Edward looks around his mother’s attic. He is seated on a chair under the skylight. There is nothing else in the room except an old trunk and the chair on which he sits. Even the floorboards are bare.
Angela groans, ‘I can never undo locks.’
‘Pull the key out slightly, and then turn it,’ he advises. The lock springs open in her hand. She places the padlock on the bare floor, puts her fingers to the rim and tugs.
Inside is a wooden tray, separated into small shallow sections, spanning the top of the trunk. In each section are little packages of tissue paper. Edward comes to stand beside her. She hesitates. ‘Go on then,’ he says.
She picks one up and unwraps it. Nestling in the paper is a coral necklace. She gasps in delight, ‘Isn’t it beautiful? Like small twigs of terracotta.’ She holds it to the light. ‘It’s exquisite.’
‘I remember now where I’ve seen that trunk before.’ He pulls the chair over towards her and sits down. ‘It belonged to my uncle. It used to be in the attic at the farmhouse. How on earth did she get it up here?’
Angela opens another package. Each parcel holds a fresh treasure: turquoise, cornelian, jade, and egg-shaped beads of amber, glistening like barley sugar. Edward remembers Rachel wearing some of them, but some he has never seen before. The last package contains a perfectly matched string of river pearls.
‘Where did she get them all from?’ Angela asks, letting the pearls run through her fingers.
‘I haven’t the foggiest idea. See what’s on the next layer.’
She prises out the tray. ‘Nothing, except,’ she leans into the trunk, ‘an old piece of newspaper with strange foreign looking writing.’
Edward stands up and peers into the trunk. ‘It’s Russian. Fancy that, it must have been my maternal grandmother’s trunk. She came from Russia when she was a little girl. I remember my mother telling me.’
The cat yowls loudly up the stairs. ‘You’d think it’d come up, wouldn’t you?’ Edward says.
‘Her pewter pearls aren’t here. I loved them. They were so … her. I remember she was wearing them at Claudette’s funeral.’
The cat’s cries become more plaintive, echoing up through the house. They try to ignore it, but it seems only to get louder, more complaining.
‘Do me a favour will you?’ He stands up, ‘Go and put that bloody thing out.’
‘Aren’t you afraid it will wander off?’
‘To be quite honest, I don’t care. I just can’t stand that noise any longer.’
The corner of the bed is folded down. The pillows are plumped and ready, waiting for Rachel. Edward sits down on the edge of the bed and is surprised to find it warm. He pulls back the covers and places his hand on the bottom sheet.
‘The electric blanket has been on all this time. She must have put it on the night she died.’
Angela comes over to the bed and, like Edward, places her hand on the bottom sheet. ‘How wonderful, it’s as if it’s been waiting for you.’
He says nothing, feeling suddenly overcome. While they have been in the attic it has grown dark outside. The heavy damask curtains are still open. Angela tugs at them and they slide together easily, the curtain rings jangling against the brass rod.
‘There, that’s better.’ She sits down on the bottom corner of the bed.
Edward prises himself up and opens the middle drawer of the dressing table. He takes out a drawstring pouch made of crimson velvet, ‘I want you to have these,’ he says, sitting down on the bed next to her. He places them in her lap. She picks up the pouch and gently presses it between her hands. ‘What is it?’
‘Open it and see.’
With her index fingers she draws open the top of the pouch and, turning it upside down, empties its contents onto her lap. She gasps, and picks up the pewter pearls. The first thing she does is put them up to her cheek. Edward sees how the light catches them, dappling her skin.
‘They’re so beautiful.’
‘I want you to have them.’
‘They must be worth loads, I can’t accept them.’
‘Mother has left me everything. Thank you, Mother,’ he looks upwards, ‘I might even be able to give up my job, so please accept them.’
‘But why, Edward? Why are you giving them to me?’
He wants to tell her that he has dreamed of placing them around her neck, of bending and kissing the blue vein running down to the softness of her breasts.
‘I want to thank you for your kindness over this last week, and for coming to the funeral with me,’ his voice cracks. ‘I’m not sure I would have got through it without you.’
She had been the first person he had thought of. He’d leafed through his notebook for her number. He’d heard her voice. That was almost enough, just to hear her voice.
‘What are you going to do with the house?’ Angela holds the pearls cupped in her hands.
‘I honestly don’t know.’ Edward is silent for a moment, trying to contain his emotions. ‘I feel so confused.’ He pauses, trying to gather strength, ‘As you know, mother and I had rather a fractious relationship.’ He thinks back to the last time he had seen his mother alive, sitting at his kitchen table. He covers his face with his hands. A tear trickles out from between his fingers and down his arm, disappearing into his jacket cuff.
He feels her hand on his shoulder. ‘Please don’t cry, Edward. You’ll set me off. Shall I make us a cup of tea?’
‘You’re wise for your years, you know?’ he says, smiling, brushing the tears away with the palm of his hand. ‘I’ve just remembered, there’s a bottle of whisky downstairs in the cupboard under the sink. Will you go and get it?’ Give me time to compose myself, he thinks.
Angela lies on her stomach, legs bent at the knees, bare feet waving in the air. He wants to put his hand out and hold the plumpness of her calves, squeeze the flesh gently between his fingers.
‘You know,’ she says, sipping at her whisky. ‘I keep getting this irresistible urge to draw you.’
‘Oh,’ he says, ‘if only. Oh, for those times back again. When life was less complicated.’
She smiles sadly. ‘Nothing seems black and white anymore does it? I should have known that I couldn’t just stick with charcoal.’ She laughs at her own joke, and gets up from the bed to pour them another drink.
‘I don’t mind, you know?’
‘What?’ She waits, bottle in hand.
‘Mother has a sketch pad downstairs.’ He watches her face, frowning, as she tries to comprehend his meaning. He imagines lying naked with her here, in-between his mother’s best cotton sheets.
She pulls a face. ‘I’m a bit drunk!’
He rattles the ice in the bottom of his glass. ‘Just think, mother prepared this ice for us.’ He hiccups. ‘You hadn’t thought of that, had you?’
‘I did actually, clever clogs. As I was running the ice tray under the tap, I had the very same thought.’
‘Shifting sands.’
‘Pardon?’
‘Shifting sands.’
‘Are you drunk?’ she grins.
‘That’s what life seems like lately.’
‘You’re right, nothing seems quite safe anymore, does it? I mean, fancy you moving out of Mrs Ingram’s. I thought that you’d end your days there. What are you going to complain about now you haven’t got her to ruin your clothes, or serve you up salty food?’ She begins to giggle. ‘Oh, Mrs Ingram? Look. You’ve ruined my best socks,’ she mimics.
He pokes her in the ribs.
Outside in the garden, they hear the cat yowling.
He must have nodded off. He wakes in the middle of the night propped up against the pillows. Angela is asleep with her back nestled up to him, snug against his body. He leans forward and, marvelling at his new-found courage, kisses the vein on her neck, letting his lips trace it down to her collarbone. She turns her head slightly and smiles up at him, her eyes still closed. If he wasn’t so drunk he could get up and turn the light off. He lays there wishing they were both naked.
And now it is the next morning and she is pacing back and forth in the kitchen.
‘Angela?’ She stops pacing long enough to look at him. ‘Do you want any sugar in your tea?’
‘No.’
‘No, thank you, Edward,’ he reprimands.
‘Any chance we can go in the back room yet? It’s so dingy in here.’
He nods.
On the side are little packages wrapped in old newspaper. He picks one up and peels back a corner to find a willow pattern cup. She must have wrapped them up to give him.
He finds it strange to be in his mother’s kitchen, using her things. He has found only one mug – a present from the Isle of Wight. He will have that. It already has a tea bag in it. He unwraps one of the willow pattern cups for Angela. He will need a tray. He finds it tucked under the sink where it always lived. He waits for the kettle to boil and smiles to himself, thinking of the night they spent together. He is beginning to feel better. He will ask her if she will come to the grave with him today. They could even go for lunch afterwards.
If he is careful he can manage to carry the tray through with one hand. He props open the kitchen door. Angela has opened the French windows. The sunlight is stippling the lawn. A bird is on the bird table. He notices his mother’s stone birdbath and remembers all those years ago when he and his father bought it as birthday present for her and how, for once, they’d got it right.
Edward watches Angela as she sits slumped in the chair. She is miles away, her finger twisting a coil of hair.
‘Penny for them.’ He expects her to smile, but she doesn’t. She removes her finger, letting her hair uncoil.
‘I decided earlier, whilst you were making the tea, that I’m going to Cornwall later this morning. If I can get a train.’
His voice is toneless, ‘But I thought we were going to the ballet this evening.’
‘I have to see someone.’
‘Who? A man?’
She snorts, ‘No.’
She is lying, he thinks. ‘Please don’t go, not yet,’ he pleads. ‘I love you.’
‘Fuck off! Just fuck off, will you?’
He hears the front door slam, the stained glass rattling in its lead.
He sits staring out into the garden, numb with shock. He holds his hands prayer-like up to his face. His grandfather, Richard Appleyard, stares kindly down at him.