But they’d been good together, really, she reflected now. They’d grown close and happy after that. She knew it couldn’t have been easy for him to go back to Power, cap in hand, begging, as Jack would have seen it, to be taken on again. But he’d swallowed his pride, insisting that Alice and the baby came first. She smiled to herself in the darkness now as she remembered what a doting father he’d been. There was none of the detachment she’d often seen in other men, who left all the child-rearing to their wives. Jack had been very modern in that sense, a father involved in everything to do with his children’s lives, a father who knew how to have fun. She felt a sudden sweep of sadness now for the little souls who hadn’t made it: Jack had been every bit as devastated as she was when three miscarriages followed, one relentlessly after the other, in the years following James’s birth. They had named those babies together, planted shrubs in their memory. Alice still thought about them, fleetingly, all the anguish finally assuaged by the birth of Elizabeth and the swift passage of years since then. That little girl had never known just how precious she was.
Alice pulled herself up onto one elbow and switched on her bedside lamp. She squinted at her watch. Three. She was hardly going to sleep now. Dawn would be breaking in another couple of hours. She might as well read. She pulled an old magazine from the top of her bedside locker. James had given her a book recently, some biography of Lady something or other that he’d said she’d enjoy. She hadn’t had the heart to tell him that she could retain nothing, not even a single thread of thought from one paragraph to the next. With any luck, the load of old nonsense they wrote in these magazines would soon make her nod off. She’d write to Beth and James in the morning. Now that she had clear, urgent ideas about what she wanted to say.
*
‘Everything all right, Keith?’
‘Yeah, fine. She’s hardly moved since you left. How was your meal?’
‘Fine,’ Beth and James said together, and grinned at each other.
‘You both look half-pissed,’ said Keith, bluntly.
James tugged at his beard and looked at his son, quizzically.
‘I wouldn’t pursue that line, if I were you. Not after last Friday night.’
Keith grinned. ‘Point taken.’
‘Now off you go home. Beth and I’ll take over.’
Each of them had taken up their position by the bed, automatically.
‘’Night, Dad. ’Night, Beth. See you tomorrow, then.’
‘ ’Night, Keith.’
Beth settled herself into the bo-bo-dee. The room gradually became quiet again. She was actually glad to be back: the restaurant had felt peculiarly artificial, detached somehow, as though real life were going on somewhere else. They had both been anxious to get home, back to where they belonged. She reached for Alice’s wrist, checking her pulse. The old woman’s breathing was still regular, steady. She noticed that June had changed the sheets, or perhaps James had done it, during Dr Crowley’s visit. She looked comfortable, safe, held in place securely by the neat blankets. Keith was right: the wine had gone straight to her head, and she could hardly keep her eyes open. But she didn’t want to miss anything, didn’t want not to be there in case her mother needed her . . . Suddenly, her head jerked forward and she realized that she had fallen asleep, just for an instant. She had had a nightmare flash of wet road, leaves swirling, a car hurtling into the solid darkness. Even her chin hurt again at the memory.
James was watching her.
‘Go to bed,’ he said, ‘even for a couple of hours. I’ll call you at three, I promise. Wine keeps me awake, and there’s no need for both of us to be here.’
‘Are you sure? I’m really sorry about this – I just feel suddenly wrecked. I think it’s the first time I’ve felt relaxed in a week.’
‘Positive. And don’t worry, I’ll definitely call you at three. I’m not into self-sacrifice any more.’
*
When James came in to call her, Beth was already awake. She pulled her dressing gown on over her pyjamas, conscious of the next letter buried deep in the towelling pocket.
‘She’s been a bit restless for the last hour or so,’ he said, ‘but I think she’s settled again. Call me if you even think you need me.’
He rubbed his eyes vigorously.
‘I will. Sleep tight.’
Beth kissed him lightly. His face was worried again, deep lines of anxiety creasing his forehead, pulling down the corners of his eyes. She wished that Olive would at least ring.
She tucked in Alice’s blankets, turned up the radiator a little and began lighting the night-lights she had dotted around the room. On their way to the restaurant, she and James had stopped off to buy a couple of little burners, and she filled them now from the jug on the dressing table, sprinkling oil of lavender across the water’s surface. Lavender was a soothing oil, the woman in the shop had told her, and Beth liked the way the scent immediately filled the room. It reminded her instantly of Granny Mac, who had always placed little pillows full of dried lavender into her clothes drawers, and hung them around her woollens in the wardrobe. It kept the moths away, she’d said. Better than camphor. It was a pleasing, old-fashioned smell.
Beth pushed the bedroom door closed, once she’d checked that James’s light had been switched off. She still felt guilty about this small subterfuge, but her hunger to read the next letter was almost overpowering. She held Alice’s hand for a moment, making sure she was warm enough. Then she eased the envelope open, her heart thudding.
‘Woodvale’
18th August 1999
Dearest Elizabeth,
This is getting to be quite a habit – and one I look forward to more and more. I can feel myself growing much closer to you, and I have a real need to fill in what I consider to be the ‘blanks’ between us. I feel very bright and alert this morning, which is rather strange, as I hardly slept at all last night. I’ve begun to notice that the early morning is my best time, and that things start to cloud over a bit by late afternoon.
I was reminded of something in the early hours of this morning, just before I fell asleep for a while. I know I slept, finally, because my lamp was still switched on at seven o’clock, although it was already bright outside. I don’t even remember closing my eyes.
I have been feeling sad recently that you, particularly, will have such few memories of your dad. At least James was of an age to understand, and to hold on to the moments which were important to him. But you were so young when Jack died that you have the right to feel more or less abandoned. And so, I’ve tried to gather together some memories for you. Of course, they won’t be yours at first, but maybe you can add them to the ones you’ve already got, and that way, they can become yours. Am I making sense? I’ve put aside a little bundle of photographs for you, at the top of your wardrobe, and one for James, too. I don’t have too many pictures of us together as a family, but those I’ve found, I’ve divided carefully between the two of you, and made notes on the back – that is, if I could remember anything significant to write.
I have one really clear picture in my mind of a time when the four of us were together, happy. You had just had your third birthday, and James would have been almost eight. Of course there were many other times, too, but this is the one I keep coming back to, or rather, that keeps coming back to me. You’ll find the photo of this day right at the top of your bundle – it has ‘Phoenix Park, May 1957’ written on the back.
We took the bus into town, and then the number 10 to the Park. You were really excited at being upstairs on the bus, and you chattered away to everyone around you. You took a real shine to the conductor, who gave you a blank roll from his ticket machine to play with. Have you any memory of playing buses with James for weeks afterwards, tearing a little scrap off the roll and handing him his ticket every time he ‘boarded’? Your bus was made out of two kitchen chairs lying on their sides on the floor. You used to sit between the legs, James in the same position behind you. Sometimes you played at being the
driver and sometimes the conductor.
Occasionally, you were both at the same time – but you were never the passenger. That ticket-roll never left your sticky little hands, not even for a moment! Your dad really enjoyed your chatter and your games – he couldn’t get enough of you.
What you won’t be able to see from the photo is the colour of the jumpers that all three of you are wearing that day. They were bright red, and my first attempt at serious knitting. I’d always been good at sewing and mending, but I’d never really tried to knit before that. Your dad had found several hanks of wool stored in a box in the attic when he went up to fix the roof – his mother, the granny you never knew, had been a marvellous knitter: Aran sweaters, Fairisle, the most complicated patterns – nothing was too hard for her. Anyway, that winter, Jack and I spent several evenings by the fire in the sitting room, winding those hanks into balls so that I could start using them. He was very patient – he would sit for hours on end with the wool stretched between his arms, moving them up and down, up and down, so that I could wind the yarn more easily.
Eventually, I had more than enough for two jumpers. In fact, I had more than enough for three, but I knitted your dad’s one secretly, when he was working late, and I used one of the patterns that had belonged to his mother. He was very touched by that.
I finished all three jumpers in time for the visit to the Phoenix Park. I was delighted that you took to yours immediately. If ever you took a turn against something, there was no way on this earth I could get you to wear it. But you loved this little jumper, and I felt very proud of my first knitted creation. If you look carefully, you’ll see the three little wooden buttons I used at the neck – you were intrigued by those buttons: you even used to suck the top one until you were told to stop!
Our day out was in May, and mind you, it was still quite cold. I was glad we’d wrapped you both up warmly. You spent most of that day up on your dad’s shoulders, surveying the world. It was a Sunday, so there were plenty of people to look at, and most, like ourselves, had brought a picnic.
But first, we brought you to see the deer. You were enthralled – I think it was the first time we had ever seen you so quiet. Your dad took you by the hand and you both walked very slowly, very quietly, up to where the deer were grazing. James and I followed in your footsteps. We could see the deer’s huge dark eyes rolling from time to time – they were very nervous creatures. But you were great: you did nothing to frighten them. You did exactly as your dad did, and eventually, you were both standing almost eye to eye with this huge, shivering, brown and white animal with enormous antlers.
I could hear what your dad was saying, and he told me afterwards that your eyes had been like saucers.
‘This is Rudolph,’ he said softly, ‘Santa’s favourite deer. The reason his nose isn’t red any more is because he’s in Ireland now, and it’s not as cold here as it is in the North Pole. This is Rudolph’s holiday – he’ll be going back to Santa soon to help him get ready for next Christmas. Do you want to tell him what you’d like Santa to bring you?’
You did. You nodded your head very slowly. Your dad said you whispered something, never taking your eyes off the deer, which had stopped grazing at that instant and turned to look at you, before moving off to rejoin the rest of the herd.
‘Big Teddy,’ was what he’d heard you say, and you never changed your mind, you never forgot – you held on to that wish for the rest of the year. I was fascinated – both your dad and I were. You were only three, but you never wavered for an instant. You told us, several times that winter, what Santa was going to bring you, and of course, you were right!
You were very quiet for the rest of the morning, and you kept looking over your shoulder for ‘Rudolph’. Eventually, you seemed to forget about it, and you and James played on the grass together all afternoon. We’d brought the little tartan rug from your bedroom with us, and we all sat on it for our picnic. We didn’t bring you to the Zoo that day, because it was too expensive, but we did rise to two ice-cream cones with chocolate flakes: weren’t they called ‘99’s? and you each seemed to be happy with that. Your dad and I had great fun with you for weeks afterwards, wondering how ‘Rudolph’ was getting on – we built a whole fantasy life for him. Anyway, it was lovely for us to be able to make your dream come true at Christmas: I’ve never seen a Teddy showered with such love. And, if you’re interested, ‘Dolph’ is wrapped up in tissue paper behind the box of photographs. Take him home with you – he may be a rather ancient bear, slightly the worse for wear, and for having had his right ear sucked, but I’d like to think of you taking a piece of that day back with you.
I think you slept on the bus on the way home – you were adorable, sticky with ice cream, grubby from playing in the grass and completely and perfectly innocent. That was a magical day.
It feels that the years since then have gone by in a flash – and I always see you and James as you were then. They’re precious years – think about Laura as a toddler, and how protective you felt towards her. That’s how I felt about you. And close, as though you were still part of me. I’ve always found it hard to let go. But I’ve loved you just as much as a teenager and as a grown woman – the problem is, I only seem to be good at showing it with small children. Still, all of this writing is helping – I feel that in some strange way, you are already listening to me, and there’s great comfort in that. I know I’m running out of time, and I don’t want to leave anger and guilt behind me – I know how destructive that can be.
I think if your dad had lived, I might have found being a mother easier. As it was, it was often terribly difficult being on my own with two children. He adored both of you, you were his life. You, in particular, he had a special feeling for – I’ve seen it with other fathers and daughters. He didn’t love you more, or less, than James, that’s not what I mean – it was just a different sort of love. He’d have been very proud of you and Laura, just as I am.
That night, after the visit to the Phoenix Park, we put both you and James into the bath together, and the pair of you squealed and splashed for well over an hour. James was always such a serious little boy, but with you, at times like that, he was free and funny and silly. We had to take you out when your fingers looked like prunes. We ran downstairs with you – you in my arms, James in your dad’s – and dried you by the fire. I remember that you each got a story – you loved The Ugly Duckling, and I’ve forgotten for the moment what James’s one was – some ‘Biggles’ adventure, I think. Your dad used to read you The Ugly Duckling over and over again, and you would never let him skip even one word. You knew the whole thing by heart – you even knew when it was time to turn the pages.
I’ve often thought it was quite an appropriate story, too – now don’t get cross. You were rather a gawky teenager, but you turned into such a lovely young woman. You’re still lovely. I wish you peace of mind to go with it.
Now that that day isn’t pulling at my memory any longer, I’m sure that lots of other times will come flooding back – this is what is happening to me now every night, usually just before I sleep. I’ve decided to leave a notebook and pen beside the bed now, so that I can make a note of the things I want to talk to you and James about. I know that there is so much to say, and I have so little time.
All my love,
Alice.
Almost at once, Beth could see the day her mother was writing about. The deer, the Phoenix Park, the picnic on the grass – these were all details etched deeply into the glass of her memory. Or had Alice’s letter just made it seem that way? Maybe her mother was right: maybe she was just adding the details of this day to all the others stored in her memory-bank. It didn’t matter; either way, she had now reclaimed that day, and it was hers for good. She could see the scene unfold before her mind’s eye, could feel herself almost becoming that three-year-old again. Her eyes filled over and over as she imagined the four of them, as distant and remote as the inhabitants of some foreign country.
She reached for
Alice’s hand once more, and began to speak to her, gradually raising her voice from a whisper to the tone of a normal conversation. Why not? Who was to say that her mother couldn’t hear her? It was much more comforting to think of her as a seeing, hearing, sentient being, even if illness had made a prisoner of her will to respond.
‘I do remember that red jumper, Alice: I absolutely loved it. And you’re right, the little toggle buttons used to fascinate me. I remember when I was older, holding the hanks of yarn for you too, and grumbling that it made my arms tired!’
Beth noticed how dry and flaky her mother’s hands had become. Still talking, she stood and walked over to the dressing table, looking for the tube of cream that Alice had always kept there.
‘Was I really only three when I got Dolph for Christmas? It’s funny, I can remember that really vividly, too. I have the impression of being just about the same size as the teddy bear, and he had a glorious red ribbon around his neck. Which I took off, of course, because I wanted to wear it in my hair.’
She began to massage the old hands gently, exerting pressure from time to time, varying the rhythm. Her mother had always taken very good care of her hands. Even now, there were the traces of clear polish on the neat, rounded fingernails.
‘I know you were trying to give me back my dad in this letter, but I have lots of good memories of him, stored away somewhere safe. What I really want . . .’
Walled Garden Page 17