You Never Told Me

by Sarah Jasmon

  THIRTEEN

  The man was leaning against the arm of the lock gate, using his weight to close it behind her in a slow-motion swing. It penned her and the boat in, like sheep, and she watched the man move round to start letting the water out. Total luck that he’d turned up just as she made it to the first lock. He’d seen her standing on the bank, holding the mid-rope to keep Skíðblaðnir in place whilst she wondered if she’d bitten off more than she could actually manage, and taken the lockwork on as a matter of course. Now she eased forward, to stop the boat’s back end grounding out on the cill. She’d visualized herself carrying out these steps so much that this didn’t feel like the first attempt, but whether she could work the locks as well was another thing entirely. The boat’s nose bumped gently against the gates in front.

  The water beneath the boat gave a tremor, and she was dropping down. The first moments felt faster than she’d anticipated, the walls rising on either side to surround her with their dank and shiny stonework. Then the pace settled, the noise of the engine increasing as the walls reached up around them. At the front of the lock, she could hear the rush of water leaving the chamber, pulling Skíðblaðnir with it. Behind her, water plumed through the join of the gates. No good being so far back that it landed on her. And then there was the cill. Bob had told her, almost with relish, about boats caught on the stone ledge as the water dropped. Boats tipping head first as their bows continued to go down. Boats capsized by careless steersmen. There it was, just appearing out of the water, further back than she’d expected. It was far enough away from the boat to let her draw a breath in relief.

  The final few inches took an age to drain. She was suspended in the dim light of the chamber, the man’s boots visible above her head as he braced against the arm of the lock gate in readiness. Someone else had joined him; she could make out the sound of voices but not the words. Again she felt the pull of the water sending the boat sideways, knocking her into the slime of the walls. Then the world settled and a crack of light appeared between the forward gates, gradually widening in a slow reveal. Charlie put a hand to the throttle, ready to go, but as the gate swung out, she paused. Ahead was an Italianesque vista done out in English green, the tiny landscape of hills and trees framed by the flare of the walls on either side, Skíðblaðnir’s roof filling in the space below.

  ‘Are you coming out, then?’ The voice brought her back to the business at hand, and she set Skíðblaðnir going. There was a minuscule time lag before the propeller effected the move, and she was heading out into reality, wider but somehow less detailed than it had seemed when framed by the lock just the moment before. It was like entering into a new world, from darkness into light. As the last few feet of the boat came clear, the sun broke through the clouds, bathing her in a warm light.

  The decision to move on had been fully formed when she’d woken up that morning, the night having been spent revolving everything she wished she’d said to Max at the time. Her anger was physical enough to make the tapping out of an email to him from her phone a slow and frustrating exercise, but she managed it. And managed it, she thought, with an admirable restraint. In it, she laid out the findings from the estate agent, demonstrating how low his offer had been. Her counter-offer was pragmatic: not the highest amount the estate agent had been willing to suggest, but meeting Max halfway. And Bella. Non-negotiable. And whilst she waited for his reply, she was going to go boating. She might not know where Margareta was, or where the photograph with Guillemot had been taken. She might never know. However illogical it was, she felt that a journey would prove to the Fates that she was serious about finding her, about unpicking this hidden moment of her mother’s life. And it wasn’t as if she had anything better to do, after all.

  She phoned Eleanor that night, walking away from her first towpath mooring to search out a signal. Partly it was to catch her up with where things were, more specifically where she was. It had been surprisingly easy to slip away without letting anyone know. Neither Libby nor Bob had been around, and there was no one else to see her leave. If Britta really had been planning to step off the map, this could definitely have worked, especially if none of them had known about the boat. There was a little bit of Charlie that liked the idea of disappearing in a similar way but here, now, moored on a stretch of bank with no other boats or houses in view, it was making her feel a touch too disconnected already.

  ‘Hello?’ It was Martha on the end of the line.

  ‘Hi, sweetie.’ Charlie remembered too late that she hadn’t sent a text message yet. Damn, what was wrong with her? ‘Listen, is your mum there?’

  ‘Ye-es.’ The word was drawn out. ‘But she’s a bit busy.’

  ‘OK.’ Charlie took a deep breath. Eleanor was always busy. ‘Look, I’m so sorry about the text messages. It’s been really busy, and I’m just not very good at remembering.’

  ‘OK.’ Martha’s voice was still flat, and Charlie felt a twinge of impatience. Was it really that big a deal? Then Martha spoke again, her voice sounding bruised and small. ‘Aunty Charlie, when are you coming back?’

  ‘I’m not sure, sweetie.’ Charlie glanced at the phone, checking the time. ‘But I’m going to be stopping in a lot of places now, and I promise I’ll text you them for your map. And maybe you can come and visit in the holidays?’ When were the holidays? Easter? Or had that already gone past? She hoped she hadn’t just pledged herself to something starting the day after tomorrow.

  ‘In the boat?’ Martha’s tone had risen. ‘Really? Just me, not Poppy?’

  ‘Yes, just you.’ Charlie imagined being in charge of Poppy on the boat. That was never going to happen. ‘I’ll talk to your mum about it. Tell her I’ll give her a ring when I’ve got a better signal.’

  It seemed to have got dark very quickly, and there were no lights here. The edge of the towpath was indistinct against the hedgerow, and she couldn’t see into the field beyond. It wasn’t that she actually thought there was someone waiting there, ready to jump out, but it did make her want to get back. The canal was dark and smooth to her left, the water silent and indifferent. She wished there was another boat, someone to call on if anything went wrong. And the boat felt empty as she opened the door. Maybe not empty so much as hollow, its length filled with shadows and the possibility of hidden intruders. Telling herself not to be so stupid, she nevertheless went all the way down to the end, turning lights on to check in every corner. There was no sign of anything unusual. Of course there wasn’t. But she still couldn’t shake off the sense of unease.

  It was when she went to check once more that the door was locked that she noticed something odd about the steps. The top tread moved, so little that she’d missed it before. She squatted to look more closely. With careful fingers, she gave the board a wiggle. It moved, just enough for her to sense the space underneath. The whole thing was very carefully done, with a recessed bolt on the far side holding it in place. She released the catch and opened up the step. Slotted in the neat space below was a cardboard filing box.

  Charlie’s hands were shaking as she eased the box out. The sense of secrecy, the promise of discovery at last, was making her feel slightly sick. But when she had it in front of her, she felt a reluctance to take the next step. Eleanor should be here as well, should be a witness to this alongside her. It was no use phoning her. She’d be too busy, or someone would need her halfway through the call. Better to see what was there and arrange a time when she could actually sit down and talk. The front clip was awkward and took her some time to work open. She was almost ready to rip the whole thing apart. But then it gave, and the yellow concertina folder fell open, letting out the smell of new cardboard and stationery. Charlie riffled her way through the spaces. A handful of items to do with the boat: a handwritten receipt, insurance papers, some kind of safety certificate. Interesting, in a way. At least they’d know when the boat was bought, and the names of the previous owners were there. Would Britta have shared anything about her plans with them? Probably not, but it w
ould be worth a try. She went back to the file. There was another page in the same pocket. It was headed with the Canal & River Trust logo and looked like another bit of bureaucracy. That was all, the rest of the pockets stiff and empty. Charlie went through them twice, even turning the whole thing upside down and giving it a shake. Nothing. She sat back on her heels, her excitement dissipating into anticlimax. Then something caught her eye at the top of the final sheet. She checked it twice and then took it over to the light to make sure she’d seen it properly. The words stayed the same. Skíðblaðnir was registered in the name of Charlotte Nilsson.

  FOURTEEN

  The owl called for a second time, an imprint of the sound lingering in her ears long after the reality of it had died away. So unfair. She wanted to enjoy hearing it, instead of feeling cross at being awake, fed up of trying to make her mind calm enough for sleep. Once again she turned, thumping at her pillow. Not that the action would make it any more comfortable, but it was the middle of the night, her head had stopped working, and she couldn’t think of anything more productive to do. In a totally off-piste way, it made sense that Britta had bought the boat in her name, well, sort of her name. She’d opened the bank account in Eleanor’s, so this was a balance. And she wouldn’t have been able to tell Charlie, because she’d been on the other side of the world. What was really throwing her was the use of Nilsson, Britta’s maiden name. Assuming she hadn’t used it by mistake, it must mean something particular. A signal that she was separating herself from a marriage she no longer wanted, had maybe not wanted for years? That at least would fit in with the boat, and the secrecy surrounding it. Had she been escaping or running away? There was, Charlie felt, a subtle difference between the two. Charlie tried again to remember their last conversation, to dig out a hint of what was coming.

  It was all caught up in the argument of the visit, with Hugo dominating the scene and Britta, as always, disappearing into the background. What if her mother had wanted to talk to her, to tell her something, but hadn’t had the opportunity? But she could have emailed or written. No, because Charlie had deliberately not given anyone a postal address, and her mother couldn’t use a computer without someone else doing pretty much everything for her. It all came back to one thing: Charlie choosing not to notice that anything was wrong, being so caught up in her own drama that she didn’t have time to find out what was on her mother’s mind. And yet the boat was there, owned by Charlotte Nilsson. A gift she had no right to. A name she was being given, but for what purpose? It was ironic, really. She’d spent hours trying to decide what to do about names when the wedding had still been on. Change her name to Max’s? Keep her own surname? And what was the point of that anyway, when it was just the symbol of another line of male forebears? This at least could be seen as a gift from her mother, the honouring of another, if previously withheld, history. But ‘Nilsson’: didn’t that mean ‘son of Nils’? So it would be a mother giving a daughter something that in its very definition was for a father to give to his son. And where did that leave either of them?

  In the end she got up, desperate to stop the circling questions. Skíðblaðnir shifted under her feet, the slight bounce in the water more exaggerated in the dark. It was as if the boat was twitching, a sleeping dog ridding itself of a fly. Charlie stopped in the kitchen for a drink of water and then moved along to the living room, navigating by touch. She picked a book from the shelf at random and took it back to bed. There was a tiny electric lantern hanging on a hook by her head. Strange to think of her mother being here, maybe reading the same book by the same light. Why did you come here? What is it all about? The questions prodded through the underlayer of her consciousness, interrupting the passage of words from the page to her brain. Over and over, she had to re-read a passage, getting to the end to realize she still hadn’t followed it. She gave up in the end, allowing her brain to wander, trying to let the thoughts travel through without holding on to them. What happened to her mother’s wider family? Why did she never talk about it? Where had the money come from? Why did she want Charlie to be a Nilsson?

  She must have slept in the end, because she was suddenly and abruptly awake, straining for the noise to come again. She knew there was one, pulling her out of sleep on full alert. Now it was quiet, though, just the squeak of a rope stretching and then easing back. No footsteps or voices, no breaking of glass. Her heart rate started to slow, only to race again at a new sound. A patter, heavier than rain and seeming to run backwards and forwards across the roof. She strained after it as all went silent again. There. A picture jumped, fully formed, into her head. Rats, dozens of them, scampering over the boat, using it as some kind of rat playground. The thought made her shudder. If it was a thing, how had she never heard of it before? She’d have thought it would be something Libby Rae might have mentioned, for a start. Maybe it just didn’t happen in marinas. Eventually she had to get up and see for herself.

  The sky was covered in cloud, keeping any moonlight to a dull glow. Far away was a faint wash of street lights. Behind the hedgerow just next to her, open fields lay quiet. Charlie shivered. The night air was cold, but the dark wasn’t threatening. She felt better, soothed somehow by the silence. And it was silent. No rats, no tiny feet. In the distance, she heard an owl call. Finally, reluctantly, she went back inside, the mystery of the noise unsolved. Maybe she’d imagined it. But then, just as she closed her eyes, there it was again, this time along with a conversational quacking. Now sleep came easily, accompanied by the gentle sound of ducks working their way around the hull, picking at algae.

  She woke up with a stiff neck and a dull pain behind her eye sockets. Her face in the mirror was wonky, not quite real. Nothing was quite real. When she went outside, even the breeze felt contrived. There was water in the bilge, under the back deck. She squatted by the access hole, trying to get her mind to work. It wasn’t much, but enough to have spread right across the metal flooring. She tightened the stern gland, just as Bob had shown her, hoping that would be enough. All she could do was keep an eye on the level. And hope she didn’t sink.

  It was a morning’s work to get to the next town, where the guide reported a small supermarket. There were no locks on the way, and just one road bridge to swing open. She felt herself in a different world as she tied Skíðblaðnir up and jogged towards the control box. The car drivers – waiting with impatience or acceptance as she worked the mechanism, returned to the boat, brought her through and finally wound the bridge in to close it – might as well have been holograms. It was warm, too: one of those early summer days when resistance to the weather could soften and retreat. Usually it was her favourite kind, where she would stand and soak it in and wish that it could stay exactly the same for the rest of the year. This morning, it just made her headache feel worse.

  Her phone pinged as she got back on the boat, and she glanced at the screen. Notification of an email arriving: that must be Max. It was ridiculous how edgy the knowledge made her feel. Exam results edgy. Bad news edgy. But why was she assuming it was bad news? Maybe, now he’d had time to think, he would see that his offer was unreasonable. In her heart, she knew they were both laying out a starting position, but they were adults, and they’d always tried to be reasonable. Surely he would have come to the conclusion that meeting in the middle would be their best option. And then they’d both be able to move on. Steering with one hand, and with more than half of her attention on the water ahead, she went through the pattern of codes and options to open her email. The sun was bright enough to make reading the words hard, and then her eyes didn’t want to focus. The message, when she managed to see it, was brief and to the point. No. Figures way out. My offer or no deal. You can have the dog if you agree to the terms.

  The moorings in the town centre were full. Four or five boats were lined up, one busy at the water point, a couple with owners carrying rubbish to the bins or waiting for their turn at the hose. There seemed to be one free mooring bollard with space for maybe half of Skíðblaðnir right at the
end of the row. Charlie hovered in neutral, wondering if it would work to go in with her tail sticking out. It seemed possible, but she wasn’t really in a state to decide. A woman appeared on the deck of the next-door boat.

  ‘Are you wanting to stop?’ she asked, with the hint of an Irish accent. Her face was set in a comfortable smile.

  ‘I was hoping to.’ Charlie felt herself drifting and gave the engine a quick blast to come back level. She thought about what she was trying to do. ‘I need to get some supplies.’

  ‘Just come up against us, lovey,’ her new neighbour said. She was elderly, with short grey hair and soft wrinkles. ‘You can tie on there and go and get your shopping. Come far, have you?’

  ‘Yes. No.’ Charlie wasn’t sure. Come far from which point? She needed to concentrate so she didn’t scrape the other boat’s paintwork. What if they needed to go out before she got back? ‘You’re not about to go anywhere?’

  ‘Ah, bless you, we don’t go far these days.’ The woman chuckled. ‘Just tie yourself to us and come across the deck, now. We came out for a little spin, that’s all, remind us what it’s all about.’ A shout came from the far end of her boat, and they both turned to see a small man with a red face waving an arm. ‘And there’s himself telling me to get along. All right, all right, and there’s no need for panic.’

  Charlie watched her trot off then went to fetch her bag. She’d passed a test of some kind, in her own head if nowhere else.

  It wasn’t a big town, but the roads and pavements were still a mild shock after the narrow quiet of the towpath. She lost her way twice and her nerves jangled at the traffic and the people. The words from the email thudded in her mind, over and over, the rhythms landing in time with her feet. My offer. No deal. You can have the dog if you agree to the terms. A car reversed at speed out of a parking space, making her jump sideways into a puddle. The driver gave her an earful of abuse as he accelerated away. Fuck him, fuck Max. The shop was busy as well, more so than she’d expected. She stopped just inside the doors, wondering if a bank holiday was coming up. She couldn’t even be sure which day of the week it was, let alone where she was in the month. Giving up, she eased her way through the trolleys and shoppers, all of them a little too large, the space between them inadequate.