The Last Words of Madeleine Anderson

by Helen Kitson

  ‘I had this fantasy of you teaching me everything you know about writing. Of turning me into a great writer, no less.’

  ‘You’d do better to sign up at one of the universities that offer creative writing MAs.’

  ‘I’d rather become a writer – if I become a writer – through trial and error. Blood and tears. Writing – serious writing – is kind of like a love affair, or should be. You get to know your story, it intrigues you, if you’re lucky it enthrals you, and ultimately it ends, leaving you wretched and abandoned.’

  ‘I think writers overplay the creative aspect of their work. It’s a trade like any other. Unless you write purely for your own pleasure, you write a book of a length and style you think publishers will want. Writers have to sell themselves. Puffing a book isn’t much different from a tart decking herself out in satin and sequins. It all comes down to money in the end.’

  Simon bit his lip. ‘I think art’s more important.’ He looked me straight in the eye. ‘I’m young enough to think that, you see.’ But he didn’t grin. He looked suddenly, briefly defeated. By his own youth? By his ideals, knowing they would inevitably be knocked about, assaulted, defiled?

  ‘I’m glad,’ I said. ‘You’re too young to be cynical.’

  ‘Was Madeleine? Was that why she killed herself?’

  ‘It was an accident. I’m sure it was an accident.’

  ‘What was she doing here? Why would she be here in the first place? How could she have got close enough to the water to fall in? Could she swim?’

  Questions fired at me without mercy. ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I don’t know!’

  ‘Then you don’t know she didn’t do it deliberately. You can’t know that for certain.’

  ‘What does it matter how it happened? She’s still dead!’

  ‘It matters,’ he said. ‘It always matters.’

  I’d believed the purpose of this excursion was to bring me some sense of closure, not to rehash events long buried. ‘Don’t you realise I’ve spent the last twenty-odd years wondering, grieving, going over it again and again?’

  ‘You’ll never stop thinking about it. Closure is about coming to terms with a tragedy, not forgetting about it altogether.’

  ‘But how she died— What actually happened—’

  His gaze was impassive, but he wasn’t fooled.

  I shivered. He was right; it mattered.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Gently but surely Simon prodded at the soft tissue, the thin skin, the old bruises.

  We’d been discussing his work in progress and I’d been trying to help him negotiate a blockage: one of those points in a novel when you feel it’s all a hideous mess; your characters made of cardboard, your plot full of holes. My PC was littered with half-completed manuscripts like so many car wrecks. All of them write-offs, their scrap value negligible, some of them so old the rust on them was lacy and friable.

  Pitilessly I gazed at Simon hunched forward on the sofa, dragging his fingers through his hair. He was young, he hadn’t known tragedy. His angst was temporary; it was nothing.

  ‘I just wish I knew what to do!’ A self-indulgent moan.

  ‘No one said it was easy. You just have to plough on.’

  He glowered at me. I daresay I deserved it. Still pitiless, I continued, ‘Creative people shouldn’t get a special dispensation. Surgeons don’t get surgeon’s block. They just—’

  ‘Plough on? Like you did?’

  That hit home. What had I been saying so breezily, so thoughtlessly?

  ‘I wasn’t blocked,’ I said. ‘I just… I ran out of steam, that’s all. I kept trying, but nothing was ever as good. It reached the point where it seemed useless to continue.’

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ he said. ‘That novel was so good – I mean so, so brilliant – it’s not credible you couldn’t have written another one as good, or better.’

  ‘You know as well as I do the number of writers who produced only one novel.’

  ‘So you’re content to number yourself among them? Gloating at everyone else who perseveres?’

  ‘I’m not gloating and I did persevere. I’ve just told you, I kept trying more times than I can count.’

  ‘How do you explain the first book, then?’

  ‘I can’t. The first one is different; you’ve nothing to live up to. No one has any expectations. You can write what you like, knowing no one will care whether it’s any good or not.’

  ‘You’re full of excuses, aren’t you? You’ve never really done anything, have you?’

  Did he believe I needed some kind of shock therapy, something to shake me out of my apathy? Perhaps I did, but Simon barely knew me and had no right to sit in judgement.

  ‘If I were you, I’d remember that you’re a guest in my house. I can boot you out any time I please. The middle of the night, if I choose.’

  ‘You’d do that, wouldn’t you? You don’t really care about anyone, that’s your problem.’

  ‘Do you? You’ve no time for your family and I’ve never heard you mention a single friend by name since you’ve been here.’

  ‘And where are your friends, Gabrielle? Madeleine’s the only one you ever talk about and she’s been dead how long?’

  ‘Why do you care? What is any of this to you? Why did you have to come and poke your nose where it’s not wanted?’

  ‘That’s rich,’ he said, leaning back against the sofa and crossing his arms. ‘You wouldn’t have let me stay if you didn’t want me to be here. I think you’re lonely. Lonely and frightened.’

  ‘Frightened?’

  He nodded. ‘You’re as timid as the respectable ladies in those Barbara Pym novels you like so much.’

  I told myself he was a silly kid who knew nothing of my life, but his arrows pierced where they hurt the most. I couldn’t deny his accusations, though I didn’t see why my failings warranted so much vitriol. Didn’t most people simply bumble through their lives, ticking over, aiming not for greatness or even happiness, but simply trying to get by?

  I took a deep breath. ‘We’re all flawed, Simon. I’ve made mistakes and often I’ve taken the easiest route, but that doesn’t make me a terrible person.’

  ‘That doesn’t, no. But some mistakes are more forgivable than others, aren’t they? Can you honestly say you forgive yourself for every bad thing you’ve done? It’s the ones you can’t forgive yourself for that matter.’

  ‘That’s between me and my conscience,’ I said, wishing I smoked or had a strong drink to hand. ‘I’m going to make some coffee,’ I said, moving towards the door.

  ‘That old cop out! Go on, then, go and make your coffee.’

  My eyes smarting, I stood with my hand on the door handle. If I walked through the door, I was a coward. If I didn’t, I was weak, doing what Simon wanted me to do.

  ‘I can’t win with you, can I?’

  ‘That’s life,’ he said with a self-satisfied smile. ‘There are winners and there are losers. It’s not my fault you blew it.’

  ‘Blew it? Blew what? You have no idea—’

  ‘Of what, Gabrielle?’ He edged forward on the sofa, stared at me as if daring me. ‘You didn’t get the breaks, is that it? Write one brilliant novel and that’s it, game over?’

  ‘It wasn’t my fault,’ I said through gritted teeth.

  ‘Course it wasn’t. Always someone else’s, isn’t it?’

  ‘It wasn’t my fault,’ I repeated more loudly. ‘It wasn’t! I never meant—’

  ‘What did you never mean? You might as well tell me now.’

  ‘I’ll tell you nothing.’

  He gave a disdainful sniff. ‘You never meant any harm, is that it? A sheep could say as much if it could talk.’

  ‘You really are a shit.’

  ‘Aren’t I just? And what are you?’

  I quailed beneath his appraisal of me. He was nothing to me; he was nobody! My home, my life. He didn’t belong in either.

  ‘Fuck off, Simon,’ I muttered.
<
br />   ‘What about the voices in your head, though?’ he said, tapping the side of his head for emphasis. ‘What about them?’

  I swallowed the lump in my throat.

  ‘If none of this matters, why do you look as if I’ve threatened you with a gun? You can’t use your brilliant book as a shield against life. That’s what you’ve done, isn’t it?’

  ‘No! I hate that damn book! I wish she’d never written it!’

  I caught my breath. Surely he’d never notice my slip of the tongue? But of course he did. He missed nothing. His eyes glinted. He’d scented blood and went in for the kill.

  ‘Of course you never wrote it. How could you? Someone like you?’

  Now what? Should I invite him to make himself comfortable while my story poured out like a thin trickle of sour Spanish plonk?

  ‘Look, hang on a minute—’

  ‘She. Madeleine. Why else would you be so obsessed with her, so haunted? She died, so you helped yourself to what she’d left behind, which just happened to be a work of literary genius. My God, that takes some beating!’

  Tears fell from my eyes. For many years the truth had ceased to matter because I (the ‘I’ who wrote The Song of the Air) had ceased to matter; had been buried beneath a drift of dry leaves, covered up like some perpetually hibernating creature.

  He picked at his bottom lip so hard he broke the skin. Roughly he scrubbed at it with his knuckles, a smear of red against his pale skin.

  ‘You’ve no idea, have you, what you’ve done?’

  What had I expected? Understanding? Amusement? I’d misjudged him. I hadn’t reckoned on his disgust.

  ‘Look, I can explain—’

  His eyebrows shot up. ‘You don’t believe in the death of the author, do you? Which is either deeply ironic or a bit macabre. I mean, you knew the author was dead – literally dead – and you just… took over.’

  ‘It was what she wanted.’ Cling to that, the stubborn root that refuses to yield its grip on the compacted soil. ‘She did!’

  ‘You don’t get it, do you?’

  ‘It was one book no one much cares about any more. It’s not like I’m claiming the novels of Virginia Woolf as my own, for God’s sake. And fiction itself is just a bundle of lies. It’s not real – only the ideas are real.’

  ‘Her ideas, not yours. Anyway, this isn’t about authorship, it’s about me and you. You lied to me.’

  ‘You want to be a writer because you’re in love with the idea of being one, not because you’ve got something deeply important to say. It’s a job like any other.’

  ‘So you did what, exactly – hot desking with Madeleine? Job share? She did the work and you took the glory?’

  ‘Glory – what glory? My fifteen minutes? Barely that! The book would have sold better if people knew she – the author – that she was already dead.’ I paused, expecting him to speak, but he didn’t. I had no choice except to bluster on, to fill the oppressive silence. ‘Plath, for God’s sake – look at her. If she’d lived to be an old woman, who’d still be reading her? It doesn’t change the poems – they’re not better or worse. It’s all smoke and bloody mirrors!’

  We stared at each other. He was the first to break eye contact, and I knew that was somehow important. I was determined to brazen it out. No cowering, no excuses, no apologies.

  ‘What would you do if I went to someone with what I know?’

  ‘Like who? Who would care? Who would believe you?’

  ‘Her parents might.’

  ‘So you’d be willing to cause them massive pain just to plant your flag on the moral high ground.’

  ‘There’s more to it than that. You owe it to posterity – to her – to have a true record somewhere of what happened.’

  ‘My confession?’ I sneered. ‘Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.’

  He nodded. ‘Why not?’

  ‘And what would I do with this ludicrous confession? Hand it over to the police?’

  ‘Don’t be daft.’ His face softened slightly. ‘You wouldn’t have to do anything with it. Stick it in a safe deposit box with instructions that it’s only to be opened after your death.’

  The phone rang. We both stared at it.

  ‘Don’t answer it,’ Simon said, glaring at me.

  I picked up.

  ‘What the fuck did you see Michelle for?’ Russell demanded.

  I’d given little further thought to my conversation with Russell’s wife. Water under, etc.

  ‘She asked to meet me. We had a perfectly amicable chat. Why are you cross?’

  ‘Jesus Christ! You’re as bad as each other,’ he shouted. ‘Bloody women, you’re worse than a pack of monkeys!’

  ‘Monkeys? What are you on about?’ Most of my mind was on Simon, who had slipped from the room. I heard him switch the kettle on.

  ‘You’re all the same,’ Russell continued, ‘rubbishing men is what you like best, isn’t it? God, I can just imagine it, the pair of you picking me over, telling yourselves you’re “bonding” but really just using me as your Aunt Sally.’

  ‘It wasn’t like that. There was no question of anyone being picked over. You can’t bear to accept that two women could have a perfectly reasonable and sensible conversation; you have to turn us into cackling witches to suit your plot.’

  ‘That’s rich! That’s really rich! Female solidarity my arse! You didn’t stop to think about Michelle while I was banging you, did you?’

  ‘Neither did you, and you’re the one who made all sorts of vows to her. Love, honour, cherish – ring any bells?’

  ‘Well, you must have said something to her – she’s left me. Gone to her mother’s, of all the pathetic clichéd things to do.’

  Back to the womb, to unconditional love. ‘She probably wants you to realise she doesn’t want to be taken for granted any more.’

  ‘Thank you, Professor bloody Greer.’

  ‘Oh, grow up, Russell. There’s no point sniping at me. You got yourself into this mess, not me.’

  He slammed down the phone.

  Simon held out a cup of coffee.

  ‘An olive branch?’ I said.

  ‘Only instant coffee. What did he want?’

  ‘To tell me his wife’s left him. Obviously it’s my fault.’ I sipped my coffee, but caffeine was too weak a drug to be of much use. For a woman who led an uneventful life, I seemed to have mired myself in complications. No point complaining. If I didn’t deserve everything that was being chucked at me, I wasn’t entirely blameless, either.

  I wasn’t the person Simon had believed me to be. A cheap pickpocket rather than a gifted novelist. I’d been exposed as ordinary, unexceptional. No talent, nothing to say. An empty box, a dud firework, a ripe plum with a grub curled up inside it. To know you’ve disappointed someone is difficult to accept. He’d admired me, been a little in awe of me. I was nothing more than the breathtaking magic trick that turns on banal mechanics.

  ‘Don’t hate me,’ I said. More tears: predictable, detestable.

  He took my hand and stroked it. ‘I don’t,’ he said. ‘It was a staggering thing to pull off, really. Almost impressive.’ He sounded as if he were trying to convince himself, trying to pull misshapen cloth into something presentable.

  ‘What would you have done?’ I asked.

  ‘God, I don’t know! If you could have written your own book—’

  ‘I told you – I tried. Maybe I hoped Madeleine would somehow inspire me from beyond the grave, but she didn’t. I had to accept I had no talent, at least not enough. That was my punishment.’

  A gentle, beatific smile. ‘Think how much better you’ll feel after you write all this down. Then, one day, people will know, they’ll understand, and it might even make you famous again.’

  He might have been right. If I made my confession now, it would appear tawdry. But if the seal was broken only after I was dead, wouldn’t there be some grotesque interest attached to it? Maybe I could even apply a bit of spin to the tale, style myself as Madel
eine’s amanuensis. There was, after all, a precedent for what I’d done: Willy, first husband of Colette. So the story went, he locked her in a room until she’d written down her spicy schoolgirl recollections, then published them under his own name. The famous Claudine novels. The balance of power eventually shifted, of course, but if it hadn’t been for Willy she might never have become a writer at all.

  ‘You do see that it has to be done, don’t you? It is necessary.’

  I didn’t see any such thing. The facts of a writer’s life interfere with our appreciation of the work. We know too much about most writers, even the most secretive ones.

  He had no hold over me. My word against his. I was a respectable, useful member of society. I worked for a vicar; I had no blots on my copybook. What was Simon? A waster. I saw him for what he was and I always had done, for what that was worth.

  ‘I won’t do it,’ I said, wiping away my tears.

  He walked towards me, gripped my wrists. Looked into my eyes. Kissed me. His mouth opening against mine; my body responding, leaning into him, flesh dissolving in the heat of his body.

  He broke the kiss. My mouth gaping, wanting. His lips parted, wet. He shook his head.

  ‘It’s no good,’ he said. ‘This will always be between us and get in the way.’

  Us? There was no us!

  ‘If I write it all down, if I do as you ask—’

  I saw only what I wanted to see, believed only what it suited me to believe.

  ‘You’d be doing it for me. It would show me how much you trust me. How much I mean to you.’

  But what do I mean to you, Simon?

  ‘Does that matter so much to you?’ I asked.

  He nodded.

  ‘Do you trust me to tell the truth?’

  ‘But I don’t know what the truth is, do I?’

  ‘And if I refuse?’

  ‘I can’t force you, can I? What’s the worst I can do?’

  Or not do…

  ‘You could tell people what I’ve told you and hope they’ll believe you.’

  ‘Would they, d’you reckon?’

  I shrugged. ‘They might want to, some of them. Her parents, for a start. They resent the money and fame that came to me when I published the book. For some reason they thought it was in bad taste, as if I’d deliberately done it to rub their noses in their loss.’