Jacob plays the offended innocent and retreats to his domain on the other side of the yew hedge. Martha watches him depart and tells Spark—again—that she mustn’t worry about Jacob. He’ll soon get used to having her here at Stowney House. Spark smiles and nods, but doubts that she will ever get used to Jacob.
Spark accompanies Martha to the orchard to feed Bontemps. Inside his wire enclosure, Spark watches the tortoise lower his ancient head into the bowl. He opens wide his jaw and clamps it shut again on the beetroot. It’s a hit-and-miss affair. The purplish-red juice stains his wrinkled face. Martha pats his head. “You’re fond of beetroot, aren’t you, old fellow?”
Spark scratches his wizened neck, something he seems to like. “Martha,” she asks, “do you know when John is coming back?”
“Oh, John will be back before you know it.”
“What does he do exactly? He works for an educational charity, doesn’t he?”
Martha reflects for a moment before answering. “John talks to important people. When they have a problem, he listens. And he always knows what to say. You can rely on him to give the long and the short of it, the he and the she of it. Oh, John’s held in high regard, I assure you, and in the very best circles.”
Yes, but what does he actually do? Spark wants to say, but decides against it. She has a feeling Martha doesn’t really know. “Aren’t you tempted to get a cell phone—so you can keep in touch with him? You can get an okay signal a couple of hundred yards up the lane. It must get tricky never knowing where he is.”
“You’re a funny girl,” says Martha, black eyes twinkling. “I don’t need to know what John is doing every minute of every day! Where would we be if we all knew each other’s business from dawn to dusk? A person would go mad!”
Returning through the orchard, something brushes against Spark’s legs. “Hello,” she says, and bends over to stroke a small tabby cat. The cat pointedly ignores her and brushes itself, instead, against Martha’s legs.
“Shoo!” says Martha, clapping her hands. “Shoo!” Spark—like the cat—can see that Martha means it. The cat dives under the yew hedge.
“Don’t you like cats?”
“It’s a stray. John likes it, so I tolerate it for his sake. She’s a mouser. Or supposed to be.”
“The cat seems to like you.”
Martha shrugs. “Cats have bad associations.”
Spark looks at her askance. “I don’t understand—”
Her remark seems to have irritated Martha. “Ah, you do. People don’t trust them. They say they’re witches’ accomplices, and hang them by their tails from maypoles.”
Spark is horrified: “You’ve seen people do that?”
“Haven’t you?”
“Not in Mansfield, I haven’t!”
“When I was younger I lived in Paris. Once I saw . . .”
“What?”
“I shouldn’t say. It’ll only upset you—”
“I’ll imagine something worse, if you don’t tell me!”
Martha shrugs. “Well, our quarter of the city was home to a lot of printers. And they all had apprentices. They were forever disgruntled. Though when they complained that their bosses treated their pet cats better than them, it wasn’t so far from the truth. Anyway, one night the apprentices decided to make their point. They staged a mock trial with a judge and a jury. Only they didn’t try their bosses, they tried their cats—for all the world as if the wretched creatures were responsible for their woes—”
“But why?”
“People do wicked things—and senseless things. No doubt because they felt sinned against. And, of course, the cats couldn’t fight back—”
“I thought most people loved cats—”
“Well, I’m only telling you what happened. It was a long time ago. Times change. Naturally they found them guilty.”
Martha puts on a spurt as they walk back to the house. Spark has to jog to catch her up. “What happened to them?”
“Ah, you can guess. I saw them the next morning strung out in a long row. It’s not something you forget in a hurry.”
Spark feels sick and has no idea what to say.
“You see. I shouldn’t have told you,” says Martha. “Though there’s no point pretending there isn’t any ugliness in the world.”
* * *
It’s Saturday. The archive room, cool even during the heat of the day, already feels like Spark’s territory. She has imposed her own sense of order on it, and she has taken it upon herself to reshelve the journals closest to a wall that (just like their partition wall at home) shows signs of rising damp. She should probably mention this to John Stone, as he doesn’t strike her as being the kind of person to be interested in house maintenance.
She picks up another journal from the pile and carefully brushes the dust from its leather binding, taking special care with musty paper edges and the embossed numerals on the spine. Spark mostly avoids opening them, but with the red journals she sometimes risks it. Unlike the blue ones, they’re illustrated. This one contains a drawing of a magnificent horse’s head, with flaring nostrils and wild eyes rimmed with white. She carefully closes the browning pages and stacks the journal on the growing finished pile.
Spark’s mind begins to wander. It occurs to her that she has managed to survive at Stowney House for nearly a week. And Ludo will have spent his first night in Mansfield. She hopes her postcard arrived in time. The thought of Ludo emerging from sleep between her floral sheets brings a slow smile to her face. She pictures his long legs sprawled across her mattress, his feet hanging over the edge of the bed. When John Stone gets back she’ll tell him she’d like to go home next weekend.
Martha calls to her from the hall: “Have you got a moment to give me a hand?”
Spark, who had promised to help take the washing in earlier, says she’ll come right away. Confirming all Spark’s fears, Martha washes by hand, bent over a huge copper tub of steaming soap suds. The wringer is not decorative. Spark turned the handle this morning (as her shoulder muscles now testify) and afterward helped hang up the smalls. They draped the sheets over a long, low hedge, which Jacob keeps pruned for the purpose.
The sun has shone down all morning so the laundry is already bone-dry. They talk as they take it down, sorting it into piles on the sun-warmed lawn. Martha enquires how Spark is getting on in the archive room.
“Oh, fine. I’ve got into a rhythm now. It’ll help once John has taught me the cipher. I thought the dates referred to when the journals were written. But they can’t do—not unless something very weird is going on! I’ve probably misunderstood his system.”
“Ah well, I couldn’t tell you anything about that. You’ll have to ask John.”
Martha suddenly grows tired of talking and makes a game of folding the sheets, throwing them up in the air and shaking them out. She asks if Spark can do cartwheels. When Spark nods, Martha whispers, as though it’s the biggest secret, that she loves doing them.
“It’s been ages since I tried,” says Spark, putting down her basket of sheets. “But I’ll have a go.”
Martha shouts out encouragement. Spark turns an adequate, if lopsided, cartwheel. Her next one is a little better. “Your turn,” she says.
Martha composes herself for a moment then propels herself sideways. Spark observes her execute an immaculate cartwheel, revealing, to her amusement, a bizarre undergarment that reaches to Martha’s knees.
“Was that a fluke or are you really good?” laughs Spark.
Martha’s face lights up. “Fluke? Ha!” She turns out one perfect cartwheel after another, cartwheeling all around the perimeter of the lawn. Spark’s whoops draw Jacob out of the kitchen garden. He stands next to the yew hedge admiring the poise and grace of his friend’s acrobatics. The ghost of a smile appears on his face.
“Wow. Did you train as a gymnast or something?”
“Oh, get along with you!” Martha laughs. “I’ve just had a lot of time to practice.”
* * *
Spark helps Martha take the bed linen upstairs. It’s the first time Spark has seen Martha’s bedroom. It’s necessary to climb a second flight of narrow stairs to get to it. The room is long and low, and furnished simply. The walls are whitewashed, and the wardrobe, chest of drawers, and small cabinets are all made of a dark, polished wood. There is a patchwork quilt in shades of red and blue, and a bed that is not much bigger than hers in Mansfield. All is spotless, tidy, and wholesome. In fact, there’s something of a young girl’s room about it. There’s even a china doll propped up in a cane chair by the window.
Spark holds the pile of folded sheets while Martha takes them, one at a time, and stows them in meticulous order in a large linen cupboard. A black-and-white photograph on the wall catches Spark’s attention. She cranes her neck to get a better view. Martha has her arm around the shoulders of a stooped and deeply wrinkled old woman, who looks up at her. There is a strong family resemblance: The proportions of their heart-shaped faces are identical. Both wear simple blouses with high, round collars edged in lace, and both have their hair tied back, although Martha’s hair is black while the old woman’s hair is pure white. Martha is smiling straight at the camera, her dark eyes shining. She looks younger, although it’s difficult to say how old the photograph is. What strikes Spark is the expression on the old woman’s face: Her milky gaze focuses on Martha, revealing a tenderness and a pride in the younger woman that is so affecting Spark’s eyes grow misty. As the weight of the last remaining sheet disappears from her outstretched arms Spark asks: “Is this your grandmother, Martha? It’s such a beautiful photograph. The way she’s looking at you . . .”
Martha does not reply, and when Spark looks down at her, still kneeling next to the linen cupboard, she is shocked by the change in her. Her mouth has opened and its corners are pointing down like a tragedy mask; her empty hands lie open and helpless in her lap, as if she has lost whatever she had been holding. There is something about the cast of Martha’s crumpling face that speaks of a very young child who has tripped and grazed her knee; there’s that same ominous silence which heralds the inevitable scream. A single, heart-wrenching sob erupts from Martha’s trembling lips. Whatever nerve Spark has touched, it’s red raw. “I’m sorry,” gulps Martha. “I’ll be myself again presently.”
Spark is dismayed. She crouches down and puts her arm around Martha. Beneath her hand the slim, warm back heaves. “Oh, Martha. What is it?”
Martha is trying to hold back the tears and Spark can sense that she’s losing the battle. “Please go!” Martha whispers in a cracked voice. “You weren’t to know.” Spark hesitates. “Please!”
Now Spark runs downstairs and into the garden, past the fountain, and onward to the orchard. She finds Jacob taking an axe to a tree stump. His old dog is lying nearby, its head resting on its paws; with every blow its tufted ears turn.
“Jacob!” she pants. “Something’s wrong with Martha—”
Jacob drops his axe and sprints toward the house, Spark following on his heels. Back in Martha’s room, Jacob crouches next to her. She has not moved, and she is weeping silently, taking deep breaths to calm herself. He cups Martha’s hands in his. “What has the girl done?” Jacob asks. Somehow it worries Spark that his rough hands are encrusted with dirt. He might soil Martha’s apron. Martha releases one hand and waves vaguely in the direction of the photograph.
“I don’t know why I haven’t taken it down,” she says.
Spark stands in the doorway pulling at the hem of her T-shirt. “I’m so sorry if I upset you,” she says.
“You should never have come here!” barks Jacob, and his pale blue eyes connect with her, like an ancient force, and she feels the full heft of his fury.
Spark descends the narrow staircase two steps at a time. She hears Martha calling out for her to come back, that she wasn’t to know. But Jacob is unrepentant:
“You don’t belong here! You should never have come!”
Monsal Dale
Spark walks for an hour under a high sun then breaks a rule and hitches a lift. She’s lucky: A farmer’s wife takes pity on her and drops her off at the nearest railway station. She’s not so lucky with the trains. The connections are bad, and it takes forever to leave this flat landscape, which she tells herself she wishes never to see again.
It’s seven by the time Dan returns her text, instructing her to change trains at Nottingham and travel on to Derby. He, Ludo, and Andy Theology are on a pub crawl through the Derbyshire Dales. By the time the train comes to a squealing halt in Derby, the sun is a pink smudge above the platform shelters and there’s damp in the air. Spark sees Dan at the same moment that he spots her. Brother and sister thread their way through the crowd of people milling about on the station concourse.
“Spark!”
Spark throws her arms around him. Family. A member of her own tribe. Dan pushes her away so that he can see her face.
“What’s up?”
“I couldn’t hack it,” she says. “I wanted to come home.”
“You okay?”
“Yeah. Just glad to be back.”
“Where are your bags?”
“I left in a hurry.”
Spark hears Dan’s intake of breath. “Nothing . . . bad happened, did it?”
“Not like that. It was just an awkward situation. John Stone was nice to me, but then he had to go away, and he’s got this gardener and housekeeper, and they’re—odd. I couldn’t seem to do anything right. . . . Dan?”
“Yes?”
“Thanks for coming to get me.”
They walk through the ticket hall. “A bit different to Grand Central Station,” says Spark. “Is it good to be back?”
“It is, as it happens. Mum’s pleased I’m home—”
Spark laughs. “Like she’s not been waiting for you to come back since the minute you left!”
“Does she know you’ve come home?”
“Not unless you’ve told her.” Spark wrinkles up her nose. “You smell of beer.”
“What do you expect?”
“I hope you’re not driving—”
Dan taps the side of his head with his finger. “Why do you think I brought Andy Theology along?”
* * *
Andy Theology, so called because of an early crush on a Sunday school teacher, has been Dan’s best friend since they were both in short trousers, and long before he abandoned him to go to his “posh” school. Because Andy has spent half his life coming over to the Park household, he is accustomed, like her brother, to ruffle Spark’s hair in greeting, and she is accustomed to pushing him off. He’s big-boned, and dressed in baggy combat gear and a fly fisherman’s hat, into which he has tucked all manner of feather lures, like exotic insects.
“Ay up, our Spark,” he says. “Are yer all rait? Eeh, we’ve supped some stuff tonaight.”
Spark frowns at this strange accent. Andy Theology gives a slight backward nod of his head by way of explanation. Spark gets it. “Greetings, Andrew,” she says, enunciating properly, in the Queen’s English. “How are you doing?”
And there he is. Ludo. Standing in the litter-strewn station car park in his rectangular shades. Floppy, sun-bleached hair lifting in the breeze. There’s an easy smile on his face. In contrast to Andy, he wears tight-fitting black everything, with the exception of his Converses, which are lime green. As he leans against Andy’s dusty station wagon, he puts two fingers to his forehead in a salute. Spark’s mouth is dry. She manages: “Hey. How are you doing?”
At Monsal Head, deep in the Dales, which they reach as the light is beginning to fade, Andy insists they walk over the old viaduct before he allows Dan and Ludo to sample any more local ale. The four of them stand in a line, high up over the valley, a warm, gusting breeze at their backs. Spark is at one end, Ludo at the other. Dan points at a hawk hovering level with them. They watch as it plunges downward, swooping over the herd of black-and-white cows that are grazing in a verdant meadow, and diving straight into the rushy ma
rgins of the River Wye. The image of Martha’s distress flashes into Spark’s mind. She switches it off like a lightbulb. The hawk flaps its wings and soars up again, clutching its prey in its strong talons.
“Water vole,” comments Dan.
“Rat,” says Andy.
It’s as if they are contractually obliged to disagree. The sound of rippling water rises up from the bottom of the valley. “This is awesome,” Ludo concedes. As he and Dan break away and continue across the viaduct, Andy tries to imitate Ludo’s limber gait. “Awe-some,” he drawls.
“You’re only jealous,” comments Spark.
“True. I can see myself in New York.”
“How long are you going to keep up this daft accent?”
“Wash yer mouth out. It’s not daft—it’s Mansfield—”
“Phony Mansfield,” corrects Spark.
Andy reaches out to ruffle her hair again. She steps to one side.
“Ludo thinks I married at sixteen and I’ve got three kids,” says Andy. “I’ve got a whole scenario worked out.”
The Many Lives of John Stone Page 17