by Unknown
“Then help her put it to rest, Robin. Please. For all our sakes.”
They lived in a second-floor flat in a graceful Regency terrace on the edge of Clifton Village, decorated in a strange blend of exoticism and formality. Rowena behaved more normally during our awkward lunch party than I’d expected, referring obliquely to her “illness” and talking about resuming her mathematics course as soon as possible. Afterwards, Sarah said she had to go out but would be back for tea. I was left in the lounge while the sisters conducted a strained and whispered conversation at the door. “Just talk to him, Ro,” I heard Sarah say. “It’s all I ask.” Then the door closed. Rowena went from there to the kitchen and showed no sign of joining me. Eventually, I felt forced to join her.
“Is that coffee you’re making?” I asked, seeing the kettle in her hand. She started violently, sending a spout of boiling water sizzling across the hob. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s all right,” she said, leaning against a worktop and closing her eyes for a second. “My nerves. They’re a bit . . . frayed.”
“Of course. I quite understand.”
“That’s what Sarah thinks, doesn’t she? That you understand, I mean.” Her eyes were open now and trained squarely on me. I’d forgotten how disconcertingly huge they were, as wise it seemed as they were innocent. Then she looked away. “I’m not allowed coffee. But if you—”
“Whatever you’re making.”
“Herbal tea.” She smiled. “Supposed to be calming.”
“Tea it is, then.”
She spooned some of the dustily unappetizing leaves into a mug for me, added water to her own and mine, then led the way back to the lounge. She sat by the window, her mug cradled in her hands, inhaling as she drank. Perhaps the herbs were working. She seemed calm enough. Almost contemplative. As if she’d seen reason. Or given up hope of seeing it.
“I was sorry,” I hesitantly began, “to hear about . . . your trouble.”
“Were you?”
“Of course.”
“Why? We hardly know each other.”
“No, but—”
“I didn’t plan it, Robin. I didn’t spend weeks building up to it. I’d even forgotten it was Mummy’s birthday. November the eleventh. I just saw it on the calendar in the kitchen. Sarah had already gone to work. And it was so grey. Like today. Mummy’s birthday. And Daddy away on a cruise with a . . . new wife. Do you think he remembered?”
“I’m sure he did.”
“It’s funny . . . to have so little control. To see yourself . . . as if you’re disembodied . . . weeping and wailing. As if your emotions are just . . . too powerful to contain.”
“Rowena—”
“They want me to forget her. Daddy. Sarah. And Bella of course. They all want me to forget her. “Put it behind you,” they say. “Accept. Adjust. Go on.” They seem to think it’s so simple. Like the doctors. And the counsellors. And that psychiatrist Daddy found for me last year. They all think the same. That this is just grief. A refusal to come to terms with reality.”
“Your mother is dead, Rowena. Nothing can bring her back.”
“But why is she dead?”
“Because Shaun Naylor murdered her.”
She shook her head slowly, more in sorrow it seemed than disagreement. “I’ve gone over it all so many times. What she said. How she said it. Like I had it on videotape and could replay it over and over again. In slow motion. Frame by frame. Looking for the clue.”
“What clue?”
Her gaze circled slowly round the room, from the window to where I was sitting. “You know, don’t you?”
“No. Tell me.”
“When Mummy left that afternoon, she said to me . . . We were standing by the car. She was ready to go. Hesitating a bit. She wouldn’t have normally. We’d said goodbye. And, anyway, it wasn’t supposed to be a lengthy parting. She said . . . I remember the words exactly. There’s no mistake. Sarah thinks I misheard. But I didn’t. I misunderstood. That’s what I did. She said: ‘I may not be back for quite a while, darling.’ I thought she meant she was going to stay with Sophie Marsden. To show the picture off to her. Well, she’d mentioned she might. So all I said was: ‘You’ll be with Sophie?’ And she thought for a moment. And then she replied: ‘Of course, darling. That’s where I’ll be.’ Then she kissed me and drove away.”
“I don’t see—”
“I testified in court that Mummy was quite specific about her plans. But she wasn’t. Not really. Otherwise she’d have phoned Sophie before setting off. She told me she was going to Kington to buy one of Oscar Bantock’s paintings. But at the end . . . as she was leaving . . . I think she meant to say something else. It was like . . . she knew she might never see me again.”
“Surely not.”
“If I hadn’t jumped to conclusions, she might have . . . And then there was the ring. I noticed her checking the finger she’d worn it on with her thumb. As if . . . she hadn’t lost it . . . but was checking . . . reassuring herself . . . that it wasn’t there.”
“A reflex. Nothing more.”
“What she never put into words . . . What I can’t exactly describe . . . You felt it too, didn’t you?”
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“She was on the brink. She was about to step off. Into the void. She knew it. And still she stepped. Why?”
“I don’t know.” I rose and walked across to the window. She sat beneath me, looking where I was looking. Out into the blanketing greyness of the sky beyond the neighbouring rooftops. “Truly, Rowena, I don’t.” On an impulse, I crouched beside her chair and took her hand in mine. She let me do so, studying me gravely through those immense far-questing eyes. “I often think—like you, apparently—that there was something amiss, something adrift, that evening. She was . . . like a beautiful yacht in full sail with nobody at the helm . . . waiting for the breeze to pick up, the current to move her. I’ve never understood it. Never been sure I’m not investing what happened with too much significance because of what followed. I don’t think I am. I don’t think you are. But . . .”
She smiled with relief. “It means a great deal to me that I’m not completely alone, Robin. It means I’m not the victim of my own delusions after all. Unless we both are.”
“She wouldn’t have wanted you to brood like this. To suffer on her account.”
“I know.”
“She’d have wanted you to be happy. Wouldn’t she?”
“Oh yes.”
“Then can’t you be? For her?”
“But I am. Sometimes. Don’t you see? What I’ve lost isn’t happiness. It’s balance. Equilibrium.” Suddenly, her expression crumpled into tearfulness. She tensed, as if to suppress a sob, released my hand, set the mug down and sighed. “They never tell you that about suicide. The thought of it . . . can be so exhilarating. So tempting.” She shook her head. “But I’m over it now. There’s nothing in the least bit tempting about a stomach pump. Take my word for it.” At that she smiled. And so did I. “Let’s go for a walk, Robin. I haven’t been out since they released me from hospital. We can leave a note for Sarah.”
We walked out onto Observatory Hill, then circled back to the suspension bridge. She meant to cross it, I knew. To tease me with the classic suicide’s view of the gorge. To test whether I’d try to stop her. But if I did, some slender thread of trust would snap between us. So I let her walk ahead, running her fingers along the railing as she went, squinting up at the high curving cables, or down at the grey winding snake of the river. She stopped in the centre and I caught her up. To find her eyes wide with joy.
“It’s good to be alive,” she said, turning towards me. “Isn’t it?”
I nodded. “Yes. It is.”
“I thought so even on Monday. It’s just . . . for a moment . . . for an hour at most . . . death . . . or oblivion . . . seemed even more attractive.”
“But not any more?”
“No. The world’s too wonderful to gi
ve up. I haven’t had my fill of it yet.”
“You never will.”
“I hope not. Except . . . do you think Mummy might simply have . . . had enough of the world?”
“I’d say the exact reverse.”
“I’m sure you’re right. It’s funny, though. When I saw her . . . in that place . . . the mortuary . . . she looked so . . . very very beautiful.”
“She was beautiful when she was alive.”
“But even more so when she was dead. Her skin was so pale. Like . . . flawless alabaster. And so cold. When I touched her, she opened her eyes, you know.”
“What?”
“Oh, it was an hallucination, of course. A figment of my over-stressed imagination. But it seemed so real. And the oddest thing was . . . how happy she looked.” Rowena took a deep breath, then started back towards the Clifton side of the bridge. As I fell in beside her, she said: “One of the things I used to like about mathematics was the certainty. An answer was either right or wrong. And if it was right, it was absolutely right and always would be. First principles governed everything. Two plus two equalled four and could never equal anything else.”
“Surely that’s still the case.”
“In mathematics, perhaps. But not in life. The variables are too great. It would be possible to rerun the events of the seventeenth of July last year a hundred times within the same parameters and produce a hundred different results. Many of them would be similar, of course. But none would be identical. Not exactly. Some would be dramatically different. Almost unrecognizable. A lot of times—maybe a majority of times—Mummy wouldn’t die. Wouldn’t even be in danger. Just because of some tiny scarcely noticeable variation. Like what she said to me. Or to you. And what we said in reply.”
“But we can’t rerun those events. Any more than we can—or should—take responsibility for the fatal variation.”
“I know.” She looked round at me and smiled. “That’s why I’m going to stop trying to.”
Rowena stayed behind when Sarah drove me to the station early that evening. Sarah, indeed, encouraged her to on the grounds that she should take her convalescence seriously. She was so emphatic on the point, however, that I suspected another reason was at work: an eagerness to compare notes with me on her sister’s state of mind. And so it turned out. No sooner had we left Clifton than she proposed we stop on the way for a drink. There were plenty of later trains than the one I’d been aiming for, so I was happy to agree.
A hotel bar supplied the privacy Sarah was seeking. She insisted on buying the drinks, as if I merited some reward for coming so far. Perhaps my willing response to her call had struck her as unusually—even oddly—generous. She wasn’t to know how helpless I was to resist any summons emanating from her family. I couldn’t have begun to explain why I should be. But I was. What she might regard as altruism was in reality a compulsion.
“I think seeing you’s done Rowena some good. She seemed much more relaxed this afternoon.”
“I didn’t do very much. Apart from listen.”
“Perhaps not. But she thinks you’re the only one who can understand what she experienced the day Mummy died.”
“I can try to. Though I don’t share her belief that your mother somehow foresaw her death.”
“No. Well, obviously she didn’t.”
“Nevertheless, her parting words to Rowena were . . . a little strange, weren’t they?”
“Ah. She told you them, did she?” Sarah toyed with her glass, rattling the ice cubes against each other and frowning, as if considering a complex legal question. “I do wish she’d forget what Mummy said and what it might have meant.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m running out of ways to avoid explaining to her that there’s a much more plausible interpretation than her fanciful ideas of precognition.”
Now it was my turn to frown. “Meaning?”
“Oh, come on. Mummy had lost her wedding ring. She’d brought a suitcase full of clothes back from Biarritz, but she didn’t leave it at home. It went with her in the car, on the grounds that she had no time to unpack.”
“I still don’t—”
“She was leaving Daddy. That’s what I think, anyway. It’s probably what she told him in the note he threw away. And it’s probably what she meant to tell Rowena. Until she thought better of it. Thank God.”
I wanted to contradict her. I wanted to deny that the mystery and ambiguity surrounding her mother’s death could be reduced to a simple act of marital desertion. But I was aware before I spoke that my protests would seem inexplicable. Why should I care whether it was true or not? Why should it be any of my business? In the end, I said nothing.
“I can’t be certain, of course. It’s not something I was expecting. Or had any reason to expect. But Mummy would have been quite capable of putting up a convincing front. Even Daddy might not have known she was planning to leave him. I can’t exactly ask him, can I? I’d have to accuse him of lying about the note—and of destroying material evidence.”
She’d thought this all along. Since before we’d met in Brussels. It was safe to tell me now, of course. The trial was out of the way. My testimony could no longer be tarnished by doubts about her mother’s image of impeccable virtue. Disgust at her father’s marriage to my sister-in-law must also have played its part. She probably took some small pleasure in enlightening me. Saw it as a vicarious slap in the face for Bella.
“Hadn’t it occurred to you, Robin? I mean, just as a theoretical possibility?”
“No. It hadn’t.”
“I was so worried it must have. And that you’d say so to Rowena. She mustn’t be allowed to think of it. It would be disastrous. She sees Mummy as perfect in every way.”
“But you don’t?”
“She was human. Like the rest of us. And she kept a great deal to herself. If she’d had enough of her marriage, it would be just like her to conceal the fact from Rowena and me. And to endure it until we were no longer dependent on her. Well, I was already off her hands. And Rowena was about to follow. Maybe last year seemed the obvious time to make the break.”
“Where would she have gone?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps she didn’t either. Perhaps it was sufficient just to strike out on her own. A few days with Sophie, then . . . If she really meant to go to Sophie’s, that is.”
“You’re not suggesting she and Oscar Bantock—”
“No, no. I’m sure not. But . . . perhaps some other man I never met was waiting patiently. Somebody she’d known years before, still carrying a torch.”
I remembered the man who’d nearly driven me down in Butterbur Lane and was tempted to describe him to Sarah in case she knew him. Then resentment of her honesty overcame me. Why say anything to support her theory when she’d kept it from me so long? Why reinforce a suspicion I wanted no part of? “You could be wrong about this, couldn’t you?” I asked, silently willing her to agree. “As a lawyer, wouldn’t you say the evidence was purely circumstantial?”
“Oh yes. I could be wrong. Easily. I hope I am wrong. I love my father. I don’t like to think of what he must have gone through if I’m right. To learn Mummy had deserted him only a few hours before he learned she was dead. And then not to be able to tell anyone. To love her and to lose her. Twice over. That’s real suffering, don’t you think?”
“I think you’ve all suffered. In your different ways.”
“And Rowena responds by trying to commit suicide. While Daddy makes a fool of himself with a glamorous widow.” She smiled, mocking me as well as herself. “Where does that leave me, Robin?”
“It leaves you taking it in your stride. Apparently.”
“Don’t you think I am?”
“You tell me. Being the strong dependable sister can’t be easy. If you’ll forgive me for saying so . . .”
“Yes?”
“You look . . . just a little stretched.”
“Rubbish.” She reddened and took a sip of her drink. “Absolute ru
bbish.”
“Is it?”
“I believe in facing facts.” She tossed her head, the haughty public schoolgirl peeking from behind the composed professional. “If necessary, facing them down.”
“But these aren’t facts, are they? Only suppositions.”
“Exactly.” She stared at me impatiently, as if I were being irritatingly obtuse. “That’s why I want to protect Rowena from them. Because what can’t be proved can’t be disproved.”
“Then stop worrying. She’ll learn none of this from me.”
“No. I don’t suppose she will.” She sat back and studied me intently through narrowed lids. “You’re a puzzle, Robin. You really are.”
“In what way?”
“Why do you care about us so much? We don’t give you much encouragement. We’re not even as grateful as we should be. When you met Mummy on Hergest Ridge— By the way, that was the first time you’d met her, wasn’t it?”
“Of course.”
“It’s just . . . well . . . we only have your word for it, don’t we? That it was a chance meeting, I mean.” Yes. They did. So did I. Only my word. Only my fallible recollection. And now, worming its way into Sarah’s mind, was the half-formed thought that had already strayed into mine. I’d met Louise Paxton by chance. The purest of chances. It couldn’t have been anything else. Could it? “Go on then, Robin. Say that’s what it was. Why don’t you? What’s stopping you?”
“Nothing.”
“But still you don’t say it.”
“Because I can’t prove it. To you. Or to anyone else.” Her eyes were open wide now, staring at me in amazement. This was the last reply she’d expected. And the last one she’d have wanted to hear. “I can’t prove it, Sarah. Even to myself.”
Waiting for the train at Temple Meads, sobered by cold air and the rowdy dregs of a football crowd further down the platform, Sarah and I looked sheepishly at each other. We both regretted the turn our conversation had taken. We were ashamed of the accusations we’d almost levelled, the inner truths we’d almost revealed. They were intimacies we weren’t ready for. Arenas we weren’t prepared to enter.