‘Yes, Mrs Wheeby, the council was . . . I remember it all, perfectly, we couldn’t get a grant . . .’
‘. . . gangs they were, lads in gangs, and they took to breaking the things. Vandals, Mr Davis. So at last the room had to be closed, and I don’t know where all the things went to. I often think of that pink goddess. I should like to send those lads to a reformatory. Breaking up pretty things like that. It’s my belief they hate anything pretty.’
Wilfred felt a faint surprise at the vehemence of her tone. He looked at her hat, from the hard line of which a pallid shapeless section of profile stood out. Mrs Wheezy, Pat had called her.
‘We really must go, Mrs Wheeby.’ He got up, then stooped to lift her shopping bag from the ground, and together they began walking slowly towards the gate.
Lorrimer Park covered no more than the forty acres, which had been the park of the family house two hundred years ago, and at no point were its trees, now half denuded of their leaves, thick enough to hide the glow from lights on the roads that ringed and hemmed it in.
He could hear the roar of the home-going traffic.
It was the same road he had always known (though its gentle curves had been hacked away and straightened) but its flawless surface and its merciless stream of cars had nothing in common with the tarry-scented, warm wood-blocks over which he had tottered, pulling a wooden horse on a string, and just ahead of his smiling young mother, sixty-three years ago.
2
The canary
The next day was Sunday.
At six o’clock, Wilfred awoke with the start that had brought him up through the blest worlds of sleep on so many mornings since Pat’s death; but on this morning his first thought was not Pat’s dead, but Mary’s run away, and the pain was worse because with it came fear.
He reached for the clock on the table between the twin beds, (the one with its burden of wide-awake, wretched man, and the other bed smooth and empty), and, seeing the time, sighed and lay back and put his arms behind his head. The house and the road outside were silent; a fragment of bright sky looked in between the curtains; it was sunlit, out there, and the brilliant faces of Pat’s dahlias, with cobwebs glittering between them, would be staring across the lawn.
He turned to look at Mary’s letter on the table beside the clock. The square, modern-style writing of the word ‘Dad’ hurt him; it seemed to set Mary away from him in a young, secret, hard world of her own.
Dear Dad,
I’m off to London to get a job. Not to worry I am nearly seventeen and not silly like some of them. I shall be alright and as soon as I’ve got the job I shall write but not any address because then you’ll be after me, I know you. In London, so huge and glamorous, I shall have a better chance.
Love
from
Mary
Love from Mary. What a letter, what a frightening mixture of a child’s inexperience and the decision of a woman! What a thing for a father, still dazed and stunned from the death of the child’s mother, to find beside the tea cosy, on the neatly set breakfast table, propped against that cosy’s gay, psychedelic patterning.
‘London so huge and glamorous.’ Wicked, dirty place, loveless and – his thoughts turned in sudden affection towards the streets and shops of Torford – heartless and rotten too . . .
This time last week, Mary had come slowly in with the tray of tea for the two of them, one cheek still creased from the pillow and her dark eyes slitty with sleep.
They had drunk their tea together, she sitting on Pat’s bed, in her navy dressing-gown, and they had had one or two of their little jokes.
Not pretty, perhaps. A bit on the plump side. But her hair was really something, her mother used to tell her. Pat had meant as well as any woman could, and done everything for the best. Keep your mind on your studies, she would say. Pass your exams, and get into university and get your degree. Plenty of time for boyfriends afterwards.
But Wilfred remembered an afternoon, nearly two years ago, when he had idly picked up from the lounge table a book bound in pink plastic and lettered True Confessions and belonging, if the inscription on the flyleaf were true, to Sandra Bailey.
Under the heading Ambition, on the page signed by Mary Patricia Davis, were the neatly written words: To get married and have three children. Max, Hugh and Cilla, in that order.
Whew! Putting down the True Confessions quickly, with one glance round the bright, silent lounge, Wilfred had wondered about Mary’s hours of evening study, up in her room. Nearly six years of them. French and Latin Grammars, and the New Maths book, lay on the table. But what ruled in Mary’s head? New Maths and Grammars or daydreams about Max, Hugh and Cilla and their possible father? In what order?
Secretive Mary. When had either he or Pat ever heard her say the names of those children, the bearing of which was her ambition?
He had never told Pat about that page in the confession book. He had been warned by Pat’s reaction on the occasion when Mary had suddenly said, at the tea table, that she would like to work in a shop.
‘What kind of shop? A bookshop? Of course, that’s––’
Pat had pounced, but Mary had gone on, undisturbed, buttering a half-slice of bun: ‘Not a bookshop – a shop where they sell clothes.’
‘Well really, Mary, I must say . . .’
For seven minutes (Wilfred had looked stealthily at the clock) Mary’s expression had remained placid under the spate of sensible, kind, unanswerable words, and her answer to the final, ‘Now don’t you?’ had been an un-sulky ‘M-mm’ which might have meant anything.
But when Mary did say something, it was something that could haunt a father; revealing, as those three names in the True Confessions book had done, depths beneath the sunlit surface of family life.
‘You think exactly what you want to think.’ Mary’s flatly spoken sentence had cut across the flow of her mother’s irritable words during the scene about the micro-mini skirt, and although Pat apparently had not heard them, Wilfred had, and he had never forgotten them.
The micro-mini skirt, fully twelve inches of it, had been worn once by Mary. She had come home from school wearing it, gone straight up to her room, and come down wearing the school’s grey pinafore dress and white blouse.
‘Thought better of it? That’s right; I thought you would,’ Pat had smiled, pouring tea. ‘Sensible girl.’
‘It wasn’t me.’
Again, no inflexion, no expression.
The skirt had never again been seen on Mary’s womanly thighs. But, now that she had gone, Wilfred painfully felt sure that this moment, and none other, had been the moment when Mary had made up her mind to run away.
Yesterday – only yesterday! – he had awoken at six, and waited for her to come in, sleepy and smiling, with their tea. Five minutes – ten minutes – she must have overslept. (Not Mary.) He had got up and put on his dressing-gown and gone along to her room and tapped on the door. Again – louder. Again. Then opened it.
Her bed was neatly made. The air of a fine morning stirred the curtains at the open window. Staring, his heart starting to beat hard, he had seen the note, and from that moment, anguish and fear, unceasing anguish and fear.
Now he struck the bedclothes, suddenly, with the back of his hand. Where to begin? Where should he start? Even that chap’s handkerchief, lying crumpled on the dressing-table, had to be dealt with.
Steady strokes from the tower of St Peter’s church sounded from the heart of the town, touching him with the comfort of familiarity. Seven. In half an hour Mrs Wheeby would begin to bump about in her room as she prepared herself to attend the church’s eight o’clock service.
At that moment, there was a ring at the front door bell. It could not be the paper boy who did not deliver the Sunday Express until half past eight. Mary?
He hurried out of bed, hurried across the room, dragged the curtains apart, pushed up a window and stared down, breathing fast.
No. A face, of a bluish-purple colour, stared back at him, to
pping a collection of clothes which caused the word rags to touch the beholder’s mind.
‘Good morning to you and a fine day it is,’ said a voice. ‘Here he is, and I brought him along early because I’m off to see me sister in London and the train leaving the station on the stroke of half past eight, and me living the other end of the town, and never a bite of breakfast in me yet. So you’ll excuse me, I know,’ and here a largish object muffled in a piece of dirty blanket was held up. ‘He’s sleeping sweetly, but off with the cloth and he’ll start away like he was one of the Beatles.’
There was a pause. Then Wilfred, feeling that the top of his head would fly open, demanded in a hoarse weak voice:
‘What is it?’
‘Why, a canary, of course.’
The muffled object was gently swayed to and fro as if in demonstration. ‘Bought off me for two hundred new pence (and a black day that was for us all, it coming in, God help us) by the old lady. There was I, sitting on the seat, and she sitting by me, and us getting into a chat, as people do, and her saying she wanted a canary, and hadn’t I the very thing by me, looking after it for me sister who’s gone to live in London, and writes me a postcard this last Saturday saying she don’t want no more of him? Wasn’t it only yesterday the postcard come, and me meeting the old lady the very same afternoon as if it were the hand of Providence? Name of Wheeby,’ concluded the voice, relapsing into a less lyrical style, while its owner nodded in emphasis.
‘I’ll – I’ll come down. Wait . . .’ Wilfred muttered.
‘Me train goes on the tick. Not a moment will they wait.’
Passing Mrs Wheeby’s door, Wilfred gave it a thump. It instantly opened, and his descent was arrested by the appearance of his lodger, white silk hair neatly gathered into the smallest conceivable knot at the back of her head, and looking at him severely over a steaming cup.
‘What is it, Mr Davis?’
Mrs Wheeby, like Wilfred, wore a dressing-gown; a Marks and Spencer one, of red flannel bordered round the collar with red satin; and the fact that Wilfred’s own sturdy garment had come from the Men’s Department of the same Universal Provider seemed to unite him with Mrs Wheeby in a common bond of humanity which he did not want at all.
‘It’s your canary, Mrs Wheeby,’ he said shortly. ‘The man has brought it early – because . . .’ his voice died away. Really, he could not go into all that about sisters and trains.
‘Ah, my Dicky,’ Mrs Wheeby exclaimed. ‘I will come down. But no. Better not. My tea will get cold. Perhaps you could bring him up, Mr Davis?’
‘Bring –? The man?’ Wilfred was poised at the head of the stairs.
‘No, that isn’t necessary, I meant Dicky, a little thing like that with tiny bones can’t be heavy. Have you ever held a bird in your hand, Mr Davis? And felt its heart beating? It is nothing but tiny bones and feathers.’
‘No I haven’t, Mrs Wheeby, and Mrs Davis always said No Pets. She made that quite plain the day you came to us. I remember it perfectly.’
‘Mrs Davis is dead,’ Mrs Wheeby said – right out, not lowering her voice, as if she were saying it was a nice morning. He stood and stared at her silently. She took a sip or two and stared back.
‘Not a minute will they wait. I’m warning you,’ came the voice from below, apparently through the letter-box.
‘I’m COMING,’ Wilfred shouted, and ran down into the hall and opened the front door.
‘His seed box is filled up and his water’s there, all fresh an hour ago, God bless him. And now I’m off and good morning to you. It’s a bit of groundsel does his heart good twice a week. Ye’ll have some in the garden. It grows whether ye want it or not. I’ll be off, for me stomach’s calling to be filled,’ and thrusting the cage at Wilfred the Irishman went quickly down the path and away, leaving the garden gate open.
Wilfred went to shut it against visiting dogs, leaving the cage just inside the hall by the open door. But quick as he was, next door’s cat had slipped out of the bushes and was sniffing at the cage, while Mrs Wheeby was descending the stairs, panting.
‘No, pussy, no. Mr Davis, can you drive Bella away? No, pussy, no.’
‘Get OUT,’ shouted Wilfred, making a pouncing movement at Bella which caused her to rush off, with tail erect, turning back to present a malevolent mask.
He turned to Mrs Wheeby, who had set the cage on Pat’s immaculately shining hall table and was fumbling with its mufflings.
‘Poor little man, I expect he’s frightened. I hope the water hasn’t spilt. Mr Davis, can you just undo this string? My fingers are all thumbs, first thing.’
‘Mrs Wheeby –’ Wilfred was struggling with the stout piece of cord which kept the blanket about the cage. ‘Really . . . wasn’t it rather . . . rash . . . Oh bother this thing . . . to pay a man you’d never seen before two hundred new pence for a canary that . . . damn . . . mightn’t have existed? He might just have cleared off with the money. And there’s another thing . . . you know Mrs Davis told you . . . she said quite plainly, when you first came, No Pets . . .’
He did not finish the sentence because he did not want to hear again Mrs Wheeby’s voice telling him Pat was dead.
But he conquered the knot, and Mrs Wheeby eagerly pulled off the cover.
Sunlight was streaming into the hall through the glass panels in the front door, where white storks and white lotus flowers paddled and floated in a yellow river. And immediately the occupant of the cage came out, a trill of piercingly sweet noise soared up to greet this light.
Wilfred instantly felt that this joyous spun-glass sound was going to be unbearable.
‘Little beauty,’ Mrs Wheeby was gloating. ‘Like drops of silver, isn’t it, Mr Davis? It reminds me of Yehudi Menuhin, but if you were to ask me – I should say it’s better, because Dicky has never been taught to sing, and Yehudi Menuhin had lessons. Oh yes, I like Dicky’s singing much better. I shan’t go to the Eight O’Clock this morning,’ she ended, and sat down abruptly beside the hall table.
Wilfred again felt that impulse to clutch at his head. ‘But you always go to the Eight O’Clock, Mrs Wheeby! You’ve been every Sunday without fail ever since you came to us. In all weathers, too; Mrs Davis used to be quite worried about you, some mornings.’
‘Very good of Mrs Davis, I’m sure, but I can take care of myself, thank you. I never did like going, but Duty is Duty, Mr Davis. I like Dicky better than Duty, so I shall stay at home, and perhaps I’ll go next Sunday and perhaps I shan’t, we’ll see,’ and she nodded, allowing a pant to come out, as she sat looking up at him.
‘Just as you please, of course, Mrs Wheeby,’ he said after a pause, and while Mrs Wheeby was nodding, as if to imply that she should hope so, he made an attempt to assert himself by adding, ‘I’m . . . I’m not sure . . . I don’t think . . . the fact is I can’t stand that noise all day, you know. It’s downright . . . piercing. People may complain.’
He lowered his voice at the end of the sentence, because he was struggling with an impulse to cry aloud ‘and it’s so awful about Mary. I can’t bear any beautiful thing because of Mary.’
‘Alternate hours,’ Mrs Wheeby said instantly.
‘What? . . . I beg your pardon?’
‘Alternate hours, Mr Davis. Eight to nine he sings; nine to ten he’s covered up; at eleven I uncover him, and at twelve under he goes again. Oh we shall soon get accustomed to it, Mr Davis. So long as people know where they are. It’s like when my sister Minnie was learning the piano. Ten to twelve, practice every morning. She was so fond of the loud pedal, nothing could cure her. But after twelve everybody could settle down. Well, I suppose my tea must be stone cold by now. Come along Dicky. Goodbye for the present, Mr Davis.’
Slowly, allowing the pants to emerge freely now, setting two small feet in bright slippers on every tread, up the stairs went Mrs Wheeby, carrying the cage, and Dicky’s song seemed to be wafting them upwards as they went.
I won’t have it, I simply won’t have it, Wilfred was thinki
ng as he went into the kitchen to make his own tea. If Pat were here – if Pat were alive – she would never have dared.
First Mary, now Mrs Wheeby. Taking advantage of Pat’s death.
Well, hadn’t they? Both of them.
He put cereal and milk, absently, into a bowl.
He was sitting at the table, staring unseeingly past the curtains at some large, yellow objects on stalks eight feet tall: the giant sunflowers that grew at the garden’s end, towering over the fence.
Oh Mary. Where are you?
The long day shone ahead, empty, yet brimming with the sensation that so many things were waiting to be done.
Two months ago, Sundays had seemed too short, what with gardening, and perhaps an hour or two at the decorating that had been going on in one of their eight rooms ever since he had retired five years ago; watching their favourite television programmes; sometimes (though not often because on Sundays the roads were too crowded with cars making for the sea) – sometimes a drive. And always the feeling of comfort and safety because Pat was there and Mary was upstairs in her room studying, or calling from the front door that she was just going round to Sandra’s for half an hour and would be back to tea.
He got up, unable to endure his memories and wandered over to the window and stood there, looking out, chewing on the sodden flakes.
Across the railway, there glimmered a line of dim grey; the old houses of Hardy Crescent that had been badly bombed in the war, when the Germans had been aiming at the railway line. They had grown more ruinous every year since, and were (as Wilfred knew, and he knew all the details too) a recurring subject of argument and suggestion at meetings of the council. Should the money be allocated to recondition the houses, or should they be pulled down and the land sold? It was always pointed out by someone, as the discussion continued and the councillors began to think of a waiting pint or television programme, that on one side they overlooked the town’s cemetery and on the other the railway. Not points to attract purchasers of land, even today.
The Yellow Houses Page 2