Xanthe
St Helier, Evening, Liberation Day, May 2019
The day is drawing to a close, and standing by the French windows Xanthe is mesmerised by the setting sun, which paints the sky in swirls of rose and apricot. It’s her last evening in St Helier, and she should pack but she can’t settle down and wanders from room to room, as if trying to imprint every detail of this house on her memory.
Upstairs, in the bedroom, her gaze falls on Hugh’s journal. ‘Shit!’ she says aloud. She hasn’t decided what to do with it. When she started reading it, she planned to donate it to the Jersey Historical Association, but its increasingly intimate details made her hesitate. She picks up the journal and wonders what Hugh would want to do. Perhaps she should just replace it at the back of the chimney where she found it.
Her thoughts turn to Daniel and she fights the despair that threatens to overwhelm her. She sinks onto the bed and closes her eyes, but the future looms ahead like a black question mark. When she looks out of the window again, the sun has almost set and against the darkening sky, the boughs of the oak and chestnut trees are tossing violently in the wind like an unsettling Van Gogh landscape.
The doorbell rings, and as she runs downstairs, her heart is pounding. Perhaps it’s Daniel after all, even though they had agreed not to prolong their painful goodbyes.
The smile is still on her face when she opens the door. But standing there is a young man she has never seen before, and she can’t conceal her disappointment.
‘I’m sorry to disturb you, perhaps this isn’t a good time,’ he says. ‘Can I come back in the morning?’
‘I won’t be here tomorrow. What did you want to see me about?’
‘Actually, it was the house I wanted to see.’
‘Are you going to rent it?’
He shakes his head. ‘I should introduce myself. I’m Anthony Jackson. This house once belonged to my grandfather Hugh Jackson.’
Xanthe stares at him. When she snaps out of her trance, she can’t stop talking.
‘Do come in, feel free to look around. It’s rather untidy because I’m leaving in the morning. Would you like to sit down? Can I make you a cup of tea? Or something stronger, perhaps? I think there’s vodka in the cabinet. Do you know anything about this house?’
Gazing at this tall young man in blue jeans, check shirt and navy sneakers, she tries to grasp the fact that he is the grandson of the man whose intimate thoughts she has read and to whom she feels so connected.
‘Tea would be great, if that’s okay,’ he says. With his direct gaze and engaging manner, it feels as if she is looking at Hugh Jackson as a young man. She ushers him into the sitting room and goes into the kitchen to collect her thoughts. Her hands shake so much that she spills the sugar and the mugs clatter.
When she comes back with the tea, he is standing in front of the French windows gazing at the garden.
‘Did you know your grandfather?’
‘Unfortunately not. I don’t know much about him really. According to my father, there was a rift in the family just before he was born and he and my grandmother didn’t have any contact with him. Sad, isn’t it?’
She nods, and studies him, wondering what she should tell. And what she shouldn’t. Knowing so much more about his family than he does gives her power that she must temper with tact.
‘So how did you know he lived here?’
He has flopped into an armchair, and with his legs stretched out, he looks as if he is at home, which of course he is.
‘When my father died, the probate listed a house in Ireland, and this one. I’m passionate about history – I’m actually reading history at Oxford – so I thought I’d come and look around, to connect with my ancestor and see where he – and the family – originated.’
She listens, struck by the similarity of their quest. ‘Do you know what became of him?’ she asks.
‘While my grandmother was alive, she never mentioned him except to say that he had abandoned her and my father and had never contacted them.’
Xanthe seethes at the injustice of that. He should know the truth, but not from her, not now.
‘And afterwards? Did your father ever meet him?
Anthony takes another sip of tea and places his mug on the side table. ‘I think my grandfather tried to get in touch with him. He was living in Ireland with some woman but I don’t know her name. He sent letters to my father with some landscapes he’d painted. I still have them. He was quite talented.’
Xanthe sits forward, anxious not to miss a word. This is a part of Hugh’s life she knows nothing about.
‘Did your father reply?’
‘Not while my grandmother was alive, but by the time he wrote back, it was too late. Shortly afterwards my father got a letter from a solicitor in Dublin to let him know that his father had died, leaving everything to him. Including this house. My father had it renovated before he died. That was two years ago.’
‘So your grandfather didn’t abandon him after all,’ Xanthe can’t resist saying.
Anthony nods. ‘I suppose not. I think they would have got on very well. My father was a doctor too.’ He turns to Xanthe. ‘What about you? How did you come to be staying here?’
She shrugs. ‘Pure chance. That’s if you believe in chance. I used to, but now I’m not so sure.’
He nods. ‘That’s what I think as well. Too many things happen just at the right moment for it to be accidental.’
If only you knew, she thinks.
‘I’d better head off,’ he says. ‘I’ve enjoyed talking to you. If you’re ever in Oxford, look me up.’
He is almost at the door when she says, ‘Wait a minute. There’s something I’d like to give you.’
She runs upstairs and a moment later, she hands him a thick notebook. ‘I found this behind the chimney in the bedroom. Your grandfather must have put it there. I’m sure he’d want you to have it.’
He gives her a hug, and she watches him walk away with his real inheritance, his grandfather’s journal.
She stands at the French windows. In the garden, moonlight silvers the leaves of the trees and dapples the ground beneath. Her gaze is drawn to the sky, which darkens, but as she watches, the wind blows the clouds apart, creating a narrow opening through which the crescent moon lights up the sky. The world is dark and bright at the same time.
Something makes her turn, and she feels Hugh’s spirit in the room. Her thoughts turn to the unexpected connections she has made, and the surprising gifts she has received; the secrets the dead have whispered, and the bonds the living have revealed, and she knows now that it is all part of the bittersweet poetry of life.