Trio

by Sue Gee

  He’d said yes, and his letter was there on the desk, George could see that great black flourishing signature, beneath Miss Aickman’s typing. And with Straughan’s name, and the passing of the letter from man to man, came a microscopic change in the atmosphere, he was sure of it.

  ‘Mr Liddell.’ Ingham leaned forward, and clasped his hands. ‘You are aware of the decisions we can make at this Tribunal?’ And at George’s uncertain nod, he went through them, slowly and deliberately.

  ‘Unconditional Exemption from military service – as I am sure you know, this is extremely unusual. Exemption on condition that you undertake civilian work, under civilian control. Or you could be registered for call-up for non-combatant duties – fire-watching, for example. You will be aware that there have already been air-raid warnings in Newcastle. Finally, if the Tribunal is not convinced that your application is genuine—’ he paused. ‘Then you would simply be liable for military service. A refusal would mean imprisonment.’

  There was a silence. Russet leaves blew past the window: he would always remember that: such beauty, and such fear.

  ‘You may leave,’ said Ingham. ‘We will write to you with our decision.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’ He did not think to nod to the other men, just got to his feet, his legs like water. He could feel their eyes upon him, as he walked slowly across to the heavy, brass-­handled door.

  ‘Not anxious about leaving a young wife . . . No, I thought not.’

  Outside, he leaned against the arched stone walls of the entrance, lined with sandbags, and shut his eyes, winging a message to his beloved, wherever he might be in earth or heaven.

  Was that how it had been? Returning to the car, Geoffrey thought back to the time when he and Evie, beginning at school to learn about the war, asking about it at home, had been told about George, and his refusal. Conchies had had a hard time of it: the Fusiliers had seen action at Dunkirk, at Monte Cassino. Northumberland had lost some 17,000 men by the end of the war, and grieving families didn’t want to see a man out and about when they’d lost husbands, brothers, sons. On the streets of Newcastle such a man could have a white feather thrust into his hand, could be hissed at, spat at, even.

  ‘But George is so nice,’ said Evie, clasping her knees by the fire. ‘I love him! They shouldn’t have spat at him.’ She put her hands to his mouth. ‘He didn’t go to prison, did he?’

  ‘He didn’t.’ Their mother got up, and went over to the piano, as almost every evening. ‘And no one spat at him, as far as I know. He didn’t think he had a hope, after that awful tribunal, but they gave him exemption, as a music teacher.’

  ‘Old Straughan’s name must have carried some weight,’ said their father, throwing another log on the fire.

  ‘George was a wonderful teacher, actually.’ At the piano, their mother began to play. ‘And he joined a sort of wartime council for promoting music and the arts. He organised lots of concerts, all through the war, not just for the Trio, but with other musicians, and children – in a way, his life went on as before, but busier. He did fire-watching, too.’

  ‘So did I,’ said their father. ‘Don’t forget that. Up on the roof of Kirkhoughton Town Hall, night after night. Grand stars.’

  ‘The Peace Pledge Union?’ Geoffrey remembered asking, as he reached the riverside now. A boy and his father were setting a little sailboat on the water, nudging it with a stick. ‘What was that, exactly?’

  And his father had begun to talk about the artists and academics who’d been a part of it – Bertrand Russell, Eric Gill, Sybil Thorndike. Benjamin Britten.

  The piano music suddenly changed: no longer a sonata but loud rhythmic chords which made them all sit up.

  ‘The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra,’ said Evie, leaping to her feet and conducting madly. She stopped. ‘George didn’t know Benjamin Britten, did he?’

  ‘No,’ said their father. ‘But he knew all about him. He took a whole lot of Kirkhoughton Boys to see Peter Grimes once, in London – that was right at the end of the war, the first production.’

  ‘Did you go?’

  ‘No.’ A wry smile. ‘It was bang in the middle of exams, as it happened.’

  ‘Dad,’ Geoffrey had said, as their mother stopped playing, and Evie flopped back in her chair. ‘You were exempt from call-up, weren’t you? Like the miners.’

  ‘Miners, teachers, farmers – reserved occupations.’ His father was watching a log break up in the fire. He leaned forward, gave it a poke. ‘Like the dockers, and the railway workers – had to keep the country going.’

  ‘But did you—’ he felt himself tread carefully, not wanting to hurt or upset. ‘Did you mind not fighting?’

  There was a silence. Their mother was turning on the piano stool, looking across the room.

  ‘Dad?’

  His father leaned back in the high wing chair. ‘Of course I wanted to stay alive,’ he said slowly. ‘For your mother, for all of you. For myself. But – well, there’s a lot to be said for fighting for what you believe in. You must read George Orwell, Geoff. Part of me felt I should be there with the rest.’

  6

  Morpeth was behind him, and now, as he drove along the old roads he’d once known so well, he felt a rising happiness. The morning was still fine, the sun striking bare tree trunks in a way which even in childhood had lifted his heart: that greeny-grey, that winter stillness – the fields stretched away in the sun. But the hills to his left were speckled with white on the tops. In the north, you could have two kinds of weather within a few miles.

  Composer of the Week: still Haydn. A quartet danced with him as he drove. He slowed to drive over a bridge across the river, passed a farm. A dog on a chain began to leap and bark wildly at the sound of the car. ‘Quiet!’ The farmer crossing the yard gave a shout, then raised his hand, and Geoffrey raised his own in greeting, glimpsing a young woman washing dishes at the kitchen window. And from thinking so much about George, who had been Evie’s godfather, and written to her until his death, he found his mind turning now to Diana Embleton, who had spent the war as a Land Girl.

  ‘Imagine it! Me! Driving a tractor, digging up swedes. Milking! Gosh, I did love milking. Some of those cows were so sweet.’

  If Evie had loved George, he had adored Diana. How could you not? So gorgeous to look at – in his teens he’d woken from dreams about her which had made him flush with mingled happiness and embarrassment. She was forty-five! How could he think of her in that way?

  He could. Lots of men could. She was beautiful, funny and kind. As she grew older, the pale mass of her hair began to grey, yet it was still something you wanted to touch, to stroke, to unpin. Her skin had never lost its English rose pink and cream; her clothes were always the kind of clothes which made you think about the underwear beneath, imagining satin, silk and lace. She had such spirit, she was such fun. But there was more than that, a dreaminess, a thoughtfulness. Now and then you’d look up from a game of croquet in the garden, or draughts by the fire, and see she was miles away. And when she played—

  ‘Of course,’ she told him once, when they were out for a walk, ‘I’ve always been the weakest of the three. George lets me know that, though he never actually says. But if anyone has to do everything three times, or keeps missing an entry, or just fluffs things – you can count on me.’

  ‘I think you play fantastically.’

  ‘Darling.’ She put her hand on his arm and he felt a tingle run through him from head to foot. She had called him darling. Could he – might he – might it ever be possible . . . ‘You’re so sweet,’ she said, as they came to a stile. ‘Help me up, would you? I’m getting so creaky now.’

  He knew that without him she would almost have vaulted it, she was so graceful and strong. And all those years in the war as a Land Girl: that must have made her really fit. But he put a hand under her arm, in its soft tweed jacket, and helped her u
p, and over. She dropped down onto the grass.

  ‘Diana?’ He followed her over the weathered planking.

  ‘Yes, darling.’

  The wind was blowing strands of hair across her face; he reached out and brushed one away. Her dreamy grey eyes regarded him.

  ‘You’re so like your father.’ And then, as he opened his mouth to speak, to make, at last, his declaration: ‘Don’t,’ she said quickly. ‘I’m old enough to be your mother.’ She laughed. ‘I almost am your mother, if that’s what godmothers are. Come on.’

  And she was striding away, over the grass still glossy from yesterday’s rain. He followed helplessly.

  She was beautiful, she was unattainable – by him, or by anyone else, it seemed. It was Evie, always the one to ask questions, and go on asking them, who had said to their mother one evening at supper;

  ‘Mummy? Why isn’t Diana married?’

  ‘I don’t know. Who wants a second helping?’

  ‘Me,’ said their father, at the other end of the table, and then it was all pass your plate, and is that enough, and who wants another potato.

  ‘She’s so lovely,’ said Evie, and he looked at his plate, feeling no one but he had the right to say that. ‘I’d have thought lots of men would want to marry her.’ She turned to look at him. ‘Don’t you think so, Geoff?’

  ‘S’pose so.’

  Evie groaned. ‘Honestly. Boys.’ She turned back to their mother. ‘Lots of men,’ she said again.

  ‘Oh, Evie. Perhaps lots of men did want to marry her. Perhaps she just didn’t want to marry them.’

  ‘But why? I mean, there must have been someone.’

  He saw a glance run between his parents down the table.

  To this day he didn’t know its meaning, and to this day he had not thought of it for years. Decades. When you were as old as he was, everything was decades ago.

  ‘I just don’t know,’ said their mother at last. ‘But I do know you haven’t done your practice yet. Straight after supper, yes?’

  ‘Oh, Mummy.’

  The evening sunlight slanted through the window. Here in the kitchen, here at the back of the house, it was always full of shadows.

  ‘Diana,’ Geoffrey said now, slowing as Hepplewick village came into view. Apart from Becky’s, it was the first time he’d said a woman’s name aloud for years. And he thought of another conversation with her, much later, when he was married, and everything was easier between them. There’d been a rehearsal, soon there would be supper. Becky and his mother were clattering about.

  ‘Music is everything to me.’ She was sitting in the drawing room, a glass in her hand. Outside, a blackbird was singing away on the rooftop – there was always a blackbird at the Hall. ‘I might not have been as good as I wanted, or everyone else wanted, but – it saved me. Without it, I’d have been just a silly girl.’ She looked out at the garden, and again he saw that faraway look fill her eyes. It was a look which could drive a man mad.

  ‘We all need something to give our lives meaning, don’t we?’ she said slowly. ‘I mean, I know that’s a cliché, but – music is mine. Just as it is for your mother. And the wretched George.’

  ‘Did someone mention my name?’ He was crossing the hall, as the clock began to chime. In he came, lifting his hand in a sweep. ‘I see everyone has a drink except me.’

  There was the village green, with its handful of houses. A few new ones, stretching out quite a way behind them. A Christmas tree stood in every window, some flashing lights, though it was barely mid-morning. There was the church. Geoffrey pulled up, got out on to the verge. It was cold, he was stiff. He shook himself, pulled on his gloves.

  Then he walked up and opened the lych gate, remembering that lovely click, though surely there must be a new latch now. He closed it behind him, looked round, trying to remember. It was over thirty years.

  One or two of the graves had fresh flowers out of season; some of the headstones were that black shiny granite he didn’t like, though you saw it everywhere.

  And there were the two Heslop tombs, there were the angels. Evie had loved them, Nina and Charlie had loved them: that billowing hair, those gowns, those upraised hands. One was stern, one had a gentle smile. All nonsense, of course. And yet – he had loved them too.

  He walked along the path towards the west end of the church, feeling more confident now. Yes. There it was. His feet sounded loud on the flag-stoned path.

  In loving memory . . .

  His father had gone first, so suddenly, so shockingly – but then, how hard he’d worked.

  Steven Geoffrey Coulter, 1910-1979

  His mother, weeping unstoppably, had clung to the Hall.

  ‘Don’t make me leave it, I couldn’t bear to leave it.’

  A cleaner came, one of the Barrow girls: Grace, the first to marry. A gardener, Nellie’s husband. There weren’t many families who’d stayed together as these two had: Heslop – Coulter, as his mother became – and Barrow; he and Evie knew they were lucky, not to have to worry too much. But then, as with Becky; as with their long-ago, long-dead grandmother; cancer came to call.

  And of his beloved wife, Margot, née Heslop

  1912-1982

  Weeds were growing round the base of the headstone, and he bent to tug them out, straightening up with difficulty. Then he just stood there, thinking.

  ‘I’m here,’ he said to his parents, and felt he need say no more.

  Up on the church tower a jackdaw was making its sharp metallic sound – you couldn’t really call it a cry. Chip. Chip-chip, into the raw morning air. The country in winter: filled with emotion as he was, he was very glad he’d come. And he walked back through the churchyard, dropping the weeds in a metal basket, and wondering whether to look in the church. Yes, just for a minute or two. The Trio had often played here.

  He walked up to the south door, turned the handle, pushed at the old oak door. But it didn’t give. It was locked – you couldn’t even get into the porch.

  Had it ever been locked in his childhood? He couldn’t ­remember. But just as well, perhaps: he still had a lot to do. He walked back to the car, got in, and drove away. No music now: he didn’t want it, didn’t want anything except this rising tide of anticipation, rounding the bend in the lane, slowing down to prolong the moment.

  He was almost there. And now he was driving really slowly, his heart beginning to thump in his chest as the lane straightened out and he saw the line of trees.

  They’d been thinned, they’d been thinned quite a lot. He looked through them and frowned. He’d misjudged the distance – he wasn’t as close as he’d thought. And he drove on, passing a lot of new build, a housing estate, and rounded the next bend. This was it.

  No it wasn’t.

  For a moment he felt himself quite lose his moorings. He was older than he thought, he was more forgetful. Somehow he’d made a mistake. And he pulled into the verge, and switched off the engine.

  ‘Get a grip, Coulter,’ he said aloud, and got out of the car once again. Perhaps he should walk, perhaps that was better. The fields to the left stretched away, just as he remembered. But there was nothing to see on the right except more fields, ones he remembered walking through on Sundays with the family, remembered that quite clearly. So where was the Hall?

  He turned back, walked past the car to the bend, and on to the next. Here were those new-build houses again: where had they come from?

  Then he knew.

  He stood in the lane and beheld not the tall iron gates, not the drive or the terrace, not the towering cedar, nor the grey stone house overlooking that limitless lawn, with its rose beds and summerhouse. Not the ha-ha, nor the tennis court, nor the stable yard. It was gone, all of it. He was looking at houses you could see anywhere in the country: bright red brick, the dark brown window frames and little porches which every builder in the land used n
ow; tarmac paths and cars where there should have been front gardens. Instead, just a strip of grass, running from house to house. And a Christmas tree in every window. From somewhere he could hear cartoon voices, laughing away in the quiet.

  He could not move. He could not move a muscle. How could he have been so foolish, so unthinking, all this time? Developers were everywhere, the price of land was soaring, people needed somewhere to live. In a great spacious county like Northumberland there was every opportunity to give it to them, and make a fantastic profit.

  When had it happened? How soon after they’d sold it had it happened?

  ‘Oh, Jesus.’ He covered his eyes.

  Back in the car, finally back there, though it felt like an hour before he made it, he reached for the Thermos. Something else he hadn’t thought of – to ask the landlady at the B&B to refill it. He slowly unscrewed the cup, then the lid, drank a cold mouthful and almost spat. But he had to have something, or die. That was what it felt like.

  Caffeine stirred in his veins. It was better than nothing. At last he stopped trembling. Then he started the car. He’d drive to Kirkhoughton, which surely could not have been razed to the ground. He’d look at the school, have a good hot lunch. And then he’d be over to Evie’s, fall into her arms.

  Cars were parked all round the Square, and all of them on meters. Of course they were. He drove round, finding almost the last space, not far from the Museum, and felt in the little compartment for coins. Another thing he hadn’t considered, but he wouldn’t be staying long, and he found a couple of pounds and some fifty pences. He got out, fed the meter, and looked about him.

  His millionth Christmas tree stood outside the Museum. Posters of Roman antiquities were pinned in a glass box at the entrance. At the top of the Square stood another, a mighty thing, a terrific tree, as tall as the one at the Sage, if not taller. He knew where it had come from, as it had come every year since for ever: from Harwood Forest, up in the hills, brought down by lorry. Even as he thought this, he wondered if it were true. The world he once knew had moved beneath his feet – that was how it still felt, and even the lights on the tree were not as they used to be, but that planet-saving cold bluish-white, as they had been at the Sage. Never mind, never mind. There were some things you had to get used to.