by Joan Smith
She dialled the Winchester number and listened, in both relief and frustration, to the forlorn sound of a phone ringing in an empty house. After a while she dialled again, checking that she hadn’t got a wrong number first time round. There was still no reply. She tried the second number, the house on the coast, with the same negative result. Loretta looked at her watch, thought that Tom Neil might not have come home from work, and resolved to try later.
By the time she left the house at half past six, for a yoga class which she hoped would help her relax, she had dialled each number half a dozen times without getting an answer. That didn’t mean anything, of course, but she was very conscious of the fact that it was now four days since she’d heard from Sandra. She walked round the corner towards Upper Street, toying with the idea of going to the police, and decided to wait until the next morning before taking so drastic a step.
It was after ten when she got back to the flat, having allowed herself to be persuaded by two women from her yoga class to join them for a sauna and a vegetarian Indian meal. There was still no sign of Sandra, nor any message from her on the answering-machine, and Loretta promised herself she would ring Tom Neil first thing in the morning.
The phone was picked up on the third ring and a tired male voice recited the Winchester number Loretta had got from Sally.
‘Mr Neil?’ She was far from encouraged by his tone.
‘Speaking.’
‘I’m a friend of Sandra’s –’ she began, wondering how to phrase her request.
‘Oh.’ She heard a long sigh. ‘You’re ringing about the funeral?’
For a second Loretta’s mind went blank. ‘The funeral?’ she repeated, exactly echoing his inflection. Suddenly she remembered that Tom Neil had taken the children on a skiing holiday, and an awful possibility struck her with the force of a blow. Oh God, that would explain Sandra’s hasty departure from the flat, why there was no note. . .
‘The children –’
They’re as well as can be expected,’ Tom Neil told her, misconstruing her concern. ‘Felix has taken it better than Lizzie, I’m just hoping after today. . .’
‘Oh – so it’s not –’ Loretta felt a wave of relief. She groped for words, anxious to find out which of Sandra’s relatives had died but not wanting to ask outright. She decided that the simplest way of finding out was to speak to Sandra herself. ‘Is she there? Can I speak to her?’
‘Speak to her? Speak to who?’
‘To Sandra. She is there, isn’t she?’
‘Oh Christ.’ There was a stunned silence at the other end of the line. ‘You haven’t heard – I’m sorry, I assumed you knew. Sandra’s – it’s Sandra’s funeral.’
Loretta gripped the phone tightly, unable to speak.
‘I didn’t – it was in the paper, and lots of her friends have – I’m sorry. It must be a terrible shock.’
‘Yes, I – I can’t – you must be – oh!’ Tears streamed down Loretta’s face.
‘I’m sorry to have told you so – so abruptly. That’s one of the things you discover at a time like this, there’s no way of – I’ve had a lot of it in the last few days.’
‘But I don’t – was she ill?’ Loretta was incredulous.
‘Oh no, nothing like – it was an accident, a car accident.’
‘Did she – when?’
‘We don’t know – some time on New Year’s Eve. There wasn’t – no one else was involved.’
‘I – I see.’
‘The funeral’s this morning – she’s being cremated. There’s a service at eleven, if you’d like to come. . .’
Loretta glanced at her watch. Its face swam before her, indistinct through her tears, and she wiped her eyes impatiently with the back of her hand.
‘I can’t – it’s too late –’
That’s all right – I understand. I’m afraid I ought to – people are starting to arrive. . .’
‘Oh yes, I mustn’t. . . Thanks for telling me, and I hope. . .’ She tailed off.
‘I am sorry – I hoped people would see it in the paper. You’ve had a shock.’
‘Yes. I – thank you. Goodbye.’
Loretta put the phone down blindly, leaned forward with her elbows on her knees, and gave way to the sobs rising in her throat. Her head was full of images – Sandra on Christmas Eve, in the hall taking off her damp raincoat; on Christmas Day, wearing a silly paper hat; in the kitchen, eating breakfast in her lilac kimono. Sandra dead – Loretta couldn’t believe it.
She sat up, wiping her eyes on a tattered paper handkerchief she had found in the pocket of her skirt. New Year’s Eve: it had happened on the very day Sandra left the flat. She had been dead all this time, and Loretta had carried on with her own life, stupidly unaware; she had even found out too late to get to the funeral. . . She looked at her watch again, checking that there really was no chance – it was twenty-five to ten, far too late to get to a funeral in Hampshire at eleven. Loretta gave a heavy, shuddering sigh, and dabbed at her eyes again. She tried to remember what she’d said to Tom Neil, so shocked by her discovery that she couldn’t even recall whether she’d said the conventional things – that she was sorry, and if there was anything she could do. . . She wasn’t even sure whether she’d told him her name, in fact she probably hadn’t. And what had he told her, apart from the fact that Sandra had died in a car accident? Loretta realized she hadn’t asked where it had happened, whether Sandra had died instantly or – that bit didn’t bear thinking about.
She bit her lip, realizing she had forgotten to tell Tom Neil that his wife had been staying with her, and that Sandra’s belongings were still in the flat. She would have to ring him again, though she flinched from doing it today. He had the ordeal of the funeral to get through; whatever the state of his relationship with Sandra, the news of her death must have come as a devastating blow – and what about the children? Felix and Lizzie, those were their names; how were they coping? The whole thing was awful, unbelievable. Loretta’s numbed mind drifted away from practical considerations to the still astonishing fact that Sandra had walked out of this very room some time last Thursday – perhaps only a few minutes after Loretta had turned down her invitation to dinner – and was dead within a matter of hours. Loretta remembered her own return home from work, her annoyance at finding the mess Sandra had left in the flat, and was overwhelmed by a fresh wave of grief and guilt.
Chapter 5
‘I still can’t believe it. She was dead all that time and I didn’t know – I hardly made any effort –’ Loretta broke off, afraid she was going to cry again. She cradled the phone under her chin while she felt in her pockets for her errant handkerchief.
‘I do think you’re being a bit hard on yourself, Loretta,’ Robert told her. ‘Obviously it’s a shock, and it’s going to take a while to recover, but there was no reason for you to think anything like this had happened. If you assumed the worst every time you didn’t hear from someone for a few days you’d be in a constant state of hysteria.’
‘Yes, but I even missed the funeral,’ Loretta pointed out. ‘If I’d rung Sally last week, when she first disappeared, I could at least have gone to the funeral.’
‘I can see that, but it hasn’t made any difference to Sandra, has it? Look, don’t you think guilt has a lot to do with this? Not that you’ve anything to be guilty about – you gave her a bed in spite of the fact you didn’t like her. Now, Loretta, you know you didn’t get on –’
‘All right, but it doesn’t help, does it?’ Loretta was beginning to regret ringing Robert. She had needed to tell someone the terrible news and her first choice had been Sally, who was out. She was no longer sure why she had fixed on Robert next, but the conversation certainly wasn’t making her feel better.
‘Anyway,’ she said, anxious to get off the phone. ‘I mustn’t keep you – were you working?’
‘Yes, as it happens. On another of those piano pieces – the ones I played last time you were here. But it doesn’t matter – it’s y
ou I’m concerned about.’
‘Oh, don’t worry about me. I’ll – I’ve got various things I can get on with,’ Loretta said vaguely. ‘I’ll be all right.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes – I’ll see you on Saturday.’
‘Oh, we’ll speak before then. I’ll give you a ring to see how you are. Try not to reproach yourself, Loretta.’
‘Yes – bye now.’
‘Bye.’
Loretta sat back in her chair, staring at a point on the floor. She remained in this position for perhaps two minutes, punishing herself by dwelling on the strategems she’d adopted to avoid spending time with Sandra in the flat. Whatever Robert said, her behaviour had not been kind. She longed to speak to Sally, and eventually she picked up the phone and tried her number again. There was still no reply and she wondered if Tuesday was one of the days Sally worked. Frustrated, she put down the phone and started moving restlessly round the room, coming to a halt in front of a card which showed the Virgin Mary standing outside an NHS maternity hospital with a ‘Closed for Christmas’ sign on the door. Her face brightened as she picked it up, but fell again as she saw what was written inside. The sender was Bridget Bennett, another former members of the women’s group, and the message gave the date of Bridget’s return to England from Connecticut, where she had gone to stay with her cousin and his wife. For a brief moment she had entertained the hope that Bridget would be back this week – she would understand her feelings, Loretta was sure – but the note inside the card said ‘back on the 14th’, more than a week away.
Loretta returned the Christmas card to the mantelpiece, feeling very isolated. Even John Tracey was out of the country – and in his case there was the divorce to think of. It was not yet clear what difference it would make to their relationship, but Loretta couldn’t believe that things would go on as they had before. She blinked several times, suddenly aware that her eyes were sore and puffy, and went into the kitchen where she bathed them messily with kitchen paper soaked in cold water. Then she went to the fridge, remembering that she hadn’t had anything to eat since the night before. She reached inside and took out a bowl of cold rice salad left over from the weekend, wrinkling her nose at its aroma – an unappetizing combination of stale cheese, stringy meat, and bits of green pepper which had begun to curl at the edges. She couldn’t imagine why she had kept it, and it was the work of a moment to slide the solid white mess into the bin. The rest of the stuff in the fridge was hardly more appealing, and Loretta decided a trip to the Sainsbury’s superstore at the bottom of Liverpool Road would be good for her mentally and physically.
The weather had turned bitterly cold again after a mild weekend and Loretta was very glad when she got home with her shopping. She had left the central heating on and it was warm and cosy in the flat. She started emptying her carrier bags on to the table, and was putting a pack of kitchen towels in the cupboard under the sink when she realized she was on the verge of more tears. It wasn’t really surprising, she thought, straightening up and wiping her eyes; she had managed not to think about Sandra while she was pushing her trolley up and down the crowded aisles in the supermarket, but it was more difficult now she was back in the flat and vulnerable to its associations. She hurried through the rest of the unpacking, leaving out a carton of ready-made soup which she poured into a pan on the cooker as soon as everything else had been put away. Then she cut a couple of slices of wholemeal bread from a fresh loaf and laid a place at one end of the table.
She had just finished eating and was stroking the cat in a dispirited manner when the phone rang. Loretta got to her feet, letting Bertie slide gently to the floor, and wondered if it was Robert. She went to the phone reluctantly and answered it with an unenthusiastic ‘hello’.
‘Loretta? You sound awful. Have you got a cold?’ It was Sally.
‘No – I’m all right.’ Unprepared, Loretta didn’t know how to tell Sally about Sandra. She hesitated, and Sally continued in a cheerful voice.
‘Well, I can’t talk for long – I’m ringing to see whether Sandra’s turned up. I was thinking about it last night, and I’d quite like to speak to her – I feel a bit guilty about losing touch. I know what I said, but I do have a soft spot for her. . .’
This speech made things worse, and Loretta found herself replying in a rush.
‘I did try to get hold of you earlier – I don’t know what to. . . Listen, Sally, it’s bad news, this is going to be a shock – I rang Tom – and she’s dead. It’s awful – there was a car crash. Isn’t it dreadful?’
‘Dead? Oh, Loretta. . .’
Sally didn’t say any more but Loretta heard snuffling noises at the other end of the line.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said miserably. ‘You must be terribly shocked – I am, I’ve been bursting into tears all day.’
‘She – you said a car crash?’
‘Yes. That’s all I know. It’s stupid – I didn’t think to ask anything else.’
‘Well, that’s – you spoke to Tom? How was he? Hold on while I blow my nose.’
‘All right, I suppose. It’s hard to tell, I’ve never met him.’
‘Have you told the others?’
‘The others?’
‘Yes – the group.’
‘Gosh, I didn’t think ... I was going to ring Bridget, but she’s in the States till next week. . .’
‘I was just thinking, I’d like to go to the funeral and I’m sure Sue –’
‘Oh – it’s too late. The funeral was today – eleven o’clock. I’m sorry, if only I’d got hold of him earlier. . .’
‘It’s all right, Loretta, you weren’t to know. I wonder – d’you think we should have a meeting? As we’ve missed the funeral, I mean? It might be a better. . . Funerals are such an awful way to remember people.’
‘A sort of memorial meeting, is that what you mean?’
‘Well, nothing formal – just a chance to talk about – what’s happened.’
‘But would we –’ Loretta was unsure. It was one thing for the members of the group to meet again at a funeral, an event whose purpose and structure were clear. The success of Sally’s suggestion would depend on their ability to recreate the old intimacy of group meetings, and without it there might be embarrassed silences into which people would feel constrained to fling mawkish remembrances of Sandra. She tried to remember when the group had last met. Was it 1981 or 1982?
‘Would we – you sound doubtful?’
‘No, I – I’m just wondering if it would work. After such a long time.’
‘I know what you mean. But I can’t help feeling we should do something. The group was an important part of my life – all our lives. We can’t just ignore –’
‘Of course not,’ Loretta said uncomfortably, sensing an unspoken accusation that her attitude was unfeeling. ‘No, if you think – How do you want to go about it? As I say, Bridget’s away till next week, and in any case she isn’t often in London. . .’
‘It may not be possible to get everyone – we may have to make do with you, me, Sue and June. If you’re willing, that is? Good – in that case, leave the arrangements to me. Where d’you think – shall we meet at my flat? Oh’ – Loretta heard a faint wail in the background – ‘there’s Felicity, she’s woken up. Sorry, Loretta, I’ll have to go.’
After she’d put down the phone it occurred to Loretta that Sally was, like herself, troubled by guilt. Sally had been critical of Sandra the previous afternoon, but had apparently regretted her remarks even before she knew about the fatal car crash. Her attempt to get the women’s group together was probably a way of assuaging that guilt, which didn’t make Loretta feel any better about the meeting. What would they talk about? It was years since she’d seen June Price or Sue Corbett, and the brutal fact of Sandra’s death would dominate the meeting. . . Loretta told herself she was too tired to think about the subject any longer. The idea was Sally’s, and it was up to her to do the worrying. Loretta glanced at her watch, went into
the drawing-room and turned on the Six O’Clock News.
On Saturday night Loretta stepped reluctantly out on to the pavement, pulling the street door shut behind her. A gust of freezing rain stung her eyes and she turned up the wide collar of her coat to protect her face, hurrying round the corner to her car. The weather was wild, had been all day, and her only consolation was that she didn’t have far to go. Sally had contacted Sue Corbett and June Price, and this was the only evening in the next couple of weeks when all three of them could make it. Loretta wasn’t free, in theory, having promised to spend the night with Robert in Oxfordshire, but the complications which arose when she mentioned this fact to Sally were so great that she had given in and cancelled the trip. Robert reacted coolly to the change of plan, so much so that Loretta took an instant and unplanned decision to conceal the reason from him. It seemed easier to take refuge in a small lie about having to go down to her mother’s than to explain about the meeting, especially as she still had doubts about the wisdom of it. The phone conversations with Sally and Robert had left her feeling resentful of their demands on her, and with a slight impression from a remark of Sally’s that she was not alone in her lack of enthusiasm for the reunion.
Now it was too late to do anything about it. Loretta turned the key in the ignition, waiting for a gap in the traffic in the side street where she had parked the car. She pulled out, peering hard through the filmy windscreen at the wet road in front of her and the reflected light of the street lamps. The rain suddenly got heavier, bouncing off the road and drumming on the roof of the car, and she was glad Sally lived near by. It was not the evening for map-reading her way through unfamiliar suburbs of London. Loretta turned left into Upper Street, heading for Highbury Corner, and at the roundabout took another left into Holloway Road. The traffic was light and she made rapid progress, eventually slowing the car and moving into the centre of the road just before Jones Brothers. She turned into Sally’s street, passing the cinema on the corner which had long been converted into a billiard hall, though Loretta dimly remembered having once seen a film there – the Coronet, that was what the place had been called. The short road was full of double-parked cars and she had to negotiate a zig-zag course to the end, turning into another street before spotting a gap large enough for her Panda. She squeezed it into a narrow space between a brand new sports car and a beaten-up purple Capri, struggling to put up her umbrella as she got out of the car. Then she set off in the direction of Loraine Road, buffeted by a wind which threatened to turn her umbrella inside out at any moment. A couple of minutes later she bounded up the steps of the house in which Sally and Peter had the upper-ground floor flat; their bell was the middle one of three.