It was just before six o’clock when the dark-haired student nurse pulled the door shut behind her and left me alone in the small, hospital-clean bedroom. A white towelling bathrobe lay on the narrow bed. On the bedside cabinet, a Gideon Bible, a flask of water, and a small posy of flowers. To each according to their need, I said to myself, as I sat down on the edge of the bed and let my shoes drop gently to the floor.
I went round the room opening cupboards and drawers, curious to see what other provisions might be made for those who kept watch in the night, or were released from their vigil, as I had been. All I found were some wire coat hangers and an almost empty jar of Nescafe.
I drew back an edge of curtain to see where I was, for once I was inside the hospital I had lost all sense of direction. It was still dark but the rain had cleared. A fresh breeze rippled the large puddles and had already dried large stretches of the Grosvenor Road. A milk float went past with a strange whining noise and a rattle of crates. Then a newsagent’s van.
I looked at the bed. It was too late to think of sleep but too early to go to the chaplain’s empty room where I was to make my phone calls. Sister said it would help no one to ring at five thirty. There was nothing to be done that could not wait till seven.
I undressed quickly, hung up my clothes on one of the empty hangers, and ran the bath. Water gushed from the taps so fiercely I had to dash back into the tiny bathroom to turn them off. I lay in the warm water and thought of the bath at Loughview. The taps ran so slowly the bath was always tepid by the time it filled. Besides, there was never enough water to fill the bath like this, for the hot water tank was too small in the first place.
My father is dead and I’m lying here thinking about the water pressure in the Loughview bedroom, I said to myself, reprovingly. Surely one ought to be thinking higher thoughts at moments like this. To be meditating upon the nature of mortality, at the very least. But there it was. My mind was full of thoughts, but none of them seemed particularly elevated. Hardly what I would have predicted.
I closed my eyes and saw my father smile at me again. ‘If a gipsy had told me,’ he began, and I was back in the car, driving up the Antrim Road, with Maisie and her gin glass at the end of it. And William John booming down the phone and Colin playing dutiful son to perfection. ‘I’d have been a lousy farmer,’ he went on, and it was my turn to smile.
‘Yes, Daddy, and I’d have been a lousy company wife, wouldn’t I? But I’ve said no and there’s no going back on it.’
‘Good girl yourself,’ he said, with that little nod he always gave when he was especially pleased. ‘Life is full of surprises and some of them are great.’
I had just finished drying myself when there was a tap at my door. Surprised, I pulled on the gown and opened it to reveal a large woman in a green overall holding a tray.
‘Here yar, dear. Sister says yer to eat it all.’
Under the metal cover there were scrambled eggs and bacon. And real coffee and toast. I couldn’t believe how hungry I was and how wonderful it tasted. I had no difficulty at all doing as Sister ordered. As I ate, I reflected that someone, somewhere, was trying to tell me something. Whatever awfulness lay ahead of me in the days to come, there would be good things too. Some of my difficulties would resolve themselves. Some wouldn’t. But what was really important was what I did with whatever came to me. I was free to live my own life as never before.
The chaplain’s office didn’t look any tidier, and certainly no more holy, than most offices I’ve been in, except for a poster on the wall which said, ‘The Lord will give you strength’. I hoped He would. I dialled Harvey’s number.
‘Hello, Mavis, I’m sorry to ring so early.’
‘Your father, Jenny?’
‘Yes.’
‘Jenny, I’m so sorry. Were you with him?’
‘Yes, I’m at the Royal now. In the chaplain’s room.’
The voice was Mavis’s all right, but there was a softness and a warmth which was quite new. She really wanted to know exactly what had happened. That wasn’t surprising in itself, I suppose, and even less so remembering her training, but as we went on talking, her questions made it quite clear that what she wanted to know about most of all was me. How did I feel when it happened? What had I done between five thirty and seven? How was I feeling now?
I answered all her questions as honestly as I could, and as I did, I saw myself standing again in the hall at Loughview, amazed to hear Harvey say, ‘Mavis and I had a talk and she insisted . . .’ And at last, the penny dropped. What had mattered most to Mavis was her father. I had never met him, because he was already a sick man when she first met Harvey and he died only weeks after their engagement.
‘Jenny, what can I do to help you?’ she asked quietly. ‘Would you like me to tell Harvey, or do you feel you must do it yourself? He’s still dressing.’
‘There is something, Mavis,’ I began hesitantly. ‘Harvey and I had a row yesterday. He’s probably still very angry with me. And we’ve got to cope with the funeral.. .’
‘Of course you have,’ she said sympathetically, ‘and with your mother as well,’ she added sharply. ‘Jenny, your dear brother hasn’t even begun to come to terms with your mother, as yet, but he’s going to have to. And now’s a very good time to start. I told him that last night. I gather you stood up to her quite successfully yesterday.’
‘Daddy thought I did rather well,’ I replied. ‘It helps me now that he did,’ I went on, horribly aware that the unexpected warmth in her voice was drawing out the tears I had said a firm no to. ‘Mavis, there’s something else I think I’d better tell you,’ I said, collecting myself with an effort.
I heard an encouraging noise.
‘Things have been very difficult between Colin and me for some time now. But it all came to a head last night. I won’t be going back to Loughview, Mavis, and I won’t have Colin at Daddy’s funeral. I just don’t know how I’ll cope with my mother when she has to be told,’ I ended limply.
There was a silence at the other end of the line. For one awful moment I thought I’d done the wrong thing, that she was so shocked she would withdraw the support she’d so unexpectedly offered.
‘Mavis?’ I said tentatively.
‘Sorry, Jenny. I’m just a bit taken aback that you’ve got this to cope with as well. It seems so unfair,’ she said gently. ‘To tell you the truth, I’m not really surprised. I thought things were bad back in the summer when I came to collect Susie. But it’s an awful lot to cope with all at once. Oh, I am sorry, Jenny.’
I knew that she really meant it and I was touched. But the result was that yet more tears coursed down my cheeks. She must have heard my sniffs, or the fissle of my kitchen paper, for she went on speaking without waiting for any reply.
‘I knew how anxious you were about your father yesterday when he bent over to put the logs on the fire, but there was nothing I could do then except keep talking,’ she said sadly. ‘Look, Jenny,’ she went on, as if she’d suddenly made up her mind about something, ‘can you ring back in about ten minutes? Let me talk to Harvey. You’ve got quite enough to cope with. There are some things he’s going to have to get straight, right now. All right?’
‘All right. Thanks, Mavis,’ I said feebly.
I put the phone down and looked at it in amazement, as if the unexceptional instrument had been in some way responsible for this transformation. Then I took a deep breath and dialled Val’s number. Poor Val, she was going to be so upset. Of all my friends, she was the one who knew Daddy best and was most fond of him.
The voice which replied immediately was unfamiliar and sounded so English, so formal and distant, I thought I’d misdialled and sat silent, confused, while it repeated the familiar Bangor number.
‘Bob?’ I said, weakly.
‘Jenny, what’s wrong? Are you all right?’
‘Alan, I thought you were at the cottage, I didn’t recognise your voice . . .’
‘Jenny dear, what’s wrong?’ he said gently. ‘Can you tell me or shall I get Val?’
Tears streamed down my face and I shook my head helplessly. I thought I could manage, but the slightest gentleness and back they came.
‘Jenny, you’re crying. Where are you? Can I come and fetch you?’
There was nothing cool about Alan’s voice now. He sounded as distraught as I felt.
‘It’s all right, Alan. Really, it’s all right,’ I said quickly. ‘Hold on a minute, till I find my hanky.’
I couldn’t open my bag one-handed so I tried my skirt pocket and drew out again the familiar screwed-up piece of kitchen paper. So strange that it was not grief that made me weep but any show of kindness or tenderness.
‘I’m all right now, Alan,’ I managed at last. ‘I do have very sad news, but that wasn’t what made me cry.’
I told him about Daddy and he listened quietly. And then I told him I’d not been able to avoid as much as I’d hoped, though Thompson’s Law had helped a lot. Things had been said that could not be avoided. I’d told Colin I was leaving him, and I was hoping to stay with Val and Bob till I found somewhere to live – if Val had room, that was.
‘But of course she has, Jenny,’ he said quickly. ‘Where are you now? Are you really all right?’
He sounded so anxious about me I had to explain how grateful I actually felt that my father had died and how relieved I was that I never had to go back to Loughview again. I told him I was actually quite in command of myself as long as no one was sympathetic.
‘I do believe you, Jenny, if you say so,’ he replied. ‘I think I just desperately want to see you.’
‘And I want to see you too, Alan. I’d have come over this evening even if I couldn’t stay,’ I replied honestly.
‘Just take care today, Jenny. Remember I’ll be thinking about you,’ he said gently, as he went off to fetch Val.
When she came on, Val was lovely, and then dear Bob made it quite clear that if I needed a mountain shifting, he would arrange it immediately. I thought of what Daddy had said about my three good friends, but this time I did manage not to cry. I said I’d be over sometime in the late afternoon, Val reminded me which plant pot the key was under, I said goodbye and dialled Harvey’s number before I could begin to feel anxious again.
He answered immediately.
‘Jenny, I’m sorry, so sorry. You’ve had such a difficult time and I hope you’ll let me do . . . you’ll let me make up for my . . . thoughtlessness yesterday. You were always closer to Daddy, so you’ll know what he would have wanted. Whatever it is, you tell me, and I’ll see that’s what’s done.’
I had never heard Harvey sound so unsure of himself in my life and to my amazement I discovered I was feeling a sympathy I’d never expected to feel. Quite suddenly, I realised that my mother’s excessive love and uncritical approval of all he did had been just as damaging to him as all her manipulating and her perennial expressions of disapproval had been to me.
‘Thanks, Harvey. It’s going to be pretty grim the next few days. Daddy won’t mind too much about the practicalities and I’m not too worried about them either. But I don’t think I can cope if Mummy attacks me about Colin, at least until after the funeral.’
To my surprise, he promised quite firmly he would make sure she didn’t. From that moment on, we were able to be easy with each other and make the decisions that had to be made before he rang my mother to break the news.
‘It’ll probably be late morning by the time I get up home, Jenny. Can you manage till then?’ he ended.
‘I’ll manage somehow, Harvey,’ I said gently. ‘I think you’ve got the rough end this morning.’
‘No, not a bit of it. I’ve ducked out of it for too long. ‘Bye for now,’ he said hastily, as he put the phone down.
I finished my calls, said my thank you to the sister, and began the long march back to the entrance. The corridors were already full of people, sunlight streamed in through the windows and skylights, and somewhere, beyond the clatter of breakfast trays, I heard a voice singing. Once again, I felt my spirits rise. I walked out into the fresh air, felt the sun on my face, and hailed a taxi as if I were greeting an old friend.
* * *
I blessed Ernie as I sat back in the large, black, city taxi. He had refused to take any money last night when he noticed how little I had in my purse. ‘Ye might need that in the mornin’,’ he’d said. He was in no hurry, he’d see me again. And so he would. But now there was another job to do. I collected my thoughts as best I could as we negotiated the traffic round the City Hall and made for Queen’s Crescent.
It was only a few minutes after eight o’clock, but the elderly school secretary was already at her desk. She frowned when she saw me. Staff were a trial to her. They only appeared when they wanted something. And that invariably meant more work for her and her assistant. Even Miss Fletcher, the vice-principal, thought twice about asking her to duplicate her world maps.
I took a deep breath and said that I would like to see Miss Braidwood as soon as she came in.
‘She’s in already, but she’s busy,’ she said sourly, looking me up and down. ‘What about lunchtime?’
‘I’m afraid I can’t be here at lunchtime, or at three thirty. That’s why I need to see her.’
‘Oh.’ She rose from her chair, glared at me, and walked out of the office in the direction of the head’s study. I took a few deep breaths. I was so nervous, the lines I’d rehearsed in the taxi had gone completely. I knew there were four things I had to say, but at this moment I could remember only two.
‘Miss Braidwood will see you,’ she said shortly. ‘But she’s very busy.’
I picked up my briefcase and tapped along the bare wooden corridor. When she called, ‘Come in,’ I opened the door and saw her move a pile of papers from a chair on to her already crowded desk.
‘Do sit down, Mrs McKinstry. You have a problem,’ she said briskly.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I have a number of things to tell you and some of them may cause problems.’
She shifted uneasily in her chair and glanced at the pile of papers she had just moved.
‘My father died this morning in the Royal Victoria. I shall need some time off, but I don’t know what the rules are.’
‘Was this expected, Mrs McKinstry?’
‘In some ways. He did have a severe heart attack two years ago, but he’d made a reasonable recovery. He was in good spirits yesterday when I saw him. The attack came at bedtime and he died at five twenty this morning.’
‘So he did not suffer?’ she said, her tone softening.
‘No, he didn’t. It helps me,’ I said quite steadily, though I had to swallow afterwards.
She paused. It gave me time for another good deep breath.
‘When I saw you on Friday, Miss Braidwood, you offered me the job of Head of the English Department. I made my decision at the weekend and I should like to accept.’
‘Good. I’m pleased that you have. You made the decision before your father was taken ill, did you?’
‘Yes, I did. I was able to tell him yesterday afternoon and that helps me too. He was very pleased about it.’
To my surprise, she smiled. ‘You were clearly close to your father, Mrs McKinstry, and I think I understand why he was so pleased. You are really rather young, you know, for such a position, but we’ve been very impressed by the impact you’ve made. We’ve not had as much enthusiasm for your subject in many years and Miss McFarlane is the first to acknowledge it. I expect your father was very proud of you.’
I nodded, but I didn’t dare say a word in case I dripped. ‘The third thing is to do with Millicent Blackwood,’ I said quickly, a wave of relief sweeping over me as I remembered. ‘I know Miss Fletcher is coming to see you about her at lunchtime. I think you should know that her mother has left the family. Millie has four brothers and she’s doing all the washing and ironing and most of the housework. I think the problem with her work is simply exhaustion. She’s not getting enough sleep and certainly not enough time for proper study. She’s an able girl but just can’t manage.’
‘And her father?’
‘He seems kind enough, but thoughtless. I don’t think it ever crosses his mind that this will wreck Millie’s chances of getting to university. It’s probably never occurred to him in any case, because she’s a girl.’
‘You think she is university material?’ she said, surprised.
‘Yes, I do. Before this happened, her work was really very good indeed.’
She made a note on a pad and looked up at me. ‘And the fourth thing?’
I hesitated a moment and then decided the best thing was to put it as plainly as possible. ‘I have left my husband, Miss Braidwood. From today, I shall be staying with friends until I find a home of my own.’
She nodded sharply and considered. ‘Has the question of your job precipitated this?’
‘Yes, I think it has. But it’s only pulled out the underlying problems which could not have been resolved in any case.’
She smiled slightly and stood up. ‘The rules about leave are discretionary,’ she said abruptly. ‘If you can return in a week I shall be very glad indeed. You know our limited resources only too well. But if you do need longer, please telephone me and we’ll discuss it. Don’t trouble to come in. Have you been up all night?’
‘Yes. Yes, I have.’
‘I appreciate your coming in. If you leave now you’ll avoid having to speak to your colleagues. I can tell them about your father for you. Would that help?’
‘Yes, it would indeed.’
She reached a hand across the table and shook mine firmly. ‘I shall see the funeral details in the newspaper and I shall think about you at that time,’ she said in a businesslike voice. Then she sat down again and took up her papers.
The staffroom was empty, as I expected, so I was able to unload most of my briefcase on to my shelf, leaving it a lot lighter to carry. I hurried along Queen’s Crescent and into Botanic Avenue, just as the first cluster of brown figures appeared from the platform of an Ormeau Road bus.
I was about to turn into University Street when I suddenly saw the gates of the Botanic Gardens were wide open. Moments later, I was walking past the huge circular bed opposite the tropical greenhouse.
‘Beautiful morning, isn’t it?’ I replied easily as the elderly gardener bent again to his task.
The summer bedding was gone and boxes of winter pansies sat on his trolley, one or two of them already in bloom. A deep, rich blue. And I thought of Debbie, my lovely, soft-spoken Jamaican friend who had taught with me in Birmingham. Once, in a Wimpy bar, following a theatre visit, we had talked about loss. After her mother died, she had left the hospital by bus, and looking down she’d seen a woman sweeping her front doorstep. ‘How can she do that?’ she’d asked herself. ‘My mother has died, and she just goes on sweeping her doorstep.’
Debbie had loved her mother, as I loved my father, but only now, as I stood and watched the bent figure tap the pansies from their pots and firm them into the soft earth, did I really understand what she was trying to say. Life goes on regardless, season by season, whatever one’s grief or joy.
I walked on slowly, found a seat in the sun and sat down. I drew up my collar against the sharp edge of the breeze. My eyes blinked and half closed against the brilliant light. My heart was breaking with unassuagable longing, a longing for a life of love and security which I knew none of us ever actually have.
Although I got very cold, I went on sitting there till after nine. I wanted to be sure my mother had returned from her neighbour’s house before I set off up the Stranmillis Road. The ten-minute walk helped to warm me, but did nothing to ease my growing anxiety. My mother would be expecting me by now. Harvey would have broken the news and told her I had to visit school first. Then he would have to contact whatever undertaker she chose. But he still wouldn’t be free to come to Rathmore Drive until he had dealt with the death certificate from the Royal and its registration.
I was about to put my key in the door when it opened and revealed my mother immaculately dressed and made up.
‘Jenny, my poor Jenny, you must be exhausted,’ she exclaimed, more warmly than I had heard her speak to me for years. ‘And you look frozen. Come in quickly and get warm.’
A wave of Helena Rubenstein’s Apple Blossom enveloped me as my mother drew me into the sitting room where a bright fire already burned. Two women rose from their armchairs and made leaving noises, but my mother would have none of it.
‘Jenny, you know Mrs Allen. She’s been so kind. I don’t know what I’d have done without her when your poor Daddy was taken ill last night. And this is Mrs Brownlee. You don’t know Mrs Brownlee, dear. She’s from Balmoral Presbyterian. Jenny used to be in the choir, Mrs Brownlee, and she taught Sunday School too, you know, before she was married,’ she went on, smiling her bright public smile, as Mrs Brownlee shook my hand and said, ‘I’m sorry about your daddy, Jennifer.’
I sat by the fire as I was bidden while my mother went to make coffee. I smiled to myself as Mrs Allen and Mrs Brownlee made the kind of gentle and inconsequential conversation the rules prescribed for the situation. My mother’s extraordinary behaviour suddenly fell into place. Custom provided the role of widow nobly bearing up under her sudden loss. I knew it was a role my mother would play for all it was worth.
‘Your mother’s taking it very well, isn’t she?’ said Mrs Brownlee gently.
‘Yes, indeed, she is,’ I agreed, as I spread my frozen hands to the blazing log fire. ‘Do you think it’s likely the Reverend Bryson will be able to call to see her sometime today?’
‘Oh yes, indeed, Jennifer,’ she answered, patting my hand to reassure me. ‘He’ll be here quite soon now. He’ll want to say some prayers with both of you,’ she added, her voice lowering confidentially.
Somehow I managed to keep a straight face as I nodded, but inside me a bubble of gaiety bounced up and down so energetically I thought I should burst. But I didn’t. I just said a few more of the polite and irrelevant things expected on these occasions while I offered up a prayer of my own. ‘Dear Lord, thank you for these ladies and for the said Reverend Bryson, and for all those others who will come and go this morning and keep me safe from harm. Amen.’
If my mother had been an actress, the morning of my father’s departure must surely have won her an Oscar. With a fluency that amazed me, she held centre stage all through its interminable length. As each caller appeared, she greeted them, set them where she wanted them, placed them for the other persons with a few neatly turned epithets, and issued them with the script she considered most suitable for the occasion. Karen’s father from across the Drive provided the trial run.
‘Ah, Mr Pearson,’ I heard her say sadly in the hall. ‘Do come in. You and dear George were such good colleagues when you served together on the Churchyard Maintenance Committee,’ she continued as she led him into the sitting room. ‘He always used to say how knowledgeable you were about lawnmowers. You will have some coffee, won’t you? Mrs Allen has just offered to make some more. How very kind.’ She dismissed Mrs Allen with a nod.
‘Now I think you know everyone here,’ she ran her eye round the room. ‘You won’t have seen Jenny for some time, such a busy girl with her teaching and a home to run. And Mrs Brownlee, she came round as soon as I phoned the Reverend Bryson so I would have someone from the church with me right away.’
I sat and watched the performance, came in promptly on my cues, and began to make a collection of the sayings attributed to my father. As the morning wore on, I noticed how they became ever more fulsome, but only at one point did I have to take my life in my hands and intervene.
The Reverend Bryson had been given his opportunity to pray. The coffee cups were parked reverently and the dispatch of yesterday’s chocolate cake suspended. I half opened my eyes and had a good look at him as he launched forth in fine style. Small and rather plump, he had a loud, bass voice which he had cultivated for the benefit of his profession. After his first two sermons, delivered in a tone much less agreeable than the one he presently employed, Daddy had resigned all his church offices and ceased to attend services. ‘That man,’ he declared, ‘stands in the long tradition of bigots who will wreck this Province in the end if they ever get their way.’
Now, ‘that man’ was well into his stride. He implored the Almighty to take care of the funeral arrangements, ensure the wellbeing and good order of our beloved Province, and assist the bringing of the Good News of the Lord Jesus to every nation and every tribe, however lowly. He announced that we must strive to fill the whole world with the Glory of God, as did our dear brother George who had been so committed to the work of the church, even if illness made it difficult for him to be present at worship in recent years.
After a few more flourishes, he amened, the coffee cups were refilled, and I heard him ask my mother about hymns for the funeral service.
‘Oh indeed, Mr Bryson, my husband so loved music. He loved all hymns. And psalms too,’ she added quickly, just to be on the safe side.
‘I made a little list, Mummy. I thought it might be useful to the Reverend Bryson,’ I said quietly, my eyes directed modestly towards the Axminster.
‘Well now, Jennifer, that was indeed thoughtful,’ said Bryson. I couldn’t say he boomed like William John, for the note was lower, more bass and less treble. What he most reminded me of was Tubby the Tuba. But I tried to put aside such thoughts as he glanced down the list of Daddy’s favourite hymns.
He nodded in a knowing way and I had to suppress a smile as my mother craned her neck and tried to read it sideways. Without her glasses, she couldn’t see much, so she contented herself by saying, ‘Well, really, all hymns are lovely, aren’t they?’
‘And, no doubt, burial afterwards in your family plot?’
‘Of course,’ said my mother, pressing her hands together in a gesture of sincere agreement.
That was when my stomach did its quick somersault. Before it landed back in place, I had already spoken. ‘Mummy, I think perhaps you’ve forgotten in all the distress that Daddy wanted to be cremated.’
‘Cremated?’ For one moment, she nearly lost her script, but she recovered herself and picked up the prompt just in time. ‘Oh, Jenny dear, your Daddy didn’t really mean it,’ she began, confidingly. ‘He was so concerned about land and the use of land,’ she went on, turning to the Reverend Bryson. ‘A conserv – ationist, I think, is the correct term. But he certainly would not want burial without the full blessing of his church,’ she went on firmly. ‘Look how hard he worked on the Churchyard Committee. Why, he raised the money for the new lawnmowers almost single-handed.’
Bryson laid a pastoral hand on her shoulder. ‘My dear Mrs Erwin, a cremation is not inconsistent with the full rites of the church. All it involves is a slight delay between funeral service and interment of ashes. We normally do that privately about a week after the church service.’
Before I had time to breathe a sigh of relief, she had turned to me again. ‘Are you sure, Jenny, that was what dear Daddy wanted?’
I reassured her and restrained myself. For one wicked moment I had thought of quoting my father’s actual words as confirmation: ‘Well, Jenny, when I go, I don’t want to take up six feet of good earth. Just pop me up to the crem and get me turned into a wee plastic jar of rose fertiliser.’
I had just finished drafting the obituary notices for the Belfast Telegraph and The Newsletter at a small table in my old room when I heard the Jaguar stop. I opened the window, leaned out and waved silently, but Harvey didn’t see me. I watched him get out of the car, go back for something he had forgotten, and walk up the garden path with his eyes firmly fixed on the crazy paving. I was shocked to see how pale and distressed he was.
I hurried to the stairs. Halfway down, I heard my mother begin her routine for the benefit of those neighbours who could now reasonably depart, their duty done.
‘Where’s Jenny?’ he said abruptly as she released him from her embrace.
I came across to him, smiled at the small queue patiently waiting for their exit visas, and said, ‘Mummy, could I possibly borrow Harvey for a moment? I need to check the notices with him before I take them into town.’
Harvey followed me upstairs and sat down hurriedly in the chair I’d just been using. I propped myself on the window ledge and waited, as he covered his face with his hands. It was hardly grief for my father, but whatever it was, it was real.
‘Harvey, you look dreadful. Can I get you something? Water, whisky?’
He looked up, shook his head and smiled feebly. ‘You don’t look half bad, Jenny, to have been through what you’ve been through.’
‘I’m a dab hand with make-up, Harvey,’ I said easily. ‘You look as if you’ve been through the wars yourself.’
He nodded. ‘Mavis spelt it out last night. She knew Daddy hadn’t got long. She said she’d been patient with me, she’d waited and waited, but I’d got to get free of Mummy before he went. She wasn’t going to have Mummy messing up our family the way she’d messed up you and me, and she’s seen signs of it already in Peter. She said if I didn’t sort it, she’d leave me.’
For the first time in my life, I considered giving him a hug. But I thought better of it. He looked so upset I was afraid he might cry, and he hadn’t got time for that. A couple more minutes and we had to be on parade.
‘Look, Harvey,’ I said gently, ‘Mavis won’t leave you, not unless you really make a mess of things, and you won’t do that, not if you listen to what she’s saying. But you can’t do it all at once. Just one thing at a time. Avoid what can be avoided. That’s what I’ve been doing and it works. We’ve just got to get through the next few days, then we can talk. If you want to,’ I added tentatively.
‘Yes,’ he nodded, ‘I think we need to talk.’ He hesitated, tried to look at me, but couldn’t manage it. ‘I’ve not been much use to you, Jenny. I’m sorry.’
‘We’ve not been much use to each other, Harvey,’ I said quietly. ‘Perhaps it’s not entirely our fault. Let’s not be too upset about it.’
I saw him collect himself and I took my chance. I showed him what I had written. He glanced at it briefly, asked what we needed to do next, and sat listening as I filled him in on where we were up to. A few minutes later, when we went downstairs together, he had rearranged his black tie and his persona and looked as if he could cope.
‘I’m going to call on Bertie and the staff,’ I informed my mother when the door had shut behind the last of the morning visitors. ‘I’ll take the notices to the newspapers and go on from there, if that’s all right with you, Mummy, now that Harvey’s here.’
‘Yes, you do that if you feel you have to, Jennifer,’ she said dismissively, her face making it quite clear how unnecessary she felt it was to show any consideration towards mere staff. ‘Harvey and I will have some lunch together,’ she went on, much more enthusiastically. ‘I presume you’ll be back over again this evening with Colin?’
‘No, Mummy,’ said Harvey. He was in so quickly, I didn’t even have time to panic. ‘I think Jennifer has managed very well to do all she’s done, but she had no sleep at all last night. I really must insist she goes home and stays there until tomorrow morning,’ he said in his crispest consultant’s voice. ‘Mavis will come down this evening, as soon as she’s given the children their tea. She’ll be able to do whatever you might have wanted Jenny to do.’
She was so busy agreeing with Harvey, she didn’t even bother to object when I collected Daddy’s car keys. I said my goodbye, reminded Harvey with a glance that he knew where to find me, and manoeuvred the Rover gingerly out into the Drive and down on to the Stranmillis Road. By the time I got to Erwin’s, I felt quite comfortable with the car, which I’ve always liked, but distinctly uneasy about what I would find in the place where my father had worked for over twenty years.
I parked between Mrs Huey’s elderly Morris Minor and Bertie’s new red sports car and walked down the yard to the back entrance to the upstairs offices. I saw a movement at a window, looked up and waved to Loretto, the newest clerk, a cousin of Bertie’s from the nearby Falls Road. Before I got to the door, Bertie came rushing out to meet me, hauling on the jacket he seldom wears as if it were an obligatory token of respect.
‘Gawd, Jennifer, I’m sorry about yer father, rest his soul,’ he said, crossing himself. ‘There’s bin no work done in this place the day. Mrs Huey’s in a bad way,’ he went on. ‘Her an’ Loretto hasn’t had a dry eye among them all mornin’.’
He put his arms round me and hugged me. Short in stature and tending to plumpness, Bertie has shoulders on him like a rugby forward, and his hug left me breathless. He led me up the stairs to the office that had remained my father’s even after he’d sold the business. During the handover, he and Bertie had got on so well my father suggested he return to work two days a week to help Bertie carry through the changes he’d planned. For his part, Bertie had insisted my father’s office was not to be disturbed. While staff were retrained and computers installed, it kept its slightly old-fashioned and very informal arrangements.
‘Haul on a minit, will ye, an’ I’ll away an’ get Mrs Huey,’ he said as he opened the door.
I took in the strange, familiar blend of the smell of old, well-polished furniture mixed in with the odour of shiny new machinery catalogues, dust, and chrysanthemums. A large, fresh bunch sat in a copper jug on top of a filing cabinet.
‘I think I shud leave yis till yerselves a minit, but I’d like till take yis for a bite o’ lunch. A’ve got a quiet wee table at the Royal Ave’nue wheniver yer reddy,’ he said hastily, as he left me.
I walked across to my father’s empty desk and sat down, and I was still sitting there, lost in thought, when Gladys came into the room. A warm, friendly woman, long widowed, I had known her all my life, and she had always been so very kind to me. One look at her gave me the answer to a question I’d had in my mind for many years, and it explained her great interest in my life. I walked across to her, put my arms round her and cried as if my heart would break, because I knew she had loved my father.
‘Now, now, sweetheart, don’ cry, don’ cry. Sure Daddy would hate to see you cry,’ she said, the tears streaming down her own face. I heard the door open and shut again behind us.
‘I’m sorry,’ I sniffed, ‘I’ve left make-up on your lovely clean blouse.’
‘And sure what matter that,’ she said, wiping her own eyes. ‘Now, com’on, Jenny. We’ll hafta to do better than this. Poor Bertie doesn’t know whether he’s cornin’ or goin’. He wants to come to the funeral and he’s afeard to menshun it, bein’ Catholic like. Ye may say somethin’ to the poor man.’
I nodded and put my hand to my pocket, pulled out the piece of kitchen paper once more and looked at it.
‘D’you think Daddy would lend us some tissues?’ I said, wiping my eyes again.
‘Surely, he woud. Sure he has everythin’ in that desk of his,’ she went on, pulling out a drawer and handing me a box of Kleenex. ‘No matter what ye’d ask him for, he’d have it in that desk – if ye waited long enough. What’ll we do without him, Jenny?’ she said quietly and burst into tears again.
‘Gladys,’ I said, hesitantly. I’d never used her Christian name before, for my father had always called her ‘Mrs Huey’. ‘Gladys, if Daddy hadn’t died last night, he’d be wired up to two machines this morning, a ventilator and a kidney machine. I prayed for him to go. You would have too, if you’d been there, wouldn’t you?’
She nodded, but could not speak.
‘Shall I tell you what his last words were?’
She looked up at me, surprised, and I told her about driving up the Antrim Road in the sunshine, and hearing the story of him standing barefoot, with the backside out of his trousers, looking up at his neighbour on the horse. She stopped crying and began to smile and said she knew the story well.
‘I asked him if he’d be in work on Tuesday, and I said I’d come down from school. The last thing he said to me was, “Good girl, that’s great. I’ll get Mrs Huey to get us a bun for our tea”.’
I had to re-do my make-up yet again before I could go and speak to the rest of the staff, but I managed it fairly well. Bertie had already told them the showroom would close so everyone could attend the funeral, if there were no objections from the family. Over lunch, I reassured Bertie and Gladys that if it were the last thing I were ever to do, I would see that all Daddy’s friends from work would stand together in the pew behind the family, Catholic and Protestant alike, exactly as he would have wished.
Lunch was surprisingly enjoyable. Any group of businessmen casting an eye over the strangely assorted group we made in a quiet corner of the large dining room would not have guessed at the sadness which was our common bond. We talked about anything that came to mind, but returned again and again to remembrances of my father. Gladys told us stories about the early days of the business I had never heard before. With little capital of his own, my father had rebuilt old farm machinery as well as importing what was new. Bertie had done differently. Coming from a home no less poor than my father’s, he had worked in the building trade all through his teens and twenties, first in Glasgow and then in London. He’d worked every hour he could to build his capital, because his ambition was to have his own business. Erwin’s was just what he wanted, for he shared my father’s passion for farm machinery.
After lunch, I drove out of the city, free at last from telephone calls and arrangements that had to be made. I looked around at the autumn trees and the sparkle of the lough and wondered yet again how a day could still be so lovely and yet Daddy gone. I thought of the blue pansies in the Botanic Gardens, and the jug of chrysanthemums Gladys had put in his office that he would now never see. And then I remembered the tiny jug of late flowering roses in my study at Loughview where I would never work again.
I parked the car outside the gates and looked across at the neighbouring houses for any signs of life. Mercifully, there were none. I remembered that Monday was Karen’s cleaning day. The babies were shipped off to her mother in the morning. By now, Karen would be on her way to collect them. She’d not be back for an hour or more.
I walked down the hall and into the kitchen. The breakfast table looked just as it had on Friday night, except that there was no half-eaten bowl of cornflakes, just Colin’s eggy plate and the dregs of his coffee in the percolator. I turned my back on it and went upstairs.
What did you expect, Jenny? I asked myself when I saw the unmade bed, the scatter of underwear on the floor, the abandoned pyjamas on the bedroom chair. I sat down at the dressing table and looked in the mirror.
‘Harvey was right,’ I said aloud. Although I was pale and had dark circles under my eyes, there was a lightness about the face I had not seen for some time. When I smiled experimentally, the solemn face in front of me responded with a twinkle that was quite unexpected.
‘Sitting admiring yourself.’ That’s what my mother always said if ever she caught me peering in a mirror. But she was wrong. I laughed aloud. How wrong she was about so many things. How wrong all of us could be, even about the biggest things.
I cleared my dressing table except for the knicker-pink twin-set and the silver brush set which was Maisie’s engagement present. Then I had a go at the bathroom. I removed all signs of a female presence, down to the last tampon. I ignored the matching luggage we’d taken on our honeymoon and pulled out my old suitcases from under the bed. What was left over I packed in a box from the garage which said ‘Old Bushmills Whiskey’. I left my summer clothes in the wardrobe for another time and carried all my winter things to the car on hangers.
Then I turned to my study. Too many books to take today, so I picked out all the new poetry and just a few others I might need for school. I looked at my collection of stones and driftwood and could not bear to leave it, even for a few days. I packed it carefully and took it to the car. When I came back, the room seemed strangely bare already. I unhooked Val’s sketches from the wall, and then my own. Less good than hers, they were still precious because they encapsulated the time and the place of their making – a sketch of the surviving gable wall of the cottage where my father began his life and one of the worn and weathered baulks of wood down at Ballydrumard, both of which I’d made on days I’d spent out with Alan.
The car was full when I’d finished. I had to put Val’s lemon geraniums on the passenger seat and wedge the little jug of late roses in the door panel where Daddy kept his maps.
I went back into the house one last time to go to the loo. There in the bathroom were the three red geraniums, very dead. Like my relationship with Colin. No need to spend time lamenting what had been. It was over. Finished. Long ago and in another country.
I washed my hands, dried them on the warm, dry towel, and pulled open the airing cupboard. Covered in slimy ooze, the homebrew bottle now sat quiet. The smell was horrible. As I shut the door on it I had to laugh. Not with a bang but a whimper, I said to myself as I ran lightly down the stairs.
I pulled up out of Loughview and pointed the car east. Another day I would go and see Ernie and pay him what I owed him and tell him about the possibility of a job with Bertie. But not today. Today, I had done as much as I could.
I looked at my watch and saw there was time to drive down to Windmill Hill and look out over the green fields and work out which patchwork piece was mine. Or I could park somewhere and sit in the sun, or walk by the shore, or I could pick up the key from under the plant pot and go into a house that would welcome me.
I could lie down and sleep and Val would cook my supper. I could worry about finding a home and Bob would tell me exactly how it was to be managed. I could ring Siobhan and make a plan to drive up to Derry and bring Keith home. I could falter and find my courage disappear and Alan would comfort me.
I sat for a moment thinking about Alan. Not thinking in a deliberate, logical way, more allowing myself to be aware of him, remembering all that had been between us over the years and what had happened in these last incredibly extended days. His tenderness was no longer a threat to the job in hand, it was a gift, so unexpected, and so precious, I could hardly believe it was mine.
Now that my life had been given back to me I was beginning to realise just how many wonderful things were mine for the taking.