“Don’t sound so ruddy pleased about it.” John’s voice wobbled with hurt. “Anyone would think you were happier without me.” He let his spoon fall into the metal ice cream dish with a clatter.
“Don’t be daft. Of course I want you to come home, love. The house doesn’t seem the same without you,” she said, trying to sound like a caring sister. “But we want to make sure you’re all right first, don’t we? I mean, you hear about them sending people home too early just to free up the beds.”
“You look different, Marion,” said John, his eyes squinting at her like the stone-lidded shellfish that clustered under Northport Pier. “Is that a new coat?”
• • •
MARION DREAMT THAT night she was running down Grange Road. She passed dozens of large Edwardian houses and hundreds of poplar trees, yet no matter how far she ran, she never seemed to reach her own home. Then suddenly she found herself at the top of the cellar steps. The door was open, and she could hear screams from below. She ran down the steps and found Lydia lying on one of those awful mattresses and chained to the wall. She rushed to help her, but John was standing there holding a hammer. Before she could do anything, he moved towards her, swinging the hammer, then everything went black.
• • •
THE METER TICKED up to ten pounds just as they turned onto Grange Road. John, unshaven and wearing his pajamas beneath his coat, sat next to her on the wide backseat of the taxi. He kept glancing at Marion.
Marion examined the contents of her purse for a suitable amount to pay the driver; she knew she ought to tip, yet was never sure of the right amount. If she gave him too much, she would be left feeling like a fool, yet if she didn’t give enough, the driver might get angry. If only John would deal with it, he was the man, after all, but he seemed too busy being an invalid to bother himself with matters like that.
As the taxi pulled up outside the house Marion noticed that Mr. Weinberg was standing outside his house watching them. After John and his bags had been placed onto the pavement, Marion thrust an amount just twenty-five pence more than the price on the meter into the driver’s hand, then hurried away without waiting to see if he was annoyed or not.
As she helped John down the path, she realized how much weight he had lost. Illness had chewed the meat right off his bones. He kept clinging to her arm, as if he was frightened of falling over, and had to be detached, finger by tightly curled finger, while she went to unlock the front door and carry his bags inside. She supported him down the hallway and then once he reached the lounge, he managed to make his way across the room by gripping bits of furniture. It seemed he didn’t even notice that all the junk and clutter had been cleared from the room.
“Always nice to get back home,” he sighed, then sank into his place on the sofa and picked up their copy of the Radio Times.
“You know, Marion, I’d love a cup of tea.”
She stood in the doorway staring at her brother, holding her breath and waiting for him to ask about them.
He turned to look at her. “What are you doing standing there like a wax dummy? Put the kettle on. And let the girls know I’m home. I won’t be able to get down to see them just yet. Those cellar steps are a devil.”
• • •
AT NIGHT, JOHN slept on the living room sofa. During the day he watched TV and read books, eating his meals from a tray on his lap. To begin with, her brother needed Marion’s help with everything: washing, dressing, and even using the bedpan. John didn’t seem the slightest bit embarrassed by any of this.
“My toenails need doing. And make sure you don’t cut them too short,” he ordered as she was pulling off his socks before bedtime.
Disgusted by the thought of touching his swollen yellow feet, Marion went to fetch the nail clippers. As she was clipping his big toenail he screamed out loud. “Watch what you are doing, you clumsy bitch. You must have cut right to the bone.”
• • •
TWICE A DAY she unlocked the cellar and then stood at the top of the steps for several minutes, shivering with horror. When she came out again, she slammed the door loudly behind her. By doing this she hoped to fool John into thinking that she was still looking after the girls. It surprised her that he never asked about the baby. Did he really think a child could survive down there with his mother in chains? Perhaps he was afraid of knowing the truth.
A district nurse came regularly to check on John. Despite Marion’s cleanup, no amount of Mountain Breeze air freshener could disguise the sickly rotten smell that hung in the air. As soon as Sister Pam walked through the front door her lip curled in disgust. A house that produced such a stink was clearly not a suitable habitat for someone recovering from major surgery. “You know your brother is still very vulnerable to infection. A squalid environment could prove lethal,” she warned Marion, shaking an immaculately scrubbed finger at her.
Andrea, the terrifyingly cheerful physiotherapist in her crisp blue polyester uniform, came three times a week to bully John into exercising. After he had been home a fortnight she finally forced him into climbing the stairs by himself.
“If you don’t get moving now, you will stay in that chair for the rest of your life.” Andrea had a way of making even threats sound jolly.
As John strained up each step, clutching the banister as he went, Marion willed the carpet beneath his feet to wrinkle so he would slip and tumble down the steep stairs. Then he might never have to discover what lay down in the cellar. But John did not fall; instead, he struggled all the way to the top and then stood there panting and grinning at the physio, desperate for teacher’s approval.
“I did it, didn’t I? Can you believe that?”
• • •
ONE MORNING, NEARLY a month after John was discharged from hospital, she heard a roar of misery echo through the house. When she found him, he was sitting at the kitchen table weeping.
“Are you all right, John? What’s the matter?”
He refused to even look at her. She knew then that he had found them.
“How could you, Marion?” His voice sounded strained, like a rope was tightening around his throat. “They were all I bloody had. I loved them. They loved me too in their way. You could never understand.”
The tea towel that he used to wipe away his tears had a map of “Bonnie Scotland” on it, and the head of the Loch Ness monster peeped out from John’s clenched fist.
“I’m not like you. I need love and affection; I need human warmth. I’m not dead inside like you. And the child—you let the child die. That was unforgivable. You killed my son—my own sister, a cold-blooded murderess. You were jealous, that was it—you didn’t want me to have anything. . . .” He trailed off as if the rope around his neck had gotten so tight, he could no longer speak.
No, Marion was about to say, that wasn’t my fault, the child was already dead. I would have done anything to save it. I would have given my own life. But then she realized she didn’t care anymore what he thought of her.
She carried on cooking his meals, making his toast in the morning, warming his tins of soup and macaroni and cheese, and he ate it all without saying a word or even looking at her.
“I could poison you if I wanted to; I am, after all, a cold-blooded killer,” she said to herself from time to time, thinking of the box of rat poison beneath the kitchen sink.
• • •
HE DID THE exercises prescribed by the physiotherapist each day lying on the living room sofa, kicking his legs in the air, lifting tins of soup, flexing his ankles. Eventually he was able to drive himself to the hospital for appointments. Every now and then, she would pass John in the hallway or they would meet in the kitchen and he would glare at her with a deathly look. He was getting stronger, and Marion knew he was thinking about revenge. The danger came from not knowing when or how he would attack, so she would have to be on her guard constantly.
John used a chain saw to cut up the sycamore tree. Its grating roar seemed to cut through her. Looking through her bedroo
m window late one night, she saw her brother pulling two black bin liners across the grass. He took them to the rear of the garden and threw them onto the heap of rubbish she had cleared from the house. Then he tossed on several logs cut from the sycamore tree. He must have soaked the wood in petrol, because when he lit a match and cast it onto the pile, great orange flames cut into the night.
A dark thrill went through Marion, and she remembered her father burning John’s magazines in the garden. But would they burn completely, she wondered, even the bones? Marion seemed to remember reading that when people were cremated, the bigger bones would not burn and had to be ground down like flour in a mill.
• • •
ONE AFTERNOON WHEN she was lying on her bed, the doorbell rang. She looked out the window and saw the dusty gray disk of Mr. Weinberg’s hat below.
If I don’t go down, she thought wearily, he’ll be out there all day.
As she went downstairs she saw the familiar shape behind the colored glass door panel. Briing-briing. Each ring made her heart beat a little faster. Then a blister of rage burst inside her. I’m not going to let some daft old bugger like him frighten me.
“What do you want?” she announced on opening the door.
Mr. Weinberg just stared at her with his ugly old tortoise mouth hanging open. Under his coat he was wearing pink and orange pajamas that must have been fifty years old.
“Well? I’m really very busy. What is it you want?”
“I know that smell,” he said.
“For goodness’ sake, what smell are you talking about?”
“The burning. That smell, the burning of bodies. I know from the war. You never forget. A smell stays with you always.”
He tapped his nose with a scaly finger.
“That’s none of your damn business!” she yelled at him. “Just go away. Don’t ever come back here again, you dirty stinking fool.” Then she slammed the door in the old man’s face and rushed back up to her room.
Immediately Marion felt a wave of self-disgust. She shouldn’t have called him those wicked names. But really, someone like that ought not to be allowed out alone; he was clearly suffering from dementia. His family, if he had any, should have him put away in a care home.
• • •
THE BONFIRE WENT on for days. On the fourth night she saw him throw a white shape into the fire. The teddy bear. Marion felt a stab of sorrow. That poor baby had dipped into the world for such a short time. Didn’t he at least deserve some fitting memorial, perhaps a stone angel or a dove of innocence to mark his brief life? When the last bonfire died down, John took a spade and began to turn the soil over until the far end of the garden was nothing but a patch of blackened earth.
“The smell was just awful, Marion. I couldn’t even leave my windows open at night,” Judith said as she placed a cup of tea on the table before Marion.
Even though there was no sugar to dissolve, Marion picked up a spoon and stirred out of habit. She was visiting Judith in order to pay her for the damage to the wall. Judith had been unable to hide the gleam in her eye when she opened the envelope of cash. Clearly Marion’s payment had been far too generous, yet it was a relief to bring the matter to a close.
“I had some people over the other evening,” Judith went on, after putting the envelope safely into a drawer, “a local artist who works with things that wash up on the beach, and his partner came for dinner, and you could taste it”—Judith screwed up her mouth and looked as though she was about to spit—“you could actually taste the smoke on your tongue, even with the windows closed.”
“I’m sorry, Judith, I really don’t know what to say—”
“But just what was he burning out there?”
“The sycamore tree, of course. I thought you’d be glad to see it gone.”
“Why not just pay someone to take it away? I mean, shouldn’t he be resting after his surgery?”
“The doctors said exercise is good for him, so long as he doesn’t overdo it.”
“But surely just burning wood wouldn’t make that awful stink? To be honest, you’re lucky no one has complained to the council about it.”
“I suppose it smelled like that because it was rotten.”
Only half convinced, Judith frowned and sipped her coffee.
At least Judith would be away in Greece in a few days, but what if someone had complained? Marion wondered. Then Judith’s phone rang. She answered it and began pacing around her kitchen while talking. “I intend to use my full baggage allowance—if you need to bring that much, then you’ll have to pay extra yourself,” she said sharply, followed by: “Greg, I honestly don’t know what you can and can’t flush down the toilets in the villa—can’t you email them about that?”
“How is Lydia getting along?” asked Marion after Judith hung up, eager to prevent the conversation from returning to the subject of John’s bonfires.
“Don’t ask,” said Judith, shaking her head. “She’s dropping out of her course.”
“Oh, Judith—what a shame.”
“She says it’s a waste of time and money—I just wish she’d decided that two years ago. Anyway, she wants to see the world instead, so she’s got a job nannying in Spain.”
“Who is she going to work for?”
“Some couple who live in Madrid. I think one of them works in the oil industry. She mentioned they have a dog.”
“Do you know anything about them? What kind of people are they?”
“Vampire rapists, I expect.” Judith scowled as if Marion’s stupidity were giving her a headache, then began clearing up the cups and putting them into the sink, in a way that let Marion know it was time for her to leave. Suddenly remembering her dream about Lydia in the cellar, Marion was filled with panic.
“But a young woman traveling abroad like that on her own, don’t you think you ought to find out more about them?”
“Oh, for God’s sake, if you had kids yourself, you would realize you can’t mollycoddle them, or they’ll end up too frightened to go out the front door in case they catch a cold. I mean, do you want her to end up like you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Living in the same house you’ve lived in all your life, never taking risks, never finding a job or getting married?”
A flash of guilt crossed Judith’s face as if she realized she had pinched too hard this time.
“Though I’m sure your life has been rich in other ways,” she said apologetically. “Perhaps ones that aren’t immediately obvious to the outsider.”
Her conciliatory smile wasn’t enough to push down Marion’s rising anger.
“You think I am this sad, plain little woman, but you don’t know anything about me, Judith. You have no idea what I am capable of.”
Then she picked up a little red espresso cup and threw it on the floor. It did not break but went rolling towards the huge fridge as if for protection.
Judith said nothing, but her look of shock could not have been greater if the cup had hurled itself across the kitchen.
Marion went back home, her heart still pounding from the outburst. The ringing of the telephone in the hallway multiplied her feeling of alarm. She picked it up fearfully, a small, silly part of her imagining Judith had called the police.
“Hello, is that Marion?”
She didn’t recognize the male voice on the line. Surely shouting at a neighbor wasn’t against the law, was it? The cup hadn’t even broken.
“Who is this?”
“This is Simon, from Tyler and Co. Have I caught you at a bad time? You came in to visit the flat on Northport Beach last summer?” Of course, Simon the estate agent, she remembered liking how his sentences bounced up at the end in a way that sounded hopeful and cheery.
“Oh yes, yes—the flat.” She must have given him her telephone number the last time they spoke.
“Are you all right? You sound like you’re a bit out of puff,” he said sympathetically. “Should I call back at another time?”
; Marion forced herself to breathe steadily.
“No, it’s all right, I just ran downstairs.”
“We did find a buyer for the flat, but unfortunately the purchase fell through, and now the sellers have lowered the price by ten thousand. I know how much you liked it, and I thought you might want to take another look.”
• • •
AS SHE MADE her way along the seafront towards Ocean Vista Court, Marion passed dozens of the benches and little brick shelters where rows of old people in gray and beige raincoats perched like pigeons. She felt they must be staring at her and thinking how ridiculous she looked in the pink wool two-piece of Mother’s she had put on to meet the estate agent.
“Look at the state of her,” they were probably thinking. “Who does she think she is, all dressed up like a dog’s dinner? And running around with no coat in February.”
The pink skirt rode up her thighs as she walked, and she had to keep stopping to pull it back down again. She had put on a pair of Mother’s American Tan tights, but her shoes, a pair of badly scuffed brogues, one tied with a blue lace and the other with black, were Marion’s own, as Mother’s feet had been several sizes smaller. The tights itched like hell. Marion scratched her leg, then cursed herself when she realized she made a ladder all the way down her right shin. A strong wind came from the sea, blowing sand into her eyes and upsetting her carefully arranged hair.
And to think she had gotten herself ready with some vague idea of looking pretty for Simon. It embarrassed her to think of the five other outfits that lay on Mother’s bed, having been tried on, then rejected. Did she really imagine it was going to matter to him if she wore the powder-blue trouser suit or the tangerine day dress? And why was she going back to that flat? It was unfair to let him think that she would really buy it, when of course this was entirely impossible. But he had sounded so polite and hopeful on the phone that she hadn’t had the heart to refuse a second viewing. If only she wasn’t such a coward, then she would have told him the truth and this nice young man wouldn’t be wasting his time on a fool’s errand.
The Visitors Page 23