by Emma Timpany
If I could smile, I would.
BALLAST
SARAH THOMAS
THEY HALTED by Fox’s Shipping Office, its long bay windows affording a clear view of the harbour and its business. Beyond the moored sloops and fishing boats, Maria Maddern could see two steamships at anchor in the bay. Her gardener Pascoe slid gratefully out of the saddle and took the horses. A gig cut a direct line across the water towards them, ferrying men and goods to shore. A long, fully-loaded barge made its way slowly upriver to Penryn. Gulls screamed, mobbing a fish catch.
A slight, tanned man, compact in blue serge, immediately picked his way through the groups gathered on the building’s wide flight of steps and approached the riders. Maria dismounted and raised a hand in acknowledgement.
‘Captain Smythe – glad to see you, sir.’
The captain looked keenly into her face, taking her gloved hand in his. ‘Miss Maddern, good day to you.’
‘Good passage, I hope?’
He smiled. ‘Matthews, fetch Miss Maddern her packets.’
‘Aye, Cap’n.’ A sailor in attendance turned smartly back inside.
‘No Master Frederick with you today?’
‘This morning he pruned one of my mother’s larch trees with an ill-aimed shot and I chose not to have his company.’ Her voice didn’t quite achieve the lightness of tone she had intended. ‘Perhaps you could offer my brother a position as crew on your next voyage – though I cannot vouch for his usefulness.’
The sailor had returned. He coughed quietly, offering some oiled cloth parcels. Smythe presented them to her with a small bow. Maria smoothed her hands over the sea-stained label of the uppermost package. New seed varieties from the Far East, an unnamed species promising to rank her garden with that of Mr Fox at Penjerrick, or those at Glendurgan and Trebah. Smythe leaned forward. ‘There are some unseen beauties in there, according to my man.’ The captain’s voice softened. ‘No doubt your Mr Pascoe will work his magic.’ He turned to acknowledge the waiting gardener.
But Pascoe had left the horses and his angular frame was poised on the edge of the granite quay like a heron. As they watched, he attempted to snatch something low in the water with one hand, while securing himself with a sinewy arm around a mooring rope. ‘Careful, man!’ Smythe started forward. The old man almost lost his grip and had to strain hard to heave himself back to safety. Was he feeling his age at last? she wondered.
‘What are you after there, Mr Pascoe?’
Pascoe pointed silently as he regained both breath and dignity. There were dark logs floating amongst the moored boats, nudging against the quayside, bobbing, crowding this corner of the harbour. Brown stumps, soft and barkless.
‘Do you know what they are, Captain?’ She stared as hard as the older man.
‘Why, that’s ballast, Miss, tossed overboard. Off the Lady Jocelyn.’ Smythe nodded in the direction of the steamship anchored out in the bay alongside his own ship. ‘Arrived from New South Wales just yesterday. They’ll not need the extra weight once she picks up her next load of passengers at Plymouth.’
Pascoe pushed himself back up on his knees. ‘Can we fish one out, sir?’
Smythe whistled and gestured. A boy emerged from the chaos of nearby nets and pots, and after brief exchange of coin, launched himself shuddering into the dark water and hooked a floating log towards him. It rolled under his hands, dense with fine roots.
‘You’ll be needing a net, sir. ’Tis too ’eavy.’
Pascoe tossed a short length of netting down and the trunk was snared and hauled to their feet. Maria crouched to study it. At its pointed crown, small bright green tendrils were growing, seeking light.
‘Why, it’s some kind of fern, isn’t it, Mr Pascoe?’ She ran her fingers over its unfamiliar texture; its wiry roundness made her think of a hibernating animal. An unfamiliar species of the antipodean world was suddenly right there in her hands. She was aware of her gardener’s intense scrutiny and smiled.
Smythe was immediately brisk with enthusiasm and the possibility of a little shore business. ‘Let us call on the Jocelyn’s captain. He’ll tell us what these are. Wells, send word ahead to Cap’n Nash we’re on our way.’
Maria took Captain Smythe’s arm and they walked the short distance to the Fox Offices. Pipe smoke hung heavy above the heads of agents, captains and merchants. The talk was of prices, weather, timings. A rumble of male voices. A nod of heads as they entered.
‘Cap’n Nash, may I introduce Miss Maddern? She has taken an interest in your waste ballast.’
Nash stepped forward. Another tanned, weathered face and a pair of observant eyes.
‘Ah, let me wager you’re considering the possibility of growing they tree ferns.’ The voice was amused, Nash not unused to the enthusiasms of his county’s gentry for growing exotics of all kinds. He nodded in the direction of the quay where the logs were just visible alongside the waterline of a barge, a sleek dark pod of movement.
‘Do you think they’ll take here in Cornwall?’ Her eyes were drawn back to Pascoe, who was directing the boy to fish yet another specimen out of the water.
‘I do not see why not. Good shelter, plenty of rain. In Australia they grow oh … so high.’ He gestured airily towards the ornate plaster ceiling and she visualised a green umbrella of fronds arching above her head. As they both watched Pascoe’s progress with a second catch, she estimated the possible volume of the floating logs.
‘Has anyone else tried yet?’
‘Not that I’ve heard. Certainly not in Cornwall.’
‘So I’ll need a barge.’
‘Miss?’ Nash strained to catch her purpose.
‘I want all of them, Captain. I can picture a forest of tree ferns at the bottom of my valley. I want to create our very own New South Wales in the Helford.’
Nash raised an eyebrow. ‘Every one of them?’ But Smythe was quick to make an offer of support. ‘Let me help you with transport, Miss Maddern. I’ll arrange for the ferns to be loaded and see them across the bay tomorrow.’
‘Thank you. Well, we must be going.’ The two men watched her walk quickly away, clutching her packets of seeds, to her waiting man and horses.
Light rain darkened the necks of the horses as they began the long ride back to the Helford. At last the granite gateposts of the estate came into sight and they paused, as was their habit, to look down into the garden. Pascoe shifted in the saddle, easing his stiffness. Maria gazed at the maze of lush exotics and lost paths with exasperation, felt the weight of it pushing, leaning on her as if she were at the tiller of a boat working against a strong current. She reflected on her hasty decision to buy the ballast. Would the ferns transform the landscape in the way she desired? She was determined to have her own triumphs, she knew that much. She nudged the tired mare forward with a touch of the heels.
The morning was lively. The captain had accompanied the barge to oversee delivery of its cargo to the Maddern estate, which, like its neighbours, used the sheltered coves of the Helford estuary to receive goods by sea. Falmouth watermen eased the boat into the shallows, allowing Smythe to wade ashore.
Maria stood waiting on the grey shingle, wrapped in a wool shawl against the wind. She watched his wet boots leave a quick, dark trail across the stones. ‘Good as your word, Captain.’ She couldn’t help but like his ebullience, despite the fact that he had made profit from her impatience for new plants once again.
The water soon bobbed with logs, tossed overboard from the barge. Two boys lunged about in the shallows like dolphins driving a shoal. Pascoe hunkered at the top of the slipway, long legs folded beneath him. He held a bucket ready to sluice the stacked ferns with fresh stream water.
John Maddern, mine owner, widower, a man who prided himself on being of a measured temperament, had walked down through the garden to observe proceedings. Maria could see her father’s irritation in his walk, hands thrust into coat pockets, massaging a gut twisted with indigestion and disappointment. She knew he felt his expect
ations of his daughter to be reasonable – marriage, a connected family seat, children. She, however, mourned his abandonment of the garden that her parents had begun together.
The discussion over dinner last night had quickly slipped into a terse fusillade of facts and consequences. Fred had related the incident with the larch tree and the gun and she knew her father’s equilibrium would be tested today by this, the cost of a barge from Falmouth full of waste ballast. Her impulse was to retreat into the cool green clearings.
‘So you and my daughter have hatched yet another scheme, Smythe?’ His tone was jovial, but Maria could see that the handshake was over-firm in its unspoken annoyance. ‘More plants, I see? Maria has taken root here in this damned garden.’
‘Captain Nash assures me no one has tried growing tree ferns yet. I think she’s onto something quite special here, sir.’ Maria was familiar with the way Smythe nurtured competition between landowners to ensure a market for his trade, but noted his quick support with surprise. He had, after all, secured his business.
‘A tour, perhaps, Captain?’
The three of them made a way through a forest of bamboos, arching stems rustling in the breeze, dried pale leaves creating a soft littered floor under their boots. The September sun glinted on waxy camellia leaves. Chinese maples blushed crimson with the change of the season. Seed pods were swelling on the branches of maturing magnolias. Water trickled downhill in tiny runnels, joining a small stream they had to bridge with long steps. The garden scented and greened the air around them.
Smythe nodded appreciatively as they navigated the more accessible paths contouring the valley slopes, shouldering past unchecked foliage. Catching the scent of barber’s soap as she stepped behind him, Maria tried to visualise the captain’s hard journeying to Canton and Shanghai. She had read newspaper accounts of crews decimated by malaria, ships lost to piracy, and yet he had made many successful passages in recent years.
‘Do you think there’ll be a time when passengers like myself could visit the Far East and look for ourselves at its natural wonders, Captain?’
‘Dear God, Maria, is there no end to this obsession?’ Her father halted abruptly on the path. Smythe diplomatically offered no encouragement for this particular plan. They arrived back at the beach.
‘I have no doubt your Australian exotics will succeed, Miss Maddern. I look forward to visiting when the Esperanza is next in harbour.’
Maria watched the powerful heave of shoulders in unison as sailors raised the sails and the barge moved slowly offshore, bound for Falmouth. Smythe stood braced in the stern, smartly saluting her ambitions.
‘You do know,’ he suddenly cupped his hands to carry his voice across the widening water, ‘there are berths open on SS Jocelyn. She’ll be sailing from Plymouth in two weeks.’
She was held by the amused challenge in his eyes and registered her father’s sharp intake of breath.
Maria thought of the coming autumn in the garden. The tree ferns bedded in, drinking the soft rain from the west, sheltered in the shade of the pines above, forming a jungle canopy. Her father went indoors and she was alone. She walked briskly, feeling lighter in mood than she had for weeks, excited by the potential of these new plants. Smythe’s comment drifted around in the back of her mind.
She followed the path around the pond to the fern stack, and there she saw Pascoe, leaning back against the plants. A single log had been upended and planted in a shallow bed, its growing tip pointing to the sunlight – ballast metamorphosing into plant. She looked from fern to gardener and saw that here too was change. Life had slipped quietly away.
‘Mr Pascoe?’ Maria came closer than she’d ever been in her life to that familiar face. She reached out and touched his shoulder, already knowing that she wouldn’t wake him now. She studied his calloused hands, work-thickened fingers and nails rimmed with soil. She was reminded of the great sycamore they had lost last winter, felled by high winds, heartwood rotting within.
He had taught her to look for the signs of a diseased plant, the tinge and shift of colour, the curl and wilt of fresh leaves. She had not observed him carefully enough, she knew. He’d never see the ferns grow, nor glory in their giant stature. Her loss welled larger, sharper, as she thought of her own future.
The low afternoon sunlight dropped shadows.
Behind her the garden settled, but down at the beach waves murmured insistently, and the tide was turning.
I RUN IN GRAVEYARDS
CLARE HOWDLE
I RUN in graveyards. I am the sort of person who runs in graveyards. What does that say about me? I know what the lady with the dachshund thinks it says. And the woman with the pram. But why is running any worse than walking a dog? Or pushing a screaming baby? It’s vital. Running is vital. I can’t think of anywhere more appropriate to run. Really.
I am thirty-four years old and four people in my life have died. Well five, I suppose. Four people close to me. And this. The reason I’m not running right now. The reason I’m sitting here. With all this time to think.
GRANDAD
I’M GOING to start with Grandad. Because almost everyone has one. Grandads are old. Sometimes very old. Like mine. We knew he was going to die. It wasn’t quite when we thought, but we knew. A week away from his ninetieth birthday. He tried, but he couldn’t hold on any longer. You always know with a grandad. Because they are old. Sometimes very old.
That didn’t stop it from being sad. I hated seeing him like that. In the hospital. He was so small. Drowning in his sheets as he used the bed button to fold himself in half, up and down, up and down, to try and make me smile.
It felt real, the sadness, while I was there. We were standing right by him. I had my hand on his, fingertips touching the drip. But he was so far away. It felt more real still as I walked out of the ward. And it swelled in my throat as I drove home on my own. In the rain.
I sat on the sofa with gin in a mug and told Alex how Grandad was going to die. And I cried. But I was crying because of the gin. And because I felt guilty that I’m not the sort of person who calls their grandad every week. Or month even. And that the last time I spoke to him was in between work calls because Dad said he was going in for his operation and it would be good if I called. So I did. But even while I was talking I was thinking about something else.
He talked about jam. Around the back of Grandad’s sheltered housing estate was a massive blackberry bush, grown so thick it was eating up the pavement that skirted the feeder road for the A39. The berries were probably toxic. He would pick those blackberries every year and make his ‘secret recipe’ jam. The council had got hedge trimmers in to cut it down. On the call, Grandad was apologising to me. He’d tried to stop them – whatever that means – but there was nothing he could do. ‘No jam this year,’ he said. Which was absurd because he still had shelves full in his tiny bedsit, with its shiny, shiny sink and crease-free duvet. And prize roses out front. He probably slept on jars of blackberry jam.
So we talked about jam and about cat-hair radios, I think, or something like that. And I acted normal. And he acted normal. It was all normal. And then he died. One week after.
At his funeral everyone smiled when they saw us, the family, I mean. But their lips were glued together and their eyes were wet. The Masons sang a song when the readings finished. It seemed impromptu. Dad held it together, Irene said. He did seem together. I’ve no idea how I seemed. The view from the crematorium was beautiful – out over the plot, across Glynn Valley, green fields, stretching trees, blue sky.
When we all left, the girls – us girls – we said goodbye to Grandad. To the coffin. I don’t know who started it, but we sort of filed up, in procession. Laura’s neck was red. I held her hand. Then I touched the coffin. I held my free hand on the varnished wood and felt how cold it was under my fingers. After the touch, I backed away, letting my fingers linger. It felt like something someone in a film would do.
I am the sort of person who runs in graveyards.
; THOMAS
WHEN I was little – like eleven – a boy I knew got cancer. He was the first person I ever knew to get it. At least I think it was cancer. But I might be remembering it wrong. We were friends, actually. He wasn’t just a boy I knew. We were friends. He saved a seat for me when we had to go to the TV room after break time to watch How We Used to Live. I sat down next to him and crossed my legs then pretended to concentrate on the TV and not on Debbie, or Joanne or Anna, who I usually sat with, as I was sure they would be laughing at me. He held my hand once. In the Victorian episode where the family get sent to the poorhouse. I think he thought I was sad. His fingers were cold and his eyes were big and so, so brown and he asked me if I was okay and I shrugged and tried to look sadder, because even though he wasn’t Chris Collier I didn’t want him to stop holding my hand.
He invited me to his house for tea after that. Not the same day or anything but soon after, a week maybe. It was afternoon break and we were playing Bulldog and I was leaning against the wire fence at the end of the playground, panting, with my hands on my knees. He had just run too, but looked fine. He played a lot of football – and was really, really good at it – so Bulldog was easy for him. His face was still pink though, as he leaned on the fence next to me. He kicked the dirt and asked me really quietly, like he didn’t want me to hear. I was watching the witchy girl who smelled a bit of wee play hopscotch on her own. 4 5, 6, 7 8, 9 pivot. I waited for her to get all the way back to number 1 before I said yes. I looked him square in the face, with all his freckles and his hair and his big brown eyes and I thought about Debbie and Joanne and Anna and I ignored it all and I said yes. He sort of smiled and said it would be toad-in-the-hole, five o’clock or I could come straight from school, up to me, then ran off into the Bulldog line again.