Dottie

by Abdulrazak Gurnah

  Brenda Holly thought she understood something of the way that Dottie felt, and assumed that the old doctor had made her feel her lack of parents and relatives. In truth, she too was intrigued by the thought of a black doctor living on the edges of Clapham Common. Mrs Holly thought of herself as a liberal woman, and would not have been too surprised to find herself accepting a black doctor as her GP, but she found it harder to think that such a GP would have found enough patients for a practice forty or so years before, during England’s dark ages. She made some enquiries. First of all, she asked her colleagues and her ‘cases.’ Had anybody heard anything about a black GP who used to have a practice in the area? None of them knew anything, but they promised to ask. Eventually something turned up at a British Legion gathering, where the mention of Dr Murray’s name elicted a surprised response from the president of the women’s section. She was the wife of a local banker, and had herself been a teacher when she was younger. Both she and her husband were now retired and living in Lavender Hill, but they remembered the doctor quite well.

  Dr Murray had had a practice in Wimbledon, it turned out, although the story about the large house by Clapham Common was also true. The teacher and her banker husband had lived in Bromwood Road. It was a pleasant, leafy street then. The school was at the bottom of the road in Chestnut Grove, and the house was handy for the bank as well, which was on the corner of the High Street and Stonehouse Street. Dr Murray’s daughter had been a pupil at the school, a tall slim girl with a pouty mouth which gave her a look of misery and sullenness. She was very well mannered, though, and was a genius with the flute. She could play several instruments but the flute was her best. The teacher remembered the tall, black man who used to come to the school concerts that the girl took part in. He had such a presence that eyes were always drawn to him, but he only appeared to have eyes for his daughter, whom he watched with a mixture of concern and pride. He had been a bones doctor, with a clinic of his own. He was very glamorous, and his speech even had a hint of a French accent. The teacher thought his practice must have been quite successful, at least to judge by appearances.

  Oh no, the daughter had not been killed, the teacher said. She had become a school teacher too and moved north before the war started. It was the doctor’s wife who had died in the bombing. She was a young woman, a second wife. She remembered the doctor had married again in his fifties. It was she who had been killed visiting relatives somewhere near the coast, near Portsmouth or Southampton. The teacher could not be sure, but she thought there was a young child who had also died with the mother.

  How odd, the teacher said, to find herself talking about that family again! There was something about them that was touched with sadness. The man, despite his charismatic appearance and the arrogant tilt of his head, had an air about him that the teacher could only remember as a kind of weakness, although she no longer knew why. Perhaps it was because he had a look of pain sometimes, as if his thoughts caused him misery. And there was the young wife who had died with her child, and who herself would not have been more than a child to the doctor. Her death was one of many at that time, but each death was as tragic as if it was the only one.

  The teacher felt sorry for the daughter most of all. It may only have been because she knew her best, but it was she who seemed the worst off of that family. She was good natured enough, but she was withdrawn and silent the way a child her age should not have been. Her mother was already dead then. After a long moment of silent thought, the teacher said, ‘There was something odd about that girl. You could see it around her mouth, so much seemed to hurt her. Perhaps some of the teasing used to distress her, you know how unfeeling children can be. She was tall and thin, with large eyes and that surly mouth . . . and, of course, she was a coloured girl. They used to rib her about that but there was no malice in it.’

  Brenda Holly could not believe her luck. She raced to Dottie with the story, as if it was a gift she was taking to her. Dottie must look like the daughter. She must have reminded the old doctor of his child. Perhaps something bad had happened between them, perhaps when Dr Murray married again the daughter had felt rejected. Maybe they were not even in touch, had cut each other off in their pride and hurt. Families often behaved like that. ‘Oh, isn’t it fascinating!’ Mrs Holly cried. ‘The daughter probably had no idea that her father was dying. She could be a rich woman and not know it. Just think! She’ll feel terrible when she finds out!’

  4

  In the silence that followed the story, it was Brenda Holly who first mentioned Hudson. She said his name and then wrote down his foster parents’ address. When she gave it to Dottie, the latter snatched at it ravenously. ‘Perhaps you should get in touch. I’m sorry if it seemed cruel but I thought it would be best for him to forget about you for a while. I thought it would help him settle in his new place . . . and give you a chance too. We talked about it at the office and decided that this was the best way. You were so tense and unhappy . . . I was afraid for you,’ Mrs Holly said, her eyes on the brink of tears. ‘You’ve done wonderfully well since then, you really have! I can see it . . . and I can see how much happier Sophie is compared to the way she was when she first came back. Forgive me if I seemed cruel. I did it for the best.’

  ‘You could’ve let him visit,’ Dottie said, dropping her voice because of the misery on Brenda Holly’s face. You talked about it at the office, did you? You put your professional heads together and decided to smash up our family, she thought. A part of her was already jumping for joy, and did not mind giving what comfort Brenda desired to receive in her surrender. Another part of her was hardening against Mrs Holly, and wanted to cause pain for the pain she had suffered. ‘What right did you have . . . ?’

  ‘He was lucky to have such foster parents,’ Brenda Holly said, plaintive in her defence. ‘Their advice was that we should give him time. I suppose . . . I was surprised that you wanted him back so much. Most people in your place would have been grateful for the respite. That was what I thought, anyway.’ Mrs Holly waited to see if Dottie would say anything, if she would blame her again, but Dottie just shook her head, not trusting herself to speak. ‘I still think it was the right thing to do, and I hope you’ll agree later,’ Mrs Holly said, and when Dottie still made no sign she sighed with defeat. ‘I’ll get in touch with the foster parents and begin the process of having Hudson returned to you if that is what you would like. It will take a while . . . perhaps until the summer. It may be best to wait until the end of the school year.’

  Dottie did not want to wait, not for one more day. Had she not been waiting long enough? In the months of silence, she had not been allowed to write, at the request of the foster parents, Brenda Holly said. They thought Dottie’s letters might stir him up, and wanted him left to them long enough so he would forget his real family. No, it was not right to expect her to wait even more, not while Hudson was being stolen from them under their very noses. But Mrs Holly had come round so completely that she thought it best not to antagonise her, not to give her cause to become indignant and unhelpful.

  ‘Yes, I think that will be best,’ Dottie said. ‘Let’s aim for the summer. It will give us time to prepare for his arrival. We’ll have to get ourselves organised. Sophie’ll be delighted.’

  Brenda Holly looked at her young charge for a long moment. Dottie expected her to say something affectionate, as she would usually have done, but she did not. In the end she nodded, as if she understood something or had made a decision. Then she smiled, but it was a tired, self-mocking smile. ‘I hope I’m doing the right thing,’ she said. ‘It’s not only you I’m worried about. I don’t know if it’s the right thing for Hudson either.’

  ‘Don’t worry about us,’ Dottie said, turning away and failing to catch a look of hurt surprise. Brenda Holly opened her mouth to speak, to protest at the abrupt manner in which Dottie had pushed her away, but in the end she said nothing. Dottie would get over it, she thought. Her bitterness was understandable. It could not possibly have been a
ddressed at her. They were good friends and Dottie depended on her.

  5

  The landlord was sceptical when he first heard about Hudson. ‘All of you in one room?’ he asked. The problem did not really engage him, although the thought of a brother sharing a room with two grown-up sisters aroused his interest. He suggested they might consider renting another room but was not surprised to find them reluctant. They were not much more than paupers, after all. If it had not been for his warm heart, and his dependence on the good-will of the social worker who could have caused him trouble with other tenants, they would have been out on the streets by now. In any case, he was more intent on paying court to Sophie than in talking about Hudson.

  His pursuit of Sophie was casual but insistent. He asked about her, brought her small presents, chocolate or candy, and always managed to hold her hand or stroke her cheek. Dottie had thought of putting a stop to it, but Sophie seemed to enjoy the attention and the landlord was never difficult. He stopped as soon as Dottie told him he had gone far enough, and laughed happily at the warnings that Dottie issued to him. She had taken him out on the landing one day, and told him in no uncertain terms what she would do to him if he tried anything funny with her sister – she’d call the police – but he had laughed at her threats, waving her away. Dottie tried to talk to Sophie, not wanting to be heavy-handed with her but afraid that her sister’s innocence would leave her vulnerable to the predatory man. But Sophie smiled with embarrassment. ‘Oh Sis,’ she said.

  ‘If you need help or something like that when your brother comes, we could arrange something,’ the landlord said, making comic faces of lust at Sophie. Sophie laughed at his crude advances, but Dottie only gave him an angry frown, which made the landlord shrug with indifference.

  Dottie wrote a letter to Hudson, reading out each sentence to Sophie before moving to the next, in case she wanted to add anything. They were careful not to mention his return, but gave him several large hints. Mrs Holly had insisted that Hudson should be told nothing until a definite decision had been made. She had thought of asking to see the letter before they sent it off, but her nerve had failed her. She was a little afraid of Dottie now, she realised. She did not want the young woman to dislike her or think ill of her. She found herself becoming self-conscious about visiting, deliberately perking up her manner to seem cheerful when before she would have breezed in without a thought. Whenever she said anything, she watched more carefully for Dottie’s response. She asked more questions, wanting to find out what Dottie thought, how she felt about things.

  Brenda Holly smiled at herself when she reflected on this. She had taken the girl for granted, and assumed that her silences and acquiescence were a kind of deference to her, and perhaps even affection. Once she had learned to see, she could not avoid noticing the way Dottie’s eyes glazed over whenever she did not want to listen. She felt the biting rejoinder thrown casually over one shoulder now, when before she would have talked over it, drowned it with the noise of her voice and her sensible advice. It was a small crisis, she thought, and she just needed to keep her wits about her. Her confidence had gone, that was all, and she was being over-sensitive. Everything felt like that, since the news of her husband’s illness. It was unprofessional of her to allow her life to interfere but she could not help it. She felt indescribably tired. At times it was hard enough to persuade herself to take any interest at all in her cases, which was a terrible state to be in.

  Dottie noticed some change in Brenda Holly’s manner, but was not attentive enough to plumb its meaning. She took her friendliness to be a kind of bond that the decision to return Hudson had forged between them, or even a relief that the boy would be returning to his family. Dottie was inclined to prefer Brenda like this, and she was grateful that she cared for them as she did, even if at times in the past she had been hard and unfeeling. ‘We could’ve done much worse than this,’ Dottie said to her sister. ‘She talks too much sometimes but she’s all right. To begin with she used to interfere too much . . .’

  ‘She’s very strict,’ Sophie said in her playfully exaggerated voice of awe. ‘I wonder she don’t frighten you.’

  ‘Like the matron?’ Dottie asked, and smiled to see Sophie’s playful look of fear turn to a parody of terror as she rolled her eyes and wobbled her jowls. ‘Brenda’s bark is worse than her bite. She gave me most of these books, you know, and she helped me in a lot in other ways.’

  Dottie looked at her small pile of books with pleasure. Among them were one or two she had bought for herself from the second-hand stall in the market. She had not had much luck with those yet, going more for the size than what was in them. She had acquired a book called Far Away and Long Ago, which she had taken at first to be a collection of fairy stories, but which she discovered to be something unreadable about cattle ranching in Argentina. She bought another book called Officially Dead, which had tempted her because it told the story of a man who was thought to have been killed by the Japanese in the fighting in Burma but turned out to be alive and in hiding from enemy soldiers. She had read that in great haste, wanting to get to the heart of the matter, to know how the man would have felt when he discovered his own death. But the moment never came, or if it did it passed her without being in any way remarkable. She must have missed it, she realised. Her latest purchase was the Collected Poetical Works of Sir Walter Scott. She knew about Sir Walter Scott because she had read an abridged copy of Ivanhoe in her children’s library period. This was her first poetry book, and she had stood a long time at the stall, wondering if she should get it. She had been seduced in the end by its size, and by the message inside that read: With love, From Uncle Bryan to Irene, 1893. At a shilling, it was worth rescuing that affection from the junk barrow in Balham market.

  Dottie saw that her sister’s eyes had turned glassy with all the talk about books. It was a shock for a moment because it reminded her so powerfully of Sharon, her mother. She had done that whenever she disapproved of something, and Dottie knew that Sophie disliked all the fuss about books. At first Dottie had tried to persuade her, to show her the pleasure she had found in them. Sophie had gone along with it for a while but had silently rebelled in the end by just not reading the books that Dottie spent hours choosing for her in the library. She smiled now as she watched her sister’s ostentatious show of indifference. Sharon would have turned round and laughed, she thought, having made her point. Sophie waited, her head turned slightly away, waiting for Dottie to release her.

  ‘She helped me find work too,’ Dottie said brightly. ‘And she used to come round to cheer me up. She didn’t make any fuss, but would turn up some evening, just like that. I remember she came one night when I was feeling low, and she took me out for a walk. Down the road and back, but it helped to lift the misery a little.’

  ‘Will she help me get work?’ Sophie asked. ‘I’m just wasting my time in that school, Sis. Better I go to work and earn something. We’ll need things for Hudson soon, you know that.’

  ‘Oh Sophie, you must learn first, otherwise everything is a waste of time,’ Dottie pleaded, but saw the distant look return in Sophie’s eyes. They had already spoken about this several times, and although on each occasion Dottie had argued Sophie to a standstill she knew that she had not won her over. It made her laugh to herself to see the stubborn way Sophie pressed her lips together. ‘But if you really want to leave, then we’ll try and find you work.’

  Sophie clapped her hands with joy and rushed at her sister, who tried to dodge her powerful embrace but failed. Sophie’s birthday was in May, and they decided that that would be the best time for her to leave, so that her departure would endanger the prospect of Hudson’s return as little as possible.

  ‘I’ll be eighteen in May, Sis,’ Sophie said, laughing at the thought. ‘And I’ll be working in a factory to help you look after Hudson. He’ll be so surprised to see how we’ve changed! Do you think he’ll be grown-up?’

  ‘I should think so,’ Dottie said, feeling uncomfortable wi
th the authority she was required to display. Sophie was in one of her childish periods, putting on baby voices and pouting over everything. It was disconcerting when it happened, because Dottie was not always sure if Sophie was playing. ‘He is fourteen now. He is probably a big, tall boy with a deep voice. You won’t be able to cuddle him all the time like you used to.’

  ‘Why not?’ Sophie asked, her face stricken with misery.

  ‘Because he won’t let you.’

  ‘He will!’ Sophie cried.

  ‘And because you’ve grown too,’ Dottie said. Sophie had not lost the weight she had put on at prison-school, but had redistributed it on her body in a way that made her seem decidedly a grown woman. She drew looks wherever they went – admiring glances whose meaning she did not always understand. She took these small gestures of homage men were ready to pay her as disinterested acts of kindness.

  The weeks passed and no word came from Hudson. Dottie questioned Brenda Holly, her mind troubled by suspicion and anxiety. Was everything going well? The foster parents weren’t making trouble, were they? Brenda smiled and told her that she had received a letter from the foster parents agreeing to the move. Not that there was anything they could do about it, Dottie declared. Was there? Brenda smiled at the uncertainty in Dottie’s voice, then she shook her head. She did not tell Dottie that the foster parents also said that Hudson did not want to return. They did not want Mrs Holly to misunderstand them, and assume that their letter was a stratagem to hang on to Hudson, but she should know that the boy was violently opposed to leaving Dover.