The Queen of the Tambourine (26 page)

“Then it was over. In the end it was a quick thing. Or at any rate, it was partly over because the thing I had voided, with its little hands was still joined on to me. I lay, wet and sweaty, and out from behind the beehive there came an old tortoise walking straight towards me. They're not slow, you know. Not at all. It came on, rather fast. Very steady on its long obscene legs, sharp claws. It lifted its snake head in the air. It had an old man's mean little mouth. Black pin-head eyes. Up on its toes it came.

“So I screamed, and tried to kick it away, but it came on and the bees buzzed in the luminous migraine dahlias.

“I passed out. I'd left my front door open across the Road and in the end—in the early evening I think—somebody found me. Henry flew home. He couldn't have been kinder. I think he and the doctor had a consultation, but I didn't ask. I know there was something, but never mind.”

“You must go on.”

“I believed. I believe—that they. I'd read that foetuses are sold for research. I heard the doctor say that mine had been very perfect.”

“I'm sure it was.”

“I should have asked. I should have been asked.”

“Forget it now, Eliza.”

“They didn't tell me what sex it was. I didn't ask that either. I still don't know. l've never told anyone about the tortoise. They're harmless creatures. They're herbivores, I think—I never really dared find out. It was the claws. Yet I do know that it was nobody's fault. It was the slightest thing compared with what our ancestors . . . It was just life. They were such claws. This is all true, Barry.”

“It is all true,” he says. “And it is all over. And you are disentangled.”

“Barry—
you
are true?”

“I was always true. I was there and true from the first time we met in The Hospice. A poor specimen but of flesh and blood. For what that's worth.”

“It's worth so much. Barry, shall I ever see you anymore?”

He's become not in the least faint or fuzzy but most brilliantly present. “I'll always be with you somewhere,” he says, and is gone.

 

The seat beside me is empty. Pack and boy have vanished. I touch the cushion. It is undented and cold. I take out the awful earrings I bought in the Indian shop on Putney Bridge, where I bought the dress and the sweets. I place them on the seat. The last trace and breath of Barry registers approval. The very last whisper of him says, “And when you get home, remember. There will be one last thing to face. A hard thing. But only to do with this last hour.”

 

The Big Wheel shakes itself. There is a wracking shudder. The lights of the Fair come on again and the tin-can music starts to play. Step by step, slowly and daintily, we are all brought down from our nests, helped out, made much of. There's a crowd. Firemen shout. Someone puts me down flat on my back on the grass, and I lie there, spread.

I hear excited voices and looking sideways I see feet. Four of them belong to two sentinels each holding a torch of candy-floss almost the size of its bearer. The sentinels run off. They return and I see between their feet, a larger figure and a pair of dirty trainers with a broken lace. The sentinels get down on their knees beside me and Amanda strokes my hair. Over Nick Fish's shoulder peeps the baby, like arrows in their quiver.

“Oh no,” I hear the Curate cry. “It's Eliza Peabody!”

 

 

Morning of mornings

 

They got me home, dear Joan, but I did not go to bed. I took a bath with scented soap and I ate some strawberries that I'd found on my doorstep, left by the man who has everything, with a note. My dog was kind to me, faithful bewildered dog. I shall put the rugs back for him, and the furniture and the cushions. Long-suffering, nice animal.

Through the short June night that never seemed to get quite dark I lay in the drawing room and sometimes I slept and sometimes I didn't. At some point, after I think I had probably slept, I faced Barry's last command and said, out loud, “And finally, of course, there was no ghost.”

I dare say I wept then, but slept again and about four o'clock woke to the marvellous chorus of the summer birds, at peace.

 

When it was light, I looked across to see if he'd left the photograph on the mantelpiece, wondering if I could forgive him if he had. He had not. I wondered if I dare look in the hall and see if the dirty shirt bag was there. I dared not. But I laughed. Then I went to sleep again.

I woke properly at a little before six, walked stiffly across the room and looked out at the Road and its dewy gardens. I looked at where number thirty-four used to stand. Nothing. I examined my clean fingernails, thin white arcs.

The paper-boy slammed up and down the road, his feet slapping on the flights of steps, clattering the gates, fading away. One quiet early car drifted self-consciously by. Then up the Road came Old Bernard on his bike, knees out sideways like a grasshopper, off to the Common for his daily meditation on the mystery of his continuing life. He did not turn his head, but raised a hand to me in salute. I wondered if he was some sort of a sign.

Certainly not, for we need no signs. We need no extras, no tickets or labels or tags. Dulcie is wrong—it
is
sufficient just “to be.” “And signs only appear, it seems to me,” I said to the empty space before me, “when the need for them is over.”

As I said it, the room behind me grew perfectly still and I turned and looked at the telephone on the gold and glass table. Presently it began to ring.

“Oh, hullo,” said a voice. “Sorry, I'm rather early. This is Joan.”

 

43, Rathbone Road,

London, S.W.

1 July, 1990

 

My dear Joan Fish,

 

Do forgive me for being so long in writing. Your early morning call must now be about two weeks ago—perhaps longer—and I am ashamed of myself. I am very busy and very happy which is my only excuse, and one I think you'll understand.

It was a delightful surprise to hear you, and no, of course, you were not at all too early. Henry and I have lived abroad so much that the one thing we do understand is the time difference. I was anyway up and about.

And I was so flattered that Lucien had “recommended” me. I am I fear rather an elderly “au pair,” but I can last, I'm sure, until Vanessa comes back to roost. I'm glad that Lucien convinced you that I would be suitable, though I believe Lucien could convince anyone of anything. I'm rather afraid, though, that he didn't tell you that I've had very little to do with children and have had none of my own.

But your grandchildren and I do get on very well, even though I'm well aware that I'm only a substitute for Vanessa, and very temporarily, for I'm sure—absolutely certain—that she'll be back. She is volatile but not irresponsible. She loves her family and they adore her. When she does get back I'm going to make Nick put her in touch with the nuns on the Common who were invaluable to me once when I was tending to get a bit low.

Now I have to tell you—but don't panic please—that before long I have to go to America with my husband where I'm to meet for the first time my sole surviving relative, and, also, my stepdaughter. I shall not go until the Fishes are back to normal. There's no hurry. And you are not to make
any
plans to come over here yourself. Sorry to be bossy, but with a “wonky leg” you should stay where you are, even if as you say you are “not yet eighty.”

I must tell you something so nice. When you rang I happened to be standing at the window, looking out at where your old house used to be. I remember it, you know. It was very bomb-damaged but I loved its garden. I used to try and imagine what the people there had been like—I never knew that it had been Nick's family's house before he was born.

But the queer, nice thing was this. When I picked up the phone and you spoke I suddenly remembered my mother's voice, and she died when I was only six.

Now—back to the shirts. I do Lucien's and Nick's with my husband's—not Amanda's. She's all for drip-dry. I could easily send to a laundry but I'm rather good at ironing. The baby I fuss over like a fool. He is really my heart's love. I go over every day and stay till his bedtime. I'm happy in that house and there is only one thing I have been tough about—that Nick gets rid of those filthy fish-tanks and that creature they keep in a saucepan by the kitchen stove. I'm making them give the money to The Society of the Risen Christ!

My cooking improves daily. I make them eat everything. When their mother comes back they'll tell her about all my hang-ups. Butter knives, clean handkerchieves, etc. Ah well.

Some escape and some never.

Thank you for ringing. Perhaps one day we'll meet? You don't know what you did for me by getting in touch. God bless you for it.

 

Sincerely yours,

Elizabeth Peabody

 

 

Jane Gardam is the only writer to have been twice awarded the Whitbread Prize for Best Novel of the Year (for
The Queen of the Tambourine
and
The Hollow Land
). She also holds a Heywood Hill Literary Prize for a lifetime's contribution to the enjoyment of literature.

She has published four volumes of acclaimed stories:
Black Faces, White Faces
(David Higham Prize and the Royal Society for Literature's Winifred Holtby Prize);
The Pangs of Love
(Katherine Mansfield Prize);
Going into a Dark House
(Silver Pen Award from PEN); and most recently,
Missing the Midnight
.

Her novels include
God on the Rocks
(shortlisted for the Booker Prize),
Faith Fox, The Flight of the Maidens
and
Old Filth
, a
New York Times
Notable Book of the Year.

Jane Gardam lives with her husband in England.