The Last Letter

by Kirsten McKenzie

  Unsmiling, she acknowledged the vulture among them. Then, catching her breath, she launched into her presentation about the quirks and intricacies of samplers and their conservation.

  ‘And now we reach the V & A’s latest acquisition’, she paused, as the next slide illuminated the stage.

  There, in all its glory, was Sarah Lester’s magnificent sampler, the one she’d brought back from Lord Grey’s house.

  ‘This example is signed ‘R. J. Williams’ and dated ‘19 June 1726’. Whilst we do have older pieces in our collection, we consider one in such immaculate condition to be our finest example. Unfortunately the V & A had to purchase this piece when, normally, families are more than happy to bequeath items such as this to us, so that they can be enjoyed by all. As a consequence, our acquisitions budget for the year has almost been exhausted.’ Eliza looked pointedly at Andrew as she delivered this verbal jab.

  Harvard busied himself with his notes. Eliza may not have realised it, but he fully agreed with her. There was no greater enjoyment than to wander the halls of a museum, soaking up the reflected glory of the past. Collectors who paid obscene amounts for objects which then disappeared into their personal collections, never to be seen again, were cultural vermin.

  As she came to a close, those seated around Harvard chatted loudly among themselves about Eliza’s presentation, oblivious to any friction. Secretly, each one harboured the tiny hope that their family heirlooms would be worth thousands of pounds. Although they might nod in apparent agreement, for most of them, money exerted a stronger pull than charity.

  The lecture broke for lunch; a sorry-looking smorgasbord of chicken curry and dry roast beef, followed by an insipid trifle with faux cream. Even so, the lacklustre food was scoffed in a trice –‘Open The Trunk’ was a highlight no one wanted to miss. Everyone wanted to be at the front of the line with their family treasures.

  For the event, Christie’s had negotiated a booth with the Royal School of Needlework, and Harvard was there primarily to enable the easy consignment of any special pieces which might come to light – a bone of contention with the V & A, who had their own appraisers there. Eliza Broadbent’s goal was to have those very same pieces gifted to her establishment instead.

  For a group of well-heeled and educated grown-ups, there was an unseemly amount of jostling for space around the tables scattered throughout the foyer. Hairspray and perfume, fused with decades of dust, created a near-toxic cloud in the confined space.

  Other auction houses and dealers had representatives there; some specialists, some sharks. Harvard’s booth was far enough away from Eliza’s that he couldn’t hear her words, nor discern whether this crowd was more likely to donate or sell their treasures. The more altruistic attendees would never consider coming to his table, so he was desperately curious to see what else was out there.

  Leaving the gathering hordes to an assistant, he wandered the foyer, just in time to overhear a slender young woman comment to Eliza that she, too, had a sampler signed by ‘R. J. Williams’, but dated 1728.

  THE RETURN

  Sarah Williams shrugged away the tray of tea things the sari-clad serving girl offered her, and turned away. This room was as foreign as the people in it; her last memory was of boarding the steamship in England, then being struck with crippling seasickness. Now she was surrounded by strangers.

  The room emptied. Sarah remained in bed, covers held tight under her chin, though not from cold, as the clammy warmth of northern India forced its way into the room. She huddled there, frozen with fear.

  The bedroom door opened again. A scent of stale lavender wafted over her, reminiscent of her childhood. She turned, half expecting to see the snowy white hair of her English grandmother. Instead, she was faced with the whirlwind personage of Naomi Abbott, her dimpled cheeks rosy with purpose.

  ‘Enough of this turning away food; you need your strength. We all agree you’ve had a nasty shock, but you must eat. No one is expecting you to make any decisions right now. But in the next few days, the Viceroy will no doubt make arrangements for your return to England.’

  Sarah’s eyes widened. Almost every word from this woman’s mouth made no sense. A nasty shock? Return to England. She tried to interrupt but Naomi held up a bejewelled hand. Gold rings jarred with her lily-white fingers.

  ‘Not one word, young lady. I know you’ll be wanting your things, but we’ll wait till the house is all cleaned up before we take you back there. In the meantime, your girls are trying to salvage some of your clothes. I’ll pop round to the other ladies’ and between us we’ll rustle up whatever you need, so for now you’re not to worry. The regiment always looks after their own, regardless of the fact that Simeon was an absolute cad.’ Another comm-anding finger thrust this point home.

  Sarah had some vague memory of being on the ship to India to join her recently widowed brother, Simeon Williams, an older brother she barely knew. A cad? It made no sense to her. She just wanted to be left alone. She smiled weakly at the nonsense surrounding her.

  Naomi took the smile for compliance. ‘Right then, I have your word you’ll eat? Then you’re to get some sleep. No one can harm you here. The Viceroy will have Simeon’s murderer apprehended in no time, you just watch. Captain Doulton is leading the hunt right now.’ Naomi bowed out of the room after dropping her verbal bombshell.

  Sleep slipped over Sarah, bringing flashbacks of Simeon’s body slumped in a chair, his skin pasty with the colour of death. Although what came before that eluded her.

  THE WAR

  Flying Officer Philip Williams lit a fresh cigarette from the dying embers of his previous one, carefully crushing the stubby remnant before slipping it into his pocket to salvage any precious tobacco when he next got a chance; if he got a chance. The moon lit the sky as if daylight had dawned – easy for flying and easy for dying.

  He sat brooding in the mess, waiting for his orders, any view of the airfield hidden by heavy blackout curtains covering the flimsy glass. Although if the Germans didn’t know by now where all the airfields along the English coast were, their espionage chaps weren’t doing their job right.

  All around him dozens of young men, cookie-cutter versions of each other, sat laughing, gambling, smoking and generally carrying on as if life was every bit as fun as it was before the war. That losing your friends every night was of no consequence. That the possibility of dying never crossed your mind. That you might end up in a foreign land being tortured for what you didn’t know. For each of them, their behaviour was papering over a very real fear of dying.

  Their commanding officer strode into the mess, followed by his adjutant. The men turned all business: cards disappearing; conversations cut short. ‘Gentlemen, let’s begin.’ – and for the next thirty minutes, some of England’s finest young men were given instructions potentially for their death that night. Philip, dashing husband of Elizabeth Williams, never stopped to consider his future; he lived for the moment – it was the only one he allowed himself.

  Before the outbreak of the war, he’d been muddling along as an archaeologist, working under Walter Pengelly, studying the Palaeolithic era in Devon – hardly a glamorous life, but one which suited his love of everything ancient. And it had been in Devon he met the young Elizabeth Grey, who was to become his wife just as he was called up to fight in this accursed war.

  Those magical weeks – where they’d found excuses to bump into each other at every opportunity: at the shops; the races; on the walking paths along the coast – were the sunlight to tonight’s darkness. Philip shook his head. Allowing Elizabeth into his mind was forbidden. A strict personal rule. The only time he allowed himself to dream of her, to think of her, was his weekly postcard. Like the mortar holding the bricks of their house, those postcards tied them together. With no real privacy or time alone, the five minutes he had to read her precious postcards carried him through the week. Her latest, filled with the minutiae of her life, warmed him more than his fur-lined flying jacket, where the card was n
ow thrust deep into the inside pocket.

  Briefing over, the mood turned sombre as they scrambled from their chairs, making their way to their aircraft. A field full of duralumin carcasses, flying coffins for the men about to climb into them.

  ‘Come on, Phil old man, hurry up. You’re slower than my grandfather,’ jibed one of the men.

  ‘You’re a fine one to talk – I wasn't even sure you you were going to make it up in the air yesterday, you were taking so long shaving. Wanted to look good for the Jerries?’ Phil joked back.

  And, as easily as that, a veneer of normality was thrown over the tension, each man laughing with the aircrew helping them clamber into their Spitfire’s cockpit. Last minute adjustments to seats and straps were carried out in good humour – each man privately conducting his own personal good luck routines: the placement of photographs; the kissing of lucky charms; and moments of prayer – before the throaty roar of the Merlin engines filled the airfield.

  In the blink of an eye, a squadron of aircraft filled the sky, leaving a peculiar silence on the ground. All over the English coast, women looked up from their sewing, from reading bedtime stories to fatherless children, and uttered silent prayers for the men flying above them.

  Phil sat in his throbbing aircraft, surrounded by the inkiness of night, concentrating on holding formation with his brothers. Thoughts strayed briefly to Elizabeth as the green grass of home gave way to the choppy seas of The Channel. A memory of their last trip to Paris before the war. They’d walked for hours along cobbled streets looking for the perfect something for a corner of the house. Her pedantic nature infuriated him at the time – nothing was quite right, every piece had some tiny flaw which didn’t fit her vision. He’d rather they’d just sat in a café by the Seine sipping strong coffee, but she’d been adamant the house needed an Empire style, burr walnut inlaid side table, with gilt ormolu mounts. Very specific requirements. And, as the day progressed, and after they’d visited at least fifteen antique shops, he was ready to throttle her. She’d been impervious to his impatience, intent on her mission – as he should be now, not reminiscing about days when he should have been more patient. Taking his hand off the throttle momentarily, he pressed it against his breast, against her postcard. Then, dismissing Elizabeth from his mind, he turned his focus towards Germany.

  THE ARGUMENT

  ‘What do you mean I can’t have a look at it? I’m hardly about to run off with it.’ Harvard argued with Eliza Broadhead outside the conference hall.

  ‘It was donated to us, and we need to undertake serious conservation work on it. Letting non-museum staff near it is against our policies. I shudder to think what you would have done with it if it had come to you. I’ve seen the work your so-called conservators do. Sacrilege. Your lot have absolutely no regard for history. You and that other lot. Rapists of history, and thieves. All of you.’ Eliza turned away from Andrew, gathering up her bags, waving imperiously at her assistant to collect the rest. Now resembling a real-life caricature of a bag lady, Eliza squeezed her immense bulk between the table and Harvard. Foolishly he put out a hand to stop her, to plead his case further, to explain how he needed to see the sampler, but, in his haste, and as she was navigating the tiny gap, he accidentally pushed her. Eliza Broadhead lost her balance, and fell to the ground – voluminous skirts, bosoms and beads tangled with overstuffed carry bags, handbag and laptop. Her assistant squealed in fright, dropping her bags in a rush to help.

  Harvard bent down to offer his assistance, apologies tumbling from his mouth.

  ‘Get away from me. How dare you?’ Eliza panted, trying unsuccessfully to disentangle her jet beads from her bag, ‘You assaulted me. I shall lodge a complaint with your employer and with the Association – and the police. You’re a menace. A menace.’ Beads of sweat formed on her forehead.

  ‘It was an accident. I only wanted to see the sampler; if you’ll just listen? I’m sorry, seriously it was an accident.’ Harvard started trying to stuff bits of fabric back into bags, the floor awash with skeins of thread and lace trims chopped from long-discarded wedding gowns.

  Like a Benny Hill farce, Eliza’s tiny assistant tried heaving the larger woman off the ground, instead slipping on silky remnants and landing on the ground herself.

  ‘Christ, girl, what are you doing? Get me up. And you, you get away from me. Leave my things alone,’ Eliza squealed at Harvard. Panting with exhaustion, she finally made it to her feet.

  Harvard’s concern for Eliza and what she might say to Don Claire, his boss, was all but forgotten as he froze where he stood. He’d grabbed a handful of fabric, and was about to shove it into a bag, when he caught sight of what he knew to be the very distinctive embroidery of the mysterious ‘R. J. Williams’.

  Eliza ripped the fabric from his hands, but not before he’d read the embroidered passage:

  “Time is an illusion. The minutes that have gone may still be ahead of you. Embrace every second.”

  THE PRISONER

  Shivering and clumsy, her limbs felt as heavy as lead, and her eyes kept closing against her will – typical symptoms of the onset of hypothermia. First-aid classes at school had described in Technicolor detail the symptoms and if she’d been in a more conscious state she would have been able to recognise them herself. Not that she could do anything about it.

  Heralded by the rasping of a metal bolt, a trapdoor was flung open. Faint light filtered down into the freezing void but failed to reach into the corner where Sarah lay huddled, semi-conscious.

  The sweaty fug of unwashed man followed as boots, legs, then man, climbed down a short ladder lowered into the cavity. In one of his huge fists, a bear of a man carried the lantern. The hair on his hands trailed all the way up his exposed arms to the back of his thick neck. Seemingly impervious to the cold, he set the light down as he began hefting wooden crates of liquor up the ladder as if they weighed no more than a sack of feathers.

  About to pick up his third crate, he paused. One of the slots was empty. The eight remaining pig-snout bottle tops stared back up at him. Grunting in surprise, he swung the lantern backwards and forwards in an attempt to locate the wayward bottle. And there it was – next to the recumbent body of Sarah Lester.

  Joe Jowl’s eyes widened in amazement. This was his cellar, and he was damn certain he hadn’t put anyone down here, at least not this month, and certainly not with this current stock of grog. Surprise gave way to anger as he considered the loss of profit from the missing bottle.

  ‘Oi, you!’ He nudged Sarah’s form with the scuffed toe of his boot. No response. Frowning he reached down to shake the thief. ‘Oi!’ He tried again. Nothing. Exasperated, he clumped off to the ladder calling out to an unseen associate, ‘Oi, Jimmy, give us a hand here,’ before returning to the unconscious girl.

  He was joined by a mirror image, down to the hirsute hands and neck, and matching rough pants and filthy cotton shirts. The two men were identical in every respect.

  ‘You put this girl here?’ Joe asked.

  Jimmy shook his head.

  ‘Who put her down here then? You been letting your friends use our place? Been giving them free grog too?’

  ‘Nah, not me, Joe. Got no idea how she got down here.’ Jimmy lumbered over cautiously to look at Sarah more closely, as you would a tiger in a zoo.

  ‘Stop your gawking, Jimmy. Give me a hand to move her upstairs. Don’t want her dying down here and stinking up the place,’ Joe growled.

  The men bundled Sarah up the ladder, none too gently. Barely conscious, she didn’t even register being dumped unceremoniously onto a lumpy bed in a room not much warmer than the cellar. Gentleness, like cleanliness, was not a concept with which the Jowls were familiar.

  Profit was their abiding life mantra, and Joe was already mentally calculating how he might turn this unexpected gift into cash. As long as I can keep her alive, that is. Just how a young woman had ended up in the cellar was irrelevant; perhaps his brother had forgotten he'd put her there. Regardless, she wa
s theirs now.

  ‘You fetch the lantern and then light the fire, Jimmy. Let’s have a better look at what we’ve got here,’ Joe directed.

  The elder twin by only fifteen minutes, Joe was the undisputed leader. Jimmy had always done what he was told by his brother. It never crossed his mind to question this. If Joe decided that the girl belonged to them, then that was the truth of the matter.

  Joe sat on a spindly rocking chair, which creaked under his weight, and rocked rhythmically waiting for his dim-witted brother to return with the lantern. Neither man had a wife, or any romantic interest. Women cost and, despite a normal sexual appetite, Joe never wasted any of his money on whores, nor did he allow his brother to partake. There were enough women around willing to give it away for free, in the hope they might marry into the Jowl wealth. He wasn’t stupid enough to believe they loved him for his looks. No, women were only after their money. This one probably was, too.

  The hastily stoked fire coughed into life, lending a smoky haze to the proceedings. The lantern’s light was further supplemented by a couple of candles on the window ledge. Jimmy slouched against the far wall, eyeing the woman on the bed. Normally he gave no thought to the opposite sex. His brother had drummed it into him that women were only after their money, and if he were to ever give into temptation, that would be the first step to ruin: the poorhouse; hunger; living off scraps to survive. The only thing more scary than losing his brother was the fear of being hungry. Now, Jimmy’s simple mind couldn’t fathom the unease bubbling inside him. He couldn’t understand why Joe didn’t dispose of her, like the others.

  Sarah stirred. Her heavy eyelids stretched open in response to the warmth gradually penetrating her chilled form. Her eyes focused on the dancing reflections in the glazed tiles surrounding the hearth, the red poppy in the centre of each tile alive with the flames.