Theo drove and, as the church came into view, rising above the surrounding marshes and dominating the Suffolk landscape for miles around, Hugh exclaimed, with carefully rehearsed spontaneity, ‘Let’s do a detour to Blythburgh! It must be ten years since we’ve been inside the church. Don’t suppose you even remember it. You must have been - what? - eleven when we were last there?… Good Lord, where do the years go?’
But as soon as they stepped inside the church, Theo remembered.
It was as if God had just popped out for a minute. The church waited breathless and still, expecting His return at any moment. Absence was the word that reverberated in Theo’s mind. An absence of people, of sound, of colour. What remained was a mournful and monumental simplicity. Here was a church that had once been great. Now it had a forgotten, almost neglected air, a dim glory, as faded as the bleached paintwork of the angel roof where the gaudy hues of medieval artists had been scoured away by the sands of time, leaving only traces of pigment here and there on the great wooden rafters and central bosses. The twelve pairs of wooden angels, with their disproportionately large carved wings were pale, anaemic creatures whose beauty was enhanced rather than diminished by their absence of colour. Theo gazed up at the roof, his shaggy golden head thrown back at a dizzying angle and regarded them. It seemed for a moment as if their ashen wings were about to flutter. He wondered if the angelic host beat their wings when the church was empty, like toys coming to life at night in the nursery. He thought it possible. In this place anything was possible.
Theo became aware of a shuffling noise behind him and looked round to see Hugh easing himself into a pew right at the back of the church. Once seated, he stared at the altar fixedly, as if waiting for something or someone. Theo smiled to himself. Hugh had the resigned and dispirited look of one who had been stood up before and knows he will be again.
Theo sauntered up the aisle, listening to the echo of his own footsteps and sat down beside Hugh, both men so tall their legs touched the pew in front. They sat in companionable silence for a while until Hugh began to declaim in a rumbling baritone: ‘I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope. My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning…’
Theo turned his head and arched a brow. ‘A psalm?’
‘One hundred and thirty. The words are a comfort. A consolation in times of sorrow, but…’ Hugh shrugged. ‘They’re just words now. Beautiful sounds. Echoes. Ghosts from the past… Your mother told me she’d marry me here. I’d brought her here to see the angel roof. She’d kept me on tenterhooks for a few weeks. She wasn’t sure, you see. She was so very young. Younger than you are now. But we thought ourselves very much in love.’ Hugh turned to face the young man he’d raised as his own, whom he loved more than Flora, more even than Rory, more than life itself. ‘My dear boy… There’s something I hoped I’d never have to say to you. But I find I must.’
Theo frowned, his bright blue eyes clouded with concern. He laid a hand on Hugh’s arm. ‘Dad?’
‘No… That’s just it, you see. I’m not.’
1975
When Grace woke she was alone. There was enough moonlight to see that Rory was gone. She sat up in bed, her heart racing, then told herself not to panic. He was probably restless, perhaps in pain. His hand bothered him more at night. He would be downstairs reading.
Before she’d arrived at any of these sensible conclusions however, Grace was out of bed and pulling on a thin dressing gown, resenting the extra layer in the sultry midsummer heat. The nursery window was wide open and the curtains drawn back but there was no breeze; the air was like syrup and the heady scents of jasmine and lilies wafted up from the garden below. As she passed the window Grace looked out at the garden, grey and unearthly under a full moon. The white border where Hugh had worked with Theo gleamed in the moonlight. Grace smiled to think that Dora’s beloved garden looked beautiful even in the dark.
She was about to turn away from the window when she saw a ghost. A figure in a long white robe drifted across the lawn and stood in front of the white border, ashen head bowed. It was Rory. Sleepwalking? Or sleepless? He stood for a long time, quite still, then looked up at the sky. He bowed his head again and covered his eyes with his good hand. Grace was halfway down the stairs before it struck her that Rory might prefer to be alone. She hesitated, was about to turn back, then realised she didn’t want to be alone.
The front door was ajar. She walked across the lawn barefoot, the dry grass springy under her step. When she was within a few feet of Rory, he spun round. His shoulders dropped and an expression passed across his face that might have been relief or perhaps disappointment. Grace couldn’t tell in the half-light. Rory rubbed at his eyes with the fingers of his good hand. He was a pale, spectral figure, naked beneath his white kimono. The gold chrysanthemums had turned, like the gold of his hair, to silver in the moonlight.
She took a step towards him, wanting but fearing to touch him. ‘I couldn’t sleep either. It’s so hot… Would you rather I left you on your own?’
He considered, then shook his head. Grace took another step towards him but Rory turned away and gestured towards the white border, shaking his head slowly and smiling.
‘Yes, it’s beautiful, isn’t it? Especially in this light. Dora says this border looks its best at dusk. I wonder if she’s ever seen it by moonlight?’
Rory shrugged. The kimono shivered, iridescent in the moonlight.
‘Dora’s so clever with her plants. She and Hugh worked so hard.’
Rory put his two index fingers together to form a letter T.
‘Theo? Yes, of course. Theo too! He moved barrow-loads of weeds, didn’t he? And watered all the bedding plants. He’s such a lovely boy. So eager to please. Flora and Hugh must be so proud of him.’
Rory nodded and looked away. He turned his back on the border, walked over to a garden bench and sat down. Grace followed and sat beside him. A white form swept down across the lawn in eerie, silent flight and Grace cried out in alarm. Rory chuckled softly.
‘What was that? An owl?’
He nodded.
‘A tawny owl?’
He shook his head.
‘Barn owl?’
He nodded again.
‘I don’t know how you can tell the difference - especially in this light.’
He looked directly at her then, his face grey and gaunt with shadow, his eyes dark in their sockets. Grace thought he looked as if he wanted to speak, as if he longed to tell her how he could tell the difference between barn owls and tawny owls. His lips twitched, then were still. He sat motionless, his face impassive, his breathing heavy. Grace watched his chest rise and fall, the V of tanned skin dark against the white silk. She lifted her fingers to his mouth and laid them on his lips. ‘One day… One day it will come back to you, my love, I know it will. We’ll talk again. You wait and see.’
He nodded slowly, then offered Grace his good hand. She took it, then reached for his right hand. She held them both - one warm, one cool - and pressed the damaged hand to her cheek.
A breeze like a sigh shifted in the trees. Rory cocked his head on one side, hearing before Grace the distant rumble of thunder. Rain began to drop out of the sky, landing with a splash on the wooden bench, on Grace’s nightdress, on Rory’s bare feet. They watched the big drops fall, trickle and spread. Grace laughed as Rory turned his face up to the rain then licked the moisture from his lips. His hair, cobwebby with damp, fell back from his face and the rain ran like tears over the planes of his face, down over his chin, his throat and chest. She shivered, partly with cold, partly with desire, long unsatisfied.
‘I love you, Rory Dunbar. I love you so much. Do you have any idea how much?’
He looked at her for a long moment, then withdrawing his useless hand from her grasp, he nodded. Standing, he pulled her to her feet so that their faces almost touched. His lips moved again but this time she prevented his fail
ure by kissing them. His mouth was cold and wet, unresponsive. Grace withdrew and stared at him, pleading. Shocked by the need in her eyes, Rory studied her face, stroked her long dark hair, then bent his head and returned the kiss, tentatively at first, then purposefully. Grace shivered again and he folded her in his arms.
1987
Theo had been silent a long time, his head in his hands. He sat up slowly, straightening his back, then lifted his head to look at the angels in the roof. Their pale, grey faces stared back, impassive, indifferent. He turned to Hugh, his face as ashen as the angels’. ‘And you expect me to forgive them?’
‘It may not be possible to forgive your parents, but it surely shouldn’t be necessary to condemn them?’
‘I don’t condemn them… But I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to forgive them.’
‘It’s quite possible that you won’t. There is after all a great deal to forgive. But you are hardly in a position to judge. You may remember the woman taken in adultery? He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. Very sound, you have to admit.’
‘But they knew what they were doing!’
‘Yes, they did. I’ve often thought that must have made it harder to bear. The guilt must have been all the greater.’
Theo rose suddenly from the pew and strode towards the altar. He stopped in front of an arrangement of cream and white flowers and stood with his arms folded, his back to Hugh. Naming the flowers mentally, one by one, Theo tried to impose order on the tumult of his thoughts. Gypsophila. Nicotiana. Lilium regale. Phlox. Campanula…
Hugh was standing beside him and speaking in a low voice. ‘Your conception wasn’t planned, therefore it wasn’t prevented. Nor was your birth. Flora went ahead with the pregnancy because she very much wanted a child… and I hadn’t provided her with one. In any case, when she found herself pregnant she didn’t have any legal alternative. You must realise, things were very different twenty years ago. I presume you wouldn’t have wanted your mother to resort to a back-street abortionist?’
‘No, of course not.’
‘So what choice did the poor girl have? She was twenty-two. And a rather naïve twenty-two at that. In whom could she have confided? Your grandmother? Me?… No, she did what she’d always done. She told Rory. And Rory told her to say the baby was mine. I’ve had many years to think about it and I believe if I’d been in Rory’s place I might have given Flora the same advice. It seemed the best thing at the time. The only thing. We weren’t to know…’
Theo closed his eyes and Hugh watched as tears seeped out from beneath the long lashes. He laid a trembling hand on the young man’s shoulder and said, ‘I’d hoped you might take some sort of comfort from the fact that you are - in every sense - a love child. I’ve never known anything like Flora’s love for Rory, or his for her.’ Hugh allowed himself a wry smile. ‘It’s like the peace of God. It passeth all understanding. I hope one day you’ll find it in your heart to forgive Flora at least.’
Theo wiped a hand across his eyes quickly and said, ‘You don’t understand, Dad! You don’t know what you’re asking!’
‘Oh, I do. I know perfectly well.’ Hugh turned to face the altar and fixed a baleful eye on the crucified Christ. ‘You forget. I am still trying to forgive God.’
1975
Leaning against the door of the summerhouse, mesmerised by the dance of butterflies on a white buddleia, settling like confetti on a bride, Rory believed at first that he’d imagined the piano. He’d spent all of the last year trying not to remember what a piano sounded like, trying not to recall the sound of his own playing, but he sometimes wondered whether it had been counter-productive, whether in fact he heard piano music as a continual counterpoint to all other sounds. The notes came again, very softly. He knew at once it was his own piano, not a distant radio. He stood rooted to the spot, trembling in the sunshine.
When he felt able to move he turned to face the house and looked towards the music room. The French doors were slightly ajar. Whoever was playing probably didn’t know they could be heard in the garden. But who was playing? Hugh was in the vegetable garden and in any case couldn’t play. Grace and Dora were both out of the house with Colin and Lottie. Flora couldn’t play. That left Theo who’d stayed behind with Hugh. Could Theo play the piano? If so, who had taught him? Ettie?
Rory approached the French doors and stood on the terrace, looking into the music room. Theo sat at the piano, curly fair head bent in concentration. He was practising a Grade One piece, a German dance by Beethoven. His playing was accurate but hesitant. Rory observed at a glance that his posture was awkward and the piano stool was the wrong height. The boy persevered calmly with the piece and Rory remembered his own youthful impatience and thunderous moods.
Theo reached up to turn a page and the music slipped off the stand, the loose sheets fluttering to the ground around the piano. He got down from the stool to gather them up and, as he did so, caught sight of Rory on the terrace. The boy’s face was suffused with horror and he clapped his hand to his mouth. Rory watched as Theo’s large blue eyes filled with tears. Lifting his hand to the door, Rory pulled it open and stepped into the room.
‘I’m sorry, Uncle Rory, I’m really sorry! I didn’t know you were there. I didn’t know the door was open. I thought you were in the summerhouse. I’m really sorry—’
Rory raised his good hand, palm facing Theo, and shook his head a little, indicating that there was no problem. He bent down and gathered up the sheets of music, set them on the music stand, then looked down at the music stool briefly. At the sight of the old cracked leather he found he had to suppress an urge to sit at the piano. Instead he gestured to Theo to resume his seat. Theo looked horror-struck again. Rory raised his left hand and wiggled his fingers in the air, then pointed at the keyboard.
‘You want me to play?’
Rory nodded.
‘Are you sure?’
He nodded again.
‘I’m not very good. I haven’t played in ages.’
Rory frowned and shook his head quickly to indicate this was of no importance.
Theo sat down at the piano and played again. Rory was impressed that the boy didn’t go to pieces under scrutiny. When he played several wrong notes he made a good recovery and continued unperturbed. As soon as the piece was over Theo turned to face him and Rory noticed the boy looked happier, that he’d evidently enjoyed playing to an audience.
Rory turned away and rifled through a drawer until he found a book of manuscript paper and a pencil. He opened the book, leaned on the piano and started to write. When he’d finished he passed it over to Theo who read: I didn’t know you were having lessons.
Theo looked up and said, ‘I’m not.’
Rory scribbled again. Who taught you?
‘Aunt Ettie,’ Theo said softly. ‘But please don’t tell Mum.’
Rory looked puzzled, then wrote: You had lessons in secret?
The boy wrinkled his nose. ‘Sort of. Not proper lessons. Dad said Mum didn’t want me to learn. But Aunt Ettie just let me play on the piano and I kind of picked it up… Then she started teaching me a few things. And she gave me all your old grade music. I just watched her play and she watched me play. And we talked about it. She never told me to practise. But I did - at church! There’s a piano there. Not as nice as this one, though.’ Theo stroked his fingers across the keys at the upper end of the keyboard, making a high tinkling sound. ‘But I’m stuck now, now Aunt Ettie’s… gone. And the piano’s always locked anyway.’ He looked up anxiously. ‘You won’t tell Gran I unlocked it, will you?’
Rory shook his head, then wrote: How did you find the key?
‘I just looked. It was in that Chinese pot on the mantelpiece. I knew it would be in here somewhere.’
Rory gazed at the boy for a moment, then wrote again: Why won’t Flora let you have lessons?
‘Don’t know. ’Cos it’s too much money, I expect. And because we don’t have a piano at the vicarage. I said
I could come and practise here, but Mum said it would upset everybody. I think she meant you.’
Rory considered this, then bent down to the piano stool. He adjusted the height, looked up at Theo, then adjusted it again. He straightened up and gestured towards the keyboard. The boy played a scale with both hands, looked up and grinned. ‘That’s much better!’ Rory ignored him and looked round the room as if searching for something. He reached under a table and drew out a battered footstool. He carried it over to the piano and placed it over the pedals, beneath Theo’s feet, so they were now supported instead of dangling in mid-air. Rory gestured once again, inviting him to play. The boy began his piece again. Rory listened for a while, then picked up the manuscript book and wrote. He thrust the book in front of the boy’s face.
Would you like to have lessons?
Theo stopped playing. He turned and stared. ‘Yes! I mean, yes, please!’
Rory regarded the boy. After what seemed to Theo an age, Rory wrote something else in the book and handed it back to him.
I could teach you.
Theo’s head shot up. He was speechless, his eyes bright with excitement, his face glowing. Rory looked away quickly, reaching for the book. He wrote, Probably not a good teacher - very bad temper.
Theo read the words, then watched as Rory added: Won’t say much.
The boy laughed, then shot a guilty look at Rory. Reassured by a semblance of a smile hovering at the corners of Rory’s mouth, Theo threw his arms round the man he believed to be his uncle and squeezed as hard as his thin arms would permit. ‘Thank you!’ Rory didn’t respond to the embrace but allowed himself to be held. When Theo released him he picked up the book again and wrote: You’ll have to ask your parents. Flora might not agree.
‘I’ll ask them. But if you don’t mind…’ Theo grinned up at Rory who stretched his mouth in an awkward attempt to smile back. He pointed at the keyboard and raised his eyebrows at Theo. The boy resumed his piece, then stopped suddenly.
Lifetime Burning Page 25
