‘When the doctor came, I told him all of it. I had to admit that I had left them alone. When Evelyn heard that, she flew at me. Then she started to cry. The doctor gave her morphine to make her sleep but as soon as she woke the next morning she began to cry again. She has cried every morning since.’
He hung his head, as if his memories made it too heavy to hold up.
‘I don’t know . . . I don’t know how things might have been otherwise . . . We buried Elizabeth in the churchyard in a little grave by the wall. Evelyn was inconsolable. I blamed myself and she blamed me too. From that moment on she has despised both me and the rest of the world. I thought that she would pour everything into the child that she had left, but she didn’t. For a long time she acted as if she had never had any children at all.
‘I distracted myself with my ministry. It took me many years to make my peace with God. I told myself that it was his will, that there was some reason for it. I learned to accept. I had to. He was all I had left. Evelyn could scarcely bear to look at me. I dared not go near Grace for fear that something might happen to her too.’
Reverend Rivers’ eyes clouded over. ‘I must admit . . .’
He hesitated. When he spoke again, it was almost as if he had forgotten I was there.
‘I have to say . . . I developed a dislike for her. For Grace. For my own daughter. It was the way that she chuckled when I went back to the bathroom. I know that she was only a child, a baby, but I felt as if she were mocking me. I can’t forget it. It comes back to me every time I look at her.’
I stared at him in horror. So many things made sense to me now; the strained silence at the rectory, Mrs Rivers’ unhappiness and Reverend Rivers’ coldness towards Grace. But knowing was no relief. It was too much to hear. I wanted to squirm and block my ears with my hands like a child. But there was something else that I needed to know. I made myself ask.
‘But why hasn’t Grace said anything about it? She never told me.’
He shook his head. ‘The doctor assured us that she was too young to remember. He said that it would be best never to tell her, and so we didn’t. We even left Elizabeth’s gravestone blank, without an inscription, so she wouldn’t come across it.’
His voice was filled with sadness. ‘But I know that something has stayed with her. She has always wanted a sister. When she was younger she used to ask us why she had to be alone. That’s why your arrival meant so much to her, to all of us. It was as if Elizabeth had come back.’
Whether Grace knew anything about it or not, I would never be able to look at her in the same way as before. Everything had changed. I had chosen to stay with the Rivers. I had chosen them instead of Ma. But now I knew it wasn’t me they had wanted. I was someone else, a replacement for a ghost.
‘So you see,’ Reverend Rivers said desperately, ‘I understand. I know how you are feeling. I understand what it is to lose someone whom you love.’
I couldn’t think of anything to say.
Reverend Rivers went on speaking, almost pleading with me now.
‘But I also know that some good can come of it. We lost Elizabeth. But God sent us you. You were the answer to my prayers. When you first came to us I dared to hope that you would make things better. You were - how can I put it? - a consolation.’
Two small blotches had appeared on his cheekbones as if he were wearing rouge, vivid against his pale skin. He was acting like he did in the study when he talked about books. But in the church his excitement was out of place, somehow wrong.
He swallowed and went on, avoiding my eyes.
‘But then . . . I have also been troubled . . . ’
There was something about the way he said it that made me nervous. I stayed very still as he carried on.
‘By feelings . . . ’
He looked up again at the altar and began to speak quickly, his words tumbling over one another.
‘I have begged God not to allow me to be led into temptation. I have prayed for strength.’
The church seemed suddenly very cold.
‘I thought God had listened. I thought it would be all right.’
My mind was racing, trying to work out what he meant.
‘But then I saw you—’
He broke off abruptly and buried his face in his hands, mumbling something to himself. I listened, trying to make out what he was saying, telling myself that it couldn’t be what it seemed. But as the words became clearer, I shivered. It was the prayer that I had been reciting just before he had come into the church in my effort to bury my desire for Grace.
. . . And lead us not into temptation
But deliver us from evil . . .
As he went on praying, my horror grew. I had heard him pray like this before, when I had watched him on his knees in the shelter, begging God to save him from something terrible. I remembered how I had heard someone at the lake that day when we were swimming. I suddenly realized who it was and what he must have seen.
Reverend Rivers lifted his head and smiled at me, a peculiar sort of smile.
‘Nora,’ he said. ‘If you knew how I have dreamed—’
He lurched forward and took hold of my shoulders. I felt the scratch of stubble and his breath against my skin as he bent to kiss me, over and over, searching for my lips with his. He slid his hands down my back, then further still, pressing himself hard against me. The smell of old tobacco and sweat filled my nostrils. As his hands began to move over my body I held myself rigid, too shocked to move, but when they reached under my skirt, something inside me snapped.
I wrenched myself away from him and scrambled to my feet. ‘No!’ I shouted. ‘You can’t mean that.’ I pushed past him and ran down the aisle. When I reached the door I turned to look at him, hunched in the pew.
‘You shouldn’t have done that. You just shouldn’t,’ I whispered, then turned and ran.
Knowing that Grace and Mrs Rivers would be waiting for me in the kitchen, I went in through the front door instead and ran up the stairs as fast as I could. I threw myself into the bathroom, slammed the door behind me and drew the bolt. I took the towel from its hook, stuffed as much of it into my mouth as I could and began to scream. I screamed until my throat was raw and my head felt as if it would fall apart. When I couldn’t scream any more I sunk to the floor, drawing my knees up to my chest and hugging them tight.
From where I was sitting, pressed up against the bath, I could see dirt at the base of the lavatory and balls of dust along the top of the skirting boards. It was like everything else at the rectory, I thought bitterly. Things looked clean enough on the outside, but under the surface, secret dirt had been building up like the hard yellow scum around the bath taps. My skin began to crawl, as if a thousand little creatures were swarming over me. I started to scrape at my arms with my fingernails. I wanted to be clean. I stood up and opened the hot tap as far as I could, until the water was tumbling out fast.
I went over to the door and tried the bolt, checking that it was secure. My blouse became a second curtain, looped over the rail. I rolled up my skirt and blocked the gap under the door. I climbed into the bath, keeping my knickers on until I was hidden, then I inched them down my legs and dropped them over the side.
I lay back, watching the water rise past the Plimsoll Line. I didn’t care any more about making do and playing my part. I would break the five-inch rule. He had broken the rules and so would I. The water poured into the bath and I let it keep coming until it had turned cold.
I took the sliver of soap from the dish and rubbed it over my arm but it did no good. The crawling sensation was still there, all over my body. I looked about the room for something stronger. There was a bottle of Vim on the window-ledge. I reached for it, twisted off the lid and shook some of the whitish powder into my hand. It stung, a good sign, I decided. It would be strong enough. I stood up out of the water and brought my hand to my chest, rubbing in the Vim with small, circular movements, then reached down to my thighs and rubbed it in as hard as I could. My ski
n turned white, then red. I rubbed until I began to bleed, then I sat back down, watching the water turn pink, my mind racing.
I was frightened. I was sitting in the same bath that Elizabeth had died in. I thought about Grace, wondering how much she really knew. Nobody could be trusted, not Reverend Rivers, not Mrs Rivers, not Grace and not me. We all had secrets, all of us. The whole damned war was about secrets, keeping quiet and hiding things from each other.
Reverend Rivers had kept the same secret as I had, hidden it inside until he couldn’t stand it any longer. When he had said it, I had been afraid and then I had hated him. If I ever told Grace how I felt about her she would hate me like that too. I would seem as monstrous to her as he was to me. I was just as bad as him.
I remembered what Mrs Rivers had said at that first Sunday lunch. ‘Nora will stay with us for as long as it is safer for her to be here than in London.’
The time had come, I thought, when I would be safer in London than in Kent. It would be safer for me and it would be safer for Grace. I had to take myself away from temptation, to protect her. I didn’t want her ever to feel the terrible panic I had felt when Reverend Rivers moved towards me.
Now that Ma was dead, there was nobody left to go to. There was nobody left to look after me and so I would look after myself. I would start by leaving this place that I had thought of as Paradise. I wasn’t going to wait to be cast out of it by God or any other sort of father. I would go back to London. If Paradise could turn out to be so rotten, perhaps the city that they said was like Hell would turn out to be all right.
Fifteen
THE NEW YEAR BEGAN WITH A CHILL WIND, AN ILL WIND, blowing no-one any good. It howled outside my window, sending freezing draughts down the chimney that made me shiver. I had new pains that were as persistent as the wind. I tried to ignore them. I had come to like my room, particularly in the afternoons when Rose would close the curtains against the dark and build a fire. Whilst the baby slept she read to me. I chose old favourites, remembering nights at the rectory when Grace and I had sat close to the hearth, taking turns with Rebecca, desperate to know what would happen next. I thought of George, reading out loud at the kitchen table as I cooked dinner. He had spent hours looking through books, searching out passages about food. When money was short, he read out descriptions of feasts as we ate scrambled eggs. It had never failed to make me smile.
One day as Rose was reading, I began to feel a dull ache in my stomach. I tried to concentrate on what she was saying but it soon became worse and before long it was impossible to ignore. I started to breathe through my nose very slowly, trying to keep calm, but then a spasm of pain passed through me, so strong that I gasped.
‘What’s wrong?’ said Rose in alarm.
I couldn’t answer. An enormous pressure was building up inside me, pushing out my stomach as if I were filling up with air. It grew stronger and stronger until something seemed to snap and I felt a sudden burning between my legs. I leaned forward and was sick, retching again and again until there was nothing left in my stomach.
Rose moved quickly, holding me up until I had finished. She smoothed back my hair and wiped my face with one of the damp cloths that she used when she was changing Grace. She brought a glass of water and held it to my lips.
‘Nora,’ she whispered. ‘What happened?’
With an effort, I pointed to my stomach.
‘Don’t worry, I’ll clean it up,’ she said, and drew the blanket back. She put her hand over her mouth. I looked down. A dark stain spread out underneath me. I was lying in a pool of blood.
Our eyes met.
‘Oh God,’ she said, and the baby began to scream.
Rose changed the sheets and washed me gently with a sponge. I closed my eyes in shame as she did it, holding back tears. She pulled the sodden nightdress over my head and brought another that smelled of lavender. She brushed my hair carefully, keeping the bristles of the hairbrush away from my scalp. Then she sat down on the bed and took my hands in hers, cradling them between her palms.
‘Please let me call a doctor,’ she said. ‘I’m scared. I don’t know what to do. I’ll look after you as well as I can, but I’m not a nurse. I don’t think I can do it on my own.’
I stared into the fire, watching the flames leap high as if they were trying to escape up the chimney.
‘It’s going to get worse,’ she said quietly. ‘I’ve seen what happens. We need someone who knows what to do.’
I knew what was going to happen too. The book had explained it all, down to the very last detail. I turned my head towards her and saw the pain in her eyes. I remembered what she had told me about her father. She didn’t need to be dragged into it again.
‘All right,’ I said finally. ‘Call a doctor. I don’t mind.’
She made a telephone call and a doctor came to visit. I felt like a child, tucked up tight by an anxious mother. When I heard the footsteps coming up the stairs and along the corridor the room seemed smaller than before. I lay very still, waiting.
The door opened. ‘Dr Armstrong’s here to see you,’ said Rose.
I turned my head to see a blonde-haired young woman, her cheeks pink from climbing the stairs. She looked like an actress, not a doctor. She wasn’t what I had expected at all. She was smiling at me. Perhaps, I thought, it wouldn’t be as bad as I had imagined.
‘Hello,’ she said.
She came to sit down, not on the chair but on the bed.
‘Well, Nora, Rose says you’ve been ill for quite a while. Can you tell me what’s wrong?’
What’s wrong? I thought. I didn’t know where to start.
‘She says you think you have cancer.’
I nodded.
‘But you haven’t seen a doctor. Is that right?’
I tried to think of a suitable answer but my mind was blank. ‘No,’ I said. ‘I haven’t.’
She frowned and scribbled something in a notebook. ‘But if you haven’t seen a doctor,’ she said gently, ‘how do you know it’s cancer?’
I mumbled my answer, knowing it would sound ridiculous. ‘A book.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘It was a book about cancer. A medical book. It gave a list of symptoms. It told me what to expect.’
‘And what were the symptoms?’
They weren’t things I wanted to talk about, but the doctor simply waited, saying nothing, and I realized I would have to tell her.
‘I couldn’t eat but my stomach grew. I felt sick. I started . . . to bleed.’ I said the last few words very quietly.
She nodded. Her eyes were kind. I hung my head.
‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘Rose told me. I’m just sorry that you’ve felt like that for so long. I’d like to do some tests, to be sure of the diagnosis.’
‘Why do you need to be sure? I know I’m going to die. That’s enough, isn’t it?’
She frowned. ‘If we know what it is, there’s a chance we can do something about it. There are lots of ways to fight cancer.’
I imagined myself in a hospital, being prodded and poked by strangers who would come to know everything about me. I would be there for everyone to see, laid out on a bed as if I were already on the mortuary slab, unable to hide a thing. They would make notes and record every detail. I would be parcelled up all over again, just like the day I was sent to the train with a label around my neck.
I wanted to shout it out for everyone to hear. Don’t you see? I surrendered a long time ago. I gave up that day in the church. Ask those stained-glass angels in the windows, they saw it all. I carried on dying all the way through the war, while everyone else was trying so damned hard to stay alive. Now it’s time to finish the job.
‘I don’t want to fight,’ I said instead. ‘I’m tired.’
‘Nora, can’t we—?’
‘No,’ I said firmly.
She sighed. ‘I can’t force you to have treatment. But I can make you more comfortable. I can help you manage the pain.’
I could
n’t tell her that the pain was a punishment, one that was long overdue.
‘Please, Nora,’ said Rose. ‘I can’t bear to see you like you were today. I want to look after you but I’m scared.’
‘She’s right,’ said the doctor. ‘It’s not going to be easy, especially with a baby here as well.’
They were sitting on either side of me, pinning me to the bed with the counterpane. I was trapped.
‘Here’s a suggestion,’ said the doctor. ‘I think you’re probably right, but I want to be certain. If it is cancer, I won’t ask you to take any kind of cure, but I’ll find a nurse to come to the house and help Rose look after you. That way you can stay at home. You won’t have to go to a hospital. Will you agree to that, at least?’
‘Must you really examine me?’ I said, without much hope.
‘I’m afraid so. I want to send a specialist cancer nurse. But first we have to be sure that’s what you have.’
The examination was another humiliation.
‘I’m afraid this might be uncomfortable,’ said the doctor. ‘Take a deep breath.’
Rose squeezed my hand as something nudged between my legs, something cold and blunt. When it began to push into me I felt a pain worse than anything I’d felt so far. I whimpered.
‘You’re doing really well. Now I’m going to take some cells. This might hurt a little.’
I felt a wave of nausea as something scratched and scraped deep inside me. I would have screamed out but I knew it wouldn’t make any difference. I bit my lip instead and tasted blood.
‘Good,’ the doctor said, when it was over. ‘All finished. Well done.’
I felt my nightdress being brought down over my legs and the blankets tucked back around me. I lay on my back, rigid with humiliation.
‘We’ll be in touch very soon,’ she said. ‘Look after yourself, Nora. I mean it.’
I couldn’t meet her eyes after what she’d just done.
Days of Grace Page 15