The Adoption (2 page)

Our cosy abode is one of several small cottages leased out to employees on the Brightmore Estate. The main house, Brightmore Hall, is a grand imposing structure built in the Regency style. The tall maize-gold walls are softened with mauve wisteria in spring. During winter, the dark-green topiaries, sculpted into chess pieces, the kings and queens, the bishops, the castles and the knights, lined up on opposing sides of the front lawn, seem to spring out at you from their jonquil background. The property situated on the North Downs is set in over six hundred acres of rolling fields and woodlands, while hugging the fairy-tale building, with its central tower, are walled rose, lavender and dahlia gardens, cottage borders that fringe the pleasant walkways, a rockery, a herb garden, a vegetable garden, and the stables, now used to other purposes, surrounding a cobbled courtyard. Henry, with his patient green hands, is head gardener here, conjuring magical beanstalks to sprout tall and majestic from a pinch of dull brown seeds. I am a general dogsbody, sometimes serving in the café, sometimes in the gift shop and sometimes in the offices. And occasionally I am seconded to the main house to show visiting parties around. Here I confess to spicing up Brightmore family scandals with more poetic licence than fact, until gratifyingly eyes pop, mouths gape and maiden
aunts
mutter disapprovingly. Very occasionally I find myself scurrying between all four to keep the great house running smoothly.

‘Of course my wife doesn’t work. Never has. Lady of luxury. Life of ease,’ Frank boasts with quite revolting prehistoric manly pride. Me, hunter-gatherer, you, stay-at-home-twiddle-your-fingers wife. ‘She likes to sew. To stitch me up, eh, Henry?’ Frank hee-haws with disproportionate hilarity at his own humourless joke. The padded shoulders of his suit jacket lift with laughter in a fair imitation of Edward Heath, spittle flies and eyes vanish in porcine creases.

I grimace. I do not like to sew. In verity I hold that needlecraft is a vile occupation, one that should be bracketed alongside consorting with the devil. It should have perished with pitiable, oppressed, medieval damsels. Poor dears, sitting uncomfortably on clunky chastity belts stitching away at interminable tapestries, while their husbands went galloping around lopping off infidels’ heads on jolly capers and crusades. Confidentially, I despise sewing nearly as much as I do my name. And, after all, the afternoon is wearing on. It is ticking by without me and Merlin bounding through it, watching the land waking up, feeling the earth soften under foot and paw, and the shoots thrust up through it. Frank counts his papers, then repeats the exercise pedantically.

‘Keep the hands busy and the mind pure. That’s what your dear mother used to say,’ he reminds me, smothering his nostrils with a damp hanky to suppress a sneeze. The whites of his eyes are tinged with pink. He’s a wee bit allergic to pet fur. Must be finding this a trial. What a shame. Actually, I don’t care a hoot what my dead mother might say. If the devil wants my hands he can have them and welcome. I’d prefer to give them to him than waste my time going blind trying to thread eensy-weensy needles. But my smile remains fixed in place as if nailed there. ‘I don’t know how you cope with working, even if it is part-time, Lucilla. I know your children are both …
out
and … and about. Such a colourful pair. Gina a married woman – and a park ranger. A park ranger! I expect that means doing all sorts of jolly things with squirrels and trees and acorns. Such fun.’ He frowns, trying to imagine it, but it proves beyond his scope. ‘Can Tim actually scrape a living making musical instruments? I can’t imagine how he goes about that. Still, I’m sure they bring all their hiccups home to Mum.’

As he talks, his shallow grey eyes take in a corner cobweb, Henry’s crumpled shirt, the layer of homely dust on the wooden mantelpiece, finally coming to rest on the cork-tiled floor, worn to a dullness by the many scrabbling muddy paws it has been trampled under.

‘I manage,’ I say shortly, not the least abashed by my lovely lived-in home. I fondle Merlin’s head, sculpt the comforting dome of his faithful skull under the silky fur cap. Etiquette demands that a hostess see her guest to the door. My enthusiasm for this last duty is betrayed when I shoot up, as if bitten on my derrière by a starving mouse. And at last Frank’s briefcase snaps closed. I still have the cheque in my hand. Twelve thousand pounds. It isn’t a great deal really. Not by today’s standards. What can you get for twelve thousand pounds? A decent car, a new kitchen at a stretch, a few designer frocks, a round-the-world sea voyage. Probably wouldn’t get you all the way round either. More likely only to the Indian Ocean to maroon you on some godforsaken island in the middle of nowhere. Is the legacy sufficient to purchase a baby? To buy off a child. To bribe a teenager. To gag a woman. I think not. We migrate into the kitchen where unconventionally the main entrance to our cottage is located.

Helpfully, I open the door. But it is Henry who exits it with a kindly wink, preparing to conduct Frank to the estate’s communal car park. Unfortunately, Frank’s broad shoulders lodge inside the door frame, making me want to uncork him and send him popping into the wild blue yonder.

‘Well, Lucilla?’ he says, bowing ingratiatingly, fingering a brown envelope tucked under one arm and swinging his briefcase.

‘Well, Frank?’ I return. I inhale the scent of coffee grounds and burned toast and warm dog, trying to rid myself of the taint of stale cigarettes that clings to the fabric of his drab suit.

‘Are you pleased?’ he inquires, his tone that of a generous benefactor.

‘That my mum’s dead?’ I rejoin angelically.

To my satisfaction I see that he loses a bit of his composure then, working his block jaw in irritation. ‘No, of course not. About the money, I mean.’ His stained teeth are crooked, leaning drunkenly against one another in his wide mouth. They appear an encumbrance to his speech, rather than tools for sharpening up his diction. Merlin waddles in from the lounge-diner, positioning himself between us, staring up from face to face, possibly waiting to see who will land the first punch.

‘If you really want to know, I don’t think it is very fair.’ I fold my arms in place of slapping a gauntlet across his smarmy face. He looks slightly taken aback – a statue wobbling on its plinth.

‘I assure you that I have performed my duties as executor and trustee of her will scrupulously,’ he blusters.

‘Oh, I don’t doubt it.’ I shrink back from the door reclaiming my snug in the bosom of Brightmore, and lean on the kitchen work surface. My gaze idles over the dishes piled in the sink as I say, ‘Do you really think you deserve a share of her money though?’

‘A third. Your cousin Rachel and I got a third each,’ he interjects, gobbling like a turkey. He sounds defensive, even annoyed. Perhaps he expected to get more, to bank the lot. Then, under his breath, ‘There would have been a small fortune, if it wasn’t for that interfering damn busybody Whatmore. He was a fraudster taking advantage of Aunt Harriet like that. It was despicable.’

Like attracts like, I muse dryly. But I let pass this reference to my mother’s ill-advised decision to sell her pretty house, to purchase an ugly bungalow on the Pembroke Dock road. ‘Wasn’t she
my
mother?’ I query delicately. My inflexion implies sincere confusion, as if I really am undecided. After all, biologically there was no bridge adjoining us. I was not blood of her blood, flesh of her flesh – thank God! I spare a charitable thought for my poor cousin Rachel whose silver spoon was filled with the gall of fertility problems. Ultimately, however materially well off she became, motherhood was denied her.

I worshipped Rachel when I was little. She was kind to me, and pretty, and there were notable occasions when she broke from the herd to gallop to my aid. But then a day came when the ease with which I produced offspring fostered a resentment in her that soured our relationship. Rachel, like my adoptive mother, had problems down below, problems talked of in hushed whispers. She was unable to carry to term, having a succession of miscarriages. The longest she went was her first pregnancy, nearly six months. The tiny alien scrap, a boy, skin raw as a skinned rabbit’s and wizened as an old man, dwindled through three days before expiring. I visited Rachel in hospital. Eerily, she didn’t weep. There were no marks of her vacuous fathomless sorrow. Though what I did fasten on was a disturbing opacity in the irises of her chalk-green eyes, as if overnight they had changed colour. I would eventually come to recognise this as the lustreless matted shade of madness. After that, as the years went by, we drifted apart: cards at Christmas, birthdays, the occasional stilted phone call.

Incredibly, Cousin Frank is still whistling through his bad teeth, justifying his slice of inheritance. It was no surprise to me, this three-way split. My mother told me of the division in advance. But once in a vanilla spring sun it rankled with me, so I cut in icily. ‘I was the adopted daughter.’ He doesn’t answer that, but I note how his eyelids fall and his disparaging gaze travels at the mention of adoption. I go
on
, undeterred. ‘When
your
mother, Aunty Enid, died, I don’t recall her leaving me a penny.’ I can feel the heat coming to my cheeks, my militant feet tapping in a war dance. ‘You and Rachel own your homes. I don’t.’ Again he is sullenly tight-lipped. ‘This cottage comes with Henry’s job. When he retires, we will effectively be homeless. We will have to buy somewhere with our modest savings.’

His small, slug-grey eyes crinkle at the corners and he shrugs. ‘You have to respect the wishes of the dead,’ he says, gorging himself on humble pie. Then, as if suddenly remembering something, ‘Oh, I’ve brought along a few documents you should have.’ He takes the envelope from under his arm and holds it out to me. He blots out the light, his shadow lying like a corpse on the kitchen floor. The features of his face blur, so that I can only detect the buff glow of his leaning-tombstone teeth.

‘I suppose I must be satisfied with that then.’ I reach for the envelope. Merlin backs a pace and growls. He has gained weight in his declining years. But, bless him, there is a wolf in that roly-poly pudding yet. I can hear distant steps on the cobbles and the murmur of the lawn mowers far off. I conjure the scent of freshly cut grass, inhale it deep down, let it purge me of my past.

‘The photographs you asked for, they’re in here. Including the one you mentioned. I tracked it down.’ Frank waits as if for a round of applause, and I recall our telephone conversation of a month or so ago. He asked me if there were any of my mother’s possessions I had my eye on. I was about to say, no, that there was nothing, no keepsakes I coveted, when I remembered the photograph. It is hard to explain what it means to me, so I shall merely say that I had a yearning for it.

‘There’s a photograph taken in August 1950. I was two and half. I’m on a donkey at the seaside. Not a real one, a stuffed donkey. Life size,’ I reported. He gave a bemused grunt.

I’m alone in the picture. My adoptive parents aren’t there. Perhaps
they
’re supervising me. I don’t know. But I’m not posing, not smiling at anyone, not trying to be anything other than what I am. A tiny girl in a white dress, sitting proudly astride a donkey on a seaside promenade. I suddenly felt hot tears coming, and sensations crowding in on me. Rows of deckchairs and the backs of people’s hatted heads, the flat of a calm sea, the slap of sunlight, the salty dead smell, the cries of gulls. And me sitting alone on a furry donkey, in command, gripping the reins. The sea breeze was blowing back my hair. I leaned forwards and stroked the big floppy ears. They were like soft toys nestling in my small hands. The donkey had a funny face. The forelock of its fluffy black mane fringed bulging eyes, cartoon eyes, white with big inky pupils. Its mouth was open in a broad toothy grin. I imagined it whinnying. ‘Giddy up, giddy up,’ I chivvied it on, kicking its flanks and jiggling my bottom on the leather saddle. I was absurdly, momentously happy. The emotion was so foreign that I wouldn’t have been able to name it, although I have no trouble identifying it today. Now I can say, ah yes, that was happiness, and this … well, this is sadness. And this? This is sorrow. And this is regret. And this is despair.

‘Yes, I’d like that photograph if you can find it,’ I said.

‘Oh. Well, I’m sure I’ll be able to dig it out. Anything else?’

‘No, no, thank you.’

‘There’s a ring you know, an engagement ring. Your mother’s engagement ring. A diamond set in gold, no less.’

‘Is there?’

‘You must have seen it a million times.’

‘I don’t recall.’

‘I’ve had it valued. It’s worth two thousand pounds. Shall I send it to you?’

‘If you like.’

If Frank was expecting me to grovel he was sorely disappointed. He kept his word though and posted it to me. Actually it was rather grubby
and
scratched. I hocked it round the local jewellers, but no one would give me two thousand pounds for it, or even one thousand. In the end, grudgingly, one chap gave me three hundred and fifty. I bought a colour television. Henry was thrilled. Now we can watch wildlife programmes together.

But the donkey photograph was priceless to me. And today I will have it in my possession. Frank continues, still seemingly reluctant to hand over my legacy. ‘There are some other things, documents I thought you might want to have. Probably sensible not to open it until I’ve gone.’ Is that the Cheshire cat or my cousin, face divided with a hideous grin? I step forwards and my hand closes on the envelope. I hear it crackle temptingly. But he still refuses to relinquish it, so that we have an extraordinary tug of war on my doorstep.

‘Lucilla, what’s in here … well, you may find it difficult to accept. Try to remember it was complicated for them too.’

I want to say, oh just give it to me and bugger off. But I wait, suddenly feeling a frisson of fear. You see, I grew up in a conspiracy of silence. He takes a breath, as if he wants to say something more. Then, clearing his throat, he seems to change his mind, at last letting go. He makes a move to peck me on the cheek. I lean backwards and Merlin bares his teeth. ‘I’ll be in touch,’ is all he says, ducking through the doorway and skulking out into the sunlight.