'Alex, it does, it's—'
'It doesn't. She's, what, some distant relation of yours and—'
'My great-aunt,' Iris says. 'Not that distant.'
'Whatever. This is a mess made by someone else, by your grandmother, if anyone. It's nothing to do with you. You mustn't have anything more to do with it. Do you hear me? Iris? Promise me you won't.'
Iris's grandmother is sitting in a leather chair, her feet propped on a stool, a cardigan around her shoulders. Outside the window, an elderly man shuffles up and down the terrace, hands held behind his back.
Iris stands in the doorway. She doesn't come here very often. As a child, she was taken to visit her grandmother once a week. She had liked the gloomy old house, the overgrown garden. She used to run up and down the tangled, mossy paths, in and out of the gazebo. And her grandmother had liked having her there, in a pretty dress, to show her friends. 'My Iris,' she used to call her, 'my flower.' But, as a teenager, her grandmother lost enthusiasm for her. 'You look disgusting,' she said once, when Iris appeared in a skirt she had made herself, 'no decent man will have you if you make an exhibition of yourself like that.'
'She's just had her dinner,' the care assistant says, 'haven't you, Kathleen?'
Her grandmother looks up at the sound of her name but, seeing no one who means anything to her, looks down again at her lap.
'Hello,' Iris says. 'It's me, Iris.'
'Iris,' her grandmother repeats.
'Yes.'
'My son has a little girl called Iris.'
'That's right,' Iris says, 'that's—'
'Of course it's right,' her grandmother snaps. 'Do you think I'm a fool?'
Iris pulls up a stool and sits down, her bag on her lap. 'No. I don't. I just meant that that's me. I'm your son's daughter.'
Her grandmother looks at her, long and hard, her face unsure, almost frightened. 'Don't be ridiculous,' she says, and shuts her eyes.
Iris looks about her. Her grandmother's room is thickly carpeted, choked with antique furniture, and has a view over the garden. A fountain twists in the distance and it is possible to make out the roofs of the Old Town, a crane wheeling in the sky above the city. Beside the bed are two books and Iris is just tilting her head to see what they are when her grandmother opens her eyes. 'I'm waiting for someone to do up my cardigan,' she says.
'I'll do it,' Iris says.
'I'm cold.'
Iris stands up, leans over and reaches for the buttons.
'What are you doing?' her grandmother squawks, shrinking into the chair, batting at Iris's hands. 'What are you doing?'
'I was helping you with your cardigan.'
'Why?'
'You were cold.'
'Was I?'
'Yes.'
'That's because my cardigan isn't buttoned. I need it done up.'
Iris sits back and takes a deep breath. 'Grandma,' she says, 'I came today because I wanted to ask you about Esme.'
Her grandmother turns towards her, but seems to become distracted by a handkerchief poking out of her cuff.
'Do you remember Esme?' Iris persists. 'Your sister?'
Her grandmother plucks at the handkerchief and it unwinds from her sleeve, falling into her lap, and Iris half expects there to be a string of them, all knotted together.
'Did I have lunch?' her grandmother asks.
'Yes. You've had dinner too.'
'What did I have?'
'Beef,' Iris invents.
This makes her grandmother furious. 'Beef? Why are you talking about beef?' She swings round wildly to peer out of the door. 'Who are you? I don't know you.'
Iris suppresses a sigh and looks out at the fountain. 'I'm your granddaughter. My father was—'
'She wouldn't let go of the baby,' her grandmother says suddenly.
'Who?' Iris pounces. 'Esme?'
Her grandmother's eyes are focused somewhere beyond the window. 'They had to sedate her. She wouldn't let go.'
Iris tries to stay calm. 'Which baby? Do you mean your baby?'
'The baby' her grandmother says crossly. She gestures desperately at something, at meaning. 'The baby. You know.'
'When was this?'
Her grandmother frowns and Iris tries not to panic. She knows she doesn't have long.
'Were you there,' Iris tries a different tack, 'when the thing with the baby happened?'
'I was waiting in a room. It wasn't my fault. They told me afterwards.'
'Who?' Iris asks. 'Who told you?'
'The people.'
'People?'
'The woman.' Her grandmother makes an indecipherable shape round her head. Two of them.'
'Two of what?'
Her grandmother looks vague. Iris can sense her sinking back into the quicksand.
'Who told you about Esme and the baby?' Iris speaks quickly, hoping to fit it all in before her grandmother loses herself again. 'Whose baby was it? Was it her baby? Is that why she was—'
'Have I had my dinner?' her grandmother says.
Someone at the front desk tells her where to go and Iris takes a turning into an ill-lit corridor with lights stretching out in a row. There is a sign above a door, Records, and through the distorted aquarium glass, she sees a big room, lined with shelves.
Inside, a man sits on a high stool with a file in front of him. Iris rests her hand on the counter. She experiences a spasm of doubt about this mission. Maybe Alex is right. Maybe she should just leave this alone. But the man behind the counter is looking at her expectantly.
'I was wondering...' she begins. 'I'm looking for records of admission. Peter Lasdun said I could come.'
The man readjusts his glasses and grimaces, as if hit by a sudden pain. 'Those records are confidential,' he says.
Iris fumbles in her bag. 'I've got a letter from him in here somewhere, proving I'm a relative.' She delves deeper, pushing aside her purse, some lipstick, keys, receipts. Where is the letter he faxed over to the shop this morning? Her fingers brush against a folded piece of paper and she pulls it out, triumphant. 'Here,' she says, pushing it towards the man. 'This is it.'
The man spends a long time perusing it and then Iris. 'When are you looking for?' he says eventually. 'What date?'
'The thing is,' Iris says, 'they aren't exactly sure. Nineteen thirties or forties.'
He gets down from his stool with a long sigh.
The volumes are enormous and weighty. Iris has to stand up to read them. A thick epidermis of dust has grown over the spine and the top edges of the pages. She opens one at random and the pages, yellowed and brittle, fall open at May 1941. A woman called Amy is admitted by a Dr Wallis. Amy is a war widow and has suspected puerperal fever. She is brought in by her brother. He says she won't stop cleaning the house. There is no mention of the baby and Iris wonders what happened to it. Did it live? Did the brother look after it? Did the brother's wife? Did the brother have a wife? Did Amy get out again?
Iris flicks over a few more pages. A woman who was convinced that the wireless was somehow killing them all. A girl who kept wandering away from the house at night. A Lady somebody who kept attacking a particular servant. A Cockenzie fishwife who showed signs of libidinous and uncontrolled behaviour. A youngest daughter who eloped to Ireland with a legal clerk. Iris is just reading about a Jane who had had the temerity to take long, solitary walks and refuse offers of marriage, when she is overtaken by a violent sneeze once, twice, three, four times.
She sniffs and searches her pockets for a tissue. The records room seems oddly silent after her sneezes. She glances around. It is empty apart from the man behind the desk and another man peering closely at something on a blue-lit microfiche screen. It seems strange that all these women were once here, in this building, that they spent days and weeks and months under this vast roof. As Iris turns out her pockets, it occurs to her that perhaps some of them are still here, like Esme. Is Jane of the long walks somewhere within these walls? Or the eloping youngest daughter?
No tissue, of cour
se. She looks back at the pile of admissions records. She really should get back to the shop. It could take her hours to find Esme in all this. Weeks. Peter Lasdun said on the phone that they were 'unable to identify the exact date of her admission'. Maybe Iris should ring him again. They must be able to find out. The sensible idea would be to get the date and then come back.
But Iris turns again to Jane and her long walks. She flips back through time. 1941, 1940, 1939, 1938. The Second World War begins and is swallowed, becoming just an idea, a threat in people's minds. The men are still in their homes, Hitler is a name in the papers, bombs, blitzes and concentration camps have never been heard of, winter becomes autumn, then summer, then spring. April yields to March, then February, and meanwhile Iris reads of refusals to speak, of unironed clothes, of arguments with neighbours, of hysteria, of unwashed dishes and unswept floors, of never wanting marital relations or wanting them too much or not enough or not in the right way or seeking them elsewhere. Of husbands at the end of their tethers, of parents unable to understand the women their daughters have become, of fathers who insist, over and over again, that she used to be such a lovely little thing. Daughters who just don't listen. Wives who one day pack a suitcase and leave the house, shutting the door behind them, and have to be tracked down and brought back.
And when Iris turns a page and finds the name Euphemia Lennox she almost keeps turning because it must be hours now since she started this and she's so dumbstruck by it all that she has to check herself, to remind herself that this is why she is here. She smooths the ancient paper of Esme's admission form with the pads of her fingers.
Aged sixteen, is what she sees first. Then: Insists on keeping her hair long. Iris reads the whole document from beginning to end, then goes back and reads it again. It ends with: Parents report finding her dancing before a mirror, dressed in her mother's clothes.
Iris goes back to the shop. The dog is overjoyed to see her, as if she's been away a week, not just a few hours. She switches on the computer. She checks her email, opens one from her mother. Iris, I've racked my brains again and again about your grandmother and I don't recall her ever mentioning a sister, Sadie has written, Are you sure they've got it right? Iris replies, Yes, I've told you, it's her. And she asks how the weather is today in Brisbane. She replies to other emails, deletes some, ignores others, notes down the dates of certain jumble sales and auctions. She opens her accounts file.
But as she inputs the words invoice and downpayment and outstanding her concentration keeps slipping out from under her, because in some corner of her mind is the image of a room. It is late afternoon in this room and a girl is unpinning her hair. She is wearing a dress too large for her but the dress is beautiful, a creation in silk that she has looked at and longed for and now it is finally on her, around her. It clings to her legs and flows around her feet like water. She is humming, a tune about you and the night and the music, and as she hums, she moves about the room. Her body sways like a branch in the wind and her stockinged feet pass over the carpet very lightly. Her head is so full of the tune and the cool swish of silk that she doesn't hear the people coming up the stairs, she doesn't hear anything. She has no idea that in a minute or two the door will fly open and they will be standing there in the doorway, looking at her. She hears the music and she feels the dress. That is all. Her hands move about her like small birds.
Peter Lasdun is crossing Cauldstone car park, struggling to put on his mackintosh. A keen wind is coming in gusts off the Firth of Forth. He gets one arm in but the other sleeve flaps free, turning the coat inside out, the scarlet tartan lining waving in the salty air like a flag.
He is just wrestling it into submission when he hears someone calling his name. He turns into the wind and sees a woman hurrying towards him. He has to stare at her for a moment before he can place her. It's that Lennox woman, or Lockhart woman or whatever her name is, and she is accompanied by a monstrously large dog. Peter takes a step back. He doesn't like dogs.
'Can you tell me,' she says, as she bears down on him, 'what happens to her now? To people like her?'
Peter sighs. It is ten past the hour. His wife will be opening the oven door to check on his dinner. The aroma of meat juices and roasting vegetables will be filling the kitchen. His children, he hopes, are doing their homework in their rooms. He should be in the car, on the bypass, not trapped in a breezy car park by this woman. 'May I suggest you make another appointment—'
'I just want to ask one question, a quick question,' she flashes him a smile, revealing a row of nicely kept teeth, 'I won't delay you. I'll walk to your car with you.'
'Very well.' Peter gives up trying to put on his coat and lets it flap around his ankles.
'So, what happens to Esme now?'
'Esme?'
'Euphemia. Actually, you know...' She trails off and flashes him that smile again. 'Never mind. I mean Euphemia.'
Peter opens his car boot and lifts in his briefcase. 'Patients for whom no provisions have been made by relatives,' he can see the policy document before him and he reads the words aloud, 'become the responsibility of the state and will be rehoused accordingly.'
She frowns and it makes her lower lip pout slightly. 'What does that mean?'
'She'll be rehoused.' He slams the boot down and walks towards the car door. But the girl tags behind him.
'Where?'
'In a state establishment.'
'Another hospital?'
'No.' Peter sighs again. He knew this wouldn't be quick. 'Euphemia has been deemed eligible for discharge. She's successfully been through a Discharge Adjustment Programme and a Rehabilitation Schedule. She is on a waiting list at a home for the elderly. So she will be transferred there, I would imagine, as soon as a place becomes available.' Peter slides into the driver's seat and inserts his keys into the ignition. Surely that will be sufficient to get rid of her.
But no. She leans on the open car door and the hound sticks its muzzle in Peter's direction, sniffing. 'When will that be?' she asks.
He looks up at her and there is something about her – her persistence, her doggedness – that makes him feel particularly weary. 'You really want to know? It could be weeks. It could be months. You cannot imagine the pressure that such establishments are under. Insufficient finance, insufficient staff, not enough places to supply demand. Cauldstone is due to close in five weeks, Miss Lockhart, and were I to reveal to you that—'
'Isn't there anywhere else she can go in the meantime? She can't stay here. There must be somewhere else. I would ... I just want to get her out of here.'
He fiddles with the rear-view mirror, tilting it forward then back, unable to get a satisfactory view. 'There have been instances of patients such as Euphemia going to temporary accommodation until such time as a more permanent placing can be found. But my professional opinion is that I wouldn't recommend it.'
'What do you mean, temporary accommodation?'
'A short-term housing scheme, a residential hostel. Somewhere like that.'
'How soon could that happen?'
He gives his car door a tug. He really has had enough now. Will this woman never leave him alone? 'As soon as we can find transportation,' he snaps.
'I'll take her,' she says, without hesitation. 'I'll drive her myself.'
Iris lies on her side, a book in her hand. Luke's arm is round her waist and she can feel his breath on the back of her neck. His wife is visiting her sister so Luke is staying the night for the first time. Iris doesn't usually permit men to remain in her bed overnight but Luke had happened to call while she had lots of customers so she didn't have the time or privacy to argue her case.
She turns a page. Luke strokes her arm, then presses an experimental kiss to her shoulder. Iris doesn't respond. He sighs, shifts closer.
'Luke,' Iris says, shrugging him off.
He starts to nuzzle her neck.
'Luke, I'm reading.'
'I can see that,' he mumbles.
She turns another page with
a flick of her fingers. He is gripping her tighter.
'You know what it says here?' she says. 'That a man used to be able to admit his daughter or wife to an asylum with just a signature from a GP.'
'Iris—'
'Imagine. You could get rid of your wife if you got fed up with her. You could get shot of your daughter if she wouldn't do as she was told.'
Luke makes a grab for the book. 'Will you stop reading that depressing tome and talk to me instead?'
She turns her head to look at him. 'Talk to you?'
He smiles. 'Talk. Or anything else that might take your fancy.'
She shuts the book, turns on to her back and looks up at the ceiling. Luke is smoothing her hair, pushing his face into her shoulder, his hands moving down her body. 'When was your first?' she asks suddenly. How old were you?'
'First what?'
'You know. Your first.'
He kisses her cheekbone, her temple, her brow. 'Do we have to talk about this now?'
'Yes.'
Luke sighs. 'OK. Her name was Jenny. I was seventeen. It was at a new-year party and it was at her parents' house. There. Will that do you?'
'Where?' Iris demands. 'Where in her parents' house?'
Luke starts to smile. 'Their bed.'
'Their bed?' she says, wrinkling her nose. 'I hope you had the decency to change the sheets.' She sits up and folds her arms. 'You know, I can't stop thinking about that place.'
'What place?'
'Cauldstone. Can you imagine being in a place like that for most of your life? I can't even begin to see what it would do to you, to be taken away when you're still a—'
Without warning, Luke seizes her and tips her sideways, crashing her into the mattress.
'There's only one thing,' he says, 'that's going to shut you up.' He is disappearing under the duvet, working his way down her body when his voice reaches her: 'Who was your first?'
She releases a strand of trapped hair from under her head, readjusts the pillow. 'Sorry,' she says. 'Confidential information.'
The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox Page 5
