The Turtle Run (31 page)

She smiled, recollecting.

Matthew smiled back. ‘What?'

‘Nothing, I was just remembering the first time we met. In England. At your house.'

He frowned. ‘My house? Oh, you mean Noak Hall. You're blushing so I definitely want to hear about this memory.'

‘I'd wondered who the banquet was for. As I was leaving I saw you run down the steps to raise an umbrella over a young woman. I was a little envious of your girlfriend to be honest.'

‘Girlfriend? The spoilt daughter of a wealthy family in Paris. They run Anglo-French excursions. I'm trying to push both the hotel here and the one in England as bilingual concerns. It just means that I have to schmooze in French and sound knowledgeable about French cuisine. And I have to dress up like James bloody Bond and look like I know what I'm doing.'

‘Oh.'

He looked at her, smiling. ‘You do know that it's all fantasy, don't you? The dressing up, the silver cutlery, the stately pile?'

‘Yes, of course. But sometimes the fantasy is nice.'

‘So, if I wanted to impress you, I wouldn't have to buy you a new car, or employ a masseur, or name a hotel after you?'

‘No, just sort out a posh dinner in a stately home. And run down the steps to greet me. That would be my fantasy.'

He laughed. ‘Then you'd be easy to please.'

He switched on the air conditioning and Becky relaxed back into her seat, realising her shoulders had been tense. She wasn't sure if this was because she was alone with Matthew and had just shared a fantasy she should have kept to herself or because she felt the weight of her own expectation when this journey ended. How would she react when she saw her father's gravestone? Would she feel anything? Would she fall apart? She just didn't know.

It was a magnificent day and the road they took towards Bridgetown wound its way past the now familiar fields of sugar cane. Edging the fields arching manes of some platinum-coloured grass rippled gloriously in the sunlight. The lanes they were bowling along bore delicious names like Featherbed Lane, Pie Corner or Cow Watering Place. She read them out as they flew past for their mutual amusement.

‘My father used to send us drawings – his own maps of Barbados: plants and trees for me, ships and cars for Joe. I think he felt more at home in Barbados than in England.'

He took his eyes off the road to glance at her. ‘So did he actually live here?'

‘I don't really know. All I know is he was in the merchant navy, made several trips to Barbados and eventually died here.'

He glanced at her again then said in a careful voice. ‘I don't want to pry but the way you said that sounds like you didn't care for him very much.'

‘I did. It's just there are lots of things my brother and I don't understand. For a start Joe and I weren't that young – I was eleven, he was eight – so we don't know why our mother kept Dad's death from us for a year.'

‘But didn't you ask, you know, when's Dad coming home?'

‘We did wait surprisingly long to ask that question. I guess because, in the past, there'd been times when we'd thought he was never coming back. Then one day he'd just turn up and it was like celebrating Christmas and birthdays all rolled into one. He always brought us fun presents. But really it was having him there that counted.'

‘So how did you eventually find out?'

‘I think it was coming up to Christmas. Mum realised Joe and I were convinced he'd finally come home so she told us that he had died. Later we found out that he'd died almost a year before but our mother had chosen not to have his body returned to England. And what was chilling was that she hadn't even flown out here for the funeral. Her excuse was that she couldn't leave us. But at the time of his death her mother was still alive. She could have stayed with us for a few days while Mum went off.'

‘Money?'

Becky shook her head. ‘The shipping company Dad worked for would have seen to all her expenses. Plane fare, accommodation at a guesthouse here. I found the letter with their offer when I was rummaging around in her desk for Christmas tags not all that long ago. I think she turned down the offer because she simply didn't want to come to Barbados.'

‘But why?'

‘I guess it wasn't the happiest marriage. When Joe and I were older and tried to get to the bottom of it she just got upset and, worse, resentful that we kept asking her – in the end we gave up.'

‘So what memories do you have of your dad?'

‘Good ones.' Becky smiled. ‘I remember he invented a hilarious game called “navy speak”. He was Captain Bligh, sitting in an armchair and shouting orders to his useless, scurvy-ridden crew. “Hoist that lug sail,” he'd shout. “Trim the binnacle lamp!” His scurvy crew, Joe and me, would run around the house like mad ants searching for something we thought might look like a binnacle lamp – whatever that was. My mother's stockpot I seem to remember came in handy and we'd dash back to his chair. “Perfect,” he'd say and pretend to trim it. We'd laugh ourselves silly.'

‘Did he ever tell you what a binnacle lamp was?'

‘No. I think he just enjoyed seeing what Joe and I would come up with.'

‘He sounds like fun.'

‘He was. Mum was more serious. But to be fair she had us day in, day out. We didn't see him that often so of course it was easy for him to seem wonderful and exciting.'

‘I take it your dad was comparatively young when he died. How did it happen?'

‘I can't blame my mother for keeping
that
from us until we were older. She thought it would upset us and she was right. He was the boatswain and he was carrying out some sort of ship maintenance when he fell. Heights had never bothered him and he had done that particular job dozens of times apparently. But that day he lost his footing.'

Matthew kept his eyes on the road ahead but she saw him grimace. It occurred to Becky that she wasn't the only one who had lost a father.

‘If you don't mind me asking how did your father die?'

‘Heart trouble,' said Matthew. ‘He was only fifty-three and he looked quite fit. He was a lean man, always doing something in the garden. My mother was brilliant for him but I think, even with her support, it was too late. His problems had “set”, for want of a better word, when he was much younger.'

‘Problems?'

‘I mentioned the sense of shame that hung over the family. I think he always had a feeling that he wasn't good enough. That can bite away at some people; really sap their strength.'

‘Now I understand why Clara feels so strongly about the Redlegs.' And her ambivalence about writing the book, thought Becky. She had mistaken it for guilt at being complicit in the exploitation of indentured labourers when it was probably more that Clara was finding it emotionally draining examining the circumstances that had contributed to her husband's premature death.

‘I was once engaged to a girl who came from an old family on the island,' said Matthew. ‘Our equivalent of the upper class, I suppose, which – believe me – used to be more snobby than anything you'd find in England. Her family made her pull out of the engagement because they thought I was – well, not suitable. My father was dead within the month. Heart attack.'

‘That's dreadful.' Becky wondered why he didn't admit he was talking about Francesca. ‘Were you besotted?'

‘I was young,' he said then pointed out an old well in a field on her side of the road. ‘Look, an uncovered one. Most of the old wells have been covered up to stop goats and children toppling in. When I was a kid I loved playing round wells. Unfortunately they are magnets for children.'

Becky tried to imagine Matthew as a young boy, running around with Alex and Chris Harris. She pictured them chasing each other barefoot through the fields.

‘On a different subject, how's the research going?'

Becky sighed. ‘It's gone nowhere to be honest. There isn't really much new material to work on. I know Clara has a lot of faith in the notes she's scribbled over the years but – how shall I put this? It's as though she wrote them ages ago and then left them alone so they have kind of grown in importance in her mind. Not that I'm criticising her.'

‘No, I realise that. The funny thing is she hasn't mentioned writing a history book since – I can't remember when – perhaps since I was in my early twenties. It was something that played on her mind for a few years after my father died but the enthusiasm gradually faded.'

‘Oh God,' said Becky. ‘Maybe it was just because she felt sorry for me she invented it as a job.'

‘She could have been thinking about it all those years even though she said nothing. I'm sure she still often thinks of my father.'

They continued in companionable silence until Matthew asked, ‘Did you say no one would have tended his grave for years?'

‘That's right. Probably not for – I don't know – twelve years.'

Matthew groaned but said nothing further.

The area they were now driving through looked familiar to Becky; she guessed they had reached the outskirts of Bridgetown. Matthew turned into a cemetery and parked next to a chapel that could have been any one of those pretty little churches you come across in the English countryside, except for the row of pink and white frangipani trees ranged along its borders.

They got out, Matthew opened the boot and handed her the flowers. She sensed he was holding back telling her something. It was quite a large cemetery. Maybe he was wondering how they would find where her father was laid?

‘I expect it'll be an unkempt grave with rank weeds and knee-high grass,' she said.

Matthew slammed the boot shut. ‘It might be worse than that.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘There's been quite a bit of controversy recently about old bodies being dug up and reburied in communal graves. You know, so the graves can be re-used.'

Becky nodded. ‘I think we have that in the UK. After fifty years or so, if no one has visited, some graves can be reassigned.'

‘The controversy is that in Barbados, in some cases, it has happened after just five years.'

Becky could not believe she had finally made it here and there was a chance she might not find her father's grave. ‘Thanks for warning me. I won't get my hopes up.'

They went through the gate and walked down the first path, stopping to peer at any headstone where the grave wasn't in pristine condition. ‘What was your dad's name?'

‘Philip. Philip Thomson.'

‘Right, let's keep our eyes peeled.'

Before long they came to a tall granite tablet engraved with the names of the luckless midshipmen, drummer boy, captain and officers of a warship that had been stationed in the West Indies in Nelson's time. The memorial recorded how, like some phantom ship in a legend, the warship had drifted into Barbados one day and people had watched its erratic progress, wondering why there was apparently no one in charge. When it was boarded the entire crew was found to be dead or dying of yellow fever. The monument stood where they were all buried in one mass grave – in the same cemetery as Philip Thomson. Matthew and Becky still had not found his grave but the memorial was a useful way of getting their bearings. It was so large it was visible from every point of the cemetery.

When they found themselves back at the grim memorial for the third time Matthew stopped and frowned. ‘We could just keep going round like this forever. You sure he's buried in Southbury, Becky?'

‘It has to be this cemetery. I made a note of it from my mother's papers. She keeps everything related to his death in one big envelope. Autopsy, death certificate. Funeral details. I don't understand why we can't find his grave.'

‘There were a couple of men back there, digging. If anyone knows the layout it will be the gravediggers. I'll go and ask them.'

‘OK, thanks.'

Becky wandered over to an area of well-tended graves where the grief was still sharp judging by the fresh flowers and unfaded cards; some had flower arrangements spelling out ‘DAD' or ‘MUM'. She paused by one grave commemorated with a simple collection of flowers – handpicked by the look of them, which somehow increased their poignancy. She noticed that a solitary card had fallen to the side of the grave and automatically picked it up to lean it against the flower receptacle. It read:
l'll never forget you, my dearest one. Rest in Peace
.

Matthew was wandering over to her. ‘Apparently this is the right area,' he called. ‘Any deaths to do with ships seem to be round here, they tell me.'

She stayed where she was until he reached her then pointed to the gravestone. ‘It's here. We missed it because it isn't overgrown with weeds.'

The gravestone looked faded in contrast to the bright flowers beneath it but (unlike the tombstones back in Somerset) it was easy to read:

Here lie the Remains of

Philip Thomson

Who lost his life aboard
Abigail

1951–2003

‘It's well tended,' said Matthew. ‘Flowers too. That's nice.'

‘Is it?'

Matthew looked momentarily confused then seemed to understand what was bothering her. ‘Look the flowers probably come from the seaman's union. Or, if not, we'll find out who the Good Samaritan is and you can show them your appreciation.'

‘Here's the Good Samaritan's card,' Becky handed it to him. ‘I guess I know now why my mother didn't want to come out for his funeral.'

Matthew read the backward-sloping handwriting and turned the card over. ‘She hasn't put her name.' He handed it back to Becky.

‘No, she hasn't.'

She replaced the card among the flowers and as she straightened up he put an arm round her shoulder. ‘I'm sorry. You had no idea?'

She shook her head. ‘Naively, I didn't. But my mother obviously did.'