‘I used to hate my granny’s hens when I was small,’ said Ruth. ‘I dreaded having to go and collect the eggs.’
Ilse laughed and put her hand on Ruth’s shoulder.
‘I would have got the eggs for you. I used to do that every day. And feed the rabbits.’
‘What happened to the mad cockerel?’ asked Ruth.
‘My mother killed it. I suppose we ate it, but I don’t remember.’
‘Did you always like girls, d’you think?’ Ruth asked her. She had never asked before, but being away from where they both lived felt freeing.
‘I think yes. I never was interested in a boy. A couple of girls came to help on the farm when I was about twelve years old. BDM, from Lübeck. One of them, Hannah, she was very beautiful. My mother taught her how to milk the cows and I hid behind one of the stalls, so I could watch her. She used to sit with her cheek pressed up against the side of the cow. The breath of the cows smelled also like milk. With her sleeves rolled up, you know, you could see that her arms were strong. There were little golden hairs … I used to like to watch her.’
‘Like Tess of the D’Urbervilles.’
‘She stayed on our farm for the summer and the harvest and then she went back to Lübeck in October. I don’t know what happened to her. Lübeck was hit, very badly, but I don’t know … I never saw her again.’ Ilse stood up. ‘Shall we walk now?’
Ruth stood. ‘And then what happened?’
‘Well, then I grew up and went to Bremen, to the university, to study. And that was my first love affair, at university. That was Ursi.’
‘And did you love her?’ Ruth felt jealous suddenly.
‘I liked her very much. Yes.’ Ilse glanced at Ruth. ‘But not as much as I like you. I like you better.’
‘I only like you,’ said Ruth. ‘I like you best of everyone.’
They stopped on the sandy path and kissed, not caring if they were seen. But there wasn’t anybody there, just a lone gull, circling above the headland, and the sound of the waves.
Back in Malvern, Ruth telephoned the girls.
‘Did you have a nice time?’ she asked Emily.
‘I tried snails!’ she replied. ‘I tried snails, but Isobel wouldn’t.’
‘And did you like them?’
‘I didn’t hate them. I only had one. It was like rubber with butter on it. We didn’t go swimming because it was too cold. Do you want to speak to Isobel?’
Ruth said that she did. Isobel was not so easy to draw out as her younger sister.
‘It was nice,’ she said. ‘We saw some donkeys and Mrs Proctor bought us dolls with Breton costumes on. And we had water ice.’
‘Who’s Mrs Proctor, darling? Your nanny, d’you mean?’
‘She’s … I don’t know. Not a nanny.’
‘Oh.’ Ruth understood suddenly what she was. She felt a stab of pain, not so much because she was jealous, but because she understood, now, why Harry had wanted to take the girls abroad. To soften the introduction to his woman friend, turn it into an adventure. The fact that he had not told her in advance seemed like a betrayal: he had had the girls when it was her precious turn to see them, and she had allowed him to, because it had been for a special treat. But now the treat turned out to be something else altogether. The knowledge that there had been four of them on the holiday – not three, as she had imagined – caused a jolt to her heart. She felt a twinge of guilt now, too, that she had been so happy by the sea with Ilse. Those days had been the first when she forgot to miss the children.
‘What flavour water ice did you have?’
‘Blackcurrant and raspberry. I liked the raspberry best.’
‘Did Mrs Proctor have water ice?’
‘I think so. I can’t remember.’
‘Did Mrs Proctor … Did you make sand castles?’
‘Daddy did, with Emily.’
‘Oh. That’s nice.’
The line went silent while she tried not to interrogate her daughter. It was shaming to use a child in this way, Ruth knew. What most piqued her curiosity was that the woman was a Mrs. It seemed remarkable to her that Harry would have an affair with a married woman. But of course Verity had put aside her scruples on such matters, so it was not impossible that her brother should do the same. Ruth wondered about Mr Proctor, whether he had been left at home, perhaps with little Proctors; or perhaps he had been discarded long ago, or not discarded yet, but freshly lied to. She could not imagine Harry being party to such behaviour, nor that he could grow fond of a woman who would behave in such a way. It was bitter, to recognise that she didn’t know everything about him, after all. But of course he did not know about her private life, about Ilse. It occurred to Ruth that this was what it meant, to separate: the love subsided so gradually that you hardly noticed it going, but what felt like a palpable loss was that you knew less and less about each other.
One evening over dinner, Christopher announced that he was to stop working full time at the beginning of the next school year. He would teach the sixth form only.
‘I’ve got so many other things I want to do. It’ll be a relief quite honestly,’ he said.
Ruth wondered if the change was entirely of his own devising, but she said nothing.
‘What I thought was, we might take a lodger. Make up the difference. This house is much too big for two really.’
If her uncle had said he was to train as an astronaut, Ruth could not have been more surprised.
‘Not let Granny’s room?’
‘Don’t look so horrified! No. The spare room.’
This was the room the girls used when they came. If a lodger arrived, there would be nowhere for them. Ruth felt herself colour and tears begin to prick her eyes. The idea of a third person in the house, a stranger, filled her with dread. She felt very powerless suddenly. She was used to thinking of the house as her house, but Christopher’s plan reminded her that this was not so. Houses were for men. Harry had a house, still. Her father did, and Digby too. This was Christopher’s house.
There would be no more cosy evenings alone with her uncle, cooking and listening to music. There would be someone else in the kitchen, the breakfast room, the study. A stranger would occupy the children’s room, leave their wristwatch on the bedside table, their dressing gown hanging limply from the hook on the door. A stranger’s toothbrush would command the washbasin, a stranger’s nakedness fill the bath that she and Ilse shared. Ilse. She had forgotten about Ilse. What would happen? A lodger could not be expected to go out as obligingly as Christopher did, twice a week. How would she and Ilse ever have the house to themselves again, how would they meet, be lovers?
‘What I was wondering is, do you know anyone?’ said Christopher.
‘Me?’ said Ruth.
‘Yes. Aren’t there any unmarried staff at either of your schools who might be on the lookout for somewhere?’
‘I don’t know. I could ask.’
‘We’d have to have a bit of a clear-out, I s’pose, if someone else was living here,’ said Christopher. ‘I mean I would.’
‘Yes,’ said Ruth. She felt too unhappy to speak.
‘I thought I might keep the dining room, put most of my stuff in there. If I wanted to do some writing, I could do it in there, you see, at the table. The lodger could have the sitting room then, and you could keep the study. So you’d still have the gramophone.’
‘You’ve obviously thought it all out,’ said Ruth. It was the only time she could remember ever having spoken sharply to her uncle.
That night Ruth barely slept. She did not know what to do.
If she were to move out and take a room somewhere, there would be nowhere for her to have the children. She didn’t suppose she would be able to afford to take a whole house of her own, not on the hours she worked. Perhaps she should look for a flat. Perhaps she should look for a staff job, with a fixed salary, instead of working on such an ad hoc basis. But there was no guarantee that such a job would come up, here in Malvern. She might be obliged
to move, in order to find work, and then how could she be with Ilse?
She did not see Ilse the next day and the hours passed slowly. Then it was Thursday, and Ilse was coming to spend the evening. Ruth was too anxious to prepare dinner. Even before Ilse had stepped over the threshold, Ruth was in tears, sobbing against her neck, her mouth full of Ilse’s hair, tears falling onto the shoulder of Ilse’s wool coat.
‘Hey, stop!’ said Ilse, taking her by the shoulders, stepping back, holding her now at arm’s length. ‘I can’t help you if I don’t know what you’re saying.’
‘It’s all ruined!’ said Ruth. ‘It’ll never work, we won’t be able to—’
‘Wait,’ said Ilse. ‘Don’t talk until I’ve come in and we’re sitting down.’ Ilse took Ruth by the hand and led her into the study and sat her down, only then taking off her own coat and the scarf she had loosely knotted around her neck. Then she stood with her back to the empty grate, her arms crossed. Ruth, still sniffling, told her about Christopher’s plan. Ilse only smiled.
‘I don’t see a problem,’ she said simply, when Ruth had finished talking.
‘But I’ve just told you! It means that we can’t—’
Ilse interrupted. ‘No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t mean that. It means we can. The lodger can be me.’
Ruth said nothing while Ilse’s words alighted, then settled, in her mind. She had stopped crying, but she could still feel a tickling sensation in the bridge of her nose. A large clear drip plopped from the end of her reddened nostrils onto her hand, which lay clasped in her lap. Without thinking, she smeared the hand on her skirt, and then wiped her nose against the back of the other hand, her eyes on Ilse throughout.
‘But I don’t want to live with you until you know how to use a handkerchief,’ said Ilse.
Chapter 9
Iris and Digby sat on the river bank, she on an old fringed tartan rug which he had spread out for her, he a couple of feet away, having made a seat for himself by taking off his mac and laying it on the long grass.
‘Player’s please,’ he said, grinning.
We really shouldn’t smile too widely, at our age, thought Iris. It gives him the most alarming appearance and I suppose I look as bad. More like a grimace really. The teeth seem too big, like a mummy’s. We actually are long in the tooth. She said none of this, but rummaged silently through her pockets for the packet of cigarettes, while her chain of thought ran on. I remember the children looking rather the same, when their milk teeth had gone, before their faces were developed enough to accommodate their grown-up teeth. She wasn’t sure which children she had in mind, whether it was Ruth and Jamie or the grandchildren. Their childhoods all tended to merge. She took two cigarettes out, fumbled over a book match, then lit both. She passed one to Digby.
They sat in silence, contemplating the midges rising and dipping over the clear brown water. Very often they did not speak much. Iris – who had always loved chatter and gossip – was surprised to find how much she liked the silence. It was more restful not to have to talk all the time. Mostly they each seemed to intuit what the other was feeling. If anything, they were happier in each other’s company now than they had ever been.
They had both got thinner with age, like a pair of old greyhounds. Digby’s hand holding the cigarette seemed almost transparent, and the skin was speckled, like the breast of a song thrush. They had a picnic with them, of sorts: a couple of hardboiled eggs and some rather stale Madeira cake. Neither of them had much of an appetite, unless there was a treat at hand: potted shrimps perhaps, or anchovy toast. Iris had become somewhat vague about cooking, sometimes producing roast chicken or pheasant if they had company, but often, when they were just two, making only scrambled egg or opening a tin of soup for supper.
They liked it here at the river. If someone had told the young Iris that her greatest joy would one day be fly-fishing, she would have barked with derision. Digby had fished as a boy, and he had had a few days away every spring during his working life, while Iris went to London to see Ruth and have lunch with friends and stock up on Floris soap. It was only when he retired from medicine that he had time to fish more often.
‘Shall I come, one of the days, and have a go?’ Iris asked him one evening.
‘If you think you’d like to. You might get awfully bored,’ said Digby doubtfully.
They had no waders in her size. The pair Digby had bought for Jamie when he’d been in his teens were much too big for her.
‘I’ll never be able to walk in these,’ she protested.
‘You won’t have to. We’ll put them on when we get to the bank. Once you’re in the water you just have to stand still,’ Digby told her.
‘Not all the time?’ asked Iris with mock horror.
Digby laughed.
She liked the feeling of pressure on her legs as the water tightened around her and the way you could tell the water was very cold, and yet you didn’t feel cold yourself. She very much liked the smell of the river, which wasn’t so much an odour as a sensation, abundant and clean and cold. The water moved more quickly than she had thought it would, surveying it from the bank, and she had to lean into the current slightly and stand askance, to keep her footing. The smooth stones on the bottom were immensely slippery, like seaweed. To begin with, her line had tangled over and over again. Digby’s sailed over the water in a lovely dripping arc every time, while hers got caught on an overhanging branch or stubbornly refused to go more than a few feet. The rod felt heavy in her hands, but Digby’s looked weightless in his, as if he was casting nothing but light. I haven’t the patience for this, she thought. I’ll never be able to do it. Frustrated, Iris had held her rod against her side with one arm while she got out a cigarette with the other hand. She stood in the river, smoking and watching her husband.
The tobacco was warm and sweet and calming. As she stood, Iris began to notice things around her. A pair of damselflies darted over the trailing leaves of a willow, their bodies impossibly slender and bright. Some were the startling colour of lapis, like sharp blue needles embroidering the pale air. She was suddenly aware that there was no human sound in this place, only the noise of the water as it moved over the smooth dark stones, and the call of birds. She looked at Digby and admired the graceful rhythm with which he cast and his quiet concentration. A feeling began to spread through her body, starting in her chest: it was very nearly bliss. It’s to do with the elements, it occurred to Iris. It’s because I’m in all the elements at once: earth, water, air, even fire if you count my cigarette. She smiled at her own silliness.
After that Iris often went out with Digby. She wasn’t a natural fisherman. Digby had told her that some of the best fly-fishers were women, that they somehow had a knack for it. But she did not. It took weeks and weeks for Iris even to cast correctly. She didn’t catch any fish at all during her first season, but she loved it. She loved being out of doors, the water, the softness of the air. Fish were the least of it, or so she imagined, that first year. Then she had caught her first trout. Digby had had to help her bring it in: it was so much stronger than a dead fish looked as if it could ever have been. She had wondered at the grey and yellowy-brown and pinkness of the fish, its markings so exactly like its home of river pebbles. Its heaviness was astonishing in her hands; it had seemed so weightless while in the water. After that she couldn’t wait to get to the river every day.
Birdle sulked. Since Jamie had grown up and her mother-inlaw had died, Iris and Digby hardly used the drawing room any more and she had brought Birdle’s cage into the kitchen, where it was warmer and he would have company. Digby had cleared the broad windowsill behind the sink for the cage, so the parrot could see out of the window. Iris generally left the cage door open, but he seldom ventured out if she was not in the room.
If she came in he would climb out slowly, using his beak to guide and balance himself, then flap over to the dresser with a terrific squawking, as if in mortal danger. This fanfare always made Iris jump and she remonstrated with him
about the noise, to no effect.
‘What a racket!’ she’d say.
And sometimes he would answer, before she had time to complete the sentence, ‘Stop that din!’
Any letters or bills left on the side he would pick up with his beak and edge forward until they flopped onto the floor. Then he would swagger along to the fruit bowl. Apples did not interest him, but he was fond of grapes, although he often seemed to yank at the fruit, turn each grape round and round in his mouth, then eject it, without actually eating any. Digby had taken to leaving a saucer of sunflower seeds out for him and these he did consume, dropping the tiny zebra-striped husks onto the floor. Only then would he hop onto the back of a chair and thence to the kitchen table, if Iris was at the cooker or sink, or onto Iris’s shoulder, if she was sitting down.
When the fishing season began and she was out most of the day, Birdle’s behaviour changed. He would not talk. He did not come out of his cage when she got home in the evening, but affected to be studying his own foot, like a girl with a fresh manicure. He adopted strange attitudes, hunching himself with his back half turned to her, a reproachful Quasimodo. Then Iris would have to coax him. ‘It’s a pity you don’t want to come out, Birdle, because I’ve got a spray of millet here for you.’
At length he would emerge, following his usual path to the table. Once there he would tear the day’s newspaper into thin strips with his beak, or stand on one of the old saucers she used as an ashtray, knocking it over. Iris was sure he was doing these things on purpose, to annoy her. Once established on her shoulder he would yank at her hair – was he grooming her, or picking a fight? – until she abandoned whatever she was doing and stroked him on the back of his head.
‘Stupid bird,’ said Iris, exasperated.
Isobel and Emily were coming for a few days at Easter. Much as she looked forward to seeing them, Iris rather wished they weren’t staying. It was her own fault for living in the back of beyond, of course: it was much too far for anyone except local friends to visit without spending at least one night. She loved seeing her granddaughters, but it was such an effort, having people – even family – to stay. They had to have proper cooked food and the fire lit in the drawing room, and things she didn’t generally notice like the tarnish on the sugar bowl suddenly showed up and she’d have to get out the Silvo, or dust the good furniture. Get groceries in. Her daily would make up the beds and do the grate, at least, but still. She got tired.
My Former Heart Page 12