The Boy Who Could See Death

by Salley Vickers

  Verity was getting to her feet, struggling a little to haul her weight up from the chair, and for the first time Eleanor saw she was to be pitied. Rosa’s Desmond was a poor fish but Verity had married a truly vile man, who had taken off not only with a younger woman but also with most of Verity’s money. Money which, ironically, had come from the religious aunt from whom she had also had her name.

  I’m the lucky one, Eleanor thought. I have Tony. Thinking this, she wasn’t surprised to see him across the room.

  ‘There you are,’ he said, and as always she took heart from the look in his eyes, a look she knew was hers alone. ‘And Verity too. How are you, my dear?’

  ‘As you’d expect.’ Stiffly, Verity allowed herself to be kissed. She gave the impression, Eleanor noted, of conferring a favour by allowing Tony briefly to hold her. But he wouldn’t mind. He would laugh and say, ‘Poor old thing’ because that, Eleanor perceived with a pang, was what Verity had become.

  Perhaps she never got over Rosa, Eleanor conjectured. I wouldn’t be surprised. Rosa was extraordinary, and how odd that I never saw what she was to Verity before today. But death does that, I suppose. Makes you see things differently. Or for the first time.

  ‘Shall we go?’ Tony asked, his hand uxoriously – delightfully so – on the crook of her elbow. ‘Have you had enough, darling?’

  She had and was grateful to him. But ‘Verity?’ she mouthed. ‘Should we …?’

  He shrugged, implying whatever she chose to do was fine by him.

  ‘Verity, we’re going. Would you like a lift? Or maybe come back –’

  ‘Thanks, no.’ The response, Eleanor thought, was needlessly brusque. ‘I’ll ring for a cab.’ She kissed Eleanor and passed a cheek swiftly past Tony’s.

  As they said goodbye to Desmond, he laid his hand on Eleanor’s arm. ‘Stay in touch, please, because I’ll need your help with the funeral. Oh, and there are some drawings of hers you might like and I’d like you to see.’

  The Chapel of Rest was clinically white, the wood all light and the soft furnishings a municipal blue.

  ‘You’d better take this,’ Tony said, offering his handkerchief to Eleanor.

  ‘I wish she wasn’t being burned.’

  ‘She’s dead. She won’t care.’

  ‘Tony! Don’t be so …’ she faded.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t know. So bloody pragmatic.’

  As she’d predicted, Desmond had chosen ‘Jerusalem’ for the funeral.

  ‘It’s both religious and radical,’ he explained, kissing Eleanor. ‘She’d have wanted that.’

  How swift people were to appropriate the taste of the departed. Eleanor was by no means sure Rosa would have wanted ‘Jerusalem’ to send her off. She was always original. How awful that Blake of all people should have become an institution. Eleanor comforted herself that Tony was, perhaps, right. Even in any afterlife it was unlikely one cared too much about such things. Rosa and Blake had joined the ranks of the mute, and life and the living would always have the stronger voice.

  The wake after the funeral was held in Rosa’s studio, which was not part of their Chiswick house but one of a set of studios near the crematorium, towards Kew. Both house and studio had been acquired before the areas became fashionable.

  ‘Old Desmond’ll sell this for a tidy sum,’ Tony said as they entered. ‘He’ll be quids in.’

  ‘Shut up, he’ll hear you.’

  ‘I bet he’s secretly quite chuffed she’s died.’

  ‘Tony, stop it!’

  The studio was undeniably a good choice of venue. A large space, free of furniture, making it easy to mill and chat. And besides there were Rosa’s paintings and drawings, some still in progress, hanging round the walls so that her presence was visibly with them.

  People talked animatedly of how her reputation as an artist had grown so much in recent years and how her fortunes had prospered accordingly. Unkind souls suggested, in lowered tones, that this was just as well, as Desmond had never been much of an earner.

  ‘What’s he currently doing?’ a man with a wispy Van Dyck beard, whose face Eleanor recognized but whose name escaped her, asked.

  ‘He’s got some sort of admin post at the Royal College.’

  ‘Can only have been through her influence!’ was the scornful rejoinder.

  Death makes people savage, she reflected. I suppose it’s a way of venting other feelings; or maybe an assertion of being alive. Anger, as she was sure Verity would say, is vivifying.

  Eleanor, looking around for Verity, saw Desmond appear instead with a glass of red wine held at a dangerous angle.

  ‘Desmond, your wine. Mind your shirt.’ The shirt, she noted, was already stained and had a button half off. Quite possibly this was deliberate. He was one of those men whose being seemed to demand that one take responsibility for him.

  Desmond took a remedial swig of wine. ‘I wanted to show you her drawings. Come over here.’ Lurching slightly, he led Eleanor to a table where a large artist’s portfolio lay open. ‘Here, see this one. That’s you, isn’t it?’

  A drawing of her youthful face looked innocently out at her. Goodness, I was pretty then, she thought.

  ‘And this is Verity, isn’t it?’

  Verity, looking quite lovely, her hands, utterly untoadlike, raking with careless grace through dark, dishevelled hair. And here was Rosa herself, quite a recent self-portrait, beautiful still with her slant cat’s eyes and archaic smile.

  ‘Do look at them,’ Desmond said. ‘I’ve not trawled through them all yet’ – how like him to say ‘trawled’, Eleanor thought – ‘but everyone she really loved seems to be here.’

  And it was true, Eleanor reflected. For Rosa had been drawing all her life. She had always been the artist. At one time it seemed as if Verity would be the writer, but after one decently reviewed novel nothing had come of that; while she, Eleanor, had been the musical one. But she was merely a badly paid music teacher now. Neither she nor Verity had turned out to have Rosa’s talent.

  But the drawings – oh the pity of it – were quite marvellous. Each of the faces she knew so well, herself and Verity, her own brothers, Tom and Ian, Verity’s sister Anna, Rosa’s brother, Charles, who had gone to Australia and obviously wasn’t planning to come back, even for his sister’s death, and her sister Kate, who had turned Tory and mortified their parents. Thinking of this, it struck her that Kate wasn’t there – and then she remembered that Kate had written to say that her husband was undergoing open heart surgery and that in the circumstances she felt she’d better stay at his side.

  All the parents were there too, growing touchingly older as she turned over the sheets of paper, as if turning the pages in some Book of Life. Now here was Desmond with his and Rosa’s children, Harry and Charlotte, and her and Tony’s children, Angus, Beth and Alexandra. Studying the portraits, Eleanor could discern a special feeling towards each of the subjects. She did love us, she thought.

  At the back of the portfolio was a pocket with a flap tucked in, and, opening it, curiously, she found another sheaf of drawings, smaller than the others but on first impression the execution struck her as more careful.

  With a sharp shock down her breastbone she recognized a face. No, many faces. The many faces of Tony: Tony still quite young, Tony with a beard – from when? Ten years ago, it must have been – Tony aged but still undeniably handsome.

  At the bottom of one of the portraits a date was pencilled. Last year’s date – last July’s date, to be precise, a date that Eleanor knew with a sudden awful clarity was exactly when Tony was away last summer in Madrid. ‘At a conference,’ he had said, kissing her. ‘Not for you, darling. I’ll have no time off for jaunts.’

  She stood holding the drawing before her while the eyes she knew so intimately regarded her with that special look she had supposed hers alone. Behind her, she felt the same eyes knifing into her back. Wordlessly, she turned to him.

  ‘It was over,’ he said. ‘Honestly,
that was the last time.’

  Furiously, she hissed, ‘How could you? You hardly showed a shred of emotion when she died. Or now. How could you? How could you be so horribly fucking, disgustingly cool?’ For suddenly, weirdly, it was for Rosa she minded.

  Behind Tony, Verity was standing with an expression which told her, incontrovertibly, that Verity had known. Of course she had. She had loved Rosa too. And she saw things with that terrible veracity that mirrored her name. But for once – and Eleanor was not yet to know whether this was something she was glad of – the passion for truth-telling had been withheld. Only she, Eleanor, had been in ignorance, left out, excluded, as in the old days.

  Weeping angrily, she strode past the two of them, reaching for Tony’s handkerchief, which was powerless to rescue her from the prison of this new knowledge.

  A Sad Tale

  (for Rowan)

  The boy knew there was something wrong. He always knew at once when anything was not altogether right with his mother, but on this occasion it was an unnerving sense that with his father things were not as they should be. He knew his father less instinctively than he knew his mother. But then he saw less of his father, since his father’s position meant that he had important matters of state to attend to, more important than the state of an eight-year-old boy. And, while his uncle had been staying (he wasn’t his uncle by blood but his father and he had been brought up together so were as close as brothers), his father had been more than usually occupied. The two old friends had gone off hunting together, had visited further parts of the country and all manner of junketing had been organized and seemingly enjoyed. But now his uncle was preparing to leave.

  There had been a small informal dinner on the last evening of his uncle’s stay, which the boy had been permitted to attend. At the end of it, as he was saying goodnight to his parents and their guest, his father had taken him by his shoulders and squeezed his nose, which had hurt, though it was apparently done in fun, and then peered into his eyes and asked him if he thought they, that is the two of them, were alike.

  They were alike, he knew. As like as two eggs, his mother’s women said, though he didn’t take too much account of them. They liked to pet and caress him as if he were still a baby, and he really only cared for that sort of thing when it was his mother kissing him. He had told his father just the other day that he liked to fight but he had merely said so to please. He liked to please his father. But, in truth, he far preferred his mother’s gentler ways and hoped that it was she whom he truly took after. She was always kind and funny and loved to play and joke with him and have him tell her stories. She liked his stories better than anyone’s and he knew that she didn’t fib or pretend in saying so, as older people often did, always with the knowing faces that betrayed their real thoughts. No, she sincerely loved to hear his inventions and praised them in a manner that lifted his heart and made him want to better them for her. He often lay in bed at night, for he was usually sent to bed long before sleep overtook him, or in the mornings when he woke early, and knew he’d be in trouble if he rose too soon, making up brave new worlds for her in his head.

  He had lain awake that night, with his father’s wine-smelling breath still in his nostrils and wondered. And he had woken more than usually early that morning and had lain in bed, happy to do so because a sharp frost was in the air and his own breath came cloudy before his face. His greyhound, Dash, sentinel by his bed, opened a golden eye and looked at him inquiringly, but even he seemed to wish to join the rest of the household and returned to houndish sleep.

  He leant down and stroked the knobbles on the long canine spine, running his hands along the smooth grey coat to pat the dog’s flank. ‘Good boy, Dash.’ Then he stretched himself out, like a snake uncoiling, as his mother once phrased it, and lay back with one hand behind his head. Outside, he heard the solitary caw of a passing rook or crow and the yap of one of the household hounds, which were not privileged to sleep indoors. And then all around there was quiet.

  He loved this dawn quiet. He liked to lie in it as if within his mother’s arms, and in its bountiful protection his mind would roam. That morning he found himself thinking about the new world that was about to arrive in the shape of a new brother or sister. His mother had grown to a ‘goodly bulk’, one of her women pronounced only yesterday. She had been tired lately and less willing to play with him and perhaps, though he didn’t quite own this to himself, he had wanted her to play more than usual, as, with a baby coming, he understood that soon she would be more occupied.

  He knew that whatever happened he was her boy, her precious one. But the women had begun to mock and tease him about the changes ahead.

  ‘You’ll be wanting our company soon enough,’ one had said when he pushed her endearments away. ‘When your little brother or sister arrives.’ He’d turned aside then, afraid that his face might appear to betray a jealousy he frankly didn’t feel.

  Thinking of this now, he suddenly saw his father’s face as he had seen it at dinner the evening before. His father had been talking to his ‘uncle’, asking his uncle about his own son whom he had left behind in his own country, and his father had called him over and ruffled his hair and asked him that odd question. And then his father had dismissed him and, looking up, he had seen his father stare across the table at his uncle with a strange expression on his face, which he altered to a too-broad smile the moment his uncle looked round.

  His uncle had been with them nine months, which seemed a long time to be away from his own family. But that was how it was when people of his father and mother’s distinction travelled. Visits abroad seemingly lasted for ever.

  He’d heard his father arguing with his uncle, urging him to stay a little longer, which seemed unnecessary, considering how long he’d been a visitor with them already. His uncle had laughed and said really he had to be away, he had duties to attend to and his own dear son would be missing him. And then his father had begged his mother to make the same request and his mother had taken his uncle’s arm and walked with him down through the long hall, where the musicians played in the gallery above, and he had seen her squeeze his uncle’s arm and then laugh with that soft sweet laugh that was so familiar to him and punch his uncle jestingly on the chest as she sometimes did to his father when she thought he was taking on about something needlessly. And he had also seen his father observe this, staring after the pair of them as they walked so close, her hand linked through their guest’s arm.

  He’s jealous, the boy thought with a sudden lurch to his stomach. The recognition made him feel very alone.

  He was aware, from the sly hints dropped and the not so subtle innuendos, that jealousy was what he was expected to feel for his new baby brother or sister. But he had never felt it yet. Now he experienced it as a searing pain near his heart, as if he stood in his father’s place and felt with his father’s blood beating in his ears.

  Was that why his father had asked if they were alike? So he could feel with his father’s troubled mind?

  He tried to turn his thoughts away to the story he was creating. There was a man he could see in his mind. He wanted to make this a happy story for his mother, for her to take to the childbed with her. But all he could see was an image of a sad-faced man, a man who was haunted by harrowing sprites and vicious goblins.

  He didn’t want to tell her a sad tale.

  Later, dressed and breakfasted and having taken Dash out for his morning run, he went to his mother’s room to find her.

  He had run to her earlier that morning, after his uncomfortable thoughts in bed, but she had been irritable and brushed him away. She was rarely irritable, especially not with him. It must be that the baby was near to being born.

  He walked up the great stairs, praying that he was not too late and that the baby had not begun to arrive already, and along to his mother’s room, where he softly opened the door.

  And there she was, like a great rose, open and blooming, the baby still in her belly, sitting among her women s
ewing a tiny silken garment. But, seeing him, she tossed aside her sewing and opened her arms. ‘Mamillius, my poppet. Come and amuse me.’

  He ran over to her, filled with joy at his return to grace. Hugging her tight, he smelt the peculiar scent of her skin, which reminded him of apricots.

  ‘How shall I?’

  ‘Tell me one of your stories.’

  ‘Sad or merry, would you like?’

  ‘Whatever my clever son has dreamt up for me.’

  She was looking at him with her dark grey eyes and the love and pride he saw there prompted a corresponding love and pride in him.

  ‘A sad tale’s best for winter.’

  Why on earth had he said that? With all his heart he had intended to tell her a happy story.

  ‘So be it. And when summer comes you can tell us a cheerful one. Tell on, my dear muse …’

  She leaned back on the long settle, pulling him close to her rounded bosom.

  He tried again for a happy image, but the man in his mind would not be banished. Very well. He would follow where this man was leading. He’d skill enough, he felt confident, to bring any story, however sad, round to a happy end.

  Edging still closer to his mother, he said, ‘I’ll tell it in your ear softly. This is a tale just for you.

  ‘There was a man dwelt by the churchyard –’

  As he spoke the words the door was pushed open and a group of men entered with his father, his face pale as death, at their head.

  One of the women screamed, ‘The gods save us!’ and the room went suddenly quiet.

  ‘Take the boy away!’

  ‘No!’

  He had cried out and stiffened all his limbs even before he was conscious of speaking. Around him all the women remained like statues, stilled.

  ‘Whatever is the matter, Leon?’ His mother had risen and was levelling her cool gaze at his father, but she used her pet name for him: ‘Leon’, or sometimes ‘Leo’, for his father was born under that sign.

  ‘I said take the boy away! I will not have him near her.’