Authors: Rachel Hore
Ann was nodding as she poured the coffee and lit a cigarette, which she inhaled, causing her to cough throatily. ‘You told me on the phone. I was fascinated to hear there are more pictures. I’d adore to see them. Do you think Mr Winterton would mind me calling in when I’m next in Cornwall?’
‘I’m sure he’d be delighted to show you. He’s been almost as interested as I am in your grandmother.’
‘How marvellous. And of course you can use these ones. I’ve got slides of the paintings, but perhaps you might like to take your own . You know, I can’t tell you how delighted I am at this interest in Pearl. She must have only a small place, the tiniest of footnotes, in the art of the period, but it would be so splendid for that to be recorded.’
‘I think so, too,’ said Mel. ‘Oh, and I’ve got something for you.’ She put down the sketchbook carefully on the table and went to fetch her bag from the kitchen. ‘I don’t know whether you know anything much about your grandfather – your biological one, I mean. But this is an account Charles wrote when he was very ill – dying, I think.’ She had typed out a transcript of the handwriting, and this she passed to Ann with the small journal.
‘How simply fascinating. Thank you.’
‘It tells the story from his point of view, of course. And was written twenty years after the events. So we must take his interpretation with a pinch of salt.’
In truth , though she didn’t like to say this to Ann, parts of Charles’s account lacked the ring of sincerity. Worst of all was the passage about the time in the war when he had gone missing. Had he really been delirious or had he temporarily deserted? And what were the circumstances surrounding his capture by the enemy? She suspected there was a story to be told there, though she couldn’t see how she would ever be able to find it out. Or whether Ann and her family would want her to do so.
And Pearl. Had a part of him – the good part – hoped to reclaim Pearl or at least to check that she was happy? She remembered how thin and gaunt he had found her when he had sneaked down to Merryn at the war’s end.
‘Your grandmother died young , didn’t she?’ she asked Ann.
‘Yes. An awful tragedy. Marked my father for life, the loss of her, it really did. I think it was asthma complicated by pneumonia . Something like that. I remember Grandfather hinting that she had had a very difficult time giving birth, that she wasn’t the same after the baby. I always used to wonder what that meant until I had children myself. Damage to the entire pelvic area, I suppose. Most uncomfortable . Anyway, she was told not to have more children. Then she nearly died of the Spanish flu in 1918, poor thing, and never really recovered her health. Terribly sad. You don’t have children yourself yet?’ Ann’s glance was suddenly curious.
‘No,’ said Mel. But she found Ann’s quirky raising of eyebrows sympathetic rather than intrusive. ‘Waiting to find the right man.’
‘Don’t leave it too long. I’m afraid I never found Mr Right, just several Mr Right-I’m-Offs, but I never regretted for one moment having my two girls.’
Mel laughed out loud. ‘I’ll remember that advice,’ she said.
Was that the answer, she wondered after she had said goodbye, leaving with promises to meet again soon. She walked back up the road following signs to Waterloo Station, as she was due in college that afternoon. Was she being unrealistic , desiring a proper father for any child she might have? After all, her own father had proved a ‘Mr Right-I’m-Off’. She remembered that conversation she had had with Patrick soon after they had met. She knew he wanted children, wanted to be there for them. She sighed. Too many ifs, not least about Patrick, but Ann was right . She shouldn’t leave it all too long. She wouldn’t.
When she arrived home that evening, Cara came downstairs bearing a cardboard box with Fragile stamped on every side. She watched Mel unpack it on the kitchen table , chasing the small zig-zags of polystyrene that burst out everywhere. The box contained a little teapot, just big enough for two cups. It was decorated with a pattern of clocks with funny spout-nosed faces and spindly legs in red and blue shoes. Woven in between the clocks were repeated the slogans, Time for tea, It’s teatime, Time to put the kettle on.
Cara, who was a romantic, stared at it, bemused. ‘Who is send you this?’ she said, searching for a label, but there was no name.
Mel laughed. ‘A very good friend of mine,’ was all she offered by way of explanation.
‘A man?’ Cara’s face was disbelieving.
‘A man, yes.’
‘I know what I say to a man who send me something like that,’ said Cara , hands on plump hips. ‘What about flowers or, mmm, something sexy for the bedroom?’
Mel laughed. ‘It’s exactly what I wanted from this man,’ she said. She would write him a note to say thank you.
That evening, Mel opened her laptop and started to thread into her book the new details she had learned that day about Pearl Treglown. Three days later, she judged
Radiant Light
finished and emailed the script to Grosvenor Press. She felt bereft after it had gone, as though a chapter in her own life had closed.
.
‘Time costs money even at Christmas,’ quipped Rob as he handed Mel a visitor’s parking permit for her car. ‘The warden will be looking for his last bonus before the great shutdown, mark my words. Here, let me take the case and that box. Can you and Rory manage the rest?’
It was lunchtime on Christmas Eve, and Mel had arrived to stay three nights at her sister’s with a car boot full of luggage.
‘We’ll be fine, thanks, Rob.’
‘I’m taking the presents in for you, Aunty Mel,’ Rory said with a solemn air, dragging a box over the lip of the boot.
‘Oh, Rory!’ Mel saved the contents from disaster just in time and helped him carry the box the dozen yards to the front door, through which she could see Rob vanishing upstairs with her suitcase.
‘Tell Chrissie I’ll be up in the loft,’ he called behind him.
Chrissie hurried up the stairs from the kitchen, her hands covered in stuffing for the turkey, and she and Mel kissed hello, no hands, like shy children.
‘These must go under the tree,’ shouted Rory, and started pulling parcels out over the living-room floor.
‘’Eddy, too.’ Freddy stumbled up the steps behind Chrissie and ran in to start a tug of war with his brother over a long thin present tied with a large silver bow.
‘Boys, stop,’ Chrissie said, helplessly waving her mucky hands. ‘You’re tearing the paper.’
‘It’s a kite!’ shrieked Rory. ‘For me from Aunty Mel.’
‘No, me,’ echoed Freddy.
‘It was for Rob, actually,’ sighed Mel. ‘Your presents aren’t in there, kids. Oh, I’ve left my handbag in the car. And all the doors unlocked.’ Casting a helpless glance at Rory’s activities she rushed out into the street.
She shouldered her bag and set down a second box of presents on the pavement so she could lock up. It had taken ages yesterday evening, wrapping and decorating them all with ribbons, bows and stickers until they looked too good to open. A silky nightdress for Chrissie, a sports biography for Rob to supplement the jokey present of the kite, a critically acclaimed travel memoir plus a scarf for her father, some pretty china for Stella. Several parcels each for the children, the fruit of a happy morning in Hamley’s toy shop with Aimee, who had chosen the latest computer game for Callum.
The only person close to her Mel hadn’t bought a present for this year was Patrick. Try as hard as she might, she hadn’t been able to think of anything suitable, anything that felt right given the circumstances. Men were difficult to buy presents for at the best of times, she told herself, so what did you get for somebody you thought about all the time but with whom you didn’t, at the moment, actually have a relationship? Aftershave? Too clichéd. Books? She wasn’t sure which. Music? Ditto. A tie? Socks? Too boring.
Worst of all, she hadn’t even heard from him since the arrival of the teapot back in mid-November. At first it hadn’t seemed to matter, she passed her days with the thought of him tucked away in her mind like a special secret. But as the weeks crept on and there was no communication from him, her brave confidence began to flag. Had he forgotten her? Or had, maybe, his view of her altered? Perhaps, it occurred to her, lying awake in the darkest hours of the night, he had even found somebody else. But surely he would have said, if that was the case. Wouldn’t he? Surely by now they had built some modicum of trust between them.
I should have written to him again since thanking him for the teapot, she decided as she reached into the boot to rescue a bottle of Rob’s favourite whisky that had rolled to the back. Shouldn’t have left things so long, unresolved. And yet space, silence, is what they had agreed to grant one another, wasn’t it?
She leaned against the open boot, suddenly devoid of energy. In the end, she had made him a beautiful card with folding cut-outs of gold and silver angels, and had inscribed it,
Darling Patrick. Wishing you a most wonderful Christmas and New Year. PS: I’m at Chrissie’s with the children as usual. How about you?
She had dropped the card in the postbox two weeks ago and gone to the door hopefully every day since, looking for something from him amongst the scattering of cards from friends, old colleagues and rarely-glimpsed aunts. But nothing came. Nothing, nothing, nothing.
Where did this leave her? Nowhere. Worse than nowhere. In a black hole.
‘Any sign of Dad and Stella?’ asked Mel as, presents tucked safely under the huge Christmas tree, she joined Chrissie in the kitchen.
‘They got here an hour ago and went straight out to the off-licence,’ said Chrissie, her arm halfway up a huge turkey carcass, Freddy meanwhile was clamped to her leg, whining.
‘Anything I can do?’ Mel said faintly, staring round the chaos of the kitchen. Something in a preserving pan was bubbling furiously on the stove, there was flour spilled on the floor. On every surface lay food in various states of preparation.
‘Can you turn down the ham? Then there’s that Yule log over there to decorate – chocolate icing’s in the fridge – and the spuds to peel. I should have done some of it earlier but there were the refreshments for Rory’s Christmas show and they gave me an extra shift at work this week, which made me furious. I still haven’t made up the beds, can you believe it – never mind wrapping presents. Oh Freddy, darling, don’t dig your nails in, that hurts.’
Freddy gave another wail at his mother’s sharp tone, and Mel, after turning the gas to ‘simmer’, reached down to scoop him up. ‘Come on, monster,’ she whispered into his ear and he turned to snuggle into her.
‘Actually, Mel, can you go and ask Rob to come downstairs. He’s been looking for the star for the top of the tree half the morning, and we really can live without it. Maybe he’ll occupy the boys for a bit, hang up the stockings and make paperchains or something.’
The doorbell rang.
‘Oh, that’ll be Dad and Stella.’
‘We’ll get it, won’t we, Freddy?’ sang Mel and started up the stairs to the hall, nuzzling the little boy’s head. He smelled deliciously of chocolate, babywipes and sleep. Last Christmas, she remembered, he could only crawl and had been more interested in wrapping paper than presents. How quickly everything changed. Had it really been a year ago that they had all sat mournfully around the dinner-table as William, in his somewhat pompous manner, toasted ‘absent friends’. William and his family were spending the day with his in-laws, this year. It would be strange having Dad instead . . . she hoped he wouldn’t be irritable.
The doorbell rang again. ‘Coming,’ she called and, with her free hand, helped Rory open the door. It wasn’t her father on the doorstep but a young man with a motorcycle helmet at his feet, juggling a long rectangular box and a clipboard.
‘Sign for this?’ he said, holding the clipboard steady. Mel scribbled her name and took the package, which felt lighter than she somehow expected, wishing him Happy Christmas. Rory shut the door shouting, ‘Goodbye, man.’
In the gloom of the hall she peered at the label to see whether the parcel was for Rob or Chrissie. Instead she was surprised that it read
Ms Melanie Pentreath
. Why would someone send her something here? The box was really quite light. Not a bottle, obviously, and the wrong shape for chocolates.
She and the boys climbed back down to the kitchen. Chrissie, wrapping foil over the turkey with a ghostly rattling, looked up, eyebrows raised. When she saw the box and Mel said, ‘It’s for me, oddly,’ she gave a curiously knowing smile. ‘What?’ Mel said.
‘Nothing,’ said Chrissie, dropping the turkey back in its roasting tray and coming over to see.
Mel slid Freddy into his high chair with the cardboard roll from the foil to play with, then sat down and started to ease out the flaps of the box. It was then she noticed the address on the courier’s label: Cornwall. She lifted the lid, folded it back, then pulled apart the layers of cellophane and tissue to reveal . . . a neatly tied sheaf of daffodil buds – no, not just daffodils, but
sol d’oeuil
, narcissi, bedded in damp cottonwool. The faint perfume, the dewy green freshness, rose from the box to transport her out of this hot ham- and onion-smelling, steam-filled kitchen back to the garden at Merryn, the only sound the songs of the birds, the salt-tinged breeze on her face. It was too much. The tears pooled in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks.
Patrick hadn’t forgotten her. He was calling her back. Merryn was calling her. Perhaps it was time.
‘Why are you crying, Aunty Mel?’ asked Rory, more interested in adult tears than the flowers.
‘Aunty no kie,’ wailed Freddy.
‘Because I’m happy,’ whispered Mel.
There was a card tucked into the cellophane and she pulled it out. Across it in black ink Patrick had scrawled:
From the garden, the eternal promise of spring. Happy Christmas, darling, all my love, Patrick
.
When Mel’s father and his wife returned five minutes later, Stella, elegant in navy and white twinset, took one look at the chaotic kitchen, at Mel sitting crying over a box of flowers, Chrissie trying to comfort her, the children yelling as they fought over the foil roll and, with tactful authority, she took charge. ‘I can make lunch, if you like, Chrissie,’ she said, whilst you deal with the more important tasks.’ And before long, soup, cold meat and salad, were laid out on the table in the dining room whilst Rob poured sherry and listened attentively to his father-in-law’s views on the parlous state of the Health Service.