Days of Grace

by Catherine Hall

  ‘Hello,’ she said. ‘Do you need any help?’

  ‘How much is the chair in the window?’

  ‘The pushchair? Twenty pounds.’

  It was more expensive than I’d hoped.

  ‘It’s a very good make, you see. And it’s nearly new.’

  Her voice was friendly, and my experience in the pawnshop had made me feel more confident than usual. Bargaining was one of the things I’d learned to do over the years. I decided to try.

  ‘I haven’t got quite enough money with me. I wonder if there’s any chance of an exchange.’

  She shook her head.

  ‘I’m sorry. We’re not allowed to do things like that. I’d get into trouble.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Of course.’ My little burst of boldness drained away and I turned to leave, but as I reached the door, the girl cleared her throat.

  ‘What did you want to swap?’

  I brought out the bag from my coat pocket and passed it to her. As she took out the earrings her eyes widened with pleasure.

  ‘They’re lovely!’ she said, going over to a mirror and lifting them to her ears. ‘Are they very old?’

  ‘They’re from the 1940s,’ I said. The earrings looked nice on her, I thought, next to her glossy hair and her smile.

  She came away from the mirror. ‘Here’s an idea. What if I bought them from you? I could give you twenty pounds. Would that be enough?’

  I liked this girl. I wanted her to have the earrings. It didn’t matter how much they were worth. The chair was all I needed out of it.

  ‘I’d like that very much,’ I said.

  ‘And then you can pay me for the pushchair with the money. We won’t have done anything wrong and I won’t get into trouble.’

  We smiled at each other as we made our exchanges, pleased with our little conspiracy.

  Remembrance Day was cold but the sky was clear and the Heath seemed full of possibility. Children were everywhere, running and chasing, throwing sticks for dogs and scattering breadcrumbs for the ducks. They looked like little splashes of paint in their colourful clothes, vivid against the faded winter grass. Joggers puffed along the pathways and people were flying kites from the top of Parliament Hill. It was exactly what I’d hoped for Rose’s first visit. She looked better than I had ever seen her, her cheeks pink and her eyes bright.

  ‘I like it here,’ she said. ‘It’ll be lovely in the summer. We can come for picnics. Grace might even be walking by then.’

  We had arrived at the ponds. The water was very still, undisturbed by wind. I didn’t want to ruin things. I wanted her to enjoy our day out. But I knew I had to tell her. I couldn’t put it off any longer.

  Two ducks came paddling past us, breaking the surface of the water and sending ripples out in circles.

  ‘I’m a dead duck,’ I blurted out. As soon as the words left my mouth I knew I should have put it differently.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’m a dead duck,’ I said, trying to sound calm. ‘I mean, I’m dying. I don’t think I’ve got long left.’

  Rose stared at me, her face white with horror and I knew that I had to keep talking.

  ‘It’s cancer. I’ve had it for a while. It’s spreading, I think. I can feel it.’

  I began to fidget, shifting from foot to foot and balling my hands up into fists. For a moment, she looked dazed, as if she hadn’t understood what I’d said. Then the questions came.

  ‘What treatment are you taking?’ she said. ‘Are you in a lot of pain?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ I said cautiously.

  ‘What do the doctors say?’

  I tried to explain. I told her I didn’t have a doctor. I told her about the receptionist with the long nails and the dying carnations in the water that needed changing. I told her about the pills from the chemist’s and the books I’d bought about our different predicaments.

  ‘That’s how I knew what to do when you went into labour,’ I said. ‘It was all there in the manual.’

  But she wouldn’t be distracted. She kept on with her questions. ‘Who’s looking after you? Who else knows about this?’

  I could see that I wasn’t going to get away with it. ‘There’s no-one else to tell.’

  ‘Haven’t you got any family?’

  I stiffened. ‘No.’

  ‘No-one at all? No brothers or sisters?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No children?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Nora,’ she said. ‘You can’t always have been on your own. Didn’t you ever get married? Did you ever have a husband?’

  It was a perfectly reasonable question. I shouldn’t have found it so hard to answer.

  ‘Yes,’ I said eventually. ‘I had a husband. His name was George.’

  Dear, kind George, I thought. You took care of me, as much as you could.

  ‘I can’t believe you’ve never said anything about him,’ she said, shaking her head.

  ‘You never asked.’

  ‘Tell me about him.’

  ‘What do you want to know?’

  ‘When did you meet him? When did you get married?’

  ‘I met him after the war,’ I said, looking out over the pond. ‘He ran a bookshop. I went in there by chance.’

  Her eyes were shining. ‘That’s so romantic.’

  She didn’t need to know all of it, I thought. I would keep some of it to myself, at least for now.

  ‘And what happened?’

  ‘He died,’ I said. ‘A long time ago. It was sudden. A heart attack.’

  He’d been reading Dickens by the fire one cold November evening, a glass of whisky on the table next to him. I had gone to the garden to get more coal and when I came back he was slumped in his chair. I had sat at his feet, holding his hand, crying for the man I had loved, never quite enough, but as much as I could.

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘Was there nobody else?’ she asked. ‘I mean, after him?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It’s just that if there’s someone who ought to know, we should tell them.’

  ‘There’s nothing to tell,’ I said. ‘And no-one to tell it to. Please.’

  ‘But you should still see a doctor. They might be able to help you.’

  ‘I don’t want to see a doctor,’ I said. ‘There’s no point. I’m tired. I’ve lived long enough.’

  Grace had woken up and was starting to whimper. Rose bent to lift her out of the chair.

  ‘You’re the only person I’ve got,’ she said. ‘You’re my friend. I don’t want you to die.’

  I hadn’t foreseen this when I crossed the street on that August evening. I hadn’t wanted any more attachments, any more involvements. But somehow Rose had slipped under my guard and now I was paying the price.

  She said something else, so quietly that I couldn’t make it out.

  ‘What?’

  ‘That’s what he had,’ she muttered.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Dad. He had cancer. He found out he was ill just before I did my A-levels and he died just after I got the results. He was so happy when I told him. He said it was the best day of his life.’

  Her eyes were brimming with tears.

  ‘That was why I couldn’t have an abortion. I couldn’t stand the thought of losing someone else. But he would have been so disappointed that I left university. I’ve gone over it so many times in my head. I’ve let him down.’

  I realized that I had the easier part to play in my death. By inviting her to live with me I had dragged her into it. I’d given her someone else to grieve for. I held her as she wept on my shoulder, trying to pass on what I knew about loving and losing, silently telling her I was sorry.

  After a while, she stopped crying and pulled away. ‘Shall we keep walking?’ she said, sniffing. ‘I’m cold.’

  I tried to lighten the mood.

  ‘It’s me who needs that chair,’ I said. ‘You should be pushing me!’r />
  Despite herself, she smiled at the thought. I hooked my arm through hers and we made our way along the path, both of us puffing as we climbed to the top of the hill. It was worth the effort. All of London curved below us, vast, like a familiar painting in which I recognized all the features but could still find new things to surprise me. I raised my eyes to the pale sky, thinking of the many years that I had stood on that spot. I had been there on summer days, wanting to run through the long grass but feeling too old and shy to do it, on dark afternoons in winter when the woods were filled with menace, in spring, when the air was thick with the sound of birds. I had shared it all with one person, who I thought of every time I saw green shoots on the trees or the first primroses in the woods, when I heard, just once, a cuckoo call. Now, on this, my last visit, I was with someone new. I had a friend. She had said so herself.

  Rose was rummaging in her bag.

  ‘Do you mind if I take some pictures?’ she said, pulling out a camera. ‘I want a photo of Grace.’ She smiled, a small, sad smile. ‘I want a photo of you.’

  She went up to a couple standing nearby and said something. They took the camera and nodded.

  We stood close together.

  ‘Smile!’ said the woman.

  I heard a click and a flash came that made me blink. Rose passed Grace to me and went over to the man. They looked together at the camera. The woman joined them.

  ‘It’s a lovely one,’ she said. ‘That baby’s so sweet.’

  ‘Now let’s have one of you and Grace,’ said Rose.

  There was another click and a flash. Rose came to me and showed me the back of the camera. I saw myself, standing with the baby in my arms, kissing the top of her head. My eyes were closed. I looked at peace.

  Twelve

  As soon as Reverend Rivers said that lessons were finished for the summer we bolted, leaving behind the silence of the rectory for long days spent drinking wine by the lake and shooting at targets with William. Grace’s hair was blonder than ever, bleached by the sun. I was strict with myself, rationing how often I looked at her. I watched her only when she was sleeping or when her attention was distracted. I came to understand what feasting your eyes on something really meant.

  We still had to put in an appearance on Sundays, all present and correct, but I didn’t find the church as soothing as before. As Reverend Rivers led the service, his words, which I had come to know by heart, seemed to be aimed directly at me.

  Almighty God, unto whom all hearts be open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid.

  The thought of my desires being known by God made me tremble. Each week as we came closer to the moment of Communion, I started to sweat. I blushed when Reverend Rivers asked us to examine our consciences. My longings weren’t mentioned anywhere in the Ten Commandments or in any other part of the Bible that I had read, but I knew that they were sinful and I knew that if I took Communion in a state of sin, bad things would happen. It was written in the prayer book.

  For then we are guilty of the Body and Blood of Christ the Saviour; we eat and drink our own damnation, not considering the Lord’s Body; we kindle God’s wrath against us; we provoke Him to plague us with divers diseases and sundry kinds of death.

  Grace and I had mocked the words that Reverend Rivers said when he stood at the altar preparing to give out the bread and wine. When we were sitting in the long grass, listening to the singing of the birds and feeling the sun on our faces, they had no power to frighten us, making us giggle instead. But in the church they meant something serious and I shivered with shame when I heard them.

  I sweated and trembled my way through the service each week, knowing that I shouldn’t go up to the altar rail but that if I didn’t, there would be questions. Living in the rectory had taught me about secrets and so each Sunday I walked up the aisle behind Grace, staring at her hair and praying for salvation. The rest of the week I trod carefully, wishing for the comfort of a priest behind a curtain, someone who could tell me what to do and save me from damnation.

  I did my best to find distractions, working in the fields in an effort not to think. Reverend Rivers had read out a notice in church that came from Mr Churchill himself, asking us all to join in with the war effort. Lend a Hand on the Land, he had said, and we went every day after that to help bring in the harvest. Almost everyone in the village was there, apart from Reverend Rivers, who stayed shut up in his study, and Mrs Rivers, who kept to the drawing room and her piano. Grace and I were glad to escape the rectory and worked long days turning the grass with pitchforks so it could dry out in the sun. As the cut grass turned from green to gold, my skin turned brown, covered with a fine dust that smelled of the fields. I developed muscles in my stomach and arms from lifting the pitchfork and two rows of calluses spread across my palms from rubbing against the wooden shaft.

  The last day of the harvest was the hottest of the summer. Fields the colour of Grace’s hair stretched about us as far as we could see in a haze of heat that hovered just above the ground. The forecast had said that the weather was about to break and we arrived early to lift the hay one last time. By the end of the afternoon, when it had all been gathered in, we were thirsty and hot. There was no shelter in the fields. They had been stripped of every blade of grass, and the rough stalks that were left were clipped shorter than a soldier’s hair. Small patches of parched earth showed through like scalp. The only noise was the cawing of the crows that circled overhead, looking for field mice. Grace and I sat observing the devastation.

  ‘We should go back,’ I said.

  Grace had her face lifted up to the sun, her eyes closed. Despite her fairness, she never burned. ‘Go back where?’ she murmured.

  I still couldn’t bring myself to call it home. ‘To the house.’

  ‘What’s the point? Tea will be bread and butter with Mummy looking miserable and wanting to get back to her piano. Father won’t come out of his study because all he can think about is his beastly sermon.’ She opened her eyes and grinned. ‘Have a look in the knapsack. I packed some apples and a bottle of the Bad Blood. That should wake us up.’

  Bad Blood was what we called the communion wine. I shivered with excitement.

  ‘Let’s go to the lake and have a swim. It would be heaven to get this hay off. I’m itching all over.’

  The thought of washing away the gritty dust was appealing. Seeds had gathered in the creases of my elbows and behind my knees. My face was tight from the dust.

  ‘Besides,’ said Grace, ‘we should take the chance whilst we still can. The weather’s going to change. This could be the last swim of the year.’

  I looked at the sky. Dark clouds were beginning to gather, casting shadows over the stubble, and the air was heavy with the prospect of rain.

  ‘All right, then,’ I said.

  We scrambled to our feet, picked up the knapsack and set off across the fields.

  It had only been a week since we had last been at the lake, but it had shrunk so low that we could see the bleached bones of an animal that had drowned in it. Small insects skated over the surface, sending out tiny ripples as they went. The clouds made the water look dead and grey.

  Grace was disappointed. ‘Let’s wait for the sun to come back out,’ she said. ‘We can have a drink in the meantime.’

  We sat on the bank, so close that our shoulders touched, alternating between bites of apple and mouthfuls of wine. The apples were mealy and soft from being knocked about in the knapsack and the wine was hot from the sun, but it didn’t matter. It took effect more quickly than usual, making me giddy and glad. Grace seemed to feel the same way and as we worked our way down the bottle we told each other jokes and larked about, doing impersonations of people from the village whom we had worked with in the fields.

  We had been there almost an hour when Grace said, ‘Nora, I feel tight.’

  ‘That’s all right, isn’t it?’ I said. ‘I’m squiffy too. It’s rather wonderful. ’ I wriggled my toes, noticing how grubby they
were and not caring.

  ‘I can say things when I’m tight. Difficult things, I mean. Somehow it’s easier.’ She sounded grave. I kept quiet, wondering what she was going to say next. I dared not hope but I crossed my fingers just in case.

  ‘Do you remember the first time we were here with the wine?’ she said.

  Every minute of that afternoon was burned into my memory but I didn’t want to talk about it. I wanted to push it away and not let it ruin anything else, so I shook my head.

  She knew me better than that. ‘You do remember, don’t you?’ she said, looking at me closely.

  I knew that lying was pointless. ‘All right,’ I said. ‘Yes, I do. But I haven’t anything to say about it.’

  ‘But I want you to know what happened.’

  ‘I already know,’ I said. ‘It was quite plain to me what was going on between you and William. I left so that you could be alone together, just the two of you.’ I remembered exactly how I had felt that day. I had frightened myself with my reactions. But I knew I mustn’t say so. I shrugged and hung my head.

  ‘I knew that was what you thought,’ she said. ‘But you were quite wrong. It wasn’t like that at all.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I said.

  ‘You think I was making love to him, don’t you?’

  I looked at my feet.

  ‘Don’t you?’ she said again.

  I felt a little surge of anger in my chest, not as strong as the rage I had felt that day, but strong enough to make me speak.

  ‘What else could I think?’ I muttered. ‘You were lying there in the flowers, looking up at him as if you wanted him more than anything else in the world. Even William understood it. You did, he did, and so did I.’

  Grace looked uncomfortable. ‘I don’t know what got into me,’ she said. ‘I didn’t want anything to happen, not really. I supposed I just wanted to see if I could make somebody want me like that.’

  If only you knew, I thought. If only you knew how you could make somebody want you. It doesn’t take communion wine and a sunny afternoon by the lake. I want you on rainy days when we’re drinking tea with your mother in the kitchen. I want you in the morning when your eyes are still full of sleep. I want you when you don’t know the answers to your father’s questions on algebra and you’re ashamed of it. But I can’t tell you any of that because I know you don’t want me.