Love, Revenge & Buttered Scones

by Bobbie Darbyshire

  ‘No!’ They must stay. They must hear. There was a cushion in her hands. She threw it at Urquhart, but he paid no attention. She picked up another.

  Janet Urquhart was back. ‘It’s past your bedtime, Georgie.’

  ‘Nae, Janet,’ said Angus. ‘Stay awhile. For there’s more to say – is that not so, Fiona?’

  Why ask Fiona? Elena began to shout, ‘Yes, there is much, much more to say!’

  Fiona turned to stare at her – everyone was staring – but Elena did not care. It was what she wanted. This was – it had to be – her moment of revenge.

  Fiona spoke. ‘Father. Please. Now isn’t the best time.’

  ‘There is no best time,’ he said. ‘Time chooses us. Yes, Janet, stay. For there’s a thing ye all must know.’

  Peter

  ‘Woof!’

  And fuck it, whole clan back, more fuss and chatter when all he wanted was to be alone, speaking of poetry with this battle-scarred warrior time-lord, framed by firelight, whose wild eyes still searched for his. Away, then back, away.

  Henry’s idiocy with the poofter writer milked apparently, barely registering on the Richter scale. Mad Señorita erupting, clutching at cushions and squawking as though about to lay an egg, face flushed and blouse adrift from skirt. ‘Yes, Janet. Angus. Please. Stay with me in the past. Before the war, you are in Spain, my country’s war. We must speak of the Sierra Nevada. The February cold, the fall of Malaga.’

  Calum spinning on his heel to look at her. What was this? The warrior dismayed?

  Hang about. Hot-lipped Señorita, cold Sierra?

  Far far colder, that is how it was.

  Wham! Getting warmer! Calum’s eyes wide for Spanish babe, his poetry laid bare. Here was the key to the Gaelic, the clue to its meaning. Voice lost in nineteen thirty-eight; the answer to the riddle lay in Spain!

  ‘I know the truth!’

  All eyes on him, Calum’s too, rusty old warlord poet, etching lines in dust with broken sword, recalling lust and loss and –

  ‘What? Thou knowst what, Peter?’

  His eyes blue terror! And all for poet Peter, shouldering an old man’s burden, knowing the leaden weight of it, the tragedy of half a century of writer’s block.

  ‘Your poem. I see what it’s about. Your love lost! Your honour lost! Calum Calum lost! In Spain!’

  Consternation in the ranks, ripple of Urquharts’ heads swivelling twixt him and proud bard trembling on hearth before subsiding logs, his eyes blue water. Flurry of sparks up chimney, throwing six decades’ silence to the stars. Opening mouth to speak his golden words.

  Henry

  The old man looked suddenly frail. He was reaching for the mantelpiece to steady himself. Was he about to confess? Henry heard Elena whisper, ‘Yes.’ But Urquhart didn’t spare her a glance.

  ‘Aye, tis true, thou hast it right. But – ’

  ‘Grandfather?’

  ‘What, Mary?’

  ‘I’ll tell you bloody what, Father.’ Red-crew-cut Gavin had muscled his way forward. ‘You made us promise never to let on you were Calum. And now you’re admitting it to anyone, as if it’s nothing.’

  ‘Hush. Please. Listen.’ Fiona was trying to quiet Gavin, but he took no notice.

  ‘Not if someone guessed or pressed us, you said. Not even when you’d gone, you made us swear it.’

  Red-faced William was up and shouting too. ‘Gavin’s right. Calum was dead in you, you said. Dead and buried, not to be dug up. We did your bidding though we didn’t understand. What the hell are you doing, with your glib “Aye, tis true” to three complete bloody strangers?’

  ‘Calm thyself, William. Let me speak,’ the old man was trembling violently, ‘for I’ve good enough reason to change ma mind.’ His voice was raw, forcing an uneasy hush on the room. His eyes were fixed on Peter. ‘I thought to be silent yet, or somehow to tell this gently. But I cannae see how, for it must be named the way it is: nae more, nae less.’

  His voice shrank to a husk. ‘The reason is that Peter is ma son.’

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Peter

  What?

  What did Calum say?

  He was saying it again. To him alone, as though no one else were here. ‘I sired thee, Peter. Thou art ma son.’

  Poetry. He meant the poetry. ‘You mean the poetry?’

  ‘Nae, lad. I mean thy mother. Maggie. Thirty year ago.’

  Wham! Shock waves of understanding. All at once, so many things. Pa’s frozen shoulder. Ma’s Gaelic lullabies. Henry’s loot.

  Calum’s eyes casting him adrift. Turning to William. ‘Let me explain to thee. To all of ye. Thirty year ago I met this lass.’

  Wham! It was Ma in the poem! The poem was about Ma!

  A roomful of eyes bored into him. His mouth hung open. Shut it, no words to say.

  ‘Hold on, Father.’ Fiona leaping up. ‘Go slowly. They’re stunned. They need time – ’

  Wham! God! No! Fiona, his sister? Fuck it, fuck it, no! But yes, he’d known it, seen it from the start. Those haunting eyes were his own!

  The brothers were yelling. ‘You knew about this, Fiona?’

  Wham! His brothers! Four of them! Because Calum . . . Calum, his father . . .

  ‘You’re telling us this nasty bit of work is family?’

  ‘What does he want? What the hell’s he doing here?’

  ‘Thirty years ago? Did Mother know?’

  ‘Oh Father, you incorrigible rogue!’

  ‘Hush the lot of ye. Fiona has it right. Ye need time, and so do I, with ma new son, alone.’

  Calum’s eyes were back. Watered blue, shining with tears. With feeling. And he too, awash with feeling but no words. Feeling demanding to be named. What name? His father, Calum Calum. Good or bad, this feeling?

  Good. Definitely good. His whole being flooded with the goodness of it. Oh vastly, vastly good! Ma, Pa, Henry, the rottenness explained.

  And more. Much more. His thesis, his poetry, his Muse, his odyssey, his houseboat rising and falling on the stinking tide, the whole universe made sense!

  What to do? Cry ‘Dad’ and run towards him? Rooted to spot, brain stalled, ears deaf, eyes locked on Calum’s, tongue swollen with nothing to say.

  Calum Calum and he. Calum and Son. Calum and Peter Jennings Urquhart Calum.

  They had to be alone.

  Elena

  ‘Ay!’

  She screamed, but no one heard her.

  ‘My village!’ She hurled the cushion at Urquhart. ‘The fall of Malaga!’

  She hurled herself after it, but big Owen caught her. ‘Not now,’ he said.

  She was nothing. She was no one. She struggled to escape Owen. He pushed her into a chair. ‘Not now!’

  ‘Es malo! Es bastardo!’ She shrieked into the growing noise of Urquharts, into a room furious with Urquharts.

  Urquhart had outgunned her. Peter was his son! She had kissed Urquhart’s son! She screamed again.

  ‘Come on to bed, Georgie. And the rest of you.’ Janet Urquhart was herding children towards the door. ‘Yes, Mary, you as well. You’ll hear about it tomorrow.’ She turned before leaving. ‘For shame, Angus. Springing such things on children with no warning.’

  Elena heard herself howl like an animal.

  Henry sat trembling on the sofa opposite. Henry was not an Urquhart.

  ‘Henry,’ she pleaded. ‘Henry.’

  His face was white, his eyes were closed. He could not help her.

  Mikhail. Suddenly she wanted only Mikhail. She would ring the whole of Brussels until she found him. She struggled from the chair and ran from the room, pushing past Janet and the children in the passage, escaping the wood-smoke, finding again the hall that smelled of Spain, oh God, driven by the need to hear her lover’s voice, as rough and gentle as a cat’s lick.

  Elena. The memory of the way he spoke her name.

  ‘Mikhail,’ she called. ‘Mikhail. Mikhail.’ She was running up the stairs.

  Elena. Yes, I know. I
understand.

  Here was the door. She found the key, dropped it, found it again, his remembered words running in her head. Always I will understand. But why can you not forget this pain?

  The key was in the lock. He was right, she had to tell him he was right. Her memories, her anger, they brought her nothing. Carlos’s shame, Marisa’s death, a funeral procession, her mother’s opened grave. Then nothing but Urquhart, Urquhart, Urquhart. What was she doing in this place?

  She burst into the room of pink roses. Her bag was on the bed. She dug inside it for her mobile. She could not find it. She tipped the contents out. It was not there.

  Her case was on the floor. She opened it. Searched for the phone. Threw out the clothes. Searched again. It was not there.

  Henry

  Shock. Too many shocks.

  It was obvious, why hadn’t he seen it before? His brother’s eyes and Urquhart’s eyes were so alike. And Fiona’s eyes. Everywhere he looked, he was seeing the same eyes. He must get away from them. ‘Fiona. Please. You said you would find me a room.’

  ‘Yes, Henry. A moment.’

  He couldn’t bear it. He had to be alone. He needed to look at himself in a mirror and find out who he was. This room was so hot, and there was so much shouting.

  ‘Why have you sprung this on us, Father? How many more bastard worms are there burrowing in the woodwork?’

  ‘Yes, and what’s your game, Peter Jennings?’

  These two loudmouths were horribly like his brother.

  ‘William! Gavin!’ Fiona spoke sharply. ‘Do as father says. Leave them alone, just for half an hour.’

  ‘You bloody knew, Fiona, and you didn’t say.’

  ‘I couldn’t, William. He swore me to silence.’

  ‘Huh!’

  But the brothers were leaving. Big Owen first, then William and Gavin, scowling and grumbling, pushed out bodily by Fiona, followed by James, the grinning chef.

  Peter’s half-brothers.

  ‘Wait here, Henry. I’ll fetch your bag. I won’t be a minute.’

  Peter’s half-sister.

  She was gone. Leaving him alone with an old man and a half-ex brother, two dogs and a dying fire.

  He might as well not exist. Peter and Urquhart hung in a trance together, waiting for him to leave. When he left, they would begin to speak.

  Fiona was back with his bag. ‘This way,’ she said.

  He rose and followed her dumbly, through a door beside the fireplace and up the servants’ stairs. Bloody suitable.

  ‘Will this do? Are you sure?’ She had unlocked a small bedroom that looked out on dark mountainside.

  He nodded. ‘Could I have some brandy?’

  ‘Of course. I’ll send Gordon with some. He won’t be five minutes. And then . . .’

  He was staring through the window at the mountain. Staring through his reflection at rock and darkness.

  ‘Henry . . .’

  ‘What?’

  He turned to look at her. She was scribbling a number on a scrap of paper. ‘I’ll be with my brothers. I don’t know where exactly, but you can page me.’ She put the scrap of paper on the bedside table. ‘When you want to talk, I’ll come. I’ll tell you everything I know.’

  She was at the door. She smiled, but he could not. She was gone. He needed the brandy to arrive.

  I’ll tell you everything I know.

  He knew already. His mind, crawling out from under its stone, was hit by an agonising weight of knowledge.

  It was Urquhart, not Peter, who stole his mother’s love.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Peter

  ‘Are you all right, lad?’

  Still no words. Knees weak. Totter to nearest sofa and drop down. This was the feeling: desire to drop, almost to sleep. How could that be?

  Calum, his father. A great man, his father. So much to know, to ask, to tell.

  Not so. All done. All answered in two words. My son.

  ‘Peter. Dinnae be angry with me.’ An old man, leaning from his chair, reaching a nervous hand. Too far away to touch.

  ‘I’m not. Truly I’m not. Not angry with you.’

  That was the feeling. That was its name. Not angry.

  ‘With thy mother then? With poor Maggie?’

  Shaking head, numb with this absence of rage. ‘Nor with her either.’

  An old man leaving his chair. Edging closer. ‘With who then? With Fiona?’

  ‘No.’

  No anger. What to take its place? An old man in a kilt? He took the old man’s hand between his two. Turned it palm up, palm down. His father’s hand, the finger-ends hard-bitten like his own. ‘What shall I call you?’

  The old man shook his head. He gripped his father’s hand. The answer spoke itself.

  ‘Calum. I can only call you Calum.’

  Elena

  She rocked and wept, crushing the receiver of the bedside telephone to her ear, hearing the ringing, far away. She imagined the clamour of it in the empty office, closed for the weekend. She pictured Mikhail’s desk: his dictionaries, his mug for coffee, the calendar with scenes of Moscow, the telephone calling and calling into silence.

  ‘Please, Mikhail. Please speak to me.’

  His desk was orderly. Pencil, pen, highlighter, notepad, keyboard, monitor. Nothing more. Or maybe, was it so, a small heap of papers waiting? Post-it notes, requests and messages? One of them headed ‘Tuesday’? Elena rang. Please call her.

  She sobbed and rocked, in time to the distant telephone. Madre de Dios! Where is he? Is he ill? Please no.

  Click. ‘Hello?’

  She leapt with hope, off the bed onto her feet. ‘Hello? Mikhail?’

  ‘Mikhail is no more here. No one here today. Is veekend. But I okay perhaps? I help you vot you need?’ The halting voice dissolved her with longing. It was not Mikhail’s voice, but so much the same.

  ‘I need to speak to him urgently. Please, do you know where he is?’

  ‘Sorry. He qvit job is all I know.’

  ‘Quit?’

  ‘Yah, he go. Leave Brussels. Vait, I get number.’

  She could hear the man whistle as he looked for it. She clutched the phone, praying, ‘Please, Mikhail. You must not do this.’

  ‘Hello. You there?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I have number.’

  She grabbed a pen from the mess of luggage on the bed, and a piece of paper. The photocopy of Angus Urquhart, smiling in his kilt.

  ‘Number is . . .’

  She started to write. She stopped. ‘No. Please. This is his mobile. I need his new number.’

  ‘This all I have. Sorry I no more help. Okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ she whispered. ‘Thank you.’

  She hung up. She stared at Angus Urquhart’s photocopied smile. Not okay. Never again okay. With Mikhail in Brussels she had been almost happy. ‘Think of the future,’ he said, making her smile. But always she ruined the future, staining it with the past.

  Slowly she began to sob. Hard sobs that hurt her throat and brought no peace.

  Henry

  The brandy had arrived, but he’d been drinking too much, he decided abruptly. He broke the seal, sniffed at the open neck of the bottle, then resolutely screwed the cap on. Reality remained the watchword. It was pouring on his head by the stinking bucket-load, but he was damned if he would hide from it in drink.

  Reality. He concentrated hard on his mother, his childhood mother, seduced away by that abominable Scot. Her elderly ghost was here, skulking shamefacedly in the corner, trying to distract him from the truth. How much had his father known?

  No need to upset yourself, Henry dear. He simply meant to appoint you head of the family.

  Lying to the last! Violent anger seized him. He glared at her phantom presence, daring it to make excuses. How could she have stood by smiling for three whole years after Father died, watching him suffer such guilt? Watching him sweat blood to make amends to her and Peter. Toiling through the lonely life that she had p
rogrammed him to live. Could she not, just once, however privately for his ears only, have confided the true meaning of his father’s will? It’s yours, Henry, because you are his child as Peter never was. It’s yours, every penny of it, because I played away.

  Decades of paternal reticence were screaming to be reexamined. How much was temperament, how much the silence of the wounded beast?

  Damn her. His anger grew. Three years she’d had. Nothing to lose but face. How dared she go to her grave without telling, leaving him nothing but memories stewed in lies?

  And Peter! What a wrong to deal his brother! There was no love lost between you and Pa. As if that was Peter’s fault! Pa’s black-sheep, Gaelic-literature-studying, wastrel poet son! Had Peter ever been offered any love to lose, and could Pa be blamed for not offering it? He’d been despised – no, loathed – for doing what he was good at, what his genes programmed him to be good at, and never once told why. What did one of those Urquharts call him? A nasty bit of work? Was even that his fault? My Ma sang Gaelic lullabies. The poor sod never stood a chance.

  But at least, unlike him, his brother would know the truth. A living, breathing, Gaelic poet father would tell it to him. A father with skeletons rattling in his cupboard, yes, like the disintegrating biscuits in his rusty tin, but what did skeletons matter – who cared if Elena opened the cupboard door? All fathers were flawed, or worse. To know his own father, warts and all, what wouldn’t he give to have what Peter had?

  His mother’s ghost stood silent, fresh out of lies.

  ‘Damn you. Damn you, Mother.’

  Help. He needed help.

  I’ll tell you everything I know.

  But Fiona wasn’t there when it happened, she would have been, what? Six? Only Urquhart knew the facts. Dates, places, his mother’s excuses. Taciturn husband, namby-pamby child. More lies, but new lies, holding seeds of truth. Didn’t lovers sometimes speak the truth?

  Yes, he must hear Urquhart’s fairytale of brief encounter. Later, when he could listen without screaming. Thirty year ago I met this lass. ‘Lass’ be damned! An Englishwoman, pushing forty, that was his mother thirty years ago. A frustrated romantic, ripe for seduction. Damn the pair of them!