Mosaic

by Caro Ramsay

  I smiled at her. ‘You are very good to us, Debs.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I am making myself useful. And while you are here, I need to know who to expect for dinner tonight. He told me last night, then again this morning. Then earlier he apologized for not knowing. I don’t think he remembered telling me. Can you find out? I need to know who to cater for.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ I did a mental count. ‘Six for dinner.’ I counted, ‘Me, Dad, Jago, Heather plus his parents, his brother and his wife. Eight. Get the caterers in, I’ll say we talked about it and decided. Salmon for starters? Chicken? Strawberries, cream. Something like that.’

  ‘We could tell him anything and he’d believe it, he’s so stressed out at the moment. And while we are being honest’ – she pulled out a pan, burned at the bottom in a black flower – ‘your dad left this on last night, he’d been warming milk. You wouldn’t have heard the alarm. Luckily, I was still here, I was just putting the rubbish out when you … when we ran into each other. Do you think your dad is coping with all this?’

  ‘He’s very distracted,’ I said, not wanting to think of the alternative.

  Deborah, like her daughter, was more direct. ‘I hope that’s all it is, Megan.’ She turned her head away from the door, I looked round, hearing the noise. Debs looked at me and rolled her eyes slightly as she swiftly turned away. Heather appeared at the door, saw me, then her eyes flicked to Debs, a quick scatter over the plaster and the bruises but they were smiling by the time they were looking back at me.

  ‘Oh, there you are, Megan darling.’ She slipped her arms round me.

  Debs was busy spooning the coffee into my Snoopy mug.

  ‘We were making a brew, do you want some?’

  ‘I think I will wait until your father is off the phone. How are you bearing up? Did you sleep well?’

  Was that a loaded question? What had my dad said? I didn’t answer. ‘I was up during the night punching Deborah in the face so I do need something to keep me awake.’

  She gave a wittery little laugh, not sure if I was being serious.

  ‘I was sleepwalking,’ I explained.

  ‘And I got in the way,’ said Deborah.

  ‘Oh, you should never try to stop them, that can be very dangerous.’

  ‘I didn’t try to stop her, we both got a fright.’

  ‘Are you feeling OK, Megan?’

  ‘It was Deborah who got punched.’

  ‘Yes, but you are the one under the strain. And you do need to start eating properly.’

  I wanted to tell her that anorexia is not catching.

  ‘Deborah, maybe you could make sure that Megan has enough to eat. Ivan is very stressed, so Megan, please eat and make sure he sees you eating.’ She turned. ‘And Deborah, I think the minister is coming today and they plan to have tea in the study, so you could see to that, if you’d be so kind. And obviously the study needs a good clean, it’s a terrible mess, and keep the door closed so the bloody dogs don’t keep getting in. And you left this in the morning room.’ She paused, putting a bottle of Gray Goose on the table, her brown eyes creased, making the chin of her heart-shaped face even more pointed. Her eyes darted over the mess on the side of Deborah’s head. ‘And could you cover that a little more, it looks bad. We don’t want to scare the horses.’

  Deborah and I waited until we heard the efficient click of her heels fade into the drawing room before we burst out laughing.

  Upstairs, through the bedroom and onto the veranda I saw Dad was still down on the terrace, on the mobile, running his free hand through his hair, standing facing the sun. He looked older. Worse than that. He looked old. Worn out. Fading and failing. He was still a tall, strong man, long-legged, handsome-faced but older. I had been away, time had passed. He seemed to have aged about twenty years since Christmas when I had met him in Glasgow and we had shopped in Princes Square and gone out for lunch, soaking wet and laden down with parcels for … Melissa.

  Bloody Melissa, she’d kill us all in the end.

  How much of this forgetfulness was stress, how much was the start of something?

  I watched him for another quarter of an hour, until Heather joined him, reaching up to place her tiny hands on his broad shoulders, high heels sinking into the grass. She looked like a dwarf trying to be seen in very long grass.

  I felt a sharp tap on my arm, Debs letting me know she was there.

  ‘It’s OK, I have my aids in.’

  ‘Sorry, I’m never sure. Well, I’ve put your clean clothes on your bed, I can put them away if you—’

  ‘No, thanks, leave them …’ I hadn’t taken my eyes off the action on the terrace, Deborah followed the direction of my stare. Dad ended his call.

  ‘Just leave him be, kiddo, he has no idea what’s happening in his life at the moment.’ Deborah put her arms round me and gave me a hug, I could smell the nicotine from her. ‘And don’t bother about my face, I’ve been hit by better people that you. It was nothing.’

  I hugged her back, nice to feel the warmth of another human being. Suddenly I was close to tears. The scent of Deborah was very like that of her daughter. Memories came back, of the boat and the splintering of wood and the flames. I shivered, pulling away before my eyes welled up.

  Heather now had her little hands clasped round my dad’s arm.

  ‘She drinks too much vodka that one. Her and your dad had a bit of a session last night. Doesn’t do him any good.’

  ‘You don’t like her, do you?’

  ‘Heather? No, I don’t. She wants the dogs out the study, out the house, off the estate, blah blah … The study! She thinks when she’s in this house she’s in a bloody Agatha Christie novel.’

  ‘Maybe she grew up playing Cluedo.’

  We both stood up and leaned on the stone balustrade, watching the couple below. ‘What happened to her husbands anyway?’ asked Debs.

  ‘One left. One died.’

  ‘Of boredom?’

  ‘Probably. I think she has been through a few husbands, not all of them her own.’

  ‘If she marries your dad, I’ll be out on my ear pronto.’

  ‘Dad’s still married to Mum.’

  ‘Do you think that will stop her?’

  ‘Mum will be back.’

  ‘I hope you are right, kiddo, for both our sakes. But in the great scheme of things, it’s not looking likely, you need to face that.’

  ‘No, I’m not going to face it, she’s coming back.’ I nodded. ‘She’ll be back.’

  ‘Megan,’ her voice was soft. ‘Have you ever thought that she might not be able to come back? Why would she leave all this? I mean it’s paradise here.’

  ‘It’s a gilded cage. She escaped.’ Then I processed what she had said. ‘What do you mean, she might not be able to come back?’

  She shrugs, not able to voice what was going through her head. ‘Something might have happened to her, the police …’

  ‘The police were here at the time.’ I point out the window. ‘They didn’t look for her because she took her passport, left her wedding ring, took a photograph of me and Melissa but not one of Dad. She left the necklace, she left …’ And then I started to cry.

  ‘Here, have a ciggie?’ Debs had a very straightforward way of coping.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  She dug about in the back pocket of her jeans, lit up two cigarettes with her faithful DuPont lighter, and handed me one. We puffed, wafting the smoke above our heads so Dad didn’t a get scent of it. He didn’t approve of women smoking in public.

  ‘Forget what I said, you are right. Your mum planned her …’

  ‘Escape.’

  ‘I can’t imagine how she felt. Carla died here and I go down to the mosaic sometimes, have a think and a wee greet. At times I was awful to her. But we live and learn. But you watch her.’ Deb pointed the cigarette at Heather. ‘I bet a few women have set their cap at your dad over the years.’ A worried little scowl drifted across her face. ‘I know what he is going through, he’s a
dad who has lost his daughter. There’s the same age gap between you and Melissa, Paul and Carla. It’s a constant reminder.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be sorry, kiddo, it keeps them alive for me, in my head. Do you remember the explosion?’

  ‘In bits, I know I was on the ground, covering my ears. I remember the noise. It was like bring punched in the stomach.’

  ‘The police grilled me and Tom, yet Melissa and Jago just drove away. They didn’t seem to want to interview any of you posh lot, only us. But I did remember Heather there, she was smoking down at the boathouse that day. Funny how these things come back. One person’s loss brings back the memories of another.’ She closed her eyes, remembering something, the crow’s feet at the side of her eyelids deepened, as she drew hard on her cigarette, as if her life depended on it. ‘I look round and I think who got the better of it all, Tom went to jail, you lost a friend and a sister, Ivan lost a wife and a daughter. I lost a daughter. Heather seems to stroll through it all. Your mum told me that. Heather is the only one that comes out of this smelling of sugar, and usually that means the stink of shite is not far behind.’

  TEN

  Carla

  Looking back, I have witnessed bits of the madness in Megan. We were down at the Benbrae, I was larking about. I slipped into the water and thought about swimming to the deep, far side of the pond. Megan had said there was a current down there, like there can be a current in a pond like this. She had talked about the wind and the trees. A load of crap. I was swimming, expecting her to follow. It was to be an adventure. We usually came off the Curlew at the island and made our way to the side furthest from the house, and skinny dip from there. I crawled over, to the deep bit, bobbing about in the water, it was cold and coloured, my hands under the surface were peat brown, like I had a really good tan. I turned and called to Megan who was sitting on the top of the wall, her long brown legs dangling, eyes wide open staring into the darkness at the far end of the pond. I splashed to get her attention, shouting and shouting. She was deaf, but she wasn’t blind. I guessed there was something wrong and I started a slow steady crawl back, thinking that Megan was frightened. She had frozen. Megan had an angry, terrified look on her face, the same face you see in a frightened dog before it either cowers away or rips your face off. She was distant, yet intent, her eyes narrowed, seeing movement across the water, listening to a sound she could only hear in her own head and whatever she thought she heard had traumatized her.

  But when I got there and tugged her leg, she jerked out of whatever trance she had been in and slid into the water to join me.

  Looking back, I know now that she’d been gazing over at the Tentor Wood, it was the first place I had hidden when I had broken in over the fence of the Italian House. Thank God I didn’t know then what I know now, or I would have been scared shitless. I had even seen the rope.

  She’s going to go down to the Benbrae today, I know her so well. She’s confused about the injury to Deborah, her dad’s sanity and the meal with Jago tonight.

  Megan thought Jago was an arse; if he was not the cause of Melissa’s illness, then he certainly didn’t do much to help her. With him it was more a case of when the going got tough the tough buggered off to pastures new without so much as a backward glance.

  The same way her mum did, hung around to get Melissa married, saw Megan through school, then was off. Or, maybe, she saw the way the wind was blowing with Megan’s mental health and saw a future of babysitting daughter number two.

  Maybe I shouldn't have shagged Jago the day before he married Melissa, him being her fiancé and me being technically underage, but some things have to be done and Megan and I had a twenty-pound bet on it. Then she trumped me by shagging him actually on his wedding day.

  There was a lot going on the day before the wedding. Now, on the day before the funeral, there is nothing to do. And that made the day long and heavy. Megan is preparing herself to be told things that are hard to hear, in both senses of the phrase.

  Before the wedding, like now, there had been solid weeks of sun, the grass was dry and brittle under foot and the roses were growing strong. There had been a bit of a breeze in the earlier hours of the morning. Megan had escaped down to the Benbrae after her tea, or dinner as they called it. I had met her there with some Buckfast and a packet of Embassy. We had a drink and a laugh, paddling in the Benbrae, looking at the dark brown petticoat of the surface, the rose petals floating on the top. We both slipped into the water, putting our heads under, linking arms and laughing. The water was biting cold, we started splashing, and then fell into each other’s arms. We lifted each other up. Megan leaned forward, her dark hair framing her lovely face, the huge brown eyes, her white cotton blouse was sodden and draped off her shoulder. She looked like a winsome gypsy. Then she smirked and leaned forward, whispering in to my ear.

  Stifling a laugh, I kissed her, long and hard, my hands clasped to the side of her face. When we broke off, we both turned to wave at Jago, standing at the fence watching us.

  Megan turned her back and looked at him seductively over her shoulder, pulling down the top of her blouse even further.

  I waved him over.

  And he came.

  Simple as that.

  So I guess this dinner is going to be interesting, they can’t dodge each other for ever. Christmases, they keep apart, and birthdays, they keep apart. Megan shagged the groom on his wedding day, and now they are meeting at the funeral of the bride who might have found out. Has it crossed Megan’s mind that Melissa might have been asking a question? Now there’s a thing. Sorry? As in, are you sorry now? Are you sorry for what you did to me?

  To which I would answer, well you married a man with a taste for underage girls, but nobody ever asked me.

  Melissa developed her anorexia rather late in life, or did it just not show itself until later? After she was married, after her career hit the big time, after the explosion at the wedding, after her sister slept with her husband, after she discovered what a tosser he really was. I guess Melissa had a lot to be angry about.

  Or feel guilty about.

  I guess that depends if Jago confessed to Melissa or not? Sorry dear, I shagged both the bridesmaids, one before the ceremony and one after. She certainly didn’t go nuts so I, we, had always presumed not, until the inquest and the rumour mill started turning. My dad did time for the ‘fatal incident’ with some trumped-up charge like he was guilty because he didn’t have a fucking crystal ball to see into the future, like he should have known a firework would come flying through the sky and land on a container of petrol that somebody else had removed from the boathouse and left open. I don’t think anybody believed that pish.

  It was deliberate, there was a chain of ‘inflammable vapour’ from the boathouse to the Curlew, the alcohol, they said, was already swilling in the bottom of the boat. I thought some drunken bugger had spilled it, I didn’t see the danger. None of us did, apart from the brilliant mind who set it up.

  Somebody lit the touch paper, somebody set Megan and I up that night, hoping for us both to be burned to a crisp. Melissa was unusually quiet, no big tantrums that evening. Was she planning something in her own wee mind? I’m not saying she tried to kill us but she was removed from the scene immediately afterwards. The might of the bank accounts of the Melvicks went round her to protect her from the full force of the law.

  Was that what had eaten away at her?

  Is that why we are burying her now?

  Well, you know what, Melissa?

  If I was you, I’d call it quits.

  Megan

  There are people at the house, but not the one I am looking for, every knock, every phone call I think it will be Mum.

  Dad came racing out the study, pointing to the phone and ranting about something. He was throwing his arms about, his face right up against mine. I had never seen Dad like that and something in the back of my head started to laugh at the state of him.

  Then it seemed to da
wn on him, he took a step back, Debs was standing there. I could lip-read what she said, telling Dad I didn’t have my hearing aids in, that I couldn’t hear the phone. That was why I walked past it rather than answer it.

  My dad went pale, and apologized. Debs and I exchanged a glance. She mouthed that she’d keep an eye on him. I said I’d put my hearing aids in and get the phone next time.

  And went upstairs, to sit at the window and watch the gates. Jago, his parents, other family that Melissa had left behind. It was weird that I had no intention of leaving. It hadn’t even crossed my mind. There was a beguiling sense of sanctuary here, away from the bustle of the city, the demands of work, as demanding as working in a private library for a friend of your dad’s can be. I earned my pay. I was good at my job. I have a precise mind. I was a good archiver, a good researcher, and I could concentrate when the place was noisy. A distinct advantage of being deaf.

  But now I can’t trust myself to sleep. The bloody doctor will be coming soon, the period of experimentation with no medication has failed, the bruises on Debs’ face are evidence of that. I know I will be put back on the drugs, the mirtazapine valium cocktail which sends me back to the tiredness and the fuzzy heads. My performance at work will stutter and Dad’s friend will ‘let me go’ until I am well.

  Then I will be truly trapped.

  In the evening, they were having pre-dinner gin and tonic. In need of fresh air, I was out with Molly, loose sandals on my feet, strolling around thinking about what happened to Debs. It was what it was. So I thought about the walk. The inner perimeter of the estate from the end of the Long Drive to the east, up round the back of the house to the open woods where the eagles and ospreys could be seen high in the sky, as the rooks fought it out for the lower branches. Then across the fields at the back, then down to the house and on the small path beyond the field, saying hello to Lorimer and Marple, then walking on down to the boathouse. Beyond that to the far end of the Benbrae. The path here was bumpier underfoot than I remembered it being.