Change of Season

by Anna Jacobs

  Another car drew up outside and someone pushed open the front door. ‘Ros! Where are you, Ros?’

  ‘That’s my husband,’ she told the police officers quietly, relief surging through her. For once Paul had put his family first. She found that comforting. If anything could be comforting on a day like this.

  ‘We’re in here!’ Jenny called, her voice breaking on the words.

  He stopped in the doorway and glared at Ros. ‘I told you not to call in the police till I got here! Do you never bloody think before you act?’

  It was Louise who got up and stood toe to toe with him. ‘Don’t you talk to Mum like that! We didn’t call the police in. They came to tell us that Tim’s body had been found in the car.’ Her voice wobbled for a minute, then she forced herself to continue. ‘He’s dead! So don’t start throwing your weight around because we don’t need any aggro from you today!’ Then she collapsed against her mother, sobbing wildly.

  Rosalind put her arms round Louise and watched her husband. He looked stunned. She was glad he was here, but she didn’t want to go to him, just wanted him to take charge. She continued to hold Louise and patted Jenny’s hand from time to time with her other hand.

  ‘Tim’s – dead?’ Paul’s voice was the merest scrape of sound.

  Rosalind nodded.

  Paul couldn’t move for a moment. Tim dead. His son. His only son. And the last time he’d seen him, they’d argued, shouted – said dreadful things to one another. He shuddered and tried not to think of that.

  The policeman seemed to materialise at his side. ‘Come and sit down, sir. You’ve had a bit of a shock.’

  Paul shook the hand off his arm and found his own way to a chair. ‘Tell me the details. I need to know.’

  So once again they described what had happened.

  He tried to focus on the police officer as he listened, but his eyes kept sliding back to Ros, sitting with a daughter on either side of her, weeping, being comforted. Why was no one trying to comfort him?

  The woman cleared her throat. ‘I’m sorry to do this to you, sir, but someone will have to come and identify the body.’

  Paul stared at her in horror. ‘But you’ve just told us he’s dead, so you must know already who he is. What good would it do for us to go and see him?’ And with a shock, he realised that for the first time in a lot of years he couldn’t do what was expected of him. He just – he simply couldn’t. ‘You shouldn’t even ask it of us, dammit.’

  Rosalind surprised them all by standing up. ‘I’ll go and identify the body, officer. I want to see my son.’ She had to, in order to accept that he was dead. Her boy. Her baby. Her agonised young man of the embroidery.

  Louise stood up. ‘I want to see him, too. I need to – to say goodbye.’

  Jenny shook her head in response to their questioning glances. ‘I’m sorry. I c-can’t face it.’

  ‘We’ll take you in the police car, Mrs Stevenson,’ the woman said quietly. ‘And bring you back afterwards. We’ll get your own car back to you as soon as possible.’

  ‘I’ll get the leasing company to change it,’ Paul said at once. ‘You won’t want to drive that one again.’

  Rosalind looked across at him. He sat down, shook his head blindly and put it in his hands without saying a word. He didn’t attempt to speak to her, let alone comfort her. And she found she had nothing to offer him, either.

  She looked at her younger daughter and put an arm round Louise’s shoulders, feeling Louise’s arm round her waist. Together they walked out of the house with the police officers.

  When they’d gone, Jenny scowled across at her father. ‘You couldn’t even help her do that, could you?’

  He glared at her. ‘You didn’t go with them, either.’

  ‘I’m not her husband. You are.’

  She went to phone Ned.

  Paul sat there and tried not to weep. He hadn’t wept since he was a small boy and it’d do no good now, no good at all. He kept seeing images of Tim, hearing faint echoes of their many quarrels – and wishing he’d seen him alive once more and made up the quarrel.

  In the end he went and poured himself a large whisky. It was the only comfort he could think of.

  By the time Rosalind got into the police car, the news was all over the village, because one of the Tuffins had found the body.

  Feeling upset about the dreadful news, Harry drove over to see Jonathon. Better if she told him about it so that he didn’t give himself away. She came straight to the point. ‘Have you heard?’

  He was working in the big formal dining room, sanding the floorboards in preparation for a new coat of stain. ‘Heard what?’

  ‘Heard about Rosalind’s son?’

  ‘Tim? No. What’s he done now?’

  ‘He hasn’t done anything. He’s dead. Drug overdose.’

  Jonathon stood up, turning white and leaning one hand against the nearest wall. ‘Dead?’ he whispered. ‘That poor lad’s dead?’

  ‘Yes. Alice Tuffin told me. Her eldest son found the body in the car park behind the pub. This morning. Just sitting in the car, she said. She thought I’d want to go and see Rosalind. But – well, I thought I’d better come and tell you first.’

  ‘Oh, hell and damnation! Hasn’t she enough to bear with that selfish brute of a husband? Does she have to bear this, too?’

  ‘Tim was twenty, that’s all. Twenty.’ Harry looked at her brother. ‘Got any gin?’

  ‘Yes.’ He escorted her through to the small sitting room he used in winter to conserve fuel. ‘Sit down. I’ll get us both a drink.’

  They sipped at gin and brandy respectively, sitting in silence. Once he got up to put some more wood on the fire. Once she opened her mouth as if to speak, then closed it again. Nothing you said made any difference at a time like this. She’d found that when her husband died, had often wished her kind friends would just go away and leave her to grieve in peace. But today she sat on in case Jonathon needed her.

  ‘What hurts,’ he said at last, ‘apart from the tragedy of a young life lost, is that I have no right to go and comfort her. And I can’t see that damned husband of hers being much use at a time like this. Can you?’

  ‘He’ll probably deal with the practical details very efficiently – which will spare her that trouble, at least,’ Harry said. ‘There are a lot of details to sort out when someone dies. I’ll call in on them tomorrow, if you like, then let you know how things are going.’

  He shook his head. ‘I’ll call myself.’ He had to make sure Rosalind was all right.

  ‘We’ll go together, then. It’ll look better, don’t you think?’

  He raised his eyes to stare at her. ‘You know, don’t you? How I feel about her, I mean?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Sticks out a mile. Well, to me it does. Pity she’s married. I like her, too. Bit soft for her own good, but nice. Heart’s in the right place.’

  But for once Harry was wrong. Paul Stevenson wasn’t dealing with anything efficiently. While he sat and waited for his wife to return, he drank a whisky quickly, then poured another one, drowning his grief in gulps of amber comfort.

  By the time the car turned into the drive, he was sitting in an owlish stupor and Jenny was fiddling around in the kitchen, trying to keep herself occupied while she waited for Ned to arrive. She went into the hall, expecting her mother and Louise to be in floods of tears, but they weren’t. They were very still and white. For the first time ever she saw a faint resemblance between them, something about the expressions on their faces.

  She took their coats, hesitated, then whispered, ‘Dad’s drunk. In the sitting room.’

  Rosalind looked in to see Paul slumped down in an armchair, snoring, a glass with an inch of whisky in it tilting dangerously in his hand. And was glad. She didn’t want to face him yet. Not about anything.

  ‘What shall we do?’ Jenny whispered.

  ‘Nothing. Leave him to sleep it off.’ She switched the living-room light off again, turned back into the hall, hesitated, th
en gave in to temptation. ‘I’m going out. I’ll take your Dad’s car.’

  ‘To see Jonathon?’ Jenny asked.

  Rosalind looked at her, startled.

  Jenny blushed and said in a very low voice, ‘I saw you kissing him at the fête.’

  ‘How long ago that seems now.’ It was important to set the record straight. ‘We’re not sleeping together, you know.’

  ‘You don’t need to tell me that. You wouldn’t.’

  But she’d wanted to, Rosalind thought. Heavens, she’d wanted much more than Jonathon’s kisses. Did that make her as guilty as Paul? Did it matter? Did anything matter now?

  At the door she turned. ‘If your father asks, would you mind saying you think I’ve gone to see Harry? If he wants his car, ring Harry and explain.’

  Jenny rushed forward to give her mother a hug, then watched her walk stiffly out of the house. Strange. She’d expected her mother to crumble, not her father. She went to sit with Louise in the kitchen and pick at a sandwich. ‘Ned’s coming over tonight.’

  ‘Good. I’m glad you’ve got him.’

  ‘What about you?’

  Louise looked at her blindly. ‘I’d actually prefer to be on my own.’

  She heard Ned arrive and go upstairs with Jenny, but sat on alone with her thoughts and memories. Tim had looked so peaceful in the morgue it had surprised her, almost as if he’d been ready to die. ‘Have you done anything to – um, make him look better?’ she’d asked the assistant as they all stood there in that chilly room, gleaming with stainless steel and smelling of antiseptic – and of something else she didn’t like to think about.

  ‘No. We haven’t touched his face at all. That’s how he looked when he was found.’

  At that moment Louise had been certain he was glad to be out of it and she even wondered if he’d done it on purpose, though she’d never say that to her mother, of course. He’d said a few times that he felt used up, exhausted. When she’d tried to talk about the future, he’d said he couldn’t see one for himself.

  But she had to carry on, and her future didn’t look very rosy, either. She had to face her pain at losing her brother and also sort out her own life. Probably that’d mean rows with her father.

  She wandered into the sitting room and stared down at him, taking the glass from his hand. He didn’t move and she didn’t try to rouse him.

  You’ve let her down, she thought. Mum needed you to be strong and you let her down. You should have gone with her today, then comforted her when she got back. I’m not going to be like you when I grow up.

  Tim was right. She still had a long way to go before she could consider herself mature. But she was sure of one thing: she was never, ever going to let anyone down again.

  And then it all overwhelmed her in a great black wave of sorrow. She had to run up to her bedroom and bury her face in her pillow so that her father wouldn’t be woken by her sobbing, so that her sister wouldn’t come in.

  Chapter Eighteen

  When someone hammered at the big front door of the manor and kept on hammering, calling his name, Jonathon ran along the hall and flung the door open. He drew Rosalind into his arms. ‘Oh, my love! My darling girl, come in!’

  He took her into the small parlour and sat down beside her, his arm round her shoulders. This wasn’t a time for large rooms and echoing spaces, but for the cosiness of the womb.

  As her grief eased a little, he poured them both a brandy, then they sat together quietly on the couch. When she looked at him, he said gently, ‘No need to talk unless you wish to, my love.’

  So she didn’t try to speak at first, not until she had drawn enough solace from his presence. She simply sat there pressed against him, feeling his arm light yet strong round her back and clasping her hands round the brandy goblet as she soaked up the peace of Destan Manor. Nobody could bring Tim back, but friends could share your grief, acknowledge that you had borne and loved a son, and that his passing was momentous enough for them to stop their own busy lives for a moment or two.

  She sipped the brandy from time to time and focused on small things to distract herself from the pain – the warmth of the liquid in her mouth and throat, the visual comfort of a wood fire flickering in the grate, the interesting textures in the worn fabric on the arm of the sofa. When at last she’d pulled enough of herself together, she started to tell him what had happened over the past few days – quietly, not weeping, because tears wouldn’t help. What did help was the warmth of this man’s body next to hers and his unspoken offer of anything he could give her. It helped so much.

  When she’d finished the tale, they sat on in the quietness of the night, the dog lying nearby, sighing from time to time as if in sympathy. Once Jonathon got up to refill their glasses, later he dozed against her, his head on her shoulder, his fine, thinning hair tickling her cheek. The occasional grey strand filled her with compassion for the way the years marked them all. You couldn’t go through life unscathed.

  She didn’t wake him because his presence was all she needed. She was deeply grateful he’d made no attempt to fill the night with meaningless chatter, but she couldn’t, she simply couldn’t sleep. Not yet. This wakeful night was, in some strange way, her special tribute to her son.

  Later still, Jonathon raised his head, blinked at her like a thin, nervous owl and said, ‘Sorry. Didn’t mean to fall asleep on you.’

  She smiled and stretched out one hand to brush the soft hair from his eyes. ‘What are you sorry for? You were there for me. That’s all I needed.’

  He caught that hand and raised it to his lips. ‘Always.’ But he didn’t labour the point. After a few minutes, he yawned. ‘It’s nearly morning. Do you want a coffee? I’ve got your favourite brand.’

  ‘I’d love one. And a piece of toast, perhaps?’ The thought that he’d bought the plunger and coffee specially for her, since he much preferred tea, made her feel loved. Of such details, she thought dreamily, were lives made. And relationships.

  So they walked through the creaking, shifting old house to the kitchen and made coffee and toast, sitting at a scrubbed wooden table just as the first fingers of brightness were tearing the mourning veils from the sky and signalling the end of her darkest night.

  Not until it was fully light did she leave. ‘Thank you,’ she told him, kissing his cheek and then fleetingly, impersonally, his lips. ‘I can think better now. I have to go back and – and deal with it all.’

  He could not help asking, ‘Are you – do you think you’ll stay with him?’

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t decide that now.’

  ‘No. Of course not. But – I do love you, Rosalind. And I want to be with you. Remember that, won’t you?’

  A fragile smile flickered briefly on her face. ‘I will. And I love you, too, Jonathon. Very much.’

  When Paul woke up, he couldn’t think where he was for a moment. He winced at the stiffness of his body and groaned when he moved his head incautiously. A hangover started to thump behind his forehead, circling his skull with a leaden band and drumming a message of pain whenever he moved. He swallowed and grimaced at the sour taste in his mouth. Hell, what had made him tie one on?

  Then he remembered.

  Tim was dead.

  He stood there, thumping his thighs with his clenched fists, until he had his damned emotions under control, then stumbled up the stairs to the master bedroom, stopping at the door in shock as he found it empty, the bed not even slept in. ‘Ros?’ He peered into the en suite but she wasn’t there. He went pounding back downstairs into the kitchen, the dining room, the conservatory. Not a sign of her.

  But there was a youngish man, a complete stranger, sleeping on the floor in the office. He mumbled in his sleep when the door opened, but didn’t wake up.

  Who the hell was he? Paul wondered as he closed the door quietly. The stranger looked familiar, but he couldn’t quite place him, and he definitely didn’t feel up to accosting the fellow and asking what he was doing there. Not till he’d had
a strong coffee and put some food into his rumbling stomach. He never thought well when he was hungry. Now he came to think of it, he hadn’t had any dinner last night. No wonder the drink had gone to his head.

  Back upstairs. One room was full of her embroidery. Bloody stuff! He picked up the frame and as he saw what she was doing, he froze and stared down at it. He had never thought her good before, but this – it was clever, there was no denying that. She’d caught him perfectly, shown him as he liked to think of himself, confident, in control of himself.

  She’d caught herself, too, with those damned pale colours – he was going to take her to a fashion consultant before they went to the States, smarten her up. His eyes slid over the image of Jenny and that bloody dog of hers, then he saw the sketch of Tim. A wave of anguish took him by surprise. Was that what Tim had become? That thin, haunted creature? He couldn’t bear to look at it, even.

  He tossed the frame down on the table, but it wasn’t enough. The sketch of Tim was still there, still looking up at him accusingly. With a growl of anger, he knocked everything on the table flying, then kicked the frame with its stretch of canvas out of the way. It went spinning across the room and he was glad to hear the wood crack.

  Where the hell was Rosalind? Tim’s room! he thought suddenly. She’ll be up there, mooning around. But there was no one in the attic. Tim’s things were lying scattered around as if he’d just stepped out and that made Paul gulp and back out. He could feel tears filling his eyes again. Hell, you’d think he could control himself better than this!

  He went and opened the front door and saw that his car was missing, which made him feel angry. He concentrated on the anger, which was better than the other emotion. What if she had an accident? Did no one in his family care about the liability of driving a car that wasn’t insured for them? And where had she gone anyway?

  He went back upstairs. Perhaps the girls would know.