Dead Man's Embers

by Mari Strachan

  Now Meg is signalling to her. Everyone has finished eating. They had decided beforehand, Meg and she, that the gifts would be given to Wil before the pudding came to the table. Meg helps her to clear the supper dishes and cutlery, and Non lights the lamp at the centre of the table. Wil looks at them, from one face to the next around the table, his eyebrows raised in a question.

  ‘It’s a surprise,’ Meg says. ‘But we didn’t decide, Non, we didn’t choose who was to go first.’

  ‘Shall we begin with the youngest?’ Non says.

  ‘You first then, Osian.’

  Meg has changed in her attitude to Osian. She has a grudging respect for his carving skills, and there is no doubt that she is quite pleased that he has chosen her as his model, though Non does not suppose it means anything to Osian in terms of love. Which of them can know for sure what goes on in Osian’s heart, or head?

  Osian is as oblivious as usual to what is required of him, and Meg helps him by bringing from under his chair a small parcel, longer than it is wide, and giving it to Wil. ‘This is from Osian and Herman,’ she says, and cannot resist adding: ‘It will be very useful to you, Wil, to write home.’

  Wil peels the paper from his gift and they gasp in unison when they see what it is. Even Meg, who has been supervising the making and the wrapping of it, seems amazed anew at its beauty and the skill apparent in it. ‘It’s one of Herman’s feathers,’ she says, as proudly as if she had made it herself.

  It is more beautiful than anything Non has yet seen of Osian’s work. It is a simple quill pen carved of wood. It is passed around the table for all to see and exclaim at. Osian’s carving, in some way Non cannot imagine, has captured the very nature of featheriness. She runs her finger lightly along it, almost expecting to feel the softness, and realises how clever a construction it is, a perfect pen, curved to fit Wil’s left-handedness. She marvels at the neat contraption at the end to which the nib is fitted to become part of the feather.

  ‘That is perfect, Osh. Thank you,’ Wil says. ‘Almost too good to use, really. What if I break it?’ He lays it on the tablecloth. And it is true that his hands, already thickened with the work they do, look too clumsy and heavy to use such a delicate instrument.

  ‘It’s stronger than it looks. Osian made it specially for you to write to us with,’ Meg says, ‘and for you to write about your adventures with.’ She produces a parcel of her own as if by sleight of hand. ‘In here.’

  Meg has prepared her own gift to Wil with such secrecy that Non has no idea what to expect. Wil pushes his pen gently to one side, places Meg’s parcel in front of him and fumbles to open the knots in the ribbon she has tied around the wrapping paper.

  ‘Open it, open it.’ Meg takes the parcel from Wil because he does not obey quickly enough, pulls the ribbon away and folds back the wrapping to reveal a book with an embroidered cover. She opens the volume to show blank pages waiting to be written upon. ‘See, everybody,’ she says. ‘Wil can write all his adventures down here and then we can read about them when he comes home.’

  Catherine Davies is watching the proceedings with her eyebrows raised. ‘A pen and a notebook,’ she says. ‘Wil has never been a great one for writing, has he? I should know. When I think of the hours I wasted trying to make him write with his right hand—’

  ‘But this is a special pen for his left hand, Nain,’ Meg says. ‘It’ll be something for him to do in the evenings. Won’t it, Wil?’

  Wil turns the book around in his hands. ‘It’s lovely, Meg. It must have taken you a long time to do this.’ Wil smoothes the cover, until his rough palm snags the threads on the embroidery. ‘Thank you.’

  Below Wil’s name Meg has sewn a ship in full sail, sitting tipsily on the waves beneath it where fish of all colours swim and leap. Non had not known that Meg was capable of making such a lovely thing. What talented children she and Davey have – though, of course, none of the talent comes from her. But she cannot help agreeing with Catherine Davies that these are not quite the kinds of gifts Wil would best like. She feels reluctant to give her own offering, but after pointed glances and nods from Meg, she hands Wil the copy of Joseph Conrad’s new book, which she has only read once since she bought it last year, so it is very nearly new. She had thought reading it would help fill his lonely hours at sea.

  ‘Well,’ Catherine Davies says through a cat’s bottom of a mouth, which Non is pleased to see Wil has not missed, ‘I’ve never known Wil to be a great one for reading, either.’

  ‘It’s a sea story, an adventure,’ Non tells him. ‘Look at the ship on the cover, Wil. D’you think the David Morris will look like that in full sail?’

  ‘Thank you, Non,’ he says. ‘But, you know, I’m going to have to work much harder on board the David Morris than you all think. There won’t be much spare time to write and read, so I may not fill Meg’s notebook or finish . . .’ He glances at the cover of the book. ‘The Rescue all that soon. But I shall treasure them.’

  There is a small silence as Meg looks at Non, and Non shakes her head at her. They have got this wrong. How could they have done that?

  ‘Maybe Gwydion will give you something you really like,’ Meg says despite Non’s head-shaking. ‘What have you got for him, Gwydion?’

  ‘I’m afraid mine’s a book, too, Wil,’ Gwydion says.

  This is Wil’s largest parcel so far, square and bulky so that everything else has to be moved aside to make room for it, and not as meticulously wrapped as Meg’s parcel, so it does not take Wil a second to find out what the book is. ‘The Times Atlas,’ he reads, and begins to leaf through it. ‘A map book.’

  ‘But he’s travelling on the sea, not on the land, Gwydion,’ Meg says.

  ‘Ah,’ Gwydion says, ‘so, see what the map on pages seven and eight shows, young lady.’

  Wil has already found the pages. ‘Look, it shows the routes that ships have to follow to get across the Atlantic Ocean. The David Morris used to sail to Newfoundland.’ He traces the journey with his finger. ‘It looks no distance at all on here, but it takes weeks to get there and back. I didn’t know where it was, though, Gwydion. This is good – thank you very much.’

  ‘And look, Wil,’ Gwydion says. ‘Go back a page – see, it tells you how deep the water is everywhere in the oceans and seas. Can you see those measurements?’

  Wil looks down at the page. His lips move slightly as he reads the figures. ‘It’s very deep in some places,’ he says. ‘I didn’t know it was so deep. I didn’t know there was so much water in the sea.’

  ‘That’s a lovely present, Gwydion,’ Non says.

  ‘Davison’s selling a lot of his books,’ Gwydion says. ‘This was one of them. I thought it’d be just the thing for Wil.’

  ‘It is, it is,’ Wil says. ‘I just had no idea . . .’

  ‘You’ll come safely home with this, Wil, however deep the waters you sail on.’ Davey takes off the charm he keeps around his neck on a leather bootlace.

  ‘Your lucky charm?’ Wil says. ‘The one Taid gave you?’

  Catherine Davies rounds on Davey. ‘And look what happened to him the minute he gave it to you.’

  There is no need for any of them to look at William Davies to see what has happened to him. They all know that over the years and months and days he has removed himself to the land of his childhood.

  But Davey will be fine, Non thinks. He no longer needs the charm. Davey the stranger has almost gone and Davey her husband has returned. It does not matter that bits of his memory are missing, they are not likely to be things he wants to remember. He has remembered the important thing, and he will be fine. They will be fine. Sometimes, it may be best not to know everything. Curiosity has its dangers, as she has discovered.

  Wil puts the charm around his own neck, and tucks it under his shirt. ‘It brought you safely through the War, didn’t it?’ he says to Davey.

  ‘It brought me home,’ Davey says.

  ‘But it’s a disgusting thing.’ Meg makes a moue of distaste.
‘Made out of bone like that. I wouldn’t let it touch me.’

  ‘Bone?’ Gwydion says. ‘Let’s have a look, Wil.’

  Wil pulls it out from beneath his shirt. It is yellowed and the shape is difficult to discern. ‘It’s a hare,’ he says, ‘made from the leg bone of a hare. It’s really old. Taid told me the story of it once, his own Taid gave it to him. Hares are lucky.’

  ‘It does look old,’ Gwydion says. ‘But I don’t think whoever made it was as good at carving as Osian.’

  ‘It should have gone to Billy. He was the eldest.’ Catherine Davies snuffles into her handkerchief.

  ‘But Uncle Billy wasn’t going to the War,’ Wil says. ‘Thank you, Tada. I’ll keep it safe.’

  ‘It’s meant to keep you safe, Wil,’ Davey says. ‘And when the time comes, you can give it to your own son.’

  His own son! Non can hardly think of Wil being old enough to have a son of his own. The boy that she brought up and cherished – a father!

  ‘It’s your turn, Nain,’ Meg says.

  Catherine Davies seems to take an age to put away her handkerchief in her sleeve. She bends from her chair to lug her voluminous handbag from the floor. They are holding their collective breath as Catherine Davies rummages in the bag. There is no knowing what she will pull out. Here it comes – it is a small round tin, which she hands to Wil.

  Wil turns it around to look at what it says. ‘The original and proven glucose travel drops,’ he reads aloud. ‘They’re mints. I like mints. Thank you, Nain.’

  ‘They are to stop you being sea-sick, Wil,’ Catherine Davies says. ‘I have never, myself, travelled on water but I understand that it is treacherously . . . unstill. I trust you will find them a great deal more useful than books and paper and pens.’

  ‘Well, I hope I won’t need them for that, Nain,’ Wil says. ‘But I do like sweets.’

  ‘And,’ Catherine Davies says, ‘once they are finished you will be able to use the tin to keep things in.’

  ‘Tiny, small things,’ Meg says, under her breath. Non sends her a warning look and she jumps from her chair. ‘Why,’ she cries, ‘this is better than a birthday, or Christmas, Wil. And I helped Non to make your favourite pudding.’

  As Non rises to her feet to fetch dishes and spoons, and the bread-and-butter pudding from the warming oven, old William Davies stirs in his chair and produces from his pocket a leather drawstring bag. He leans across the table to give it to Wil.

  ‘What’s that you’re giving him?’ Catherine Davies tries to snatch it from her husband’s hand, but William Davies manages to evade her grasp.

  Wil opens the bag and spills its contents onto the table. They all count the golden sovereigns that lie there, glittering in the lamplight. Twenty! Twenty golden sovereigns.

  ‘I can’t take so much money from you, Taid,’ Wil says. ‘It’s a fortune!’

  ‘You keep it, my boy,’ old William Davies says. ‘You might be glad of it one day. And good luck to you on that ship.’ He nods at Wil, and then winks at him. ‘Just one bit of good advice, Wil. Don’t let your hair get wet in winter.’

  ‘What do you mean, Taid?’

  ‘Oh, Wil, when I was a bit older than you are now I was courting the prettiest girl in Lln – I was the lucky one then! I was going to see her one evening, January it was, bitter cold, and I was running late because we’d had a big blast at the quarry that afternoon and my hair was full of dust, so I had to wash it. But there was no time to dry it by the fire, see, because if there was one thing she didn’t like it was anyone being late. So, I jumped on my bike, wet hair and all, and off I went. But my wet hair froze and gave me the most unbearable pain in my head, Wil, and I had to turn round and go home. She never spoke to me again. Broke my heart.’

  They all laugh, because the heartbreak was a long time ago, and not a fresh pain. All but Catherine Davies; she glowers at her husband. But even as they laugh and William Davies laughs with them, a vacant look begins to steal into his eyes, like a mist settling on the sea, and then – he has left them. He rises from the table. ‘Thank you for the meal,’ he says. ‘I have to be getting home, Mother will be wondering where I am. She worries, you know, since David my brother was killed. She thinks the rock face is going to fall on me, too.’

  Catherine Davies takes hold of his shirt sleeve and pulls him down into his chair where he sits with a slight smile on his face.

  He seems to be happy, wherever it is he has gone, Non thinks. It was nice to have a rare visit from him to see Wil on his way; Wil will always remember that.

  34

  Non is tired of train journeys and this is one she does not want to make. She glances away from the fields and trees and hedges that race by and looks at Wil sitting opposite her. He, too, is watching the passing fields, the sheep-filled meadows and the streams as they journey. She wonders if he is storing them up in his memory so that when he is far away he can take them out, as he would photographs, to remind himself of what he has left behind. Or is he thinking of all the new countries he will see as he sails the oceans, and how different they may be from all this? He is just a boy, she thinks, his cheeks still smooth and a little plump. And then he turns to look at her and she sees the man in his eyes.

  Yesterday she spent hours preparing everything for Wil’s departure in the morning. Socks were darned, shirts washed and starched on Monday were ironed, new patches were put on jersey and jacket elbows, trouser hems were let down – when did he grow that extra inch? – buttons were double-sewn on everything that had buttons, pots of salves and dark bottles of tinctures for this and that were packed around the clothes into the corners of the old canvas bag found for him by his father in William Davies’s garden hut. The bag had held old William’s quarrying tools and was full of granite dust, but Davey had shaken it out and scrubbed it thoroughly and laid it out in the sun to dry. They were all surprised to see the bag was coloured green, not grey, a green not unlike the colour of the sea in the bay on sunny days.

  When they waved him off this morning Meg had insisted that everyone call out Farewell to him, because, she said, it was less final than goodbye. It was one of those rare times when Non wondered if the County School was entirely good for Meg. She had also read a poem she had written for the occasion, and Wil had turned scarlet and looked at her in horror when she insisted he take the paper it was written on and stick it into the notebook she had given him, which she now called his journal. Non wishes they had been more successful in their choice of going-away gifts for Wil – but this morning she had tucked into his canvas bag the pen, the notebook, and Catherine Davies’s tin of mints, which might yet prove to be the most useful.

  Wil had asked Davey to take care of old William Davies’s money, with instructions that his grandparents were to be given it back if they were in need. He said he treasured Taid’s advice about not getting his hair wet much more. It had been a great deal of money, and a shock to them all for they had not dreamt that William Davies possessed so much. It would be a long time before Catherine Davies gave up demanding its return.

  ‘Your father will be sure to keep his eye on Taid and Nain’s finances, Wil. You know that, don’t you? He won’t let them want because Taid gave you the money.’

  ‘I know, Non. But he helps them so much already with all that money for Billy’s mistakes. It’s not fair, is it?’ Wil is indignant on behalf of his father. ‘I don’t understand why Nain is so . . . nasty to him. You’d think she’d rather he was dead and not Billy.’

  Non has thought the same thing herself often and puzzled over why it should be so, when everyone else likes and respects Davey so much and never has a good word for his brother Billy. ‘I don’t know why she’s like that, either, Wil. I’m sure there is an answer, but I don’t know it.’

  Wil smiles at her. ‘But he’s looking happier – Tada – isn’t he? Don’t you think so, Non? He was even making silly jokes in the workshop yesterday.’

  ‘He’s relieved that he’s remembered what was in some of
the gaps he had in his memory. Things are coming back to him slowly.’ Davey wants to remember everything that happened to him. He has experienced so much relief from remembering that he had not been unfaithful to Non, he told her, that he would be able to deal with whatever he remembered. He wants to know what and when and why. Especially why. Non understands, her own nature is a curious one, her father brought her up to be inquisitive, but . . . but . . . She is not certain that knowing everything will help Davey, although she cannot explain why she feels this so strongly. Especially when the discoveries she has recently made about her own past have planted her feet more firmly in the present.

  ‘It was bad for people over there, in the trenches, wasn’t it, Non?’ Wil says. ‘I think I’d want to forget, not remember.’

  ‘I suppose your father needs to remember everything that happened before he can make the decision to forget it,’ Non says, for who really knows how the human mind and the human memory work. She recalls thinking when she was at the hospital with Angela that doctors of the mind were needed as well as those of the flesh to look after the broken soldiers who returned, and she is surer of that than ever. If only there were doctors who were as clever at treating damaged minds as Seb was at treating damaged hearts. ‘He’ll miss you, Wil. You’ve spent so much time together in the workshop.’

  ‘I don’t know how he’s going to manage, Non. There’s something not quite right about that Teddy, but I don’t know what it is. He’s not used to working with his hands, for sure.’ Wil grins. ‘You should have seen him with the plane – he had no idea which end was which.’