by Roma Tearne
Ranjith turned to look at Thornton’s daughter again.
But she’s beautiful, he thought with wonder. Really, he chided himself, what is wrong with me?
Everything seemed a little flat after the garden party, like a calm sea, but without the sun on it. Thornton went back to work, travelling the lift to the top of his glass tower. In a few weeks he had agreed to meet Hildegard. They had been in contact several times by letter and had planned to meet at Liverpool Street station. There were other things on Thornton’s mind too. Ever since the garden party several people had remarked on Anna-Meeka’s appearance. Even Jacob had brought up the subject.
‘Isn’t it time the girl was introduced to a suitable young man?’ Jacob had asked. Adding caustically, ‘Before she finds something unsuitable herself’ (knowing Meeka it would be unsuitable), ‘bringing it into the house of her own accord?’
Thornton groaned. ‘What am I supposed to do?’ he asked. ‘She needs to pass her exams and get to medical school. I can’t think about a suitable boy just yet.’ This child of his had been nothing but trouble. ‘Why can’t she show some interest in her schoolwork? In physics and chemistry? Why is the only thing that interests her the piano?’ He was working himself up into a fury. ‘You’re good at giving advice,’ he said, bitterly. ‘Send her to private school, find her a husband. Make sure she has a career.’
‘But Thornton, the two things are not incompatible,’ Jacob told him, earnestly. ‘Women can have a career and marry, you know. Look at Geraldine, she more or less runs the shop, you know.’
Thornton had no wish to look at Geraldine. The idea of broaching the subject of a suitable boy with his daughter filled him with fear. He imagined Meeka with that big mouth of hers, hooting with laughter at the very idea. Popping a Rennie into his mouth he hurried home to see what Savitha would say.
‘I know we didn’t have an arranged marriage,’ he began, sitting in the kitchen, watching Savitha prepare the food. ‘But we were living at home then. Here you don’t know what sorts of fellows there are.’ He paused and cleared his throat.
‘So, what are you planning then?’ asked Savitha, when he recounted the conversation.
‘Planning, planning?’ Thornton said, instantly furious. ‘I’m not planning anything, I’m asking. Can’t you tell the difference?’
Savitha folded her lips. Years ago, when they were still living in Sri Lanka and Anna-Meeka was a baby, she had had a discussion with Grace. Long before the subject had even entered Thornton’s head, her mother-in-law had told Savitha something she had never repeated to anyone else. She had never forgotten the story. It had made a deep impression on the romantic Savitha who wanted a love match for her only daughter. Something complete and perfect, something everlasting, was what she wanted for Anna-Meeka. She had decided this many years before. She did not want a marriage chosen by horoscopes or planetary influence. She did not want a marriage founded on superstition or the time of her birth. It was all such nonsense; she wanted her daughter to marry for love. One day she hoped Meeka would find happiness with a person of her own choosing. Savitha had no intention of voicing any of this and there was little use telling her besotted husband anything at the moment. In any case, she knew, he was simply frightened; he did not want Meeka to get hurt. Well, there’s nothing we can do to stop that, thought Savitha. So instead, to take his mind off his worries, she said experimentally, ‘Well, she has been menstruating for two years now, so you better start looking straight away!’
Thornton spluttered. He turned red. Who would have thought he would develop a temper in early middle age?
‘Aiyo!’ he shouted, with disgust. ‘When did you become so coarse, woman! You’re just like Christopher.’
Savitha turned her back to him. Her shoulders shook with silent laughter.
‘What’s the problem?’ she asked. ‘Do you think it’s not about sex then?’
Anna-Meeka walking into the room just at that moment confused Thornton further. He glared at her. Meeka raised an eyebrow.
‘Mum, he’s flipped,’ she cried. ‘Being called “Doctor” by that footman in Buckingham Palace has affected him!’
Savitha burst out laughing. Oh good, thought Meeka, at least we’ve got a happy mood in the kitchen. She wondered if this was the time to talk about the skirt she wanted to buy. Increasingly she was becoming interested in the differences between her parents’ wishes and her own desires.
But the moment was not right. The garden party had had a profoundly disturbing effect on Savitha. She had gone to the arcade in search of the papery bone china she had seen at Buckingham Palace, but instead all she found was a crude imitation of the real thing. She would find nothing like it ever again. The day itself and all its luxury had vanished but the feeling of elegance was still with her. It lingered elusively in her mind in the weeks that followed, surrounding her like a mist of fireflies. Everything seemed to be touched with this new discovery. Nothing was real any longer; all was insubstantial. For on that afternoon, in the palace grounds, Savitha had caught a glimpse of something different, something that had been completely invisible until now. It gave context to this thing they called Empire and to the people who once had ruled their country. With a shock she realised that only by leaving her home could she have seen any of it. For distance, thought Savitha, was what had been needed, distance had sharpened her perspective, revealing many hidden truths. Distance had brought her to this point. Here it was then, unchanged by the centuries, distilled down and concentrated. On a perfect June afternoon, with the roar of traffic a faint smudge beyond the palace walls, with the sun so gentle, and the flutter of well-pressed linen all around, here, in this privileged corner of England, was the thing she had until now only intuited. Forcefully, she glimpsed it; effortlessly, she understood. Never had she had this capacity to connect in such a way before. Never would she see it so clearly again. For history, thought Savitha, history was what made you what you are. History was what made you feel at ease with yourself. History gave you a solidity, a certainty, in everything you did. She had thought they were escaping to a place they could call their own, but now, she saw, this could never be.
In that moment, all her ideals, all her hopes for their life on foreign soil, seemed as nothing. We are nobody, she thought with silent pain. It was so simple. We are displaced people. They had no history left, for carelessly they had lost it along the way. Escaping with their passionate ideals, they had arrived here. Hoping. Hoping for what? Acknowledgement perhaps? Understanding, maybe? But she saw it was for them to understand. We belong nowhere, thought Savitha in despair. No longer certain, she hesitated, wondering what she might do. She was halfway through the journey that was her life, middle age beckoned; the monsoon heat was seven thousand miles away. Suddenly she felt a great longing for the connections they had shed so lightly, the old certainties of her youth, the simplicity of it all. Looking at her daughter’s young face, seeing the struggle ahead, saddened, Savitha kept her own counsel.
The summer wore on but it was disappointing; low clouds crossed the Atlantic, the sky was overcast. The promise of June would not be delivered. On the news it was reported that suicide bombing continued in Sri Lanka. Two British journalists, sent to cover the war, had been captured and were reported missing. Outside in Thornton’s garden, rain splattered the roses to the ground. Late one evening, a telegram arrived. Grace had died peacefully in her sleep.
20
FROM THE BEDROOM WINDOW THE VIEW into the garden was mysterious. Overgrown honeysuckle and roses tangled with each other, forming a rough, dark tunnel. Thornton had not engineered this; it had just grown that way. As he glanced out while straightening his tie, combing his hair, brushing his jacket, he thought, I must cut it back. I must clear the space. But he did nothing. So the tangle of roses and honeysuckles flourished, mixing and knotting across the kitchen wall, scrambling the sash window, making it almost impossible to open. Overnight Thornton had aged. Everywhere he looked he saw his mother’s face, heard her voice, felt the l
oving touch of her hand on his life. Like rivulets joining a stream, her presence threaded through everything he had ever done. Instead of growing closer to the others, Jacob, Christopher, Alicia, he retreated into a private grief. Like a man with third-degree burns, any bandage, any sign of containment was too painful to bear.
None of the de Silvas could go back for the funeral, none of them could organise their papers in time. There was also a nagging fear they might not be allowed re-entry into Britain. Instead they gathered at the Catholic Church in Highgate for a Mass, loosely together in spirit, bereft and silent, each with memories of their own. Sons, daughters, grandchildren, they were all present. Jacob, remembering his mother’s face as he waved goodbye, felt his alienation with piercing sorrow. He had always felt he was the one on the outside, emotionally absent from his family. In the end his mother had never seen his wife or his sons. It had always been this way, thought Jacob, genuflecting. When the telegram had come, he had cried out to Geraldine, ‘What more could I have done?’
Standing with his head bent, listening to the words of a discarded liturgy, Jacob recalled his last walk across the tea-covered valley towards the House of Many Balconies. It was always the last day at Greenwood School that he remembered. ‘Everything finished that day,’ he had cried, when the telegram came.
He saw now, with the clarity brought on by her death, that he had blamed her for the loss of his hopes of a university education. But he had loved her, he told Geraldine. For all that he never showed it, he had loved her. And he had always done whatever she wanted, whatever was needed, without complaint.
‘She was lonely,’ he said. ‘Like me, she was lonely.’ One of the aunts, he told Geraldine, had said their mother had loved a man from a lower caste. ‘If it was true we never saw any sign of it. The main problem was always my drunken father.’
‘It’s not your fault,’ Geraldine had consoled him. ‘They were the ones who stopped you going to school. It wasn’t fair, what they did. You were clever.’
He had got away, although he did not belong here either. He would spend his days sitting forever behind the till of his corner shop. Looking around the church at his family, he felt a great weariness descend upon him. His youth had gone. Until this moment he had hardly noticed it. Jacob was not a political man. He was not like Christopher. All he had wanted was to study, to live and to die in the place where he had been born.
Alicia knelt in the pew behind Jacob. She had thought she had no tears left but she had been wrong. With her mother went the last of her youth. The incense in the church reminded her of the radiant day when she had married. The church in Highgate was a modern one; the stained-glass windows were not as beautiful as the one in Kollupitiya. But the sun still filtered in through them. They stood for the Creed. Sunil. She could say his name, at last. On this day of her mother’s funeral, something that had been stuck in Alicia for years seemed to loosen. Like grit it was falling away. She had done nothing with her life. How her mother had worried over her. Sunil would not have wanted her to live like this. Earlier that day Alicia had spoken to Savitha and a small barrier had come down for the first time.
‘I never considered her feelings, once,’ she had cried.
Savitha had held on to her, saying nothing, comforting her with silence. A strange peace descended. Savitha had astonished Alicia. It was time to bury the dead. Next week Robert Grant was taking her to dinner. She was not certain why she had agreed. Suddenly, Alicia was aware of the need for connection. It was now nine o’clock in the morning. Across the world, in the afternoon sunlight, her mother’s body was being placed in the ground. ‘Dust to dust,’ Father Giovanni would be saying.
Looking around the church, seeing the stunned faces of her family, Alicia was overwhelmed with love. It was many years since she had felt this way.
Christopher, shuffling his feet, did not weep. He was damned if he would weep in front of Thornton. Late last night, after all the others had made their phone calls, after all of them had done their weeping and wailing, Christopher had rung Frieda. Privately. His grief had always been a private thing. He had declined staying for the meal Savitha had cooked, declined talking on the phone with the rest of them. Instead he had walked home across London and made his own phone call.
‘It’s me,’ he had said, offhand, not wanting to say much.
‘Christopher?’ Frieda had asked.
Her voice had come across the ocean, faintly and somehow young. She sounded strained and bereft. It had caught Christopher off guard, reminding him of his mother’s voice. She had even said his name in the way his mother used to. With a questioning lilt. It had been Christopher’s undoing.
‘Don’t worry,’ he had said. ‘I know how you suffered. I was there. I knew about Vijay.’
Frieda had talked over him, trying to comfort him, not understanding a word he said.
‘Your secret is safe with me, forever,’ he had said. ‘I saw what happened to you. It was the same for me.’ Then he had mumbled something about being the son most like her. ‘Not like Thornton,’ he had told Frieda. ‘Not like that idiot.’
Taking Communion in Highgate, he remembered planting the jasmine bush, silently keeping his mother’s secret, never uttering a word when the others had talked about the change in her.
‘The body of Christ,’ the priest said.
I have only ever loved two women in my life, thought Christopher. There will never be another one.
Meeka, dressed in a pale sari, knelt in the pew opposite, her long hair falling across her face. She moved slightly, pulling at the silk, struggling with its length, wishing she had never agreed to wear it, wishing she had resisted her father’s insistence. Turning, she caught Christopher’s eye and hesitated, uncertain, not knowing if she should smile at him, her face unusually solemn.
But she’s here, thought Christopher, astonished. Couldn’t they see? Their mother was here with them, in this church. By some miracle she had come back. And she was young again. He stared at his niece. This is the one who will carry the de Silva name forward, he thought, clenching his fists. It must all come right with this child.
Anna-Meeka felt guilty. She remembered her grandmother of course, but time had blunted her memories. So many years had passed since she had lived that other life. She wished she could shake it off. Why on earth did her parents keep looking back? It only brought endless misery. She was here to support her father. His grief frightened her. Fear tightened her chest, made her hands cold. It made her feel a child, just when she had decided she would never be a child again. Maybe, she thought, waiting for the priest to clean the chalice, she should work harder at school, try to become the doctor her father wanted her so passionately to be. At this moment she was prepared to do anything for him to stop this grief. She fidgeted, distress crawling across her back, black-beetled and slow. Feeling disconnected, glancing at her mother, she noticed Savitha had a peculiar expression on her face. Meeka pressed her lips together. It was too much. Her mother looked so funny that tears of hysterical laughter filled Meeka’s eyes.
Savitha felt apart from the de Silvas; she was not a Christian, she was a Buddhist. Churches gave her no comfort. She understood more than any of the de Silvas about karma and the cycle of cause and effect. The link that joined all their lives would exist through Anna-Meeka. While the de Silvas were only just beginning to see this Savitha had known it long ago. It was her job to anchor her daughter until she grew up. I am the custodian of their history, she thought, listening to but not understanding the Mass.
Ranjith could not take his eyes off Anna-Meeka. So much life in the midst of all this sorrow, so astonishingly beautiful. What was a man like him to a girl like this? He doubted she so much as noticed him. Watching, he saw her determination, mistaking it for certainty, forgetting the difference, forgetting his own youth. Watching her, Christopher felt her struggle and was filled with love.
Aloysius and Frieda simply waited for the day to be over. It was the longest day of their lives. Ther
e had been more bombs in the centre of the city and another member of the Cabinet had been assassinated. Frieda prepared the food silently. She needed something to do. In the middle of the preparations, unannounced, Myrtle had arrived. Frieda, trying to stay calm for Aloysius’s sake, had been thrown. Myrtle had not brought a suitcase with her.
‘Don’t worry, I won’t be staying,’ she said before Frieda could speak.
Frieda looked around wildly. Her father was resting.
‘I’ll go, if you want,’ Myrtle said, looking uncertain. ‘I had to try to get here. I wanted to speak to Aloysius. I wanted to tell him that I’m sorry.’
She looked about to cry. Frieda was shocked.
‘I know, I know, I’m the Devil from Hell, but she was my only relative. I tried to write to her afterwards but I never managed it. Don’t think things have been easy for me either. I just wanted to say goodbye. But I’ll go if you want.’ She managed to sound both upset and belligerent.
‘Would you like a cup of tea,’ Frieda asked, helplessly, not knowing what to do. Her mother, she knew, would not have borne a grudge, but her father was a different matter.
‘I’ll see if he’s awake,’ she suggested, uncertain.
Myrtle looked terrible. Her skin had darkened, her hair was white and she looked as if she had not slept for days. Aloysius was not asleep. He had been lying in the shuttered room watching the sunlight flicker through a gap in the wood. A bee-eater chirped in the trees outside. Everything around him looked as it always had. Only he had changed forever.
‘Let her stay,’ he said heavily, when Frieda told him. ‘If she wants evidence of what I feel about your mother, then she’ll get it. If not, she should not have come. I don’t care either way.’
Frieda’s eyes filled with tears. She had been crying on and off during the last few days and she was exhausted. Her face was swollen with grief. She missed Alicia and Thornton desperately. She wanted Jacob with his sense of duty to help her to carry this new burden. She had never felt so alone in her life. Her father had been unable to eat or sleep. She was frightened that he too might suffer a heart attack. She had summoned the doctor several times in the last few days to sedate him. Frieda gave him another pill and tried to make him go to bed but she knew he would not sleep until later. Then she went back to talk to Myrtle.