‘I’m afraid we’ve opened it already. Shall we bring it up?’
‘Who’s we?’
‘Jan and Frances and me. Dr Braddock says he’ll come back later. We’d love to come and join you for a bit if you’re sure you are up to it.’
‘Of course I am now they’re gone. I like that Frances Murray, don’t you? She’s a local girl, you know. Something about her I can’t remember … Helen, my memory is getting much worse.’ She reached out and caught Helen’s hand. ‘You won’t forget what you promised me, will you?’
‘I was mad to.’
‘But you did, bless you. You’ve no idea how much better it has made me feel. Safer. Being sure I can count on you. And I can, can’t I?’
‘If the worst comes to the worst …’
‘And I must be the judge of that. It’s my life, remember.’
‘But, Beatrice—’
‘You promised, don’t forget. It’s my lifeline, that promise.’ She smiled. ‘Deathline. When my mind goes.’
‘If it goes.’
‘It’s going. It’s been my mind a long time, Helen. I know its little ways. Paul used to say they could use my memory for the national archives. I knew his poetry better than he did. All gone now … lost … vanished …’
‘Do you exercise it?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Your memory. Make it work?’
‘What an odd idea. No, I suppose I don’t. What is there for it to work on, stuck up here all day?’
‘We’ll have to think of something. I thought I’d order us a newspaper when things open up again. Maybe I’ll examine you on the news every evening.’
‘Bossy, aren’t you?’ said Beatrice. ‘And now we have settled all that, where’s that champagne? Please invite the ladies downstairs to join me in my salon.’ Her smile lit up her face. ‘Fancy you getting a promise out of sad Hugh Braddock. I’d forgotten what a nice room this is. He says it’s time I got up, by the way.’
‘Good,’ said Helen. ‘I’ve been wondering about that. I’ll fetch the others, but mind you tell us the minute you begin to feel tired.’
‘I’ll probably fall asleep,’ said Beatrice cheerfully.
They had moved on from smoked salmon and champagne to chicken sandwiches and white wine by the time Dr Braddock arrived. ‘You’ve got some catching up to do.’ Helen thought he looked totally exhausted. ‘Champagne or white wine? We saved some smoked salmon for you.’
‘Later.’ He had moved straight to the bed. ‘You’re fine, I can see,’ he told Beatrice.
‘More than you are. Sit down, for God’s sake, before you fall down, and let them nourish you. When did you last eat?’
‘Can’t remember. At the hospital I think. Bit of a crisis there. Trolleys in all the corridors. The flu has started. The poor bloody health service is on the point of collapse again.’
‘And so are you, Hugh,’ said Frances Murray. ‘When do you come off duty?’
He looked at his watch. ‘Two hours ago. Champagne, thanks, but only one glass. I have to drive home presently.’
‘Nonsense,’ said Frances. ‘I’ll drive you.’
‘Kind, but I’ll need my car in case I’m called out.’
‘Then I’ll drive you in yours and walk back. It’s no distance by the lanes and I’ll enjoy it. Is your insurance still OK?’
‘Oh yes, comprehensive as you can get. That’s no problem.’ He reached out for a second chicken sandwich. ‘Do you know, I would be grateful, Frances. It’s been a bad day. No, I’ll switch to white wine now, thanks. And not too much of that or I’ll fall asleep where I sit.’ He turned to Helen. ‘I do apologize for being such poor company at your delicious meal. Just what I needed, God bless you. How did the signing go?’
‘I near as dammit had another stroke.’ Beatrice claimed his attention. ‘And all you talk about is being tired and hungry. Those terrible women wanted to read my will. If Frances hadn’t taken them away and Helen hadn’t helped me relax, I might have died.’
He drained his glass. ‘You’re a thoroughly unreasonable woman, Beatrice Tresikker. You’ve been saying for months that you want to die, and now look at you.’
‘Do,’ she said cordially. ‘I’m enjoying myself, aren’t I? Never thought I would again. Helen’s going to get us a newspaper and examine me on the contents every evening. And tomorrow I am going to get up and sit in a chair.’
‘Good,’ he said. ‘But tonight I think it is time you had a little quiet, and I went home. If you really don’t mind, Frances?’
‘Of course I don’t.’
‘But you’ll come back,’ Helen said to her. ‘And help us drink in the new year.’
‘I’d love to. Are you sure you’ve had enough to eat, Hugh?’
‘And to drink. Many thanks, Miss Westley, and sleep well, Mrs Tresikker. Where’s Miss Dobson?’
They found Jan waiting downstairs with a plastic bag in her hand. ‘Some spare sandwiches for you, Doctor, and a mince pie or two. Helen and I can’t possibly finish them.’
‘Ladies bountiful,’ he said. ‘I’d kiss all your hands if I was that kind of fellow, which I’m not.’
‘Good God, pretty speeches from you, Hugh!’ said Frances. ‘Come along home before you fall flat on your face.’ The door closed behind them.
‘They seem to know each other very well,’ said Jan.
‘Yes, don’t they? It’s odd, isn’t it, coming in to a place like this, knowing nothing about anyone. Come and give me a hand tidying things upstairs, Jan? Dr Braddock thinks it’s time we left Beatrice in peace.’
‘She’s had quite a day, hasn’t she?’
‘And stood up to it splendidly.’ She absolutely must not tell Jan about that rash promise she had made Beatrice Tresikker.
Half an hour later, Beatrice was comfortably settled in bed, with Bach playing on the compact disc player Jan had given her for Christmas. She had been scolded for it, but scolded so gratefully that it was better than thanks. ‘I shall fall asleep before it finishes,’ she told them cheerfully. ‘But the great advantage of it is it’ll turn itself off when it does. Not like the radio at all. Now you two go off and enjoy yourselves and give my love and thanks to Frances Murray when she comes back from her errand of mercy. Clever of you to find me a solicitor who is an old friend of my doctor, Helen.’
‘Yes, wasn’t it? Sleep well, I hope, and don’t let the New Year fireworks disturb you.’
‘I like hearing the bells,’ Beatrice said sleepily.
Frances got back soon after the other two had settled themselves with fruit and mince pies in front of the television to watch the millennium festivities sweep round the globe towards England. ‘You missed the Queen,’ Jan told her. ‘She looked bored rigid, poor woman.’
‘Well, the automatic pilot didn’t work,’ said Helen. ‘We all know how that feels. Did you get him safe home, Frances? Poor man, he did look tired.’
‘Yes. And that house of his is an absolute tip,’ said Frances. ‘I couldn’t bear it. Stayed for a bit to sort things for him. That housekeeper isn’t worth the paper she’s written on.’
‘Does she live in?’ Helen imagined some kind of confrontation.
‘Goodness, no. Lives with a daughter who works, and a dozen or so grandchildren, and when one of them is ill she stays home and lets Hugh starve. Good thing you thought of those sandwiches, Jan, they’ll help to see him through the weekend. That and the hospital canteen, but he says the food’s terrible there. Oh, look, they are waltzing in Vienna!’
‘Very stylish,’ said Jan. ‘How different from our own unfortunate Dome. But I mean to go and see it just the same.’
‘Oh, so do I,’ agreed Frances.
‘Not me,’ said Helen.
Eight
‘I’m going to get up today,’ Beatrice announced when Helen came to take away her breakfast tray next morning.
‘You’re sure you feel up to it? It was quite a day yesterday, what with one thing and another.’
> ‘Those Fanshaws! Did me good, actually. It gets boring, just lying and thinking about oneself. But I don’t think I’ll try and dress today. There’s a warm housecoat in the closet somewhere, or there was before you did all that tidying.’
‘Ungrateful brute.’ Helen went to the closet and produced a dark crimson robe. ‘Three-quarter length, I’m glad to see.’
‘Yes, I bought it with the stairs in mind. I’m reckoning to get to the loo by myself once I’m up. Easier from that chair.’ Helen and Jan had manhandled a high, straight-backed armchair up the stairs for her.
The telephone rang and Helen reached out to answer it, rather expecting a Happy New Year from Frances Murray. But it was her brother’s angry voice. ‘That you, Helen? It’s more than time I heard from that idiot daughter of mine. We’ve waited all week for an apology, her mother and I, and it’s making Marika ill. So if you will just be so good as to fetch her to the phone we can get things sorted out, once and for all.’
‘Happy New Year, Frank,’ said Helen.
‘I don’t know what’s supposed to be so happy about it, but the same to you, I suppose. How are you getting on with your mad old lady?’
‘Beautifully. She is sitting in a chair right beside me as I talk to you. I am afraid you will have to wait a bit, Frank, while I go downstairs and tell Jan you want to speak to her.’
‘Tell her I must. We’re not standing any more of her nonsense, Marika and I, and so you had better warn her. I trust there is another phone somewhere in the house so I can have a word with my own daughter without your mad old lady listening to every word we say. Oh, and Helen, before you go, I’ve got a buyer for the house, contents and all. Fixed the whole thing up over Christmas without benefit of estate agent. Quite a saving, I can tell you. So I’d thank you to clear your stuff out of your room asap. Oh, and that reminds me, you weren’t seriously meaning to go off with those two little bookcases, I trust?’
Helen took a deep breath. ‘Indeed I am, Frank. Our mother gave them to me for Christmas and my birthday one year. You must remember that.’
‘But she never meant you to take them out of the house! They are part of the furnishings of that room. And very nice little items too. My buyer particularly admired them, so I am afraid they are part of the deal now. Anyway, why in the world will you need bookcases now you are fixed up as some kind of carer in someone else’s house?’
‘Instead of being an unpaid one in our mother’s?’ She was almost too angry to speak. ‘I’m sorry, Frank, those two bookcases were about the only really nice things Mother ever gave me and I don’t mean to part with them. You will just have to find replacements for your buyer. And now I will go and find Jan for you, but do try and remember that she is over eighteen and her own mistress.’ As she laid down the phone on the bedside table she caught Beatrice’s amused eye.
‘Your charming brother, I take it?’
‘I’m afraid so. He wants to speak to Jan. Did you hear it all?’ She had moved away from the receiver.
‘He has a very carrying voice, your brother. Don’t you think perhaps you and Jan should drive up today and rescue your things before he does something you’ll regret?’
‘But what about you?’
‘I’ve been on my own before, remember. And it might not be a bad thing if you were there when Jan talked to her parents. Anyway, you’d better go and get her.’ With an expressive glance at the silent phone.
‘Father?’ Jan exclaimed. ‘Oh, hell.’
‘Better get it over with, don’t you think? Oh, and he wants me to take my things away. He’s sold the house. Beatrice suggests we drive up together. Today.’
‘Leave her alone?’
‘I don’t much like it either. But you’d better see what he says.’ She started back upstairs as Jan reluctantly picked up the phone in the front hall.
Beatrice was looking pleased with herself. ‘I got to the loo and back,’ she boasted. ‘No problem. I feel really better, Helen. Isn’t it ridiculous? Not what I meant at all! So, no reason why you two shouldn’t drive up to town today, face your gorgon and fetch away your things. I was thinking in the night that it was time we dealt with that turret room – or rather you did. I don’t suppose I’ll be climbing those stairs in the immediate future. So, if you’ll clear it out for me, then, fair’s fair, you store your stuff there. And Jan’s of course, what she doesn’t want to take to Durham with her. How big’s her car?’
‘Well, that’s part of the problem,’ said Helen. ‘It’s not her car, it’s her father’s, and he wants it back.’
‘Better still. You can hire a van that’s big enough to take the lot and make sure it comes with a willing driver who’ll help with the carrying. Those turret stairs are no joke.’
‘But, Beatrice, are you sure?’
‘Making a will concentrates the mind wonderfully, I find. Of course I’m sure. Time all those clothes went to the Salvation Army, and then you and I are going to go to work on Paul’s papers and see if we can’t put something together out of them. With what I’ve done already as a preface perhaps? Better that way, I think. There began to seem something a bit grumbling about what I’d done of A Final Account. And anyway, it will be a project for us for the wet rest of the winter. What’s the time, Helen?’
‘Half past ten.’ As she consulted the bedside clock she heard the downstairs receiver being put back.
‘Then you’d better be off as soon as you can. Just leave me some more of those delicious sandwiches and I’ll be fine.’
‘But we might not be back till late.’ It was only one of the many protests that were surging in Helen’s mind.
‘Then I’ll be hungry. But not for a whole week like last time. You’d better leave me some bananas too. Just in case.’ The telephone rang and Helen picked it up.
‘Happy New Year,’ said Frances. ‘I hope this isn’t too early for you. I do thank you for that happy evening.’
‘Wasn’t it nice?’ said Helen warmly. ‘And, actually, Frances, you are by way of being an answer to prayer. Jan and I need to nip up to London today to fetch away some stuff and we’d been wondering—’
‘About Mrs Tresikker. May I come and spend the day with her? Would she let me? Could she bear it? May I bring the lunch and my knitting? And a book, of course, for when she gets tired of me.’
Some busy arrangements later, Helen and Jan were on their way to London, to meet the hired van at the house. They had decided on a self-drive one in the end, and lucky to get it, they were told, and very expensive it was going to be. But Jan had insisted on paying. ‘My things as well as yours, Aunt Helen. You’re saving my life, you know. I just hope we don’t find Father at home.’
‘I think I left him with the impression that we weren’t able to get away until the afternoon.’
‘Bully for you. But I’m still not looking forward to it. If Mother cries, I’m done for.’
‘Oh, no, you’re not. If the worst comes to the worst, you’ll just have to go and sit in the van and let me handle it. Frances says they haven’t a legal leg to stand on.’
‘Isn’t she a godsend. I loved the way she turned up, Scrabble and all, and took over.’
‘Yes, a very capable woman.’ Helen was glad the conversation had changed to this smoother channel.
‘It must be a bit sad to come back to where you grew up and find so few old friends.’
‘And a couple of old enemies instead. I wonder what really went on.’
Back at the High House the same subject was under discussion. Beatrice had greeted Frances Murray with enthusiasm and a demand for a glass of sherry.
‘To drink in the new century. Not that it is really, in my view, till next year, but I’m sick of that old argument.’
Settled at last with her glass on a small convenient table with some of her favourite cashew nuts, she smiled at Frances. ‘Now put me out of my misery,’ she said, ‘and tell me why those dreadful Fanshaw women hate you so?’
‘Bad as that, do you think? Wasn
’t it awkward! I did wonder when I heard they were to be the witnesses, but there wasn’t much I could do about it. And I have to say I had no idea it had gone so deep with them. None of it any of their business, and it was so long ago.’
‘Yes, maybe. But remember you’ve been out in the world getting on with life, and they have been stuck here with not much to do, I suspect, and plenty of shared brooding time.’
‘I suppose so. I certainly hadn’t the slightest idea, or I think I really wouldn’t have come back. Craven but true.’
‘So what did you do to them that was so dreadful?’
Frances sipped sherry thoughtfully. ‘They always disliked me. They taught us all at school you know, Hugh Braddock and Sandra Jones, who married him, and me. Sandra was prime favourite, always, and made the most of it. She knew just how to handle them, and you can imagine how the rest of us felt about that. I suppose we gave her a pretty hard time really, but I still feel she deserved every bit of it. And then we left and went our various ways. Sandra had these wonderful A level results we were all so puzzled about, but something went wrong at her Cambridge interview and she ended up at Keele, what a surprise. Hugh and I both got to London, which was what we wanted, and we saw quite a bit of each other. Concerts and theatres and driving home together for the vacation because he had a beaten-up old car and we could just about fit all our stuff in.’ She paused and drank.
‘Don’t talk about it if you’d rather not.’
‘I believe I’d like to. I never have. He was my first, you see. I was so sure it was for keeps, just taking it slowly … Happy, friendly times … We both saw other people, but we always circled back to each other … I thought I knew him through and through.’
‘Such a mistake,’ said Beatrice. ‘What happened?’
‘Christmas of our last year, Sandra came home from Keele with a broken relationship and a new hairdo and decided she wanted Hugh. You never saw anything like it. Straight for him, all sex-guns blazing. You won’t believe it, but we hadn’t slept together yet.’
‘I see,’ said Beatrice. ‘So she got him?’
‘Hook, line and sinker. He went mad, poor man. It was sad to watch. It was heartbreaking. It broke my heart. That’s never going to happen to me again, Mrs Tresikker.’
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