‘Deal,’ she said, and had the fun of seeing his surprise.
‘Really?’ he asked.
‘Really. Now, let’s see if I’m still capable of getting my own breakfast.’
*
That had been one of the easier days, made possible, she suspected, by the long rest the night before. Other times during the first couple of weeks had made her cry with vexation and disappointment that the simplest, most everyday tasks were no longer within her grasp. But this morning she felt refreshed and optimistic. She woke early, and rehearsed her routine before she got out of bed. Breakfast, Mass, walk to the shops for bread and milk, rest. James would come at lunchtime today, and every day until term started. There was something else, too, something she wanted to do on her own: the sheets needed changing, that was it. It would be a good test, good therapy for her, to see how long this familiar job took, now that she was feeling strong again. She was looking forward to the challenge: she must never give up, must not turn her face to the wall.
Full of purpose now, she padded out in bare feet to the hot-press on the landing. She chose the warm winter sheets, blue flannelette with an all-over pattern of little pink sprigged flowers. She felt awkward as she reached up to the second shelf, surprised that she needed her left arm so much – she’d thought it would have been more of a silent partner. It was strange to miss it. Dragging the old sheets off her bed made her pause for breath several times. Her left arm seemed to increase in uselessness just when she needed it most. Once she had the mattress stripped, she had to lie down for several minutes, waiting for her heartbeat to return to normal. She could barely face the rest of the task on her own. She’d have to ask for help to smooth the new sheets into place, to plump up the pillows. But pride suddenly gave her strength. Bit by bit, she eased the clean sheets on to the bed, leaving the tucking-in part until later. The whole thing had taken her almost two hours; she was exhausted by it and she knew she should stop. It would be reasonable to ask for help with the blankets, they were heavy at the best of times. Alice felt that the more competent she appeared, the less likely James would be to tell Beth. And she wasn’t ready for Beth, not just yet. There were too many things she had to tidy up in her own head, first. She had so much to do, and so little energy available to her. And now, there was no question of her leaving the house today. She’d missed Mass, anyway, and was much too tired to think of shopping. She was going to have to consider her limitations, instead, and how she was going to cope with them.
Downstairs in the silent kitchen, she made herself a promise. If asking for help was the ironic price of holding on to her independence for as long as possible, then so be it. It was astonishing to think of all that she had been able to do, even up to a couple of weeks ago, but that way madness lay. This was the new normal, this failing physical strength was what she had to get used to. As long as she could hold on to her self, then it didn’t really matter if she could make up her bed on her own or not.
The doorbell rang suddenly and Alice jumped. Now who could that be? She made her way to the front door, unable to make out the figure standing in her porch. She opened the door cautiously.
‘Mrs McGrath!’ she said in surprise.
Her neighbour was standing there, a small bunch of delicious-smelling freesias in one hand, a brown-paper bag in the other. She was smiling a little nervously, as though she didn’t quite know what to expect.
‘Mrs Keating – I hope I’m not disturbing you. I didn’t see you out this morning, and I was concerned. I was speaking to James the other day, and he said you were feeling a little better.’
She spoke in a rush: Alice could see that she was embarrassed, that she didn’t quite know the etiquette of this new situation. How on earth did you explain to your neighbour that you’d thought she was dead, but were now quite pleased to see her standing in her hallway?
‘Please, come in.’ Alice held the door wide open. It suddenly amused her to think that this woman had been her neighbour for over fifty years, and yet neither of them had ever crossed the other’s threshold before now. She had always regarded Mrs McGrath as nosey, and she had learned over the years that Mrs McGrath had always thought of her as uppity. They had spoken from time to time when the children were young, but each of them had chosen to keep her distance from the other. Now Alice was genuinely grateful to her – without Mrs McGrath’s sharp eye a few weeks ago, she, Alice, could have wandered around the house on her own, ill and lonely, for an awful lot longer than she had. Now that they were both nearly eighty, ‘nosey’ and ‘uppity’ were hardly such mortal sins any more. There were much more important things to worry about.
Mrs McGrath hesitated to come inside: fifty years of formality would have to be overcome in a single step. It was quite a jump.
‘I’ve got the kettle on,’ offered Alice, and that seemed to do the trick. More tea, her neighbour’s warm brown scones, and Alice’s genuine effort to be welcoming made the rest of the morning disappear. Mrs McGrath only got up to leave when she heard James’s key in the front door.
‘Don’t forget, now,’ she said. ‘You know I go to ten Mass every morning, like yourself. If you don’t feel like going out, just give me a ring. I’ll be glad to pick up whatever you want at the shops.’
‘Thank you,’ said Alice, touched by her simple kindness. She felt suddenly warm and cared for: tea with Mrs McGrath, lunch with James and then Gemma this afternoon, once school was over. This was a rhythm she could get used to. It was life at a very different pace, to be sure, but life none the less. If this was as bad as it got, she could learn to be content.
*
‘Gran?’
‘In here, love.’
Alice was sitting in her favourite armchair, with the tartan rug tucked around her. She was having increasing difficulty in keeping her feet and hands warm. James had lit the fire before he left, the late-September afternoon grown damp and chill. And no matter what he did, this old house continued to be draughty. Pulling the heavy curtains helped, but Alice liked to postpone that for as long as possible. She didn’t like shutting out the natural daylight before she had to; besides, the green sweep of the grass soothed her, and she liked the orange and red frenzy of the swirling leaves.
Gemma burst into the room, breathless, trailing her usual cloud of energy with her. She knelt at once beside Alice’s chair.
‘How’re you today, Gran – good?’
‘All the better for seeing you,’ Alice replied, kissing the young cheek made cold and ruddy by the sudden east wind.
‘I’d better be careful, then – that’s what Little Red Riding Hood’s granny said – and she turned out to be a wolf!’
Alice laughed.
‘Haven’t you seen what big teeth I’ve got?’
Gemma threw her school coat onto the other fireside chair, and sat on the rug, spreading her hands towards the blaze.
‘Cuppa?’ she asked.
‘No thanks, not yet. There’s something I want to do upstairs, and I need your help. I’d like us to do it now, before we get distracted by anything else.’
Alice had made careful note of this task, sitting at Beth’s little desk upstairs. She was ticking off her list, night after night, making sure each item on it was completed in the right order. She wanted to leave no loose ends for others to tidy up, wanted no quarrels or dissension after she died.
Gemma scrambled to her feet.
‘Okay – let’s go.’
Arm in arm they went upstairs to her bedroom. Alice was a little breathless when she reached the top, and had a moment of confusion when she felt Elizabeth’s hand on her arm, and had been about to turn to her daughter in surprise. Just then, Gemma spoke, and the spell was broken.
‘Here we are.’
‘Sit down on the bed there,’ said Alice, and went over to her dressing table. She opened the jewellery box that James had given her, and pulled out three pieces wrapped in tissue-paper. She sat down beside Gemma, and took her granddaughter’s hand.
&nb
sp; ‘I want you to choose one of these pieces of jewellery for yourself . . .’
Alice got no further with her speech. Gemma suddenly erupted into tears, and drew her hands quickly away from Alice’s.
‘No! I know just what you’re doing and I don’t want to! I don’t want you to die! You’re the only one I can really talk to!’
It seemed for an instant that she would get up off the bed and run for the door, but instead, she flung her arms around her grandmother’s neck and sobbed. Alice held her close until the storm of tears had abated. They had been close these last few years, with Gemma coming to her more and more as Olive put increasing pressure on her only daughter to be different, to be other than she was. Alice was old enough to appreciate the irony.
‘Sweetheart, I hope to be around for a long time yet,’ Alice lied, ‘but my memory isn’t what it used to be. I really want you to have something precious that once belonged to me – I can’t do that if you won’t help me.’
Gemma wiped her eyes with the backs of her hands. Alice smiled at the gesture. It reminded her so much of Beth on the rare occasions when she had cried – she used to make the same angry gesture, furious at herself for her tears, for showing weakness in the face of the enemy.
‘I just want you to put your name on it, so that I can be happy, knowing it’s gone to the right person. Once you’ve chosen, I’m going to put it away – the other pieces are for Laura and your mother.’
Alice unwrapped the delicate paper. Gemma watched, fascinated despite herself.
‘These are very old pieces – they belonged to your grandad’s mother, so they’ve been around for well over a hundred years. I don’t know what they’re worth, but that’s not the point. They’re of huge sentimental value to me, and I want you to have the one you like best.’
Alice stroked her granddaughter’s hair, and watched as the young eyes filled again. She was such a little softie that Alice felt a sudden stab of anxiety for her. She hoped that life would treat her kindly.
‘Can you tell me something about where they came from?’ said Gemma, gesturing to the pieces on the bedspread. Alice unwrapped the first tissue-paper parcel, a gold locket on a heavy chain. She’d polished it recently until it gleamed. She pressed the little catch and the locket sprang open, revealing two tiny photographs of a dark-haired man and a fragile, pretty woman.
‘These are your great-grandparents, on the Keating side, John and Margaret. They were married in 1918, just after the First World War. He’d been a soldier in the British Army, and apparently he’d never talk about his experiences. Your grandad Jack always believed he’d died young because of what had happened to him in France. He’d been with . . . let me see, I have it written down here somewhere . . . yes. He’d been part of the Dublin Fusiliers, the sixteenth Irish Division. They’d fought at the Somme and at Messines. Your grandad Jack said it had been an absolute massacre. His father was not the same man when he came back from France. I think that James has done a lot of research on this period – you should ask him.’
Gemma’s eyes were wide, fascinated.
‘I will . . . He has talked about it, but I never realized . . . I mean, this makes it all seem so much closer.’
Alice smiled. She could remember exactly the same expression on James’s face, probably thirty-five years before, when he’d come across old photographs and a campaign medal belonging to his grandfather. She’d liked the thought of another link forged between the generations. She’d been pleased then at James’s obvious interest, and she was pleased again now. Something else for him and Gemma to enjoy; another thread of shared history to pull them closer together. Perhaps it would be something to hold on to amidst the wreckage of their own family, which Alice knew was fast approaching. She continued.
‘Anyway, John Keating had a farm near ours in County Meath, his family’s land, and his family had lived and worked there for donkey’s years. But something happened to him and he had to give it up – Jack said his father had got so the silence of the countryside unnerved him completely. Now this was several years later, long after the War, but poor John kept waiting for explosions – even walking the fields terrified him; so they sold up and moved to Dublin. They were lovely people; Margaret was a pet. I was very fond of both of them.
‘I cut these pictures out of a copy I had made of an old wedding photo of theirs, so that you could see what they looked like. They were both only in their mid-fifties when they died. Margaret died first, of a heart attack, and then John, only six months later. He just gave up living without her.’
Alice paused, surprised at the strong feelings she’d stirred up, talking like this to Gemma. She remembered the awful yawning emptiness after Jack died, in a senseless repetition of his own parents’ untimely deaths. She wondered how long she, Alice, would have lasted if Beth and James hadn’t dragged her back to life again, hadn’t demanded that she put them first.
‘It was a pity that neither of them lived to see their grandchildren – I’ve been so much luckier.’
Gemma managed a smile. She picked up the next piece.
‘And this?’
It was a tiny solitaire.
‘That’s Margaret’s engagement ring. She had very small hands, as you can see.’
‘Were they happy, her and John?’
‘Yes, I think so – when he got ill, I think things were very hard, but yes, they’d been happy together.’
‘And you and Grandad, were you happy?’
Gemma was twirling the ring around, her eyes fixed on it. Alice thought she knew where these questions were coming from. She’d have to be very careful with what she said.
‘Yes, we were. Not every minute of every day, you can’t be happy like that, not all the time. And every marriage has its ups and downs, some years are better than others. But yes, I loved him, and I am glad I married him.’
Gemma nodded.
‘Did you fight over money?’
‘Yes,’ said Alice honestly, ‘we did, particularly at first. Your grandad was a hopeless case when it came to managing money, and in the early days we were often hard up. He’d give it away to anyone who asked him, without realizing that there wasn’t enough to go round. It’s not a happy way to be.’
‘But when you did have enough, did you still fight?’ Gemma persisted.
Alice could feel herself begin to sweat. This couldn’t wait for another letter – she’d have to find some way, soon, to tell James of his daughter’s distress.
‘I don’t remember ever having enough – but don’t forget your grandad died very young. I had to struggle along on very little money on my own.’
It wasn’t an answer, and it probably wasn’t even completely honest, but it was the best Alice felt she could do, for now.
‘And this?’
Gemma had picked up the third piece, a simple gold bangle, most of the engraving worn away by time. But still visible on the inside, were the words ‘Margaret from John, 10th March 1920’.
‘That’s a gift from John to your great-grandmother, to mark your grandad Jack’s birth. He was an only child, you know. There were no brothers and sisters.’
Gemma nodded.
‘They’re all beautiful. But I really like the locket best – I like feeling part of their story.’
Alice smiled. She had hoped that Gemma would say that.
‘Maybe you might get round to tracing the Keating family history, one day. Now that you know some of the background.’
‘Can you do that?’ Gemma asked in surprise. ‘I’d love to do something like that.’
Alice wrapped the three pieces and put them back in her jewellery box. As soon as Gemma went, she’d make sure to put the locket in a little box, with her name on it. It wouldn’t be right to do it in front of her. The child seemed to be upset enough, as it was. Maybe she wouldn’t give a piece to Olive, after all. She’d been right; that woman was causing trouble, more trouble than she might be able to handle.
She turned to her granddaughte
r, and smiled at her.
‘Let’s see if we can find any more photographs to help the new family historian. The Genealogy Office will help you do the rest. What about that, and a cup of tea?’
*
She was exhausted after Gemma left. This business with James and Olive was obviously very serious. How was she going to broach the subject without James going all stiff and silent on her?
She closed her eyes. She really couldn’t think about it any more. She was much too tired. She’d just snooze by the fire for a little while, and then go up to bed. She hadn’t the energy to tackle the stairs just yet.
*
Alice had no idea where she was when she woke. There was a bright pool of light by her right elbow, and she turned her head in that direction. Her cup and saucer were there, on the little table, lit by the gleam of the small lamp. Relieved, she sat up and looked around her. The familiar pieces of furniture in the sitting room arranged themselves in the shadows while she waited for her eyes to focus more clearly. She must have fallen asleep downstairs, then. Was it daytime, or night-time? The fire was out, and the room had grown chilly.
She glanced at her watch. Four o’clock. Cautiously, she took the rug off her knees and folded it over the back of the chair. Picking her way carefully across to the window, she pulled the velvet curtain open, just a chink. Darkness. It was still night, then. That fitted. Then she remembered: she had sat down after Gemma left, promising to go to bed straight away. Never mind, no harm done. She obviously hadn’t gone wandering, and she was still in one piece. There were no gaps, either – she’d been simply asleep, so all her time was accounted for. It was like having an unruly child in the house again: it was exhausting, keeping track of what her mind might make her do at any moment, when she wasn’t looking. She’d take a hot-water bottle up to bed with her now; her hands and feet felt completely numb.
While she stood in the kitchen, waiting for the kettle to boil, she noticed that the tradescantia on the far window-sill was looking droopy: when had it been watered last? Immediately, she pulled the little yellow block of paper towards her and wrote, with difficulty, her fingers still stiff: Water plants. This she stuck beside the other messages on the tiles. She walked to the far end of the kitchen and took the plant pot off the ledge. She noticed how light it felt: it was obviously suffering badly from drought.
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