After the Funeral

by Gillian Poucher

  Julia fished out a tissue from the pocket of her grey wool jacket. Even though she too was now crying, she felt a burden had been lifted. Ever since reading her mother’s diary in the early hours she had been tormented by the thought that Emily had been unhappy with her father. The image of her standing so rigid in their wedding photograph, that shy but tense smile hovering around her lips, had mingled with her dreams.

  ‘Thank you,’ she whispered. Ray pressed her shoulder again before dragging the room’s single armchair towards the bed. He slumped into it. Julia realised how difficult it must be for him to recount these painful memories. But she had more questions.

  ‘What did you do, when Ada told you Mother had married my father?’

  ‘I went straight back to Canada.’ He massaged his temples with his long white fingers. ‘I was, in every sense of the word, a broken man. In time I entered the seminary and became a priest. I tried to put the war and my memories of your mother behind me, throwing myself into my parish work. Then Linda traced me. Until I heard from her just before Christmas, I had no idea of her existence.’ He laid his hand on his daughter’s arm. ‘My bishop was very understanding and arranged my trip to Walsingham.’ His voice faded to a hoarse whisper. ‘But I was too late to see Emily one last time.’

  Julia went over to the window, looking towards the ruined abbey. Its columns rose unevenly. A milky sun gleamed in the pearl grey sky above. She remembered how unhappy her mother had been that first day here, the despair of her final entry in the 1943 diary: I am exhausted, drained, and more miserable than I have ever known. Even writing in here no longer helps. I do not know how I will go on.

  She shivered, wondering how Emily had coped until Linda’s birth, what it had been like for Linda growing up in a staunchly Catholic household. She turned back towards the bed where her half-sister lay, her life in the balance in these early days after surgery. Yet she looked more at peace than Julia had ever seen her since their first encounter at their mother’s funeral.

  ‘So you were born here? Everything went…’ she bit her lip, appalled by the callousness of it all, ‘… according to our grandmother’s plan?’

  A shadow passed over Linda’s sunken face. ‘I was born prematurely,’ she said. ‘Mother told me last summer that our grandfather died of a heart attack less than two months after she came here. It was probably the terrible news which meant she gave birth early. She told me she never forgave herself, believing that her pregnancy was the shock which caused his heart attack.’

  ‘Poor Mother,’ murmured Julia, tears rising again. ‘And then she left you with Winifred and Thomas?’

  Linda nodded.

  ‘Winifred sounded… very religious?’ Julia framed the question carefully, out of deference for the priest, thinking of her mother’s references to rosary beads and Winifred’s insistence that Emily’s plight was some kind of answer to prayer.

  ‘Yes. She brought me up in the Catholic faith.’ Linda paused, a pained expression on her face.

  ‘Or her version of it!’ Ray said with a sudden savagery.

  Linda laid a placating hand on his arm. Julia wondered again at her composure. Perhaps being so ill gave you a different perspective, but Julia was sure she wouldn’t be so calm if she’d experienced as much tragedy in her life as Linda had.

  The sick woman turned towards Julia, patting the quilt to indicate she should sit down on the bed. ‘I didn’t know until Winifred died that she wasn’t my mother,’ she said. ‘She kept it secret all those years. Thomas never said anything either. He died when I was fourteen. It was only when she died, here in this room, that she told me. But she didn’t tell me anything about my real mother, about Emily. I was twenty-four when Winifred died, and four months pregnant. I married Philip three years earlier, as much as anything to get away from home. I found it oppressive here and I felt very isolated. Winifred wasn’t one for company. I’d wanted to go to College to study Art, but she’d pressed me to help her with the farm instead, although it was failing by then. I met Philip at a Catholic gathering for young people in Norwich. We got on well enough. After a few months he asked me to marry him. We lived in Norwich, and moved back here when Winifred died. She left the house to me.’

  Julia nodded. She remembered Grace had told her that her father had been Catholic before he was ‘born again’ when he met her step-mother Frances.

  Linda’s eyes were unfocused as she stared towards the door. ‘It was a terrible shock, finding that the woman I had called “Mother” all my life wasn’t my mother after all. It obsessed me for the rest of my pregnancy. I had a difficult birth. Soon after I began hearing voices and hallucinating.’ She looked at Julia, who took her hand.

  ‘No one understood,’ Linda went on. ‘I began to produce these frightening Madonna and child paintings. Philip was out a lot working, and I found being here alone with a baby very lonely. The story of how the abbey had burned down hundreds of years ago played on my mind. Winifred had spoken a lot in her later years about judgement and hell fire, and I think somehow, it all got tangled up in my mind, so that one day…’ Her voice trailed off and she raised her hands to her shaved head, rocking back and forth. ‘And I lost my baby!’ She made a terrible keening sound.

  Julia shuddered, thinking of Grace, the vulnerable young woman who had touched her so much with her tragic story. Hopefully she would be here soon. Looking at Linda as she sank back exhausted on to the pillows, Julia feared they might not have long together. But perhaps the restoration of her father and daughter, and the news of a grandchild which Julia had left for Grace to tell, might prove more effective than the radiotherapy?

  There was a knock at the front door. Linda’s eyes lit up. Ray sprang to his feet and began to pace the floor again.

  Julia walked slowly down the stairs and opened the heavy wooden door. Grace stood on the doorstep. A few feet behind her, Pete was bent over the grey and white tabby cat which purred appreciatively as he stroked its ears.

  Grace’s wide blue eyes – so like her grandfather’s, Julia suddenly realised – were shining in expectation. From the dark circles beneath, Julia suspected that the younger woman was as sleep deprived as she was.

  Grace tugged at her plait with the familiar uncertain gesture. ‘Is she well enough for me to see her?’ Her voice sounded more like a little girl’s than ever.

  ‘Yes. She’s upstairs. With your grandfather.’

  ‘My grandfather?’

  Julia didn’t trust herself to speak, moving back into the hall. Grace stepped forward and wrapped her slim arms round her. ‘I don’t know how you’ve managed it, Aunt Julia,’ she whispered, ‘but thank you so much.’ She slipped past her and up the stairs as Ray’s tall figure emerged on the landing.

  Aunt Julia. Julia found she was close to tears again. She resolutely shut out thoughts of what Grace must be thinking about her affair with James, after discovering that he was her half-uncle. Time enough for that later. Julia was certain Grace would be totally preoccupied at present with being reunited with her mother and meeting her grandfather.

  She walked out towards Pete. ‘Thank you so much for bringing her, Pete.’

  ‘It wasn’t a problem.’ He rose from the cat which wound briefly round his legs before slinking away past the side of the house. Julia detected a slight flush on his cheeks. His eyes didn’t quite meet hers. She took a deep breath. If she had learned anything from the startling revelations of the last twenty-four hours, it was that life was just too short.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she began, ‘about my reaction in the car that day. I was all over the place.’ She held out her hand. ‘It wasn’t that I’m not interested,’ she went on softly. ‘I just need a bit of time.’

  He took her hand and met her eyes. ‘No worries.’ He grinned. ‘Does that mean I get to call you “Jules” now?’

  She smiled back. ‘I think so.’

  Hand in hand they walked through the garden. Clumps of snowdrops gleamed white in the sunshine. Julia’s heart lifted as s
he gazed at them, so fragile but so resilient. After the long dark winter spring was finally coming.

  – ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS –

  I had no idea how much work was involved in transforming text into novel. Many thanks to the team at RedDoor Publishing for their enthusiasm, support and advice. In particular I have been very grateful for their patience with my queries about the mysterious process of creating and marketing a book! Thanks to copy editor Laura Gerrard for her eagle eye and to Jason Anscomb for capturing the mood of the story perfectly in his cover design. Thanks too to Angela Montague at Push Creativity for creating my web-site and for opening up the world of social media to a self-confessed technophobe!

  I would like to remember my mother who encouraged my love of reading and always said I should write a book. Thanks to Dad for his endless optimism and support of all my endeavours including this.

  Finally, thanks to my husband, Neil, for encouraging my ‘harmless hobby’ and to my daughter, Alice, for putting up with my distraction when writing. I am grateful to you both for keeping me grounded in the real world and for reminding me that there is, in fact, more to life than books.

  – BOOK CLUB QUESTIONS –

    1.  How did you react to Linda at the start of the novel? Did your feelings change as the story progressed?

    2.  During his row with Julia, James tells her that their mother Emily had once said, ‘Julia struggles to understand us mere mortals. It can be difficult living with someone with such high standards.’ He also describes her as ‘smug.’ Do you think there is any justice in these comments about Julia?

    3.  What do you think about Emily’s decision to fall in with her mother’s plan and leave her baby to grow up with relatives, without divulging her secret in later life?

    4.  Linda tells Julia she promised their mother not to tell Julia about the family secret until Julia was in a ‘better place.’ Do you think Linda made the right decision to withhold the story from Julia once Emily had died?

    5.  Julia’s life unravels during the course of After the Funeral, but there is hope for her at the end. What has she learnt? How has she changed?

    6.  Emily dies before Ray has the opportunity to meet her again. What effect does this have on the revelation of their love affair?

    7.  Mother/stepmother and daughter relationships are central to the novel. How do these relationships influence and affect Emily, Linda, Julia and Grace?

    8.  How hopeful are you that Julia and Pete might have a future together?

    9.  How important are setting including place, weather, season and year to the atmosphere of After the Funeral? What impact is created by references to art and spirituality?

  10.  Loneliness is a theme of the novel. How does loneliness shape the characters?

  –  ABOUT THE AUTHOR  –

  Gillian Poucher was born in Bolton. After studying History at undergraduate level, she worked as a Solicitor before training as a church minister. She was ordained into the United Reformed Church in 2006 and completed her PhD in Biblical Studies in 2013. Gillian lives in Lincolnshire with her husband and daughter. After the Funeral is her first novel.

  gillianpoucherauthor.co.uk

  You can follow Gillian at:

  @GillianPoucher

  @GillianPoucherAuthor