, opening her arms to hug him, not even noticing he was still holding his cup. When he spilled tea on the table, she retreated all embarrassed and apologetic.
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