by Fiona Shaw
There had been a pile of other tasks after that, and though she told her father about only a few of them, they were all performed for him. Cataloguing butterflies, swimming to the far rock, eating quickly, jumping off high walls, knowing the direction of the wind: the list was long and diverse, the challenges ever greater. It culminated in Jean’s determination to study medicine.
‘I’m speaking for your father in this, too, and it’s not what we want for you,’ her mother had said.
‘But it’s what I want,’ Jean said. ‘What I’ve wanted for years.’
However, her mother had her speech to say and she would not be diverted.
‘We’ve discussed it at some length’ – Jean had heard the sound of their discussion the evening before; her mother’s shrill, querulous voice, her father’s voice careful, placating – ‘and we’re agreed that it is not an occupation suitable to your temperament, your turn of mind and so we will not support it financially. How will you find a good marriage if all your time is taken up with sickness and disease?’
‘It’s a profession, not an occupation,’ Jean said. ‘And why is it only you telling me this? Where’s Father?’
‘He’s happy for me to talk to you, and I resent your tone. Your attitude just confirms that our decision is the right one.’
Jean’s years of medical training made up the last and hardest of her tasks. She was not a natural scientist and her studies took much of her mental energy and kept her at her books for long hours into the night. Her parents’ disapproval cast a shadow at the start and, though eventually, begrudgingly, they gave her a small allowance, she struggled through her student years. It was Jim, now a practising solicitor, and not her parents, who made sure she had enough to eat and coins for the gas. Often he would turn up unannounced and take her out to the Italian restaurant on the corner or arrive with a shopping bag full of canned food.
Driving home from Mrs Sandringham’s new life, Jean felt that same fierce energy she had known in her growing-up. She felt it for the first time in nearly twenty years and so distinctive was it – like a mood that changed the very colour of the everyday world – that she stopped the car by a path into some woodland on a road she didn’t know.
She got out and set off walking, then jogging, and then she was running, running hard in the wrong shoes over the gritty scumble of the path, to feel that old sense of exertion.
Jean dipped her finger into the glass and tasted the beer froth.
‘The Red Horse has the best beer,’ she said. ‘And this is a new barrel. Am I right?’
‘I wish you wouldn’t do that,’ Jim said.
‘Am I right?’
‘Yes,’ he said, his voice sulky.
‘Nobody can see us, tucked away in here.’ She put her finger in again. ‘You sound like my mother. Besides, I’ve always done it.’
‘And I’ve always disliked it. Now for God’s sake eat the crisps, so I can tell Sarah.’ He pulled the packet open and sprinkled over the salt.
‘I’m perfectly well,’ Jean said.
‘Perfectly well, but mysteriously unable to sleep and without appetite; both by your own admission. Losing weight hand over fist.’
Jean shifted on her seat and looked at the walls, but horse brasses and old prints of the town offered no diversion.
‘Since Mrs Sandringham went,’ she began, but Jim interrupted.
‘Don’t tell me. Since Mrs S went you’ve had an epidemic, countless sets of tonsils, a worrying bout of early-in-the-season bronchitis in the elderly population, a few industrial accidents and an uncommon number of births, all demanding your singular attention.’
‘You sound angry,’ Jean said, and Jim rolled his eyes. ‘But why?’
‘You’ve found a receptionist for the surgery – good. I’m sure she’s doing a fine job with the filing, and ringing the bell nicely for the next patient. But she’s not putting your dinner to keep warm, or making sure there’s food in the house and neither are you. What have you done about finding a housekeeper?’
Jean shrugged, but said nothing.
‘I don’t know how to explain the state you’re in, but we’re worried. You’re not eating properly; you’re working too hard; probably listening to your jazz records till the small hours. You’re burning the candle at both ends and in the middle.’ Jim picked up his pint. ‘I’ve said my piece, and now I need a drink.’
Jean glanced at her friend. He didn’t know. He hadn’t guessed. But she could only tell him the half of it.
‘I’ve got some ideas,’ she said. ‘I’m just a bit short on time.’
Jim stared into his beer, then suddenly looked up and round at her.
‘You haven’t done something really daft?’ he said. ‘Been converted by one of those ghastly evangelical preachers, perhaps? Sneaked off to a tent when nobody was looking?’
Jean laughed. ‘I couldn’t bear the music.’
‘Or discovered something else. I don’t know – that the truth lies in the stars, so you’re up all night with a telescope?’
‘I will find a housekeeper,’ Jean said firmly. She took out her cigarettes and offered them over. ‘How are the girls?’
‘They’re fine. They’d be even finer if they got to see their favourite godmother occasionally. I can’t believe you’re out on call every night.’
‘Please, Jim,’ she said.
He got to his feet. ‘I’m getting you pickled eggs now, and some of that fat pork.’ From his tone she knew he was struggling to force a banter. ‘Then I can add them to Sarah’s list.’
Jean put the cigarette to her lips and breathed the smoke in deep. She felt her lungs fill, expand and then she breathed out slowly, letting the tension ride with the smoke into the tiny room.
As he left the snug, Jim turned.
‘I know something’s up,’ he said, pointing his cigarette. ‘I know you’re not telling me. But as well as being desperately curious, I’m worried, because look how it’s taking you.’
Jean went to the window. The wind was getting up and the Red Horse was rocking on its pole. She stood very still, looking out, sheltering the small flame in her mind. Jim was right; of course he was right, though she couldn’t tell him why. But their conversation had given her an idea so obvious she couldn’t believe she hadn’t thought of it before and, standing there, she willed it to survive and grow stronger. Which it did and became the rising of a plan. So even as she waited for Jim with his eggs and fat pork, she began to chafe with impatience to be home.
It was newly dark and the air was fresh. It would rain soon. Jean opened the yard gate and let herself in. She looked across to the house. Charlie’s light was off and Lydia stood at the kitchen window looking straight out at Jean’s patch of darkness. Jean watched her, entranced. Then Lydia moved away and the back door opened and she stood in the doorway, a dark shadow of a woman. Jean could make out a cup in her hands.
As Lydia sat down on the step, wrapping her cardigan round for warmth, it looked as if she might almost have been waiting for Jean.
Jean watched and her heart beat out the seconds like a percussive force. She was unavoidably, unaccountably in love with this woman who sat there on the cold stone, unknowing and unknown.
Stepping forward, past the bicycle and the dustbin, past the geraniums, their garish red veering into the drift of light from the open door, Jean called out softly, urgently.
‘Lydia.’
She watched Lydia put down her cup and listen, shoulders wary, staring into the dark.
‘Lydia,’ Jean called again and unable to hold herself back any longer, so much energy awkward in that small space, she ran the last few steps, took her hands, tugged her to her feet and kissed her.
Lydia pulled away. ‘The neighbours,’ she said. ‘Or if Charlie hears us.’
‘I’ve had an idea,’ Jean said, her words tumbling out.
‘You smell of beer. You’re not drunk, are you?’
‘Listen. I’ve got to tell you.’
‘It’s late, Jean.’
‘One minute, and then I’ll go if you want. I can just slip away into the night.’
Lydia laughed. ‘There’s no need to be melodramatic. I can listen for your minute.’
She poured Jean a cup of coffee from the jug and they sat on the step, hip to hip, and Jean explained herself. The conversation in the pub with Jim; the swinging horse sign, the wind, which mattered for some reason.
‘What do you think?’ she said finally.
‘Jean,’ Lydia said slowly, ‘you’re a doctor, and I work in a factory.’
‘It solves everything,’ Jean said. ‘Your crisis. My crisis. We can live under the same roof. Charlie would love it. The garden, the bees …’
‘Wait a minute. Don’t rush me.’ She put her hands between her thighs and dropped her forehead to her lap.
‘Lydia?’ Jean touched her shoulder, the back of her head. ‘You’re cold. Let’s go inside.’
‘Let me think, please.’
Jean stood up and stepped away, her hands beating the dark in frustration. She went into the kitchen and put on the kettle. A picture of a man standing by a spaceship under a full moon was pinned to a cupboard door. Charlie had signed it with a tiny bee emblem under his name. Jean smiled, and touched it with her finger.
They drank the coffee in silence, hands nursing cups, and then Lydia beckoned Jean in.
‘Let’s talk now,’ she said. She brought down blankets from upstairs, and they wrapped themselves up on the sofa.
‘So what do you think of my idea?’ Jean said.
‘It’s not as simple as you think,’ Lydia said. ‘For me to work for you.’
‘Why not?’
‘Jean, we come from different ends of the street.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘In fact, you don’t even come from a street. You’re from a house in the country that just has a name. A beautiful house with gardens all around and a gardener to keep it nice. You probably can’t even see another building from the windows.’
Jean shrugged. ‘But that was then. Growing up. I left it gladly. Now we’re here, in your sitting room –’
‘Front room.’
‘It doesn’t matter what you call it.’
Lydia looked round at Jean.
‘But it does. It matters a lot. That’s exactly what matters.’ She shook her head, lips pursed with frustration. ‘I don’t want to be employed by you,’ she said. ‘My kind is always employed by your kind, but us, the two of us, we’re not …’
Jean took her hand. ‘But you’d be my companion, my friend, my –’
‘You might know that, and I might. But it’s not what everyone else would know. They’d see me doing your cooking and washing.’
‘Sounds like your marriage,’ Jean said. ‘Only with friendship added in.’
‘Don’t,’ Lydia said.
‘It’s a means to an end,’ Jean said, rubbing her eyes, trying to see again what had seemed so clear, so simple, two hours ago. She stood up out of the blanket and put her hands against the mantelpiece, pushing, bracing against it, needing to feel something firm, unchanging.
‘It’s a way to be living under the same roof,’ she said. ‘It wouldn’t be like that for ever. Just for now.’
‘What about Robert? What about your friends? What about mine?’
‘My friends like you already. Jim and Sarah.’
Lydia laughed a short laugh. ‘But they don’t know, do they? They don’t know how you’ve kissed me. And when they do? Besides, they’ll look at me differently when they know you’re paying my wages.’
Jean turned back to face Lydia.
‘Listen to me. Every week women come to me suffering from nervous exhaustion, or because they can’t sleep, bags under their eyes, fatigued, worn out. Or it’s their children, especially in the winter. Bronchial conditions, ear infections, weepy eyes. Upset stomachs, diarrhoea. Why? Because their mothers have to skimp on fresh food, so they’re malnourished, more prone to infections. Some get pneumonia.’
‘Stop it.’ Lydia put her hands to her ears. ‘You don’t need to make a damn speech. You don’t need to tell me all this.’
‘I visit them in rooms where the paper is peeling with the damp and fungus is growing on the walls, on the ceiling even. Where the drains are blocked and the toilet doesn’t flush and the water from the tap has a funny smell. As often as not the husband’s nowhere in evidence; either gone altogether, or drinking the children’s health away in the pub.’
‘You’re blackmailing me,’ Lydia said, her voice furious.
‘And I want to know why the Council hasn’t condemned these buildings,’ Jean said, ‘or clapped the landlord in prison. I want to know how the husband can hold his head up and why he hasn’t been shamed for his neglect. But the women, the mothers, the wives, sitting in my surgery with their handbag clutched to their lap, or laying their child out for me to examine on a bed I can smell the damp from – they think it’s their fault.’
Jean stopped.
‘So what do you think would be best for Charlie, Lydia?’
Lydia was silent, and after a minute Jean sat down beside her.
‘Lydia?’ she said.
Lydia looked round at Jean, eyes blazing, mouth bitter.
‘That’s what I hate about your kind,’ she said. ‘Born with a silver spoon. Making out that I can’t look after my son properly because I’m from the wrong class.’
‘I don’t think that,’ Jean said.
Lydia shut her eyes.
‘You haven’t even got a child; you’ve got no idea what it’s like.’
She didn’t see Jean wince, didn’t see the cut she made.
‘I’m only saying what I see as a doctor,’ Jean said. ‘And what I see again and again is how hard things can be.’
Lydia made no reply.
‘Please,’ Jean said. ‘Live with me.’
Still Lydia was silent, eyes shut, lips tight, but there were tears on her cheeks.
‘Don’t coddle me,’ Lydia said at last, ‘or blackmail me, or patronize me. Don’t fool yourself that the best things are easy. More than anything else, for God’s sake, don’t try and fool me.’
They talked on until exhaustion took them, then slept, wrapped in blankets and one another’s arms, till dawn.
26
Charlie raced all the way across the town, along the streets like his own, past the children like him and the grown-ups in their Sunday habits. The town looked like a Sunday and it smelled like Sunday, too, what with the factory chimney quiet, no smoke out of it, and every now and then the smell of dinner roasting. The day was bright and dry and Charlie went past children kicking leaves into clouds, and others coming from the park. Behind them, flicking the pages of a newspaper, or sucking on a pipe, would be a father. It looked to Charlie as if every boy in the town but him had a father behind him. As he ran he made a fierce face so no one would think he cared.
Annie was the nearest thing Charlie had to a sister and he’d missed her, these last two months. There were four precious jars of honey on his windowsill and one of them was for her. But they didn’t go to lunch at Pam’s on a Sunday any more, him and his mother; and Annie didn’t come and visit them either. That was because of George. Leastways, that’s why his mum said it was. So this Sunday he’d made a plan. He’d even written it on a piece of paper, very small, and rolled the paper up and pushed it under the skirting in his room where the wood was split.
He wanted to give Annie the pot of honey and tell her all about what he’d done for the honey harvest, but he wasn’t going to cross the town with a jar in his hand, so it would have to wait a bit longer. Instead he slipped a photo in his pocket to show her. Dr Markham’s friend had taken it on the harvest day: Charlie in his bee suit, standing beside a hive. Then he turned the knob on the front door all the way so it didn’t make a sound closing, and set off.
Charlie ran as if his life depended on it, only stopping to get his breath back by the was
te ground at the head of the street, and to pick up some pebbles. Three boys were standing under the trees along one side. They might have been the same three boys he’d seen all those months ago with the cat, the last time they went to Pam’s, when his dad didn’t stay for trifle. But if they were, then they looked younger than before, not frightening at all. They looked like boys with fathers who’d go home soon and eat their Sunday dinner.
Charlie was going to throw pebbles at Annie’s window from the back yard. That was his plan. He’d throw the pebbles; Annie would look out to see what it was, see him and come down. Somehow she’d smuggle him into her room. He hadn’t worked out that bit of the plan yet; he figured they’d have to play that bit by ear. That was something his dad always said.
Then once he was in Annie’s bedroom, she’d bring him up a big plate with roast potatoes, meat, cabbage and gravy. He wanted to see Annie, but he was hungry, too. His mum was sick in bed since the day before. He’d felt her forehead today, but it was still too hot and she wouldn’t be making any meal. Or if she did, it wouldn’t be roast potatoes with thick gravy. So it was a good plan. He thought it was a good plan, though now he was here with the pebbles in his hand, there were butterflies in his stomach.
The alley smelled of old fish. Cats were digging at a pile of newspapers. Charlie walked down to Pam’s back yard. He’d been reading one of his mum’s thrillers today and now he had a slight swagger to him, his hands in his pockets. He was Johnnie Delaney checking out the territory in downtown Chicago. Casing the joint before putting the sting on a likely hoodlum. He thought his aunt Pam would make a good hoodlum. She could be scary enough.
Gingerly, Charlie lifted the gate latch. It wasn’t locked. He wiped his brow clear of imaginary sweat and pushed. The gate opened noiselessly. So far so good. The yard was empty and there was nobody standing at the kitchen window. Ducking behind the coal shed, he rummaged in his pocket for a pebble, then stepped out, eyes raised to Annie’s window. He could see her through the glass; her silhouette familiar, reassuring. Holding the pebble in his fingers, he got the window in his sights and drew back his arm to throw.