by Cathy Glass
‘So much for global warming!’
A few minutes later he switched on Radio 3, which allowed Mandy to take her iPod from her bag and plug in her headphones. It was a compilation – garage, hip-hop, Mozart and Abba; Mandy rested her head back and allowed her gaze to settle through the windscreen. The two-hour journey slowly passed and her thoughts wandered to the trips she’d made to and from her aunt’s as a child. The adults had taken turns to collect and return Sarah and her from their weekend stays. Mandy remembered how they’d sat in the back of the car and giggled, the fun of the weekend continuing during the journey. Then the visits had abruptly stopped and she’d never seen Sarah again. Stopped completely without explanation, and she’d never been able to ask her father why.
They turned off the A11 and Mandy switched off her iPod and removed her earpieces.
‘Not far now,’ her father said.
She heard the tension in his voice and saw his forehead crease. She wasn’t sure how much of his anxiety was due to Grandpa’s illness, and how much by the prospect of seeing his sister again, but Mandy was sure that if she hadn’t agreed to accompany him, or her mother hadn’t changed her mind and come, he would have found visiting alone very difficult indeed. His dependence on her gave him an almost childlike vulnerability, and her heart went out to him.
‘Don’t worry,’ she said lightly. ‘I’m sure Evelyn will be on her best behaviour.’
He smiled and seemed to take comfort in their small conspiracy. ‘We won’t stay too long,’ he reassured her.
They slowed to 30 m.p.h. as they entered the village with its post-office-cum-general-store. Mandy remembered the shop vividly from all the times she’d stayed at her aunt’s. Auntie Evelyn, Sarah and she had often walked to the store, with Sarah’s Labrador Misty. When Sarah and she had been considered old enough, the two of them had gone there alone to spend their pocket money on sweets, ice-cream, or a memento from the display stand of neatly arranged china gifts. It had been an adventure, a chance to take responsibility, which had been possible in the safe rural community where her aunt lived, but not in Greater London when Sarah had stayed with her.
Mandy recognized the store at once – it was virtually unchanged – as she had remembered the approach to the village, and indeed most of the journey. But as they left the village and her father turned from the main road on to the B road for what he said was the last part of the journey, she suddenly found her mind had gone completely blank. She didn’t recall any of it.
She didn’t think it was that the developers had been busy in the last ten years and had changed the contours of the landscape; it was still largely agricultural land, with farmers’ houses and outbuildings dotted in between, presumably as it had been for generations. But as Mandy searched through the windscreen, then her side window, and round her father to his side window, none of what she now saw looked the least bit familiar. She could have been making the journey for the first time for the lack of recognition, which was both strange and unsettling. Swivelling round in her seat, she turned to look out of the rear window, hoping a different perspective might jog her memory.
‘Lost something?’ her father asked.
‘No. Have Evelyn and John moved since I visited as a child?’ Which seemed the most likely explanation, and her father had forgotten to mention it.
‘No,’ he said, glancing at her. ‘Why do you ask?’
Mandy straightened in her seat and returned her gaze to the front, looking through the window for a landmark – something familiar. ‘I don’t recognize any of this,’ she said. ‘Have we come a different way?’
He shook his head. ‘There is only one way to your aunt’s. We turn right in about a hundred yards and their house is on the left.’
Mandy looked at the trees growing from the grassy banks that flanked the narrow road and then through a gap in the trees, which offered another view of the countryside. She looked through the windscreen, then to her left and right, but still found nothing that she even vaguely remembered – absolutely nothing. She heard her father change down a gear, and the car slowed; then they turned right and continued along a single-track lane. Suddenly the tyres were crunching over the gravel and they pulled on to a driveway leading to a house.
‘Remember it now?’ she heard him say. He stopped the car and cut the engine.
Mandy stared at the house and experienced an unsettling stab of familiarity. ‘A little,’ she said, and tried to calm her racing heart.
Three
It was like déjà vu – that flash of familiarity, sensed rather than consciously thought. A dizziness; a feeling of not being there. It was as though she’d been given a glimpse of another life. It had been fleeting, and without detail, but as Mandy looked at her aunt’s house, panic rose. She’d been here lots of times as a child but couldn’t remember any detail. It was like looking at a holiday photo in someone else’s album of a place she too had once visited.
She read the old wooden signboard – Breakspeare Manor – and then looked at the house again. It was a large sprawling manor house with two small stone turrets and lattice period windows. The front of the house was covered with the bare winding stems of wistaria. Instinctively Mandy knew that in a couple of weeks the entire front of the house would be festooned with its lilac blooms, like the venue for a wedding reception at a far-off and exotic location. She knew it without remembering – a gut feeling – and also that the house was 150 years old.
‘Ready?’ her father asked after a moment, gathering himself. She nodded and, taking a deep breath, picked up her bag from beside her feet and got out. The air smelt fresh and clean after London but it had a cooler, sharper edge. Drawing her cardigan closer, she waited for her father to get out. He reached inside the car for his jacket, straightened and, pointing the remote at the car, pressed to lock it. Mandy looked around. There were no other cars on the sweeping carriage driveway, and the double garage – a separate building to the left of the house – had its doors closed. None of the rooms at the front of the house had their windows open and the whole house looked shut up and empty.
‘There must be someone in,’ her father said, echoing her thoughts. ‘Grandpa’s here and we’re expected.’
She walked beside her father as they crossed the drive to the stone arched porch. Mounted on the wall to the right of the porch was a black-on-white sign announcing ‘Tradesmen’, with an arrow pointing to the side of the house. Mandy didn’t remember the sign but knew her aunt had insisted the butcher, housekeeper, gardener, newspaper boy, plumber and electrician used the side entrance, while friends and those arriving in big cars used the front door. She also remembered this had seemed strange to her as a child. At her house everyone used the front door, including those delivering goods and reading the gas and electric meters; the side gate was only used to take out the garbage.
‘Shall we let ourselves in the tradesmen’s entrance?’ her father asked, taking a step out of the porch and looking up at the front. ‘I don’t want to press the bell and disturb Grandpa if he’s sleeping.’
‘The gate is kept locked and the bell is even louder than this one. So they can hear it from the kitchen and laundry room.’ Her father looked at her, mildly surprised she’d remembered this detail. She shrugged and hid her discomfort.
Mandy didn’t know how she knew about the bell; her reaction had been instinctive, as though she’d absorbed the information from being part of her aunt’s family during all the times she’d stayed as a child. And while she still couldn’t remember visiting the house as such, nor had the least idea what the rooms would look like once they were inside, she found she knew that breakfast and lunch were taken in the morning room and supper in the dining room, and that Wednesday was the housekeeper’s day off. Perhaps she’d remembered this because it was all so very different from her own family’s modest home and routine, she thought.
Her father pressed the bell and almost immediately the door opened. For a moment Mandy thought the dark-haired woman standi
ng before them was her aunt, until she saw the apron.
‘Good morning. Please come in,’ the housekeeper said, clearly expecting them. ‘Mrs Osborne is busy with her father.’ She smiled warmly and stood aside to let them in.
Although Mandy couldn’t have described the housekeeper from when she’d visited as a child, she felt sure this wasn’t the same woman, but they clearly used the same polish. The faint but distinctive smell of beeswax drifted into the hall from the dining room, and Mandy instinctively knew that the dining table needed a lot of polishing.
‘Please come through to the sitting room,’ the housekeeper said, leading the way along the wooden panelled hall, which seemed vaguely familiar.
Mandy felt the same vague familiarity as she entered the sitting room, while not actually recalling ever being in the room. She looked at the off-white sofa and matching armchairs, the light beige carpet, curtains and soft furnishings, and wondered if she and Sarah hadn’t been allowed in this room as children, which could explain her lack of recall.
‘Sit down and make yourselves comfortable,’ the housekeeper said, waving towards the armchairs and sofa. ‘I’m Mrs Saunders. Mrs Osborne will be with you shortly. Can I get you coffee?’
‘Yes please,’ Mandy said, and her father nodded.
‘That’s not the same housekeeper who was here when I used to stay, is it?’ Mandy asked her father as soon as the door closed behind her.
‘No. That was Mrs Pryce. She left –’ He stopped as though he had been about to say something but had thought better of it. ‘This one is new.’
They sat for a while, both gazing out of the French windows and on to the upper terraces. Although it was only March the gardener had clearly been busy. Brightly coloured spring blooms dotted the terracotta pots on the patio and the neatly tended flower beds beyond. Instinctively Mandy knew that further down the gardens, out of sight on the lower lawns, there used to be swings, which Sarah and she had played on as children.
The room was quiet, save for the ticking of the brass pendulum clock mounted in the alcove by the fireplace. Indeed, the whole house seemed quiet; unnaturally so, Mandy thought. It was a sharp contrast to her studio flat where the comings and goings of the other occupants meant there was always noise of some sort.
‘I don’t know why we have to wait here,’ her father grumbled after a moment. ‘I’ve come to see my father, not drink coffee.’
‘The housekeeper said Evelyn was busy with Grandpa,’ Mandy soothed. ‘I’m sure she won’t be long.’
He harrumphed. Mandy could feel his tension and knew that unless he changed his attitude he was going to start off on the wrong foot when he met his sister again after all these years.
‘Has this room changed much?’ she asked shortly, still unable to place it and trying to cut the silence with conversation.
‘I don’t know,’ he said quickly. He looked away, deflecting further questions.
They sat in silence again, gazing out of the window, until a knock sounded on the door and the housekeeper returned carrying a large silver tray with coffee, and biscuits arranged on a white porcelain plate.
‘Help yourselves,’ she said, placing the tray on the coffee table between them.
‘Thank you,’ Mandy said, grateful for the biscuits, having not had breakfast. Her father nodded.
‘You’re welcome. Mrs Osborne is on her way.’ She smiled and left the room, closing the door behind her.
Mandy put sugar in one cup and passed it to her father and then picked up the other cup and took a sip. It felt very odd sitting here drinking coffee with the sense that it was all familiar while not actually recalling it – like watching someone’s home movie. You saw the intimacy of their lives but weren’t part of it. The sitting-room door opened again and Evelyn came in. Mandy knew immediately it was her aunt: a smaller, female, and slightly younger version of her father. Her father stood as she entered and put down his cup. There was a moment’s hesitation before Evelyn came over and they air-kissed. ‘Hello, Ray,’ she said, and then, turning to Mandy: ‘Good to see you again, love, though it’s a pity it’s in such sad circumstances.’
Mandy felt another stab of familiarity as she stood to kiss her aunt. Evelyn had always called her Mandy, as her friends and work colleagues did, while her parents still used her full name: Amanda.
‘How’s Dad?’ her father asked.
Evelyn took a step back and Mandy saw the anxiety in her face. ‘Very poorly. Sit down while I explain what has happened. You need to know before you see him.’
Mandy thought he was going to protest at being kept longer from his father, but he clearly thought better of it. He returned to the armchair while Evelyn sat on the sofa beside her. Drawing her hand anxiously across her forehead, she looked from Mandy to her brother, her face sad and serious.
‘Dad is very old,’ she began slowly, ‘and his heart is weak. He was lucky to recover from the stroke last year, but it has taken its toll. His body is slowly closing down. As you know he was admitted to hospital two weeks ago with a chest infection. They put him on intravenous antibiotics. Although the chest infection cleared, his general condition deteriorated.’ She paused and Mandy thought she was choosing her words very carefully, as though trying to let them down slowly.
‘Dad had never been in hospital before,’ she continued, ‘apart from when he had pneumonia as a child. He was very upset by the whole experience. He felt no one cared and he insisted he wanted to go home. Clearly it was out of the question for him to go to his house – Mum couldn’t have coped, so I made the offer for them both to come here, which they accepted. Ray,’ Evelyn said, looking directly at him and her eyes misting, ‘Dad won’t be returning to hospital, nor to his home. He has come here so he can have peace and quiet among his loved ones at the end.’
‘But I don’t understand,’ her father said abruptly. ‘You said Dad responded to the antibiotics, so why shouldn’t he make a full recovery?’
Evelyn paused and glanced at Mandy, almost for support. ‘His body is slowly shutting down. He’s tired, Ray. He’s had a long life and a good one, and now it’s coming to its natural end. I don’t know how else to put it, Ray, but Dad is dying.’
There was silence. Mandy looked from Evelyn to her father, who was clearly as shocked as she was. He had gone very pale and was absently wringing his hands in his lap. Presumably Evelyn had had time to come to terms with the seriousness of Grandpa’s condition while they had not. ‘Has the doctor said this?’ he asked at length.
‘Not in so many words,’ Evelyn said gently, ‘but it will be obvious when you see him.’
‘I’d like to see him now, please,’ he said, standing. ‘And I think we should leave the prognosis to the doctor.’
Mandy felt embarrassed by her father’s curtness and hoped Evelyn appreciated it was a result of the shock of hearing how poorly his father was, and didn’t take it personally.
‘I’ll take you to him now,’ Evelyn said evenly, also standing. ‘We’ve converted the study into a sick room. Mum sits with him for most of the day.’ She hesitated and looked again to Mandy for support. ‘Be prepared to see a big change in him. He’s lost a lot of weight.’
‘Why? Isn’t he eating?’ her father asked as they crossed the sitting room. Mandy knew he hadn’t really grasped the implications of what Evelyn had told them.
‘He takes a little water sometimes,’ Evelyn said. ‘But even that is getting less. He’s sleeping more and more. My hope is that in the end he’ll just fall into a deep sleep from which he won’t wake.’
Four
Mandy felt her pulse quicken as she followed her aunt and father along the hallway at the rear of the house. When her father had said Grandpa had taken a turn for the worse she hadn’t for a moment thought he could be dying, only that he was ill. She was struggling to take in what Evelyn had told them; she could see her father was too. They walked in silence down the wood-panelled hall, which, like the reception hall and the other rooms they passed, se
emed vaguely familiar. Evelyn stopped outside a closed door on their right and, giving a brief knock, eased it open. ‘All right, Mum?’ she said, poking her head round. ‘Ray and Mandy are here.’
They followed her in. Gran was sitting beside a single bed, a little away from the wall, where Grandpa lay on his back asleep. ‘Don’t get up,’ her father said as Gran began struggling on to her walking frame to greet them. He went over and, kissing her cheek, helped her back down. Mandy saw his face crumple as he looked at the bed.
‘He’s asleep,’ Gran said protectively, her voice small and uneven. ‘He’s very poorly. I’m so pleased you’ve both come.’
Her father nodded but couldn’t say anything.
Mandy kissed Gran, hugging her thin shoulders, and then looked at Grandpa. She could have wept. It was only three weeks since she’d last seen him and although he was in his eighties he’d been fit and well. He’d taken her on a tour of his garden and had proudly shown her the spring bulbs and the forsythia which was about to flower. Now he lay on his back propped on a mountain of pillows, his previous ruddy complexion waxen and his cheeks hollow. His jaw had relaxed in sleep and his mouth hung open as his head lolled to one side. His right arm, thin and wasted, jutted from the sheet and Gran held his hand. It was pitiful how quickly someone of his age could deteriorate, Mandy thought. She looked at her father and saw her own pain reflected.
‘The nurse has just left,’ Gran said, her voice slight. ‘He’ll sleep for a while now. It tires him out being messed around with.’
‘The nurse was washing him, Mum,’ Evelyn qualified. ‘Not messing him around.’
‘It’s all the same to him,’ Gran returned smartly, ever protective of her husband of fifty-nine years.
They fell silent and all that could be heard for some moments was Grandpa’s heavy and laboured breathing. Mandy looked at her father, who was standing beside Gran, one hand resting reassuringly on her shoulder. She saw his creased brow and the pain in his eyes, and knew he was as shocked as she was by Grandpa’s physical decline. And perhaps, Mandy thought, he saw his own end reflected in his father, for they had been very much alike in stature and temperament, until now. Mandy looked at the outline of Grandpa’s wasted body beneath the sheets and could see none of her father’s strong and muscular frame, nor his pride and dignity. As she watched saliva ran from the corner of Grandpa’s mouth and dribbled on to the pillow. Evelyn took a tissue from the box on the desk and wiped the corner of his mouth. ‘There, there, that’s better,’ she soothed, as though tending a baby. Mandy cringed inwardly.
