An Empty Death

by Laura Wilson

  ‘No!’ Dacre shouted. ‘No!’ He was feeling dizzy, he couldn’t hold himself up, his balance had deserted him, he was falling…The old man’s face fell away, too, a sheer drop into darkness, and then – quite suddenly – nothing at all.

  Part II

  Sixty-Six

  April, 1945, nine months after Jenny’s death: Stratton stared into the small fire in Mrs Chetwynd’s sitting room without really seeing it. It was ten o’clock, and Monica and Pete had gone to bed, Mrs Chetwynd having declared it more sensible for them to remain in Norfolk overnight and return to London with Stratton the following morning. After a miserable winter of ice, burst pipes, chilblains and incessant doodlebugs, not to mention the time it took for his arm to heal and his and Ballard’s frustration that Dacre appeared to have vanished off the face of the earth, the last bomb – a V2 rocket – had fallen at the end of March, and it was deemed safe for the children to return home. Doris and Lilian had promised to help keep an eye on them, and in any case Monica, at fifteen, and Pete, at twelve, would be able to do a great deal for themselves.

  Mrs Chetwynd entered, carrying a tea tray. Her elderly housekeeper having died the previous year and the servants long departed, she was, as she put it, ‘learning to fend for herself’. A raw-boned, angular woman, she had, Stratton thought, grown thinner since they’d first met almost five years earlier, when she’d taken the children to live with her. There were more lines on her long, rather horsey face, and more grey in her hair – things, Stratton thought, that were true of him, also. It occurred to him that, after Monica and Pete departed, she might be lonely, all by herself in her great house. As if reading his thoughts, Mrs Chetwynd said, ‘You know, it would be a relief to sell up and move into one of the cottages, but nobody wants these big places nowadays.’

  ‘Someone might turn it into a school,’ suggested Stratton.

  ‘Too much work to do,’ said Mrs Chetwynd, briskly. ‘They’d have to change everything, and the roof is in a terrible state. It’s a white elephant, really.’ Eyes down, concentrating on pouring tea, she added, ‘It’s been lovely having Monica and Peter here, you know. They’ve kept the place alive.’

  ‘I’m very grateful to you,’ said Stratton, and then, feeling that this sounded automatic, he said, ‘You’ve been so kind to them, especially since…’

  Mrs Chetwynd put down the teapot and looked directly at him. ‘Since Mrs Stratton died. I am so sorry, Mr Stratton. It was a terrible thing to happen.’

  ‘Yes, it was,’ said Stratton, abruptly, and turned back to the fire, unable to bear the kindness in her eyes.

  ‘People never talk about the dead, do they? They don’t want you to talk about them, either.’

  Stratton, reflecting on how few conversations he’d had about Jenny, even in the first days and weeks after her death, said, ‘No, they don’t.’

  ‘It’s not because they’ve forgotten, you know. It’s because they’re embarrassed, and they don’t want to upset you.’

  ‘I know.’ Stratton sighed. ‘Everyone has been very good.’

  ‘But it’s not good if you want to talk about them, is it?’ Mrs Chetwynd handed him a cup of tea.

  As he stared at the pale liquid, Stratton realised quite how much he did want to talk about Jenny, as well as thinking about her. It wouldn’t make him miss her any less, he knew that, but it would be…comforting. Even with Donald, he hadn’t really – he’d kept hoping that his brother-in-law would mention her name, or that there might be an opportunity…Not to go over how it had happened, because that was not only pointless, but beyond his ability to discuss without lifting the lid on a great reservoir of fury and self-hatred that seemed to lodge, like a physical thing, inside his chest. But he would like to be able to talk about her, how she looked and was, and things they’d done together, and laughed about. ‘No,’ he said, ‘not if you want to talk about them.’

  ‘Well,’ said Mrs Chetwynd. ‘I’m listening.’

  Stratton blinked. He didn’t know what to say. Then a picture of Jenny in the yard at Mrs Chetwynd’s home farm came into his mind, and he said, ‘She was a London girl. When we first met she’d never been further from home than Southend…We used to go and stay at my brother’s farm in Devon sometimes, when the kids were small – that’s where I come from. I grew up on the farm, but Jenny was always scared of anything bigger than a dog. She worried about the children getting too close to the cows, even when they were here. When we first met, she used to laugh at my accent – it was stronger then. But it wasn’t unkind – she never mocked people. That was one of the things I first noticed about her, how kind she was. If anything went wrong, she worried in case it was her fault, and tried to put it right…and she was a wonderful mother, right from the start, the way she looked after them…all of us…I miss her being there. In the same room, or knowing she’s somewhere in the house…I used to walk through the door at the end of the day, and even if things weren’t going well at work, it didn’t matter, because there she was and everything was all right, somehow…’ Stratton found he couldn’t speak any more, and suddenly an enormous, gulping sob was in his throat and he couldn’t hold it back. He put his head in his hands and, for the first time since Jenny died, wept.

  Mrs Chetwynd left the room quietly, and returned a couple of minutes later with two large white handkerchiefs. ‘Here you are.’

  ‘Thank you. I’m very sorry about that.’ Mortified by his outburst, Stratton blew his nose, hard, and attempted to rally sufficiently to bid her goodnight before he disgraced himself any further.

  To his surprise, Mrs Chetwynd sat down opposite once more and said, in a conversational tone as if nothing had happened, ‘Yes, that was how Mrs Stratton struck me, you know. A very good mother. Not that I have children myself, but one can sense these things. My husband was killed in the Great War. I was eighteen when I married. Nineteen-fourteen. We’d known each other since we were twelve, and Edward never seemed to mind that I wasn’t beautiful.’ She chuckled. ‘My parents must have been amazed to get me off their hands so quickly, because I had no money coming to me. Edward was killed in September 1915. The Battle of Loos. His brother, Alfred, was killed about eighteen months later, at Arras. His mother never really recovered – they were her only children.’

  Understanding that this confidence was kindly meant, Stratton said, ‘And you were never tempted to marry again?’

  Mrs Chetwynd shook her head. ‘Edward was…well, he was it, if you see what I mean.’ There was no self-pity in her voice, just the flatness of one stating a fact. ‘But I had the consolation of knowing that Edward had died for his country…’ Her face darkened. ‘For some years, at least. When I heard Mr Chamberlain’s broadcast announcing that we were at war again, I thought, Edward died for nothing. They all did.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Stratton. ‘I thought the same about my eldest brother. He was killed at Passchendaele.’

  ‘It’s different, though,’ said Mrs Chetwynd. ‘They were soldiers. It’s harder for you. The way Mrs Stratton died…The children haven’t talked about it much – or not to me, anyway. It’s difficult for them to understand – well, for anyone. So…pointless. I’m sorry,’ she said, hastily, ‘if I’m speaking out of turn, but I think that’s why it’s so hard for them. If it were a bomb, they would understand it better – the apparent randomness, I mean, but this…’

  ‘Yes,’ said Stratton. ‘A bomb would have been easier. I don’t know,’ he added, on an impulse he didn’t quite understand, ‘how I shall ever explain it to Monica and Pete, because it wasn’t really as random as…well, as I told them. The woman was looking for Jenny, and…’ He stopped and stared for a moment at Mrs Chetwynd, whose eyes made him feel that he could say it, before continuing, ‘it was my fault.’

  ‘How?’

  Stratton launched into an explanation of the events which had led to Jenny’s death, from the beginning – his words tumbling over each other and the things he’d known and hadn’t known coming out as a jumble, so that he
had to go back several times and clarify what he meant – to Elsie Ingram’s eventual arrest. ‘The worst thing is that everyone blames themselves for it. Doris says it’s her fault because she should have listened to Donald and asked for Mrs Ingram to go to the asylum, and because she saved her when she tried to gas herself. Jenny didn’t want to bother me, you see. Donald was all for telling me about Mrs Ingram’s attempt to commit suicide, but Jenny and Doris persuaded him not to, because they thought I’d have to report it, so he blames himself for that…And I knew Jenny was worried about the woman, but I was so taken up with what was happening at work that when she didn’t say anything about it I was relieved, to be honest. I should have asked her. Made her tell me. And at the Rest Centre, if I’d just paid attention – a few moments earlier, and she’d be here now. She was pregnant. I only found out afterwards. She hadn’t told me. The baby would have been due last month. I wish she’d told me. She was trying to, at the end, but I didn’t listen…didn’t understand.’ Stratton shook his head. ‘Before, she must have thought I’d be angry, because we’d always said we’d only have the two…’ Stratton stopped, shaking his head again, in despair. ‘I can’t tell Monica and Pete I rescued the woman who killed their mother. I wasn’t to know, but I think it would be hard for them to understand. They might end up hating me.’

  ‘I don’t think they will,’ said Mrs Chetwynd, ‘but I think you should wait until they’re older before you try to explain all that to them. I doubt if even a mental specialist would understand the woman’s condition.’

  ‘I’m sorry that you had to be the one to break the news to them,’ said Stratton, recalling how it had been when he’d arrived, a week later, to see them: Monica weeping, Pete, white-faced and silent. ‘I did wonder if I should have taken them back with me, for the funeral, but…’

  ‘It was probably for the best, Mr Stratton. Having to return here afterwards – away from your family – that would have been very hard for them. Monica has started to talk about her mother in the last couple of months, but not in front of Peter. I think…being rather younger, I suppose…he isn’t ready to talk about her yet. Monica was very worried about you, you know. She kept saying that they ought to go home because you’d be lonely by yourself.’

  ‘That’s so like Jenny,’ said Stratton, touched by this in an enormous, but entirely inexpressible, way. ‘Thinking of other people. She’s a good girl.’

  ‘They both are. You should be very proud of them, Mr Stratton. It always seemed to me – if you don’t mind my saying so – that you had a very happy marriage, and I’m sure that Monica and Peter are aware of that…of your love for their mother.’

  ‘I’d have given anything to save her.’

  ‘I think the children will understand that. Now, as there won’t be much time tomorrow morning, there is something I’d like to say: I shall miss Monica and Peter, very much. If they wish to visit me – to stay, in the school holidays – I should be delighted to see them.’

  ‘That’s very generous—’ began Stratton, but Mrs Chetwynd raised a hand to cut him off.

  ‘Nothing generous about it. Pure selfishness on my part. I like their company. Besides,’ she twinkled at him, ‘if they come in the summer, they can help with the harvest. And you are very welcome too, of course, if you can spare the time from your work. If you can’t, the children are quite old enough now to travel on their own.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Stratton. ‘And thank you for…for listening to all that,’ he finished, lamely, feeling that it wasn’t quite what he’d wanted to say, but he couldn’t think of a better way to put it.

  ‘Not at all.’ Mrs Chetwynd rose from her armchair and picked up the tray. ‘Goodnight, Mr Stratton.’

  Sixty-Seven

  The children were subdued on the train home, staring out of the window and saying little. Stratton watched them, covertly, from behind his newspaper. Monica, now she was older, looked heartbreakingly like Jenny, except for her black hair, inherited from him. Pete had Jenny’s colouring – green eyes and chestnut hair – but the face and build were more like his own. What would the new one have been? Boy or girl? And how was he going to look after Monica and Pete? It wasn’t the practical things that bothered him – Doris and Lilian would see that they were fed and clothed – but getting to know them again. When they’d returned in forty-two, it was Jenny who had smoothed their transition back to life at home, not him. They’d had their own war, up in Norfolk, experiences that he did not know about, other than the things they’d put in their letters, and, in the eighteen months since they’d been re-evacuated, they’d changed again, grown up…

  Jenny would have known what to do, how to behave with them. His thoughts moved into the futile repeating loop of asking himself why she hadn’t told him about how bad Mrs Ingram was – the suicide attempt and the other erratic behaviour – and answering himself, as he always did, that it was because of his job. She’d seen him then as a policeman, not a husband: no wonder, when he hadn’t been behaving like one – distant, not listening to her, belittling her fears, not asking her what was wrong…If he’d been able to report the suicide attempt, Jenny would still be alive.

  But being a policeman had nothing to do with why she hadn’t told him she was pregnant – he couldn’t kid himself about that. It was possible that she was waiting until she was certain – they’d said it was very early – but he knew, in his heart, the real reason was that she thought he’d blame her. That, he supposed, was true, but now – Oh, Jenny, he thought, I wouldn’t care if we had ten more children, if you were only here.

  As the train drew nearer to Liverpool Street, Stratton watched his children stare at the ruins of the City, the massive craters left by the V2 rockets, the gaping cellars and rubble where whole streets had been razed to the ground, punctuated here and there by the burnt-out shells of churches. It was far worse than it had been the last time they were in London. Staring out at the devastation, he thought of the reports he’d heard on the wireless from Buchenwald and Belsen, of the open mass graves and socket-eyed, barely-living skeletons. It was as if God were saying, ‘If you think that’s bad, chum – war, deprivation, bombing, losing your wife – just you wait and see what I’m really capable of.’

  So much grief…How can we ever recover? Things can never be the same again for anyone, thought Stratton. He’d seen a fair bit in his time, but if someone had told him, five and a half years ago, that human beings could do such things to one another, he would not have believed them. Now, he felt, he could believe anything of human beings, however brutal, degraded or senseless it might be. How can we build a better world from this, for our children? Where do we start? At that moment, grieving for Jenny, for the family life they would not now share, and, by extension, for the human race itself – he could not imagine.

  Sixty-Eight

  Doris was waiting for them at home, with tea ready on the kitchen table. She’d even managed to scrape together the ingredients for a sponge cake. Monica and Pete seemed pleased to see her, but they behaved like visitors, quiet, minding their manners and careful not to eat too much. The house, which Doris and Lilian had cleaned and polished, seemed on its best behaviour, too, as if, Stratton thought, it was holding its breath.

  After they’d eaten, he asked Monica and Pete if they’d like to see the allotment. Pete refused, claiming that he was tired, but Monica said yes. On the way, she talked about Mr Roosevelt and what a shame it was that he’d died before victory was announced. ‘We said prayers for him at school,’ she added.

  ‘Do you say prayers for Mum?’ asked Stratton.

  Monica looked at him, surprised. ‘Of course I do.’

  Stratton showed her the rows of leeks and spring cabbages. ‘Not as good as the ones at the farm, I’ll bet,’ he said.

  ‘It’s different there,’ said Monica. ‘They have manure, and it makes things bigger. But these are good.’ This was so kindly meant – and so like Jenny – that Stratton felt a lump rise in his throat.

&nbs
p; ‘Have to plant the potatoes soon,’ he said, gruffly. ‘They’re sprouting.’

  ‘I can help you,’ said Monica, looking up at him. ‘If you like, I mean. I know what to do because I helped Mrs Chetwynd.’

  ‘Did she grow the vegetables herself?’ asked Stratton, surprised.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Monica. ‘When the gardener left. She asked him to teach her how to plant the seeds and things. I don’t think he thought she’d be able to do it by herself, but she did. Not as good as you, though,’ she added, loyally. ‘Can I see if the radishes are ready?’

  ‘It’s a bit soon,’ said Stratton. ‘I only put them in a month ago.’

  ‘That one looks ready,’ said Monica, pointing at a clump of leaves larger than the rest of the row.

  ‘Go on, then.’

  Monica pulled it up, carefully, by the base of the stalks, dusted the earth off the root with her handkerchief and held it up. ‘See?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Not bad.’

  ‘Would you like it, Dad?’

  Stratton shook his head. ‘You have it.’

  ‘All right.’ Monica tugged off the leaves and bit. ‘Hot,’ she said, spluttering.

  ‘It’s all right,’ said Stratton. ‘You don’t have to finish it.’

  Monica chewed and swallowed. ‘No, I want to.’ She popped the rest of the radish into her mouth.

  ‘Here,’ said Stratton, pulling a bar of chocolate out of his pocket, saved specially for the occasion and, until that moment, forgotten. ‘Wash it down with this.’

  Monica took the chocolate, and broke off two squares. ‘Thanks, Dad.’

  ‘Keep it,’ said Stratton.

  Monica, her face serious, almost scandalised, shook her head. ‘It’s for you and Pete.’

  ‘All right, then.’ Stratton pocketed the chocolate. ‘Bossyboots.’