The Songbird

by Marcia Willett

  Still she hesitates and he summons all his willpower to keep turned away from her. Then she goes out, he hears the door close and gives a huge sigh of relief . . . and regret.

  Tim stands at the landing window listening to the thrush. This is the time of day when he feels most vulnerable, most alone. Very often he and Charlotte share supper. She can’t leave Oliver, of course, so sometimes he takes a prepared meal round so as to do his share. They are quite at ease together, though now and again she attempts what he calls ‘the three-degree interrogation’ about his future and he has to stonewall her. He understands that this is her way of showing an interest in him, even caring about him, but he can’t afford to lower his guard.

  Meanwhile he thinks about the child in the woods and what the next step might be. It’s become a game that takes his mind away from his private suffering. The toy car was gone when he went back two days later and the stone mouth of the face was rearranged into a smile. He smiled, too, to see it, and sat for a while on the seat hoping someone might appear. As he waited patiently he could hear the cuckoo down in the valley and its ancient, haunting call filled his heart with delight and an odd melancholy. He thinks of his mother and how her life was cut short by such terrible chance and his own action. If only he hadn’t tried to open the catch on the gate; if only it had remained stubbornly closed as it always had before. It is as if the child who decorates Pan and leaves his toys embodies the happy child Tim was before his life was changed for ever.

  Now, he gives a little jump as someone raps on the door and then opens it a crack and shouts: ‘Are you in there, Tim? It’s William.’

  ‘Yes,’ he calls with relief, hoping for rescue from his loneliness, and hurries down the last flight of steep stairs.

  ‘We’re having a little get-together at Charlotte’s. Bit of a picnic. Like to come?’

  William looks in a very good humour, rather as if he’s been invited to a party, and Tim’s spirits rise.

  ‘I’d love it,’ he says. ‘Shall I bring something?’

  ‘What have you got?’ William follows him into the kitchen. ‘I’m supplying the wine and some cold roast beef.’

  ‘I’ve got some Sharpham brie,’ Tim begins to search in the fridge, ‘some olives, roast tomatoes,’ he piles the cartons out on to the working surface, ‘and a packet of sliced ham.’

  ‘Bring it all along,’ says William cheerfully. ‘Got a bag?’

  They go out together and into Charlotte’s cottage, where she and Fiona are assembling food on the kitchen table, watched by Wooster.

  ‘Rather like a tapas without the glamorous bits,’ Fiona says when she sees them. ‘I feel really awful that I’m not supplying anything.’

  ‘You can share with me on the wine,’ William tells her and she gives him a surprised and gratified look, which he pretends not to see.

  Tim notices, though, that there is a very different atmosphere this evening from Fiona’s previous visit. Fiona is much more relaxed, helping Charlotte whilst deferring to her as to where things are kept and whether she should wash the salad leaves, joking with William and clinking a glass with him when he passes her a drink.

  It’s as if, thinks Tim, she has reverted to someone she once was, taking back to herself a familiar role. Gone is the spikiness of a woman trying to lay claim to territory that is owned by those she has hurt and betrayed. Something has happened to energize her and give her courage.

  He remembers Kat insisting that he should come to the tea party to help to keep it civilized. ‘Three women, all feeling the least bit threatened. It’s bound to get tricky. We need the down-to-earth male influence,’ she said. Surely it can’t be simply William’s presence here tonight that has changed the dynamic: William, whom Fiona has hurt the most? Or can it be Kat’s absence?

  He sees that Charlotte is quite relaxed – though Oliver is not present to cause any possessiveness – and talks to Fiona about small domestic things as they finish laying the table.

  Tim receives his glass from William and raises it to him. ‘Here’s to the unexpected.’

  William looks sharply at him and then smiles, such a sweet smile.

  ‘I’ll drink to that,’ he says – and Fiona catches the exchange, and smiles too, and raises her glass to them both.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  WHEN CHARLOTTE WAKES the next morning she feels restless. It was such a good party, everyone in harmony, and Fiona had been so easy and such fun, so different from on her previous visit. Charlotte wonders if she’s slightly misjudged her. It’s rather unsettling, when you’ve made up your mind about someone, to find them presenting a different side.

  She talks to Oliver as she gets him dressed and feeds him his breakfast, and he smiles at her and blows bubbles and bangs his fists on his tray. Wooster is stretched out on the floor and Oliver leans out of his chair to look at him and make unintelligible noises.

  ‘That’s Wooster,’ Charlotte tells him. ‘He’s a good dog, isn’t he? And you’re a good boy. What shall we do this morning?’

  Last night William decided he would do a return match and he invited everyone to a barbecue supper in the courtyard this evening. Charlotte offered to help but he refused, saying that even he could manage a barbecue. He suggested, however, that she might get some bedding plants for the tubs and stone troughs now that the daffodils are over. There’s some potting compost in the barn, he told her. It would be nice to have the courtyard livened up for the barbecue.

  ‘We’ll go to Staverton Bridge Nursery,’ Charlotte says to Oliver. ‘We’ll buy some plants and have coffee in the café. Or out on the balcony if it’s warm enough.’

  She wipes his face, takes him out of his chair and swings him round. Oliver chuckles and Wooster sits up to watch.

  ‘You can come, too,’ she tells Wooster, ‘as long as you’re on a lead and behave yourself.’

  She wonders whether to invite Tim but decides against it: she fears that she’s becoming rather reliant on his company. If she sees him as she goes out she’ll suggest it, otherwise it might look a bit unfriendly, but she won’t make a point of it.

  By the time she’s changed Oliver, made him up a drink and got herself ready, there’s no sign of Tim, and William’s car has gone from the barn.

  ‘I expect he’s gone shopping,’ she says to Oliver as she straps him into his seat. ‘Gone to buy our supper. Off we go.’

  She reverses out of the barn, turns out of the gate and sets off down the lane, talking to Oliver as she drives, singing to him; giving him a commentary of their journey.

  ‘Look,’ she says. ‘See the sheep, Oliver? “Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool?” Look at the magpie on the gate.’

  She doesn’t know how much he takes in but it seems important to connect him with his surroundings. They have to wait, pulled in tight to the hedge, for a tractor coming up the hill towards them and Oliver gazes at this huge monster in silence as it rattles past them.

  There is no train at the level crossing today, no steam-engines to show him, and Charlotte drives on over the bridge, slowing down so that he can see the river flowing away and curving out of sight beneath the overhanging trees.

  At the nursery she parks the car, loads Oliver into his buggy, and lets Wooster out. He’s already wearing his lead, so she can simply grab it as he jumps down, and he walks beside her, very well-behaved, knowing he’ll get a biscuit when it’s coffee time.

  Charlotte wanders into one of the big greenhouses, looking at the bright palette of flower-colour washing along the big trestle tables. In here the air is moist and warm, full of the vegetative scents of new plants and damp earth. As she pauses, trying to decide what will flourish best in the old stone troughs and the painted tubs, she hears an odd cheeping noise. Looking about, she sees that on a nearby table there are some wooden bird-houses for sale and, even as she watches, a bluetit with a beakful of insects darts into one of them. Going closer, she sees a notice: ‘These are not for sale until the babies have flown.’ Now she can
hear the baby birds cheeping and the parent appears again at the edge of the hole, pausing for a moment before flying away.

  Charlotte laughs. ‘Look, Oliver,’ she says. ‘There are baby birds living in there.’

  Oliver has seen the parent bird. He watches it intently and appears to be listening, and she knows that he can hear the babies in their nest. Suddenly she feels a great sense of excitement at the prospect of all the things there are for him to discover that she will be able to share with him. She walks around the aisles, looking at the profusion of bedding plants, mentally making her choice. Presently, she carries the small pots to the counter and makes a neat collection of them, then she pushes Oliver out into the sunshine, round the back of the café on to the decking high above the river, and parks the buggy by one of the tables. She secures Wooster’s lead under the foot of the chair, tells him to sit and goes inside to order coffee.

  By the time she returns, carrying her cup of cappuccino, Oliver is asleep and Wooster is stretched beside him, nose on paws. Charlotte sits down and breathes a sigh of contentment. She relaxes as she gazes across the woven willow fencing, down into the steep valley and through the trees beside the river. Through the new flush of green leaves she can just make out the old station house and one or two steam-engines on the track.

  She sips her coffee and thinks about Aunt Kat and Jerry and Fiona, and how surprised she was when the three of them appeared after lunch. She’s still not quite certain of Jerry’s status. It was Fiona who seemed to be in control, giving her a hug and saying: ‘Look who I found having lunch in the Cott. This is Jerry. This is my daughter-in-law, Charlotte, Jerry. She’s a brave naval wife and Andy is very lucky to have her. Oh, and we mustn’t forget Ollie.’

  And Jerry came forward to be introduced to Oliver, and then Wooster came bounding out, and somehow she never did quite grasp his relationship to either Aunt Kat or Fiona. Jerry, however, has a brother who was in the navy and he was able to talk intelligently to her about what it was like to be married to someone who went away a great deal; how lonely it could be and how difficult to make and keep some sort of bond between the absent father and his children. He was sympathetic and amusing, and very sweet with Oliver, whilst Wooster sat beside him with his head on his knee, panting his approval.

  It was clear that both Aunt Kat and Fiona were entertained by this, though neither of them said very much, and Charlotte was aware of an unusual empathy between them. By the time she took Oliver in to change his nappy and then came back to offer more tea, Jerry and Aunt Kat had disappeared and Fiona was sitting with Wooster, looking rather pleased with herself.

  ‘They apologized for dashing off,’ she said, ‘and Jerry said it was great to meet you and Oliver, and he hopes to see you again. They have some kind of date with someone or something like that. I do hope you didn’t mind me bringing him over without warning? It was just one of those spontaneous things. He’s a bit lonely since his wife died.’

  Charlotte said of course she didn’t mind, that she liked him, and did Fiona want to do the bath-and-tea routine with Oliver and stay to supper? And then, somehow, that had turned into a lovely evening with William and Tim coming round as well and, though she couldn’t put her finger on it, there was a really good atmosphere. Aunt Kat didn’t appear and her car wasn’t there when Fiona left to go back to the Cott.

  ‘I think they mentioned a film at Dartington or something,’ Fiona said casually. ‘I’m sure she’ll be back any time.’

  It occurs to Charlotte that Aunt Kat’s car wasn’t there this morning and she wonders, with a tiny internal shock, if Aunt Kat spent the night with Jerry. Surely not: apart from them both being old, he was so . . . well, respectable, and not at all the kind of man one associates with having a bit of a fling. He and Aunt Kat hadn’t seemed particularly involved with each other, either . . .

  The shriek of the steam-engine rouses Charlotte from her reverie and she glances at her watch. It’s time to pay for her plants and load them into the car. Then she’ll take Wooster for a walk on the path down to the river and go home and have a good planting session.

  Tim watches Charlotte planting up the troughs and tubs; watching how, with quick, deft fingers, she beds the plants into the dark, chocolatey-cake-crumb brown earth. She has a knack with colour and shape and he tells her so. She looks pleased and stands up to look at her work, dusting her hands on an old apron that William has given her to wear.

  ‘I still think it’s a bit ambitious,’ she says, ‘to be having a barbecue. It’s only May, after all. We’ll probably all freeze. William says we’ll just have to wrap up.’

  They both look across the courtyard at William, who is assembling the barbecue, which lives in the angle of the walls. He is clearly enjoying himself and Tim smiles to see him busy and happy.

  ‘It’ll be OK,’ he tells Charlotte. ‘At least it’s dry. It’s a pity Mattie can’t be here.’

  He speaks without thinking and Charlotte glances sideways at him.

  ‘Yes. Yes, it is. She’d enjoy it.’

  ‘Wasn’t it a pity she didn’t get the job?’ He heard from her only a few days ago and she was very disappointed.

  Charlotte nods her head sympathetically. ‘She’s really gutted but she says she isn’t giving up. It’s made her determined to move back. She’s coming down to see the parents for the Bank Holiday weekend so I’ve said I’ll go over with Oliver. It’s Mum’s birthday.’

  Mattie hasn’t said anything to him about the weekend and Tim feels oddly disappointed about that, but, after all, there’s no reason why she should. There’s a little silence and then Aunt Kat appears looking rather pleased with herself and as if she’s enjoying a private joke. Tim studies her curiously, thinking of what Charlotte told him about the way she and Fiona had brought Jerry back after lunch at the pub. William glances round.

  ‘Is he coming?’ he calls.

  Aunt Kat nods. ‘Yes, he is and he says thanks for inviting him. About six, like you said. Seems a bit early.’

  William looks pleased. ‘I’ve invited Francis, that’s why. He might come just for a drink. He keeps early hours these days.’

  ‘Quite a party,’ says Aunt Kat, still with that secret look of self-satisfaction. ‘Those tubs look wonderful, Charlotte. You are clever.’

  Charlotte looks almost embarrassed by so much praise, mutters something about going to wash, and goes inside pulling off the apron.

  Tim looks at Aunt Kat, eyebrows raised.

  ‘So who is it that’s joining the party?’ he asks.

  ‘Jerry Fermor,’ she answers. ‘My new best friend. Just moved to Totnes from Plymouth so I’m helping to get him bedded in – if you see what I mean?’

  She looks at him so mischievously that he bursts out laughing.

  ‘I’ve never heard it called that before,’ he says.

  ‘A good old West Country expression for making somebody feel at home, darling,’ she says.

  ‘What’s the joke?’ asks William, appearing beside them. ‘Come and help me with the big table, Tim. It’s in the barn. If it really is too cold we’ll have to retreat to the kitchen but I hope it won’t be.’

  Still laughing, Tim follows William. He’s looking forward to the barbecue, and to meeting Jerry, but he still wishes that Mattie could be here.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  BY THE TIME Jerry arrives in the courtyard the party has begun. He feels apprehensive, still in shock after his night with Kat and wondering how she will greet him. Her text inviting him to the barbecue arrived whilst he was making himself a rather late lunch and, though he was already longing to see her again, part of him was inclined to refuse the invitation. He tried to imagine strolling in, greeting Kat casually and pretending nothing much has happened, and his nerve failed him. Would she have told Fiona, for instance? Perhaps they all know.

  He remembered how she’d taken him into her embrace; her long arms and legs enfolding him, drawing him in. Just for a moment, he’d been nervous, embarrassed, but t
hen quite suddenly the whole act of love with her seemed so easy, so natural. They’d fallen asleep, still entwined together, and when he wakened he was almost afraid to move. But then she, too, woke a few moments later and there was no awkwardness. She simply rolled away from him and said sleepily, ‘I need a pee, Jerry, and I’ve forgotten where the loo is,’ and he got up and put the light on for her in the bathroom across the passage, leaving the bedroom unlit lest she should feel embarrassed by her nakedness. He wondered what the form was; whether he should get back into bed, or whether she would want to leave, so he dragged on his dressing gown and sat on the edge of the bed feeling rather foolish.

  Even then she’d handled it all so easily. ‘I’m absolutely starving,’ she said, as she came out, bundling her hair up with both hands, smiling at him. ‘Are you?’

  And he suddenly realized that he was. ‘Bacon?’ he suggested. ‘Croissants from yesterday. Not fresh.’

  ‘Perfect, darling,’ she said contentedly. She’d picked up his discarded shirt, wrapped herself in it and they’d gone into the kitchen and fried bacon and dunked the croissants in their coffee, and afterwards they went back to bed and made love again.

  By the time he wakened the second time the sun was pouring in and she was dressing. He struggled up on to his elbow but she merely bent over him, kissed him and said, ‘That was just lovely, darling Jerry. See you very soon,’ and slipped away, leaving him in a complete whirl and wondering what happened next in these situations.

  What he certainly hadn’t expected was to be plunged into a family gathering quite so precipitously. He stood staring at the text, not knowing how to respond. This whole experience was way outside his comfort zone, and he wondered if perhaps he should quit now before it became too complicated, but even as he began to form an excuse another text pinged in: Cold feet? You need extra socks xx