‘In the end we were, but we hadn’t been close over the years. I was only just beginning to understand what made her tick. Now she’s gone I’m desperately sorry we didn’t make the effort to smooth over our differences sooner. She was a complicated woman, but very interesting. There were so many of my own memories I wanted to share with her, but I left it too late. It was unfair of me to blame May for Charles’s manipulative ways, but he was the sort of man who could and did cause a lot of damage and get away with it.’
‘Was there something in particular that wound you up so much?’
Emily can just hear Andy reading a story to Tamsin now, his voice rising and falling as he does all the funny voices. She wants to creep closer and listen but Julia is speaking again now.
‘Yes, there was, but I should have made time to talk to May more. She was so isolated when she came to live down here on Memory Lane.’
Julia’s eyes are wet, and Emily reaches for her hand, still thinking about the long stand-off between the two charismatic older ladies.
‘You shouldn’t feel bad about it, Gran. Maybe you didn’t have anything to say to each other at the time?’
‘No, you could be right. But there are things I wish I’d discussed with her. She was so … instinctive. She understood a lot more than she let on. And I let what happened with Charles colour how I felt about May.’
Emily waits. Is Gran finally going to come clean about why she froze May out for so long?
‘It was Will, you see. He was so fragile, both in body and mind. And when I caught Charles …’
‘Go on, you might as well tell me now. I think you need to, don’t you?’
Julia twists her hands together. ‘Charles had got Will backed up against the graveyard wall. If Will hadn’t cried out, I’d never have looked, but I saw them, and they saw me. Charles had his hands on Will’s chest and he was just starting to unbutton his shirt.’
‘But … what was Will doing about it? Was he pushing him away?’
‘No, but he looked at me with such confusion on his face. His eyes were all glittery and excited but he seemed ashamed at the same time. I think Will had never dared to do anything like that before. He wanted it to happen, but he was disgusted with himself for how he felt, if you know what I mean? I was so angry with Charles for forcing his hand.’
‘What did you do?’
‘Well, you see – that’s the thing, Emily. I did nothing. I was so shocked I just rushed away. When I got home, I planned to talk to Will when he got back for tea. But he never did.’
‘What?’
‘Oh, don’t look so tragic. Nothing bad happened to him. He just left without a word. He sent a message with Elsie later to say he’d been invited to a party and he’d be very late. He came back after we’d gone to bed, packed, and we later found out that he hitch-hiked all the way back home. Don was horrified.’
‘But didn’t you say something the next time he visited?’
‘I was going to, but I was away visiting my mother when Will came again. She was very ill … dying in fact. He didn’t stay long, and it was soon after that he joined the priesthood and went to Ireland. It was around the time that Charles drowned, but I missed all that. I stayed with my mother for over a month until she passed away. Afterwards, I planned to have it out with Charles, but of course it was too late by then.’
Emily is stunned by all this. If only Gran had talked this over with May. And now even that’s not possible.
‘You’ll miss May very much,’ she says eventually.
‘I will, and so will Tristram.’ Julia’s looking more like herself again now, and Emily thinks it must have been a huge relief to get those memories off her chest at last.
‘It seems so awful that although everyone in the village seems to have quite liked May, nobody cares enough to weep and wail,’ she says. ‘There should be some of that after a death, surely? Howling and keening? Well, maybe not so extreme in this case but at least a few tears. Or are we just too buttoned up in Britain?’
Julia thinks about this, frowning slightly. ‘I see your point,’ she says, finally. ‘But May was her own woman. She sometimes seemed a bit bored with her life but I don’t think she was unhappy, even if she was sometimes lonely. Perhaps no one knew her well enough to feel the sort of raw grief that comes with close bereavements.’
‘Like you felt after Grandpa died?’ Emily doesn’t usually like to bring up those awful first days when her gran cried constantly and was unable to eat or sleep.
‘Well, yes. Don and I were partners. We did pretty much everything together. We made each other laugh, argued about lots of things, but not seriously, and we talked all the time; it was such fun being married to him. Drinking tea in bed, with him reading snippets from the newspaper out to me, and me filling him in on the village gossip.’
‘That sounds wonderful.’
‘Yes, but the silence afterwards was hideous, especially in the mornings. I missed having someone to start the day with – to run through everything that was planned and so on. And the weekends seemed endless. May and Charles were never like that.’
Andy walks back into the long pause that follows Julia’s words. Both women look sombre, clutching their now-empty glasses as if they’re lifelines.
‘I think I’d better open another bottle,’ he says. ‘It looks like it’s going to be a long night.’
Chapter Forty-Three
Later that night, when Julia and Emily are rather blearily making macaroni cheese to cancel out the wine, they hear footsteps coming down the side of the house and Tristram’s voice calling, ‘Are you at home, ladies?’
He comes into the kitchen, sniffing rapturously. ‘That smells wonderful. We’ve been eating leftovers all day to make our hangovers better but I could use something hot.’
‘There’s plenty. I’m just going to put the dish in the oven to brown. It’s good to see you,’ says Julia. ‘It’s been a difficult day.’
They sit around the table and quietness descends. It’s very peaceful, and Emily’s eyelids begin to droop.
‘Hey, don’t fall asleep on me. I didn’t just come round to cadge food, I’m here to tell you something important, Emily,’ Tristram says, leaning forward.
‘Do you want me to go somewhere else? Is this private?’ Julia’s half standing now, but Emily raises a hand.
‘There can’t be anything Tris wants to say that you can’t hear, can there, Gran? We haven’t got secrets from each other any more, have we?’
Tristram smiles. ‘Right. Well, I don’t know if I told you that May asked me to call in and see her, not so long ago?’
‘Yes, I remember.’
‘Well, amongst other things, May told me in confidence she’d decided to make a new will. She was planning to write it herself because it was very straightforward and she wanted me to post it to her solicitor, Trevor Marshall. He’s in Mengillan. She’d written it all out ready.’
‘Wow. This is like a mystery story. Carry on, I can’t wait to hear what she wrote.’
‘Well, at the last minute she changed her mind and rang Trevor to come to her to draft the will. She was worried it wasn’t going to be legal, and he’d got the copy of her old one at his office so she was mad keen to let him know this one superseded it. She wanted me to be her executor and we asked Vi to be the second witness.’
‘But what was it all about? Why did she need a new one so suddenly?’
‘May was sometimes impulsive but she’d really mulled this idea over, and I think she had a feeling she hadn’t got long left with us. Anyway, Trev’s going to ring you soon to make an appointment but May said that if anything was to happen to her, I was to be the one to talk to you first to prepare you.’
‘Talk to me? But why?’
Tristram smiles at Emily, his eyes very kind. ‘Because, my lovely girl, May has left her cottage and a considerable lump sum of money to you.’
The silence following this bombshell seems to stretch indefinitely. Emily and Julia
stare at Tristram. ‘So that was what you were getting at when you dragged me out of the party to tell me about your future plans?’ Emily finally blurts out.
‘Yes. I couldn’t give you details or tell you why you might be involved in them too because I had no idea how long May would be with us. I hoped it would be ages yet,’ he says sadly.
‘What’s all this about?’ Julia asks, but Tristram won’t be drawn. ‘It’s not the time for that yet,’ he says. ‘Let’s get the practicalities out of the way, and then we three are going to need to have a very big chat. Now, I’m starving. Did someone say macaroni cheese? We need to eat before Trevor gets on the case.’
Sure enough, only minutes after Tristram has eaten a hasty bowl of pasta and left them alone, Trevor rings.
‘He’s sorry to ring so late in the day but he wants to see you tomorrow morning, if possible,’ whispers Julia with her hand over the receiver. ‘What shall I say?’
‘Tell him the earlier the better. This is so weird. I want to know all the details so that I might begin to believe it. Can May really have left me everything? Why ever would she?’
The next day, Trevor arrives almost before breakfast is cleared away, carrying a battered leather briefcase and a bunch of yellow roses.
‘I brought these for both of you. They’re from my garden,’ he says shyly, handing them over. ‘I always used to bring some for Mrs Rosevere. She liked them because they’ve got a proper scent. The yellow ones were her favourites.’
‘May did love flowers that had a fragrance,’ says Julia. ‘And so do I. I’ll need to organise something a bit special for the top of her coffin. I’ll do them myself and we can all contribute something from our own places. The ferns and other foliage in May’s garden will be good for filling it out, and there’s some beautiful lavender.’
‘Do we know when the funeral is yet?’ asks Trevor.
‘Monday of next week. It’s all been sorted fairly quickly. The Methodist minister was free and there was a slot at the crematorium. May didn’t mind if we used the church or the chapel, according to Tristram. There’s nobody else to wait for – no family – so Tristram’s helping us plan it. He’s got the instructions that May left.’
Emily sits through all this small talk with growing impatience. When will he get to the point of his visit? Then she notices that he’s casting sideways glances at Julia, who spots this at the same time.
‘I’ll leave you two alone to go over the paperwork,’ she says. ‘Call when you’re ready for a cup of tea.’
Trevor smiles at her gratefully and sits down at the table, moving a heap of letters to one side. ‘I see you brought all these back from across the road,’ he says. ‘Mrs Rosevere told me how interesting they were.’
‘Oh, yes, they’re interesting all right. Andy carried them over for us. I’m hoping we can use them in some constructive way. It’d be such a shame to waste them.’ Julia’s on her way out now and closes the kitchen door behind her.
Emily grins at the solicitor. ‘I think she means she now wants me to write a book using the letters as a jumping-off point. Subtlety isn’t Gran’s strong point.’
‘Will you do it?’
‘I’m certainly going to consider the idea. There’s a mystery hidden in there. A missing piece of jewellery. Gran would really love to have it.’
‘Hmm. Intriguing.’
There’s a silence as Trevor peers into his case. Then he pulls out two long envelopes. ‘Both of these concern you, Miss Lovell,’ he says, ‘but I think I’ll just give you the first one to read for yourself.’
‘Could you call me Emily, do you think? Miss Lovell always sounds like an ancient spinster in tweeds.’ She takes the envelope and looks down at the neat copperplate handwriting. Her name is on the front, but nothing else. She opens it and draws out the letter.
My dear Emily,
By the time you read this, I’ll have found out if all that religious malarkey is true or not. If it is, I’ll either be on a cloud wearing a nice pair of wings or down below, somewhere much hotter. If there’s no truth in it, who knows what’s happened to me? Anyway, that’s not important.
What I want to talk about, Emily, is what happens next to YOU. Over the years when you’ve visited Pengelly I’ve watched you grow into a lovely young woman with a very kind heart and it’s been my great pleasure to know you. These days, getting onto the property ladder is nigh on impossible, what with rising costs, shortage of suitable housing and all the rest of it, and I haven’t got any family to pass my house to. So my idea of giving you a leg up, as it were, is to give you a few more life choices.
I would love it if you decided to live in my little cottage, at least for a while, but I’m not making any silly conditions. You can do with it what you will. The building and its contents can be kept, sold or given away, as you wish.
Consider carefully who you share the house with, if anyone. You can be free now, hopefully much less tied down by mortgage and money worries (unless you’ve been silly enough to get yourself into debt already).
I wish you a very happy life, dear, and a lot of love, whichever way you choose to find it. Take care of my friend Julia – she has become very precious to me in a short time, although we’ve known each other for years. Also keep an eye on the lovely Andy and Tamsin, if you would. You could do worse … but I mustn’t interfere.
Your gran’s letters are going to be a very significant part of your life, I think. There’s a book to be written in there somewhere. I know she’s thought of tackling it herself but I think it makes more sense if you did it? A family feud, sisterly love, a sense of history … a missing link … do it, Emily.
Goodbye and good luck. Oh, and could you take charge of poor old Fossil for me, too? He’s not long for this world and he smells a bit, but he’s a good soul in his way.
Much love,
May Rosevere
Emily finishes reading May’s letter and looks over at Trevor, who’s got up to stand by the window overlooking the bay. His hands are in his pockets.
Emily clears her throat. ‘What a random, generous thing to do, isn’t it?’ she says, blinking hard. She doesn’t want to cry in front of the solicitor – he’d probably self-destruct with embarrassment.
‘Generous, yes, but not random at all – Mrs Rosevere knew exactly what she was doing. And for the record, I think she was quite right.’
He blushes furiously and is suddenly very interested in a magpie perched on Julia’s birdbath. Emily follows his gaze. One for sorrow, she thinks. Well, there’s plenty of that at the moment. She takes a deep breath and gets herself under control. ‘And the will?’ she says.
Trevor turns round and comes back to the table. ‘It’s very simple. The cottage and the legacy of cash go to you. There’s been money set aside for her funeral – that’s already lodged with the undertaker at the top of the hill. She’s added a separate sheet with her instructions for the service and cremation. She did consider burial but there were no plots available in the churchyard. I know Tristram has a copy of all this, too.’
‘She’s thought of everything. It seems incredible. And all her worldly goods to me?’
Trevor collects a few stray papers together busily and doesn’t reply.
‘And I can’t even say thank you,’ Emily continues.
‘It’s not for me to comment really, but I’d like to say that the best way to thank Mrs Rosevere is to enjoy her gift to the full.’
‘Oh, I will. I really will.’
‘Do you think you’ll want to live in the property? It’s a fine little cottage, with some of the best views in the village.’
Emily leans back in her chair, more peaceful than she’s felt for a very long time. To live in May’s cottage and eventually produce a book? Can she do it? She’ll have a place to call her own, where she can write to her heart’s content, if she chooses to do so. If she decides that this is the right plan, she must make sure she lives like May lived: independent at heart, even if she does find a par
tner to share things with; brave and full of humour when things don’t go to plan. Emily thinks of May and her wonderful legacy with a surge of gratitude that takes her breath away.
‘It seems like an option, at least for now,’ she says. ‘And later … who can tell?’
Chapter Forty-Four
The next few days seem to drag endlessly. The day before May’s funeral, Emily asks Julia if she will come over to the cottage with her, just to help her to get a feel for the fact that it’s Emily’s now. They stand in the kitchen and look around, feeling like interlopers.
‘There are so many treasures here,’ says Julia. ‘It’ll be hard to know where to start when you begin to sort everything out. Look at those old tins on the shelf, for instance. They must be collectors’ items now.’
Emily remembers the Bovril tin and its bizarre contents. She reaches for the canister that used to hold Cornish fairings, prises off the lid and tips out the contents onto the table. Julia gasps.
‘What’s all this rubbish?’ she says, running her fingers through the small heap. There’s a hairclip with a tattered flower attached, a pair of silver cufflinks, an ancient lipstick, a tiny photograph of the Queen in a gilt frame and some silver sugar tongs.
‘I knew she’d taken those tongs,’ exclaims Julia, picking them out and holding them up to the light, ‘but why all these other things?’
‘I have absolutely no idea, and actually, I don’t want to know,’ says Emily. ‘Let’s go home.’
The sun breaks through the clouds as the two of them go back across the lane and Emily takes that as a good omen for the next day’s ordeal, but May’s final goodbye takes place on the wettest day of the summer so far. The rain has been bucketing down since before dawn. Small rivulets of water are gaining strength as they pour down Memory Lane, joining forces as they go. Julia’s conservatory has sprung a leak again and her begonias have all but been washed away. The clouds are low and heavy, and there’s no way Julia and Emily will be able to walk up to the chapel without ending up looking like drowned rats.
59 Memory Lane Page 27