A Little Learning

by Anne Bennett

  By the day of the funeral, she was so bone tired she was finding everything an effort. Somehow she got through the service, flanked as she was by her parents.

  She followed the cortège out of the church, head bowed, aware of the mass of people who had come to pay their respects. In the porch, the vicar stopped Richard and Claire’s progress for a moment to express his deepest condolences. Janet was right behind them, level with the back seats of the church. Idly, she glanced across the pews, and came face to face with Ben Hayman.

  She was stunned with shock. He was the last person she’d expected to see; he should, she reasoned, have been in America by now. Her eyes blurred with tears. It was too much to see him at Chloe’s funeral, and with Ruth standing alongside him. The procession was moving again and Janet gave neither of them a sign of recognition but followed behind the funeral party with her eyes once more cast down.

  Outside the sky was leaden grey and oppressive. Rain dribbled from the heavy cloud through the cold damp air. They shivered through the service by the graveside and the vicar’s breath trailed mist from his mouth as he intoned prayers for the dear departed Chloe.

  Raindrops skittered on the opened umbrellas and plopped on the coffin being lowered gently into the tiny grave. The trees sighed around the group as if moved by some great sadness, and their leaves dropped giant teardrops. People stepped forward one by one to take handfuls of earth and drop them on the coffin with a dull thud, while the mud around the feet of the mourners turned to slimy sludge.

  All around Janet, people were weeping, but not Claire, who seemed too weak to cry. She was almost incapable of walking and Richard half carried her to the waiting cars. ‘I’ll see you back at the house,’ he said to Janet as he passed.

  ‘Are you sure?’ Janet asked, and Mary Wentworth pressed her hand gently.

  ‘Please come, my dear.’

  Betty and Bert said they wouldn’t intrude so Janet went alone, packed in someone’s car with people she didn’t know. It didn’t matter; she was in no mood to make conversation and sat in silence until they reached the house.

  Once there, in Chloe’s own territory, she could hardly believe the little child she’d loved was gone forever. Never again would she run flat-footed across the room to throw herself against Janet and put her plump arms around her knees. She’d tried so hard to control the lisp she had but had never quite mastered it. ‘Thing,’ she’d say to Janet with her endearing smile. ‘Thing thomething to me,’ and Janet would go through all the nursery rhymes she knew, always finishing with ‘Daisy, Daisy’ because it was the song that Chloe had liked best.

  Suddenly the loss seemed almost unbearable. It was like a physical ache and Janet could feel the tears welling in her eyes and a lump in her throat that threatened to choke her. This wouldn’t do, she thought, she had to be strong for Claire. She didn’t know how she’d stand it. How did people cope with sorrow as extreme as this? she wondered. Mary Wentworth saw that Janet was almost overwhelmed by grief and took her hand in a gesture of support. ‘Bear up if you can,’ she said, ‘because we need you,’ and she pressed a tray of sandwiches into her hands.

  Janet was glad to have something to do and busied herself replenishing the food on the table and dispensing drinks. It was as she turned with another laden tray that she heard her name called. She knew who it was, for hadn’t she heard him call her many times, and she swung round to face Ben Hayman. She had a sudden urge to throw the tray in his face. She restrained herself with difficulty, but she was angry.

  What the hell are you doing here? What right have you got? The words were screaming in her head. For a second she thought she’d said them aloud, and then she saw Ben’s puzzled face looking at her and realised he was waiting for her to speak. Did he think he could swan in and out of her life, taking advantage of her and casting her aside, then greeting her like an old and trusted friend?

  Ben was glad to have the opportunity to see Janet again before he left, though he bitterly regretted the situation that had brought them together. Therese’s assurances that Janet would welcome her freedom from the engagement, plus the letter she’d written, had convinced him that she couldn’t have been upset about the ending of their relationship and that she’d be mature and sensible about the whole thing should they meet again.

  He was not unduly perturbed that she had appeared not to recognise him in the church, or respond to the hand he’d raised in greeting. The lighting was dim for a start, Janet’s mind would possibly be elsewhere and she would not have expected to see him there, so he was glad to have the chance to meet up at the house.

  He wondered if she knew he was married. He presumed Ruth had told her, but he’d only arrived home days before his wedding and Ruth had been strangely elusive. Therese had demanded most of his attention. With one thing and another, he never got to have a quiet word with his sister and he did wonder if she thought he’d let Janet down, though of course, he reasoned, she didn’t know the whole story.

  But whichever way it was, there was no time for quiet talking at the wedding itself and then he and Therese were off on honeymoon. When they returned for a few days at home before leaving for America, Ruth had already started at Oxford. And then came the call to the Hayman household from Richard Carter, and when Ruth arrived home after a frantic phone call from Naomi, she could only talk about the tragedy of it all. Therese couldn’t understand why Ben felt bound to go to the child’s funeral at all.

  ‘She’s nothing to you, not related or anything,’ she said.

  ‘You don’t understand.’

  ‘It’s not as if you’ll do any good.’

  ‘It’s a mark of respect for her parents.’ Ben’s tone was placatory. He knew from bitter experience on the honeymoon that if he were to inflame his wife’s temper, the resultant tantrum would be fierce, frightening and exhausting.

  He resisted Therese’s sulks, however, and contacted his American firm to explain the position. They readily agreed to postpone his starting date. Therese had refused to go with him to the funeral, for which he was grateful, but he hid his relief from his moody wife and accompanied his sister.

  He was unprepared for the disgust he saw now in Janet’s eyes and the ferociousness of her verbal attack. ‘You shouldn’t have come here. She was nothing to you, Chloe, just an interesting case. Go back to your wife and study other children in America who I’ll never know and grow to love.’

  ‘You’re not being fair, Janet,’ Ben said, and Janet almost laughed aloud. ‘I did care about Chloe and I have great respect for her parents.’ He added, ‘I postponed my passage to the States. I told them the circumstances and they quite understood I had to be here.’

  ‘Bully for them,’ Janet said sarcastically, ‘and for you too, but you needn’t have bothered, you wouldn’t have been missed.’

  ‘Janet, don’t let’s be like this,’ Ben said and put his hand on Janet’s arm. To her shame, she felt her insides begin to tremble and her heart start to thud against her ribs. She forced herself to speak harshly to keep any note of longing out of her voice.

  ‘Get your hand off me, Ben Hayman.’

  Ruth, seeing Janet speaking to her brother, had crossed the room and now said placatingly to Janet, ‘Don’t, Jan, we only came to … you know, to say we’re sorry.’

  ‘Huh!’ Janet exclaimed. ‘You’re sorry? We’re all bloody sorry.’ She added witheringly, ‘Get out of here. You’ve no place here today.’

  Ruth was hurt. ‘It’s not for you to say,’ she said, but Janet retorted savagely:

  ‘Sod off, the pair of you, before I forget this is a funeral and throw something!’

  Ruth’s eyes widened and she might have argued further, but Ben saw that Janet was very near the end of her tether and he pulled his sister towards the door. Outside she was inclined to be indignant with Janet.

  ‘I know Claire was a personal friend of hers,’ she said, ‘but I helped with Chloe as much as she did. I even helped Richard and Claire at fund-raising events i
n the holidays when Janet was working, so she had no need to be like that and act all high-handed.’

  Really, Ruth knew that it had little to do with Chloe and the issue of their right to be there. She’d seen the way Janet looked at Ben before she had the chance to put on the mask of indifference she wore. She’d seen the glimpse of longing on her face, and realised that her friend still loved her brother. She hoped Ben was unaware of it. He seemed sunk in thoughts of his own, and such deep thoughts he seemed unaware she’d spoken.

  ‘Don’t you think she was out of order?’ she said.

  Ben didn’t answer. He was wondering what had happened to him when he put his hand on Janet’s arm. He’d meant it as a gesture of support, but he hadn’t imagined the spark that had jumped between them. It had caused the blood to pound in his veins and brought a weakness to his legs, and he’d had an insane desire to crush her to him and kiss her and beg her forgiveness and say he’d been a bloody fool. A fine kettle of fish that would have been.

  At home, surrounded by crates and boxes, was his sulky, temperamental wife, a slight swell in her stomach already betraying her condition. She was a beautiful woman, always ready for sex – sometimes almost too ready. He longed to plead tiredness, but he’d seen the evidence of her temper when she was thwarted in anything and he would be ashamed to let his parents witness her uncontrolled fury. She’d been the darling daughter the Steinaways had doted on and had had her own way in everything, and now she demanded it of Ben, though her selfish, possessive and jealous streak had not been apparent till after the honeymoon.

  He decided that the best thing he could do was get out to the States as soon as possible and work until he was tired enough to sleep. That was the only way to deal with this madness. He’d make a life of sorts with Therese, and it was no good complaining; he’d married Therese with his eyes wide open and she was carrying his child. In time he’d forget about Janet Travers.

  Lou and Shirley were very worried about Janet when she returned to the hostel after the funeral. She was white-faced with strain and exhaustion and thinner than ever, but it was the aura of sadness she held around herself that most concerned her two room mates.

  Janet herself wished she could break out of the apathy that seemed to be burrowing inside her, but she seemed powerless to stop the images of Chloe that flitted unbidden into her conscious moments.

  ‘Time heals’ was such a trite remark for such sadness, and yet it was true. Janet wasn’t aware of when she started to feel that she was not quite so consumed with sadness and began slowly to emerge as the girl Lou and Shirley had known before the tragedy.

  The term was drawing to a close, the last essays were in, the last lectures given. Janet eventually felt strong enough emotionally to drop a line to Claire inside a Christmas card. As arranged before she’d left for university, Betty had managed to find Janet holiday work at the sauce factory, but as it wasn’t full time she’d still be able to visit Claire, and she told her she’d see her soon.

  She didn’t expect a reply to this at the hostel, but she was surprised on arriving home to find nothing from Claire at all. She would have liked to have gone over to the house straight away, but the family claimed her attention as always, and her mother advised caution.

  ‘It’s her first Christmas without the little one,’ she said. ‘She’s bound to feel it.’

  ‘Yes, that’s why I …’

  ‘I think it’s best to leave her and Richard on their own, don’t you?’

  ‘I don’t know what to do,’ Janet said helplessly, but she didn’t go near, afraid her presence might make matters worse.

  She was incredibly lonely, despite her family, who were delighted to see her, and her job. She missed Claire, her friend and confidante, and yet she could not contemplate visiting Ruth. Ben’s betrayal still hurt like hell and she felt that if she was to get over it, she had to keep away from the Haymans.

  She tried not to let her family see her restlessness and threw herself into the festivities with a will, decorating the room and the tree with the children. She helped Sally and the twins choose presents for the family and then wrap them and hide them in secret places all over the house. She felt guilty that she couldn’t be more content, especially as she knew her mother had missed her so much, and she tried not to be irritated by her. Not being able to understand Janet’s course, Betty busied herself with practicalities.

  ‘Hostel okay?’

  ‘Fine, Mom, yeah, great.’

  ‘Get on with the other girls, do you?’

  ‘Oh, yes, they’ve become good friends.’

  ‘I hope you’re looking after yourself properly. You do cook good food, I hope, and not fill up on junk.’

  ‘Most of it is cooked for us, Mom,’ Janet said, in an exasperated tone she tried hard to disguise. ‘And we take it in turns to cook snacks and things like that.’

  ‘Not damp or anything, the bedrooms?’

  ‘No, no, they’re okay. In fact, everything’s okay.’

  Betty shook her head. ‘I don’t like to think of the place empty all this time with you all away on holiday. The beds could really do with an airing before you go back in January. You’d better take a couple of hot-water bottles back with you.’

  ‘Oh, Mom, don’t fuss,’ Janet muttered and took herself off to her grandparents. She was shocked to find her grandad ill in bed.

  ‘Sit up here, bonny lass,’ he said, patting the bedspread, ‘and tell me how it goes,’ and Janet dredged up incidents from her first term at university to interest and amuse him. She could see that Sean was sinking fast.

  She told him of the miserable old caretaker, Mrs McPhearson. ‘She’s a big, dour Scottish woman,’ she said, ‘with a face on her like she’d sucked a lemon. And she’s got this sniff, when she disapproves of anything, you know, and she seems to disapprove of everything we do. She’s always snooping round to see if someone is smoking, which we’re forbidden to do in our rooms, and she’s against us having a drink, and after all we’re all over eighteen.’

  ‘A drink never did anyone any harm yet,’ declared Sean.

  ‘She wouldn’t agree, Grandad,’ Janet said. ‘We end up sucking peppermints when we come in at night, so that if she’s lurking in the hall she won’t smell our breath.’

  Janet was pleased to see her grandad chuckle and hear his wheezy laugh. ‘Does she do that?’ he asked. ‘Hang about to catch you?’

  ‘You bet she does. In case anyone should come in rolling drunk, or try to creep upstairs with bottles of something, or, worst of all, try to sneak up with a man! I tell you, Grandad, you haven’t a hope of getting past her!’

  ‘Perhaps she was a sergeant-major in the war?’ Sean suggested with a smile.

  ‘Oh, she would have been at least a general,’ Janet cried, and went on, ‘One day she came up to inspect the kitchen, it’s little more than a cupboard, and she’s always trying to catch someone doing something they’re forbidden to do. We got word she was coming up and went to town, cleaning the place in the little time we had. Lou had this disgusting black cloth she cleaned everything with, and not finding anywhere else to put it, she threw it in the teapot. Anyway, when McPhearson had gone, after poking into everything and sniffing at our attempts at cleanliness, we all had a cup of tea together. Only we’d forgotten the dirty cloth still in the teapot and made the tea on top of it. Point was, we could have been poisoned and yet it was the best cup of tea I’d ever had!’

  Sean McClusky laughed so much the tears ran down his face and he had to mop them away with the big hanky Janet found for him. ‘You’re a marvel, young Janet,’ he said, ‘but,’ and he touched her arm lightly, ‘don’t tell your mother about that last incident. I’m not saying a word against her, mind, she’s a fine woman in her way, but she’d not have found that amusing.’

  Later she kissed him goodbye and was surprised how paper-thin and lined his skin appeared. ‘You’ve cheered him up no end,’ Sarah told her granddaughter. ‘You’re a grand girl to bother abou
t us old ones.’

  ‘I love you both, Gran, you know that,’ Janet protested.

  ‘I know that, but some in your position would be too high and mighty for the likes of us.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, Gran,’ Janet said, giving the old lady a hug. ‘Why, what would I do without you?’

  Everyone was at the Travers’ house on Christmas night as Sean McClusky was too ill for them all to call there. ‘You’re looking well,’ Patsy said to Janet as they were both taking a breather in the kitchen from the noise and the children.

  ‘And you,’ Janet said, not at all sure that the slight bump in Patsy’s stomach was what she thought it was.

  Breda, coming in at that moment, caught Janet’s quizzical gaze and said, ‘You might well stare, young Janet, the bloody woman’s on again. I told Brendan he’d be best tying a knot in it. It might help.’

  Patsy laughed. ‘Oh, Breda,’ she chided, ‘you’re awful, and anyway, I wanted another after losing that one in the summer. Point is,’ and Patsy leaned forward confidentially, ‘I’m only on three months and the doctor says I’m so big it could be twins.’

  ‘Holy Mother of God,’ Breda said. ‘You’ll be grey before you’re much older if you have a couple like Conner and Noel, added to the two rips you have already.’

  Janet listened to the shouts and screams of the lads in the living room and thought Breda had a point. ‘It could be twin girls, though,’ she said. ‘Our Sally wasn’t much bother, nor your Linda either, of course,’ she said and added loftily, ‘Or it could take after me, the perfect child!’

  ‘And the most big-headed,’ Breda commented with a laugh.

  ‘Well, let’s hope if it is a girl it’s nothing like her Auntie Breda!’ Brendan commented, coming into the kitchen at that moment. ‘Or she will be bad-mouthing the whole world as she comes out!’

  ‘You cheeky sod,’ Breda said in mock indignation as the laughter swelled around them.