The Sea Gate

by Jane Johnson

  ‘Sorry,’ I say reflexively.

  ‘No need for you to apologize,’ she says. ‘We can’t choose our family, can we? I should tell you we’ll be starting the discharge process shortly. She’s being assessed by the reablement team, and we’ll arrange a visit to her home by social services to look at her needs, and go from there.’

  The tiling, lighting and final fixes in the bathroom have yet to be done; the walk-in shower needs grab rails and a stool; the doors have to be made and fitted; a hospital-style bed and adjustable chair have to be bought; the new bedroom could do with painting; and a floor surface that won’t trip her up… The realities of the situation begin to unspool in my head: all that, and cooking meals… heck. I have not thought this through. And then there is the cellar…

  I give the nurse manager my contact details and explain the signal problem at the house. ‘Ah yes,’ she says, looking at her notes. ‘We have Mrs Sparrow down as the back-up contact.’

  Rosie.

  ‘There will be a landline soon,’ I say hastily. ‘Please take Mrs Sparrow off your contact list.’ Recklessly, I give her Reda’s mobile number. He’s a kind man: I hope he won’t mind. I’ll clear it with him when I call.

  ‘She’s in the TV room at the moment.’

  That’s where I find her, sitting at some distance from the other patients, who are watching Bargain Hunt turned up loud. When I call her name she does not respond and when I get closer I see she has stuffed cotton wool in her ears. It sprouts out of her head like some weird tufted plant. She appears to be deep in a book. When I tap her on the shoulder she looks up, and I feel the force of her annoyance as she turns her eyes on me, then her expression relents and with some effort she pulls the cotton wool out and winces at the volume of the television.

  ‘Oh, it’s you. Thought it was somebody come to disturb me again. They can’t bear that you should have a moment of peace in this place, as if a bit of silence might kill you.’

  I am getting better at understanding Olivia’s mangled speech. One side of her face droops, though am I imagining it, or is it drooping a little less today? Her left hand rests on an upturned book. ‘What are you reading?’

  She makes a wonky face and shows me the cover. ‘Got it off the library trolley.’ Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca. ‘I’ve read it before and it’s a bit lightweight, but reasonably entertaining.’

  ‘Mum called me after that.’

  ‘Strange, she was not a nice woman, the Rebecca in the book.’

  I had read the letter from Mum from amongst the many in Olivia’s under-bed cache:

  Dear Cousin Olivia

  Well, goodness, now I understand why you never had children: what an awful to-do pregnancy is. I have felt trapped in my own body these past months, hauling around a burgeoning alien. Really, I can’t wait for these heavy little souls to be born so that I can regain my life again. There isn’t anyone else I can tell this to: everyone is so relentlessly thrilled for me. That’s what they say: ‘You must be thrilled.’ ‘Aren’t you so thrilled?’ ‘We are so thrilled for you.’ ‘Isn’t it utterly, utterly thrilling?’ Well my dear, it utterly, utterly isn’t. My body is like an elephant and I am sure my husband is having an affair. He returns at all hours of the day and night smelling of cigarettes, and you know he has never smoked, so I think you were right when you said to me after meeting him not to trust a man with a roving eye. I cannot leave him – not in my current state – so I am stuck in my choice and must make the best of it.

  Thank you so much for the book you sent me. I so loved it and shall seek out Daphne du Maurier’s other works.

  Would it be wicked of me to call my unborn daughter Rebecca? It is, after all, a very pretty name and it will always remind me of Cornwall…

  ‘I miss my mother,’ I say.

  Olivia pats my arm. ‘I miss her too.’

  ‘They said you’ll be coming home soon.’

  She gives me a smile, and yes! I am sure it is a little less lopsided. Goodness, what remarkable recuperative powers she has. A tough old bird, indeed.

  ‘I just want to get back into my house again and be surrounded by my own things and all my memories.’

  This would surely be a good moment to raise the matter of the paintings, and the bone in the tunnel. I open my mouth to ask that very question… then close it again. I no longer want to know about that bone. I just want to brick it all up and forget about it. So instead I say, ‘Cousin Olivia… I went up into the attic – the roof was leaking but the builders fixed it – and I found some paintings up there. Some wonderful paintings.’

  She stiffens.

  ‘You didn’t tell me what a marvellous artist you were.’

  For a moment a small, secretive expression of satisfaction twitches one side of her mouth. Then the shutters come down again. ‘I don’t know anything about that.’

  I turn on my phone and find the photo I took of The Sea Gate and show it to her. ‘It’s so beautiful, and so sad. Tell me, Cousin Olivia, are you the “OK Painter”? It is you, isn’t it? I found an article online…’

  The eye closest to me fills with moisture and I watch a solitary tear swell and spill and roll down her withered cheek. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you cry,’ I say, gently wiping it away. ‘You mean the world to me.’ Another tear follows the first, and I feel cruel.

  I pull a tissue out of the carton on the bedside cabinet and she blows her nose noisily. ‘I would have done things differently,’ she says after a while. ‘I wish I’d had the courage.’

  ‘To do what?’ I prompt, but she shakes her head.

  ‘No good comes of digging up the past. It’s a fool’s game. Read me the next chapter.’

  She thrusts the book at me, and I do as I’m told. Another visit in which I can’t bring myself to press her for answers. But there is always the next time, and the time after that. As Olivia herself would no doubt say, softly, softly, catchee monkey.

  *

  Before I head back to Porth Enys, I call Reda and am hugely relieved when he answers. ‘I’ve got some more money coming through,’ I tell him. ‘Enough to pay you and Mo for most of the work you’ve done.’ This makes him very cheerful.

  ‘You see? I told you God would provide.’

  We agree that he and Mo will come back tomorrow. ‘We want to finish the job and make the old lady happy,’ he says. ‘And you, too.’

  It seems there are still some good people in the world.

  *

  The house appears peaceful and secure when I return, but when I press the key into the front door and push, something stops it from fully opening. I shove the door and squirm inside, to find something jammed between the doormat and umbrella stand. I bend to examine it, and spring back. It is a huge dead rat. Someone has squeezed it through the letter box; the force of this has made its nose bleed and bits of its guts have extruded past its yellow teeth at one end and out of its anus at the other.

  Maybe Gabriel can smell it, or has sensed the violence of the act, for he is shrieking in the parlour, jumping from the low perch to the high one and back again. Forcing my gorge down, I pick up the rat’s corpse on a shovel and take it to the overgrown orchard. By the time I get there it does not disgust me any more; rather, the act that robbed it of dignity in its death tears at me, and I am suddenly furious. I dig a hole for it, channelling my anger into each strike of the spade, and stamp the soil down as if I am stamping on Saul and Ezra Sparrow’s faces. I have no doubt at all that they are responsible for this atrocity.

  Then I wash my hands and take Gabriel the treats I have picked up for him in Penzance. I let him out of his cage and he flies around the parlour for a few minutes, his wings clattering. I only have one mess to clear up – not too terrible before it dries – and he goes back in meekly as if making a great effort to be polite.

  But when I go to the door and turn the light off he croaks, ‘Evil old bitch.’

  He sounds just like Rosie Sparrow.

  14

 
Olivia

  1943

  THE TELEPHONE WOKE OLIVIA FROM A DEEP SLEEP. DOWN in the quiet cavern of the hall it rang on and on and on. When it became clear that no one else was going to answer it, she hauled on her pyjama bottoms – discarded, along with the top, in the mugginess of the night – and ran down the stairs, convinced that the phone would rattle its last before she reached it.

  The black Bakelite receiver trembled in her hand. ‘Is that Penzance 272?’ an unfamiliar voice enquired.

  ‘Yes.’ Olivia’s heart beat faster. She sat down on the bench, her knees wobbling. It was still dark outside, though shades of grey had begun to filter through the panes flanking the front door. Who would ring so early? Perhaps it was Leo Roberts or Nipper Martin, intent on terrorizing her. Or maybe Winnie wanting to speak to Mary. Perhaps something had happened to Mummy up in London…

  All these thoughts and more ran through her head as she heard the operator say, ‘Putting you through.’

  ‘Darling?’ Her mother’s voice, sounding very far away. ‘Is that you, Olivia?’

  ‘Mummy! Oh, Mummy, I was so worried about you. Are you all right?’

  ‘Hush, darling. I’m afraid I’ve had some terribly bad news…’

  Olivia held her breath. Not Daddy. Not Daddy. Anyone but Daddy. No. No. No. She would bear anything – Aunt Winnie, Mary, Farmer Roberts, going to church, doing her chores without complaint, or any other bargain with the Almighty that could be made – if only Daddy were safe.

  ‘Are you still there, Olivia?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said in a tiny voice, as if quietness could lessen the impact, or shrink the truth.

  ‘I wish I was with you, darling, to tell you properly…’ Her mother’s voice was clipped and controlled, as if she knew she was being overheard. ‘If I could have come to you, I would have… but, it’s all rather complicated.’

  The blood buzzed in Olivia’s ears. She knew what was coming and she did not want to hear it.

  ‘Olivia, dear, I’m so sorry to tell you like this, but I’m awfully sad to say that Daddy has been killed in action.’

  ‘No…’ The word in her head was a wail; what emerged was barely a whisper.

  ‘He died a hero, darling, not that that makes any difference in this wretched war. I really am so terribly sorry to tell you like this, Olivia, but—’

  The operator’s voice cut in with, ‘Three minutes, please, caller.’

  ‘Tell Mrs Ogden to make you some cocoa!’ Mrs Kitto called down the line. ‘I love you, darling. I—’

  The phone went dead. Olivia sat there, staring at the receiver, as if it were the traitor that had broken her world apart. Then, very slowly, she replaced it on the base unit and sat with her hands in her lap staring at her bare feet planted on the cold tiles of the hall floor. Brick-red, black and cream, replicating patterns of fleurs-de-lys, black on red, red on black, black on white, more of them illuminated as dawn broke outside. What was the matter with her? Daddy was dead, yet she couldn’t cry, couldn’t shed a single tear. Her feet were brown against the tiles: it had been a hot summer and she had spent a lot of it shoeless and outdoors, ‘like an urchin’, as her father would have said, tousling her hair.

  He would never say that to her again. She would never ever hear his voice again.

  Now the tears came, huge, silent tears drawn from deep inside her as if she were weeping with her heart’s blood. Daddy was dead. Killed in action. Daddy was dead and Mummy couldn’t be with her and there wasn’t even Winnie Ogden here to make her cocoa.

  ‘Why are you sitting half-naked by the phone?’ Marjorie’s voice was sharp with suspicion. She came down the stairs at speed now, slippered feet thudding. ‘Leo Roberts told us all about what you’ve been getting up to, Olivia Kitto. You’re nothing but a little whore!’

  Olivia stared at her with hot, seeping eyes, and for the first time ever could not find a word to say.

  ‘For God’s sake cover yourself up! You’re absolutely shameless. Been on the telephone to one of your beaus, I expect. Well, Beryl and I are not sticking around to get tarred with the same brush. We’re packing up this morning and moving to the farmhouse on the request of Mr Roberts, so give us back our ration books and we’ll say good riddance.’

  Olivia stood up, feeling the thundery air swirl over her naked skin. Like an Amazon she stalked past Marjorie and up the stairs, using every ounce of her willpower to hold the tears till she was out of sight. Reaching her room, she put a pillow over her head and wept and wept.

  *

  ‘What are you doing?’ An accusing voice.

  Olivia unearthed herself and stared at the intruder.

  ‘You’ve been crying!’ Mary announced with unholy glee. ‘Is it because Marjorie and Beryl have gone?’

  ‘Go away.’

  ‘Shan’t.’

  ‘Go away and leave me alone.’

  ‘I want my breakfast,’ Mary said mulishly.

  ‘Get your own breakfast.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Well, go hungry then.’ Olivia turned her back on the disobliging little beast.

  ‘I’ll tell on you.’

  ‘Good luck with that,’ Olivia said wearily.

  Mary stared around the room, full of malice. Spying Olivia’s sketchbook, she grabbed it up and started ripping pages out of it.

  Olivia sat bolt upright. ‘You bloody little savage!’ She flew across the room and gave the child such a clout that Mary ended up against the dressing table, howling as if all the demons in hell had been unleashed.

  Olivia was unrepentant. ‘Never, never touch my things again, do you hear me? Or you’ll get worse than that.’

  Mary bawled, nursing her sore jaw, on which a large red mark was blossoming.

  ‘My father is dead,’ Olivia said fiercely. It sounded surreal to say the words aloud, as if by uttering them she had made it true.

  ‘Good,’ said Mary. ‘I hope you die too.’

  Olivia took the child downstairs and applied cold compresses to her face with controlled fury as if by doing so she might erase the deed along with the bruise.

  ‘I’m going to tell on you,’ Mary declared again, sniffling.

  ‘I really, really don’t care. Nothing matters any more.’

  Robbed of her leverage, Mary glowered. ‘I’ll make you sorry you hit me if it takes the rest of my life.’

  *

  Olivia walked Mary to the village school in silence, the child dragging her feet unhelpfully. It was a long walk for her, but Olivia kept up an unrelenting pace, feeling hollowed out, her mind elsewhere. Where was Mummy? Why couldn’t she just get on a train from London and come to comfort her only child? You’d think, Olivia reflected angrily as she stomped back up the long hill towards Chynalls, that she’d care that much about her. Surely the bank could grant her compassionate leave, especially with her daughter alone here in Cornwall, hundreds of miles away. Of course, Mummy didn’t actually know that Winnie Ogden wasn’t there. Olivia had been rather vague about that the previous time Mummy had called, but even so. It was clear she didn’t really care, despite all the soothing words and ‘darlings’.

  Olivia kicked a stone up the hill with ever increasing degrees of violence. Darn her! Well, she was on her own now, that much was obvious. She would just have to fend for herself. Olivia against the world!

  Back home, she took in the drab interior with rising dismay. There were feathers and splatters of guano all over the parlour and dust on every visible surface. Marjorie and Beryl had left the remains of their breakfast scattered over the dining room table, their dishes and cutlery defiantly unwashed. No doubt they’d left their rooms in a state too. The kitchen was already a shambles. Olivia hated housework and without Oberleutnant Winnie to keep her in line she had let things slide. She rolled up her sleeves. This was her domain now: she would take charge of it.

  For the rest of the week, Olivia dusted and mopped, pummelled, scrubbed and pressed through the mangle everything that could possibly be washed. The
monotony of all this domestic work kept her mind from circling around her deep-seated grief, but in the depths of the night it sought her out and found her, burrowing up to the surface to torment her with all the knowns and unknowns of her losses.

  The weather remained heavy, lowering clouds trapping sticky air between the sky and sea. In the mornings a livid line of light showed across the horizon, held prisoner between the elements. Olivia could not stop looking at it: it called to something deep inside her, that stripe of light trapped in darkness. She sat with her father’s treasured Leica for a long time in her hands, imagining she could smell his scent on the leather case, and when she pressed her eye to the viewfinder, she thought about how the last eye other than her own to look through that tiny window had been his. It was oddly comforting. She had taught herself how to use it, wandering far and wide along the coast to take photos with this expensive piece of kit while Mary was at school, taking a malicious pleasure in trespassing across the edges of Farmer Roberts’ land. She had rigged a studio in Marjorie’s vacated room, where the blackout curtains came in useful, and learned how to develop the film from absorbing her father’s photography books, and a lot of trial and error.

  Exposure errors became deliberate style statements, the photography print papers lending different textures and finishes to her creations. She was rather pleased with some of her efforts, but most she destroyed. She was, she told herself, developing her own artistic sensibility. Her favourite images she essayed in the medium of oil paint. When money for supplies ran out, she mustered new-found courage and went to see Mrs Harvey, who ran the down-chapel hall, and offered to give drawing classes for a shilling a class. She took her sketchbooks with her. Mrs Harvey looked through them dubiously. ‘You do know there’s a war on, don’t you, bird?’

  ‘It’s a good way for people to escape from all that for a while,’ Olivia said doggedly.

  And so on Tuesday just before midday Olivia took up residence in the hall, bringing a roll of cartridge paper she had bought in Penzance with what was almost the last of the grocery money, a handful of drawing pencils and some erasers. She had cut up some of the hardboard used to floor sections of the attic into drawing boards and gathered whatever bulldog clips she could find. She set the hall chairs in an optimistic semicircle and put on each one a board with a piece of paper clipped to it. From her duffel bag she brought out a piece of driftwood scavenged off the foreshore beneath Kemyel, some sea-smoothed stones with interesting markings – rounded pebbles of quartz-speckled granite, lumps of folded slate bearing unusual striations – apples from the orchard in various states of wellness and decay, and a mackerel, which was beginning to smell, but which offered a tantalizing exercise in the use of light and shade.