Lovers and Newcomers

by Rosie Thomas

  ‘Exactly how drunk were you, Dad?’ Ben wondered.

  ‘Epically,’ Selwyn said.

  ‘Really, Dad? You must have been, like, totally wiiild when you were young.’

  Selwyn majestically turned to his son. ‘My dear boy, just be aware, everything you think you know best, we discovered in the first place.’

  Alpha tilted her lovely face to her father, taking up the tease. ‘Go on, tell us again about Grosvenor Square.’

  Sam was enjoying this too. He leaned forwards to Amos. ‘And Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh, eh Dad?’ Sam and Toby were both known to be politically right wing in their views. Amos held up his hand.

  ‘You may mock. This is your allotted role. But Selwyn is right.’

  Alph and Omie and Toby waggled V-signs in the air. ‘Peeeeace, man,’ they drawled. Jessie sniggered and Amos raised an eyebrow at her.

  Selwyn rested his elbow on the table and massaged the purplered rocket scar at the side of his head.

  In the last hour he had grown back into himself. Now he seemed larger and more animated than any of the rest of them, as if there were volumes more blood running in his veins, and richer air inflating his lungs. For forty years, through his own reversals, even through the quite long intervals when the couples had grown apart, each of them would have acknowledged that he had been and always would be the leader of their small group. Now he commanded the attention of his old friends, their children and the guests. Looking on, Polly felt her heart swell with love for him and pride at his importance to all of them.

  Now he rose up and demanded, ‘Listen. What do you think you know, you kids? Sex? Began in 1963. Music? What do I need to tell you? You’re still listening to it. Recreational drugs? Our invention. Political activism? Our generation’s trademark. Social anarchy? Check. Art? Culture? Fashion? Look what we started. And admire.’

  The room was ecstatically divided now. Polly applauded, pounding her hands together as Miranda and Katherine joined in.

  ‘Blame it on the Boomers,’ jeered the young ones.

  Joyce cupped a hand behind her ear. ‘What? What are they all saying?’

  Selwyn roared, ‘What have you given us, you X-ers? The bloody internet. YouTube.’

  A tinny jangle of music sounded. It was surprisingly insistent and it went on and on. Selwyn looked around to see what was interrupting his moment.

  Jessie jumped, almost knocking over her glass.

  ‘Sorry, God, sorry. My phone.’

  Sam steadied the glass with one hand, with the other he reached for her bag and handed it over.

  ‘Nice ringtone,’ he grinned.

  Jessie stabbed at the buttons. She turned aside in her chair and hissed into the phone, ‘What do you want?’

  She listened and then replied, ‘Yeah, well, where do you think I am?’

  The noisy talk at the table rippled on. Jessie listened more intently, pressing her finger to one ear. After a few more muttered remarks she snapped the phone shut and tossed it into her bag. She sat upright, squaring her shoulders against the high carved back of her chair.

  ‘This is interesting,’ she announced. ‘Guess what?’

  She was brimming with news, happily half-drunk, delighted to be the one who could pass on a juicy piece of information.

  ‘What?’ Selwyn rejoined.

  ‘They’ve got the treasure back.’

  Miranda gasped. She clapped her hands agian, this time in sheer delight.

  ‘Our treasure? The Mead treasure?’

  Amos looked first at Katherine, to see her reaction. It was several seconds before he turned to Jessie.

  ‘Them?’ he queried softly.

  ‘Yeah. The police. The fabulous stolen treasure of Mead was found this morning by three of those model plane guys, hidden in a ruined pillbox in Lockington woods. I know the place, we used to have a den in there when we were little, but no one ever goes near it now. Kids nowadays have got better stuff to do than make dens, I reckon.’

  ‘And that was the police on the phone, was it, to notify you personally?’

  Jessie cocked her head at him.

  ‘Nope. It was Damon. He’d, um, already heard on the grapevine that the cops were on the track of it. Blokes who nicked the stuff must have got nervous and stashed it up there for a bit.’

  ‘Your ex-boyfriend is remarkably well-informed,’ Amos remarked.

  Miranda called out, ‘Is he sure? Are they sure? It’s wonderful, if they’re right.’

  Jessie’s delight was fading. It occurred to her that perhaps she shouldn’t give too much away.

  ‘Damon heard the gossip. You know what Meddlett’s like. The news is all over the Griffin tonight, you can imagine how they’re all gabbing away. Glad it’s my night off. Apparently they’ve got the archaeologists in now, checking the authenticity. Probably the police’ll tell you in the morning.’

  Amos was expressionless. ‘I’ll hope for that,’ he said.

  Jessie was aware that her story had somehow misfired. Whatever Kieran might choose to believe, the actual truth was that she didn’t know whether Damon had found out any more than she had originally mentioned to him, back when she was quite missing him after they had split, or whether he had then been involved with the theft.

  She had her suspicions, though.

  Red in the face, she blurted out, ‘Uh, maybe Damon has got it all wrong anyway. He’s had a few drinks, by the sound of it.’

  ‘I hope it is true,’ Omie sighed. ‘I love to think of all the treasure being safe in one place again, not taken off and sold all over the world to rich people.’

  A general move away from the table began as people carried plates through to the kitchen. Selwyn was put out that the centre of attention had shifted elsewhere, Polly went to him and laid her cheek against his head, where the red scar puckered his skin.

  ‘I love you,’ she murmured.

  Selwyn didn’t answer, but she thought he nodded.

  Katherine took a tray of glasses and tried to duck away, but Amos caught up with her. He took the tray and roughly deposited it on the oak sideboard in the hall. The lights of the Christmas tree twinkled behind them.

  ‘You knew, didn’t you?’

  Katherine stared at the stone floor, the curled edges of a rug, the scatter of fallen tree needles at her feet.

  She had forgotten to look surprised at Jessie’s news, and Amos was far too sharp, too forensic, not to have noticed. However much whisky he put away he saw what he chose to notice, and his choice – after so long, ironically since she didn’t welcome it – now fell on her. She could almost hear the ticking of his formidable mind as he scrutinized her.

  ‘How did you know?’ he persisted.

  When she didn’t answer, he nodded slowly.

  ‘Ah, I see. Of course. Well, I suppose I’m hardly in a position to complain. Your choice of a lover is unusual, if it is who I think it is, but that’s your business. The difference between us is that I never went as far as to deny our marriage, or to back out of it because of any of my liaisons. I always honoured you as my wife.’

  Katherine raised her eyes. ‘Do you call that honour?’

  He took in a breath.

  Mutual pain now separated them as precisely as any of their differences.

  This hurts so much, Katherine thought. She felt blinded, hobbled by it.

  ‘Mum?’ Toby called.

  Her son – no, both her sons – were hovering at the foot of the stairs. They stared at their parents and the shining tree, a distortion of the happy family Christmas tableau.

  She sidestepped her husband and crossed to the boys. She put an arm around each waist.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ she whispered. Then she went quickly on into the kitchen.

  From somewhere Miranda’s voice called, ‘Charades?’

  Polly was scraping plates into the compost bin. Her face shone with sweat and when she glanced down she saw a dark grease stain on the sloping shelf of her blue silk bodice.

  Seeing Kathe
rine’s face she asked, ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  They regarded each other, battered but not extinguished. Ben was now calling for charades too, his voice echoing through the house.

  ‘What about you?’ Katherine asked. Joyce’s words were still in her head, so she could imagine how clearly they must sound for Polly.

  Polly rotated the bangle on her wrist, forwards and backwards.

  ‘I’ll carry on,’ she said at last. Feet were running up and down the stairs, a pair of stilettos clicked in the hall and a door slammed. Music briefly blared. ‘Let’s go and play charades. It’s as good a metaphor as any, don’t you think?’

  Briefly, they clasped hands.

  Jessie hovered near the back of the drawing room. The big sofa with folding arms and fat tassels had been pushed back and a tatty old rug or two rolled away to leave a space of bare floorboards. She had never played charades in her life, and had only the most approximate idea of what the game involved. It was the kind of thing you puzzled over in old-fashioned novels, or maybe read in articles in dentists’ waiting-room magazines about the Royal Family at Sandringham. In fact apart from Pass the Parcel at one or two birthdays she had been to when she was seven, the only indoor game she could remember participating in was Spin the Bottle, and having to kiss Kenny Carson as a result of it. Yet all these people knew exactly what they were doing, as if they had spent half their lives playing party games. Jessie wondered if by noticing this divide she had stumbled on a really quick and effective way of determining whether or not you were posh.

  Names were written on slips of paper and then pulled out of Ben’s woolly hat to make two teams. The one Jessie was on withdrew across the draughty hall to the dining room. There were puddles of wax on the table, nutshells and satsuma peel scattered everywhere. Sam Knight put a piece of paper and a pencil in her hand and told her to write down a film or a book or a song title, or a quotation if she felt like it.

  Her mind went blank. She screwed up her concentration to the point of pain and wrote One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Apparently that was good enough, because a minute later they were back in front of the fire. Selwyn and Miranda and the rest of the other team were waiting, drawn up in front of the fender like a row of migrating birds.

  The hat was held out once more. Selwyn rolled up his sleeve and rotated his wrist over the opening.

  ‘I’m going first,’ he announced. With a magician’s flourish he extracted a piece of paper and unfolded it. Toby clicked one of six buttons on his all-purpose heavy-duty mountaineer’s and deep-sea-diver’s watch.

  ‘Go!’

  At once Selwyn’s arms and hands flew around. He held up fingers and mugged at his team. At once everyone started yelling.

  ‘Film. Six words. Second word. One syllable.’

  Jessie stared. What on earth was all this?

  Selwyn drew himself up. Balancing on the balls of his feet on the fender bar he filled his lungs with air. His chest visibly expanded. His face was flushed and his hair stood up in a stiff crest. Then he extended his arms, lifting and stretching them away from his shoulders. His fingers drooped like wing feathers as his elbows rose and fell in a slow arc. He closed his eyes, transformed from a starling into an elegant raptor.

  ‘Bird?’

  ‘Crow?’

  Selwyn’s eyes snapped open. He glared as he launched himself off the fender, gliding and swooping. Miranda and Ben and the twins shouted bird names.

  Amos barked, ‘Flight?’

  Selwyn whirled around. He stabbed a finger at Amos and beckoned.

  Miranda and Polly knelt side by side on the floor, shouting words. They were both absorbed in the game.

  Selwyn jabbed his thumb over his shoulder, silently exhorting them. His eyes suddenly widened, staring at nothing, the whites showing.

  ‘Are you hitchhiking?’ Joyce shouted.

  ‘Mum, you’re on the other team,’ Miranda called.

  Selwyn’s shoulders jerked.

  He had been poised, like a puppet held by invisible strings. Now his head tipped back, his jaw hanging open. His knees buckled beneath him. They watched, their shouts and laughter frozen in their mouths. Selwyn dropped like a ruined tree. His head smashed against the corner of the fender.

  Omega’s voice rose in a thin scream.

  There was a rush of people, scrambling from their seats. Selwyn lay without moving, his face turning a dark, contused crimson.

  ‘Is he still acting?’ Joyce wanted to know.

  Polly knelt beside his body. She laid her head to his chest, her mouth shaped to a cry but no sound coming out of it. They were trying to loosen his clothes. She heard confused voices crying out for air, water, a telephone.

  This has been the longest night I have ever lived through.

  I can see Selwyn lying on the floor. I am staring down at the fingers of his left hand as they uncurl, slowly and tenderly, as if he is letting go of something deeply precious.

  I know for certain that he is already dead.

  Yet for what seemed like an hour, Toby and Sam and Colin took it in turns to kneel at Selwyn’s side, blowing air into his stopped lungs and compressing his chest with cruel thumps of their hands. Counting the breaths, willing a tremor into him, watching for a flicker in his darkened face.

  Polly knelt there too, with her head bowed and Selwyn’s hand folded between hers. She was whispering encouragement and endearments to him. Their children looked on, drawn into a huddle, silent and white-faced.

  The paramedics came running into the room with their cases of implements and coiled wires. They worked on him, but even as I prayed I knew with the detached, dry kernel of myself that they wouldn’t get him back.

  Selwyn was carried out of my house on a stretcher. Polly went with him in the ambulance and Colin drove the three children after it. The rest of us sat anyhow. The kettle was put on and tea was made, then left undrunk. Eventually Joyce fell asleep amongst the cushions on the drawing-room sofa. I tucked a rug over her shoulders and folded it beneath her feet. Amos and Katherine waited, not speaking to each other. Their boys murmured in a corner of the kitchen. Jessie and Nic sat together, awkwardly holding hands.

  The telephone rang at last, splitting the silence, and I snatched it up.

  ‘Col?’ I said.

  He told me that Selwyn was dead on arrival. The time of death had been given at approximately ten-thirty p.m., when we were playing charades in front of the fire as if we had all our lives ahead of us.

  The doctors had told them that the heart attack was so huge he would probably have known nothing about it.

  I heard myself whisper, ‘I see. Yes, I see.’

  I remember thinking, this means Sel won’t be able to get the barn properly finished. He’ll be angry about that.

  Colin said he would be bringing Polly and the three children back home to Mead. He wanted me to be there when they arrived, but he thought it might be best if everyone else withdrew.

  I put down the phone. There was no need to say anything. Katherine came and we held each other for a moment.

  I was grateful to Amos for taking charge. He told Sam and Toby that they should go back to the cottage. If there was anything they could do, he forestalled them, he would come and collect them. He said that he would drive Jessie home. She picked up her coat and they went off into the night. I filled a row of hot-water bottles, then wondered futilely if I should make some sandwiches. The kitchen was messy with the debris of dinner. Did I have enough food in the house for the next days?

  Nic slid away to bed, her face blotted with tears. Katherine and I woke up my mother and between us we helped her upstairs. I broke the news as she sat on her bed.

  ‘Who’d have thought I’d outlive him?’ she kept saying. Her hands on our arms were knotty and dry as dead leaves.

  When Joyce was asleep Katherine and I waited together. We washed glasses, rinsed and dried them and put them away, moving around each other, hardly exchanging a
word. Shock silenced us.

  At last we saw the lights of Colin’s car sweep over the field grass beyond the yard gate. I went out into the dark and held open the gate. They came slowly, in bewilderment, letting Colin and me lead them into the barn. After the long weeks of chill in there I was struck by the warmth lingering in the big room. Colin found the switches and lights blazed. Selwyn’s jumper lay discarded on a chair. Polly picked it up and held it to her face.

  The two girls clung together. They were deadly pale, their eyes ringed with smudged mascara and puffy with tears. Ben made them sit down and brought them a small glass of brandy apiece. His shapeless face had taken on firm, sombre contours.

  ‘Drink this up,’ he ordered, and they did as they were told. Omie’s teeth clinked against the rim of the glass and she coughed helplessly. Ben stroked her shoulder until she caught her breath.

  Polly was sitting at the table, her hands spread flat in front of her. I covered her left one with mine and our rings grated.

  ‘Would you rather Katherine be here with you?’ I whispered. She shook her head. ‘Stay with me. Stay with us.’ Colin nodded at me over her head.

  Polly and I sat there for hours and hours. Colin went quietly away, and it was Ben who saw his exhausted sisters to bed. He came back again to check on his mother and me, then rolled himself in a blanket and stretched out on cushions laid in front of the fireplace.

  ‘Remember Katherine and Amos’s wedding?’ Polly whispered to me.

  ‘I remember.’

  Selwyn was Amos’s best man. I was done up in the Ossie Clark dress in which I had planned to marry Selwyn, even though Polly and Selwyn were an acknowledged couple by this time. A self-absorbed and strikingly careless gesture, I thought, in shame at myself. I began a mumbling apology, but Polly dismissed it.

  ‘Do you remember Selwyn’s speech?’

  ‘No, I don’t think I do.’

  ‘He read out that poem by Robert Herrick.