My Former Heart

by Cressida Connolly

  The smell of the house changed with the advent of the nursery. Pencil shavings, the pleasantly rubbery scent of new plimsolls, paper glue like pear drops: these aromas, faint but sweet, hung on the air. The freshly painted principal rooms showed up the shabbiness of the rest of the place. Ruth became aware of how the sofa in the study dipped in the middle, its underside now touching the floor, like an old sow. The sage-green velvet curtains which had been there since her grandparents’ day hung forlornly, limp and yet brittle at the same time, faded to a memory of green, like a dusty meadow after the hay has been cut. The hearth rug had little black holes all over, where sparks had landed. The leather top of Christopher’s kneehole desk had shrunk back from its edges and darkened, so that a shallow border of pale wood was exposed all the way round. The shade on the standard lamp behind the armchair had oranged in places, where the heat of a too-bright light bulb had singed the silk. And this was only one room! The bedrooms were practically museum pieces, with their big mahogany wardrobes, their fraying satin eiderdowns with matching scallop-edged counter-panes, and their scant curtains.

  So, with the nursery thriving, the two women embarked on decorating the house. Ilse chose claret-coloured curtains for the study, a new sofa with striped covers and some kind of rush matting for the floor, which Ruth thought would be uncomfortable underfoot – too prickly, too hard – but which, she had to admit, made the room look twice the size. One of the antique shops in the town was able to restore the desk, as well as replacing two of the drawer knobs which had been missing for as long as Ruth could remember. Upstairs, Ruth decided on plain linen curtains for the bedrooms and fawn carpeting. The little room off her grandparents’ bedroom had always, rather grandly, been referred to as the dressing room, although it was never used for such a purpose and had never been anything but a repository of old cardboard boxes. Ilse’s idea was to make this into a second bathroom, one which gave off the bedroom, as in a grand hotel. This bedroom, the biggest in the house, was unused except when Isobel came to stay, or even more seldom, Iris; Emily preferred the side bedroom she had always slept in as a child. Ilse proposed that they move into this room themselves, to make the most of the view and the morning light.

  Ruth had been unwilling at first to encroach on the big bedroom: it was hard to get over the feeling she’d had as a child when she first came to the house that she was not really allowed into this room. But she saw that Ilse was right. It was much nicer than the one they had always used, much brighter. Now that there were radiators in every room, it would be warm, even in the winter. Once they had taken the old kidney-shaped dressing table out of the bay window, the room seemed even bigger. Ruth suggested they get rid of the dark wooden bed that had been her grandparents’ and which still had its original horsehair mattress on top of large iron springs which squeaked like a bed in a radio drama.

  In the bed shop at the top of the town they tried out different mattresses, each taking it in turns to lie on her back, arms folded, like a carved figure on an old tomb. It struck Ruth that neither she nor Ilse ever actually slept in this position, nor even lay in it, yet assuming a more natural stance seemed too private a thing to do in full view of passers-by. It had never occurred to Ruth that there could be so many beds to choose from. She had not bought a bed since she and Harry were first married, when her mother-in-law had taken her to Heal’s. Perhaps it was not a good idea to let your husband’s mother buy you a bed, she now considered. The Longdens had never liked her very much: perhaps Mrs Longden had cursed the marriage bed, like a bad fairy in a story. It was certainly much more fun to choose your own. She and Ilse both became quite giggly, not least because the man in the shop spoke with such solemnity.

  ‘This is one of the most important decisions you are ever going to make,’ he told them. He was clearly a little nonplussed as to which of them to address, deciding in the end to direct his advice at Ilse. Ruth had often noticed that this happened, perhaps because her accent gave Ilse some authority in people’s minds. Or perhaps they thought that being foreign meant she was a more serious customer, that a German wouldn’t waste time window-shopping, or browsing idly. Or perhaps she looked better-off than Ruth did. It was a mystery.

  ‘You spend a third of your life in bed,’ he went on. ‘Yet a lot of people give less thought to what they sleep on than they would to choosing a pair of shoes. Think about it.’

  Ilse raised her eyebrows at Ruth, who stood behind the man’s back. Ruth could feel her lips pucker as they tried to resist the elastic of laughter.

  ‘That’s three thousand hours a year, give or take, that you’ll spend on your bed. Think about it. Over a lifetime, that’s more than two hundred thousand hours.’

  ‘I don’t suppose we have so many sleep hours left,’ said Ruth. She hadn’t meant to sound so blunt. ‘But, still, I see what you mean.’

  At length they chose a double divan with a medium-soft pocket-sprung mattress as their bed and also a second double with a slightly firmer mattress, to replace the old bed in their former room. For Christopher’s old room they bought a pair of single divans, with matching pine headboards. For weeks afterwards Ilse made them both laugh by admonishing, ‘You drink eighty thousand cups of tea in a lifetime. Think about it,’ as she handed Ruth a mug at breakfast, or, ‘You peel seven hundred thousand onions in your lifetime. Think about it,’ while she was making soup for their supper.

  Moving into the new bedroom made Ruth feel absurdly pleased and rather shy at the same time, like a newlywed. They now had lamps on both sides of the bed, where in their old room there had only ever been one, always on Ruth’s side, even though she wasn’t the one who tended to read in bed. Ilse had insisted that they get rid of the ancient wool blankets and replace them with a continental quilt of the kind she had grown up with. At first Ruth had disliked its lack of weight, but making the bed in the mornings was less of a chore and you didn’t have to burrow to keep warm as she had when the blankets slipped. What Ruth liked best was the special towel rail, fixed to the wall, in their new little bathroom. This rail got hot, like a radiator, so that the towels hugged you warmly when you got out of the bath. It was like being an especially cosseted guest every day. And the new boiler meant that there was masses of hot water, enough for both of them to have a bath every evening, even a deep one, without running cold as the old boiler always had. Ruth didn’t know whether it was the gleeful novelty of everything, or from being in good sort because of the redecoration, but it was as if she and Ilse had chosen one another anew. Under their airy feather cover they found new delight. It had been years since they had slept naked, but often now when they woke in the mornings their nightdresses still lay crumpled on the floor, where they had been abandoned the night before. Sometimes, mixing poster paints for the children at the nursery, or helping them into their art overalls, a mental picture of what she and Ilse had done the night before would flash across Ruth’s mind and make her blush. She looked forward to the nights. Before supper, when they were in the kitchen, Ruth would sometimes stop what she was doing and come and stand behind Ilse, and put her arms around her waist, and inhale the familiar smell at the nape of her neck where small strands of her hair unfurled like tiny ferns, and feel the warmth of her skin through her shirt, and think how lucky she was.

  Chapter 14

  Neither of her older granddaughters went to meet Iris’s solicitor to hear about the will. Jamie drove Ruth into Hexham to go through it, the day after the funeral, once the rest of the family had gone.

  The house went to Jamie, as they had known it would, and the money, such as it was, to Ruth, a legacy which surprised both of them. To Ruth came the pink and gold china which had belonged to Iris’s mother and some jewellery, including the very formal sapphire and diamond ring which Iris had been given by Edward, when they became engaged. It had been in her mother’s faded red leather jewellery box for many years, unworn, superseded by the unpolished emerald ring Digby had given her, which was to go to Jamie’s wife. Ruth was also to hav
e the portrait of Iris as a child. She had always loved the portrait. It had always fascinated her, this glimpse of her mother before she knew her, when Iris was innocent of the future which lay before her. It showed a girl – she must have been ten or twelve – not smiling but with a flicker of amusement in her features. She wore a pale-blue dress with a wide sash and sat on the edge of a low chair, as if she had only perched there for a moment, before she ran outside in her pale stockings and polished shoes, through the French window which opened behind her right shoulder, to the beckoning pale-green light beyond. All of Iris’s vitality, her impatience and her wryness, was already present in this young girl’s face, as was the lovely colour of her eyes, neither grey nor green, nor quite brown.

  On the first morning that Iris and Digby had woken in the same bed, as they lay, noses almost touching, smiling into each other’s faces, Digby had said to her, ‘I’ve just realised that your eyes are exactly the same colour as the stones in the river at home. I’ll take you there, when this business is finished. They don’t show, when it’s cloudy, but when the sun comes out they catch the light and shine through the water. I think you’ll like it there.’

  Iris had always remembered him saying that, because it had made her so happy, reinforcing the odd feeling of homecoming she’d experienced as soon as they became lovers. She knew her eyes were unusual and her admirers had always told her so. Their colour had been compared to many things, generally exotic: tiger’s eyes, or gemstones. Only Digby had chosen something as ordinary as river pebbles. But he never mentioned it again, and she never reminded him.

  The other grandchildren, Jamie’s three, got various bits and pieces: some silver; a picture or two, the revolving bookcase; a carriage clock, a bracelet with an amethyst and pearl clasp. To Emily, Iris had bequeathed a brooch of knotted seed pearls, a gold locket and an old oil painting of cows grazing in a meadow. To Isobel she left a pair of rose-cut diamond drop earrings and a battered old leather writing case full of bundles of letters, as well as some books, mostly of poetry. And Birdle.

  ‘But why?’ Isobel almost wailed, when she heard the news. ‘I don’t even like Birdle! I don’t mean to be unkind, but he looks pretty scary these days. He’s like some sort of ancient lizard or something. How long do parrots live, for goodness’ sake?’

  ‘I think Mummy thought you were the most like her of the grandchildren,’ said Ruth. ‘It’s funny really, because she paid more attention to Lem, when you were both small.’

  ‘I wish she’d left me those three flower jugs on the shelf in the kitchen. She knew I liked those. And what am I supposed to do with all her letters?’

  ‘Read them, I suppose,’ said Ruth. ‘Look after them.’

  ‘But nothing ever happened to Granny, did it?’ said Isobel.

  ‘I dare say she didn’t see her life as completely uneventful. Something happens to everyone,’ said Ruth, annoyed now. ‘I’m sure Jamie would let you have the jugs, if you specially like them,’ she added, relenting.

  Isobel enlisted Emily. ‘Can’t you tell Mum that Birdle shouldn’t be left alone all day, while I’m at work? She’ll believe you.’

  ‘Actually that is true,’ said Emily. ‘He’s never been alone in a house before. I think it would be very stressful for him, on top of the move as well. And he’ll probably be missing Granny. I don’t feel very optimistic about his future health as a matter of fact. Poor Birdle.’

  ‘Oh God, he’ll pine and then he’ll die and Mum will get cross with me,’ said Isobel. ‘Can’t you take him?’

  ‘I could put a card up at the surgery. We do it for dogs and cats that people don’t want. Might find someone to take him on that way.’

  ‘I just can’t. I’ve already got Rita. She might try and eat him anyway. I don’t think she’s ever seen a parrot.’

  When Isobel left Jacob – not on the day of her departure, but three weeks later, when she’d gone back to the flat to collect the remainder of her things – he had given her the dog.

  ‘But she’s yours. She’s your dog,’ Isobel had protested.

  ‘I know. But she loves you better. Plus you can take her into the gallery. She gets to have more of a time with you.’

  Isobel went to her husband and put her arms around his neck.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

  ‘I love you,’ he said, into her hair. ‘And if you have Rita, a part of me gets to still be with you.’

  ‘Don’t,’ said Isobel, her head against his collarbone. ‘Don’t say that.’

  For the first few days in her new home, Rita had been off colour. She kept going to stand by the door, looking mendicant and sighing theatrically. On the bed at night she curled herself into a comma, resolutely facing away from Isobel, towards the bedroom door. Outside she ran up to every passer-by, panting and pulling frantically at the lead, as if she was hoping that someone on these unfamiliar streets would turn out to be Jacob. Isobel sympathised with Rita, because she felt very much the same. Jonathon from the gallery had a friend who was taking up a teaching job in Edinburgh, leaving a basement flat in Islington empty, so Isobel had moved in. She hadn’t given Jacob the address, but he was a clever man: if he’d wanted to find her, he could have done so with little difficulty. She tried not to spend every minute that she wasn’t at work hoping that he would arrive, unannounced, begging her to come home. She pictured him on the doorstep, contrite, dishevelled with longing. But the days passed, and then the weeks, and he didn’t come.

  Gradually Rita seemed to forget about Jacob. When Isobel bought herself a car, Rita discovered a new joy in life. At first she refused to jump into the footwell of the passenger seat, nor onto the seat itself. The dog had travelled on the floor of countless London taxis, but she sensed that cars were in some way different, and refused to budge from the pavement. Cowering but obdurate, the dog had had to be lifted into the car, no mean feat, given Rita’s bulk and density of muscle. While Isobel clipped in her seat belt and switched on the ignition, Rita panted with anxiety, her wide mouth parting to reveal an expanse of mottled gum.

  ‘Silly thing,’ said Isobel. ‘What’s the matter then?’

  For the first few minutes, Rita sat stolidly on the passenger seat, staring reproachfully at her owner. But in due course something outside the car caught her interest. Her ears pricked and, almost despite herself, she raised herself up, front paws spread on the padded upholstery where the window met the door, her warm breath shading the glass. From this moment Rita loved the car.

  The trouble with the window ledge was that its narrowness didn’t offer enough purchase, so that Rita fell over whenever Isobel negotiated a roundabout or sharp bend. After a few trips, Isobel tried moving the passenger seat as far forward as it would go, so that the dog could put her front paws on the more accommodating dashboard. This was a great success. Like the carved figurehead of an old ship, Rita breasted the approaching world. Over time she learned to lean into the bends, like a pillion rider, always glancing at Isobel in self-congratulation when her balance had been tested. In the car she made a new noise, a low rumbling grunt of pleasure. This sound made her more porcine than ever.

  ‘Pig dog,’ Isobel would say, approvingly, while Rita, mouth gaping, seemed to smile in agreement.

  One evening Isobel left Rita at the flat to go to a film with a friend. It hadn’t been worth taking the car into the West End – there was never anywhere to park – so she’d caught the bus. They had a pizza, then went to the cinema. After they had parted, Isobel walked along Shaftesbury Avenue a little way, then waited at the bus stop. Along came a number 19 and she hopped on, taking a seat downstairs, towards the front on the driver’s side. And then, as the bus trundled off, two things happened. Outside the window, she spotted the headline of the Evening Standard, displayed on a grille at the front of a now shuttered newspaper stall: ‘Last dance for legend Astaire’. A man had got on the bus at her stop and taken the seat in front. He had just opened his paper and she peered over his shoulder: Fred Astaire had died
of pneumonia, at eighty-eight. At the same moment there was an almost imperceptible flurry of air inside the bus, as someone moved along towards the back. A faint waft of scent came to her, the rare but familiar smell of limes. Jacob.

  All at once, Isobel found that she was crying. Not polite, photogenic tears, but snotty, red-faced, hiccuping weeping, erupting in a succession of unmannerly coughing sobs. She didn’t have a tissue, so she hid her face in her hands, trying to stop. This only made her feel as helpless as a child. The crying got worse. It was a level of grief which might have been suitable for the chief mourner at a freshly dug graveside, but she was aware that it was much too extreme for London Transport. She stood up and blundered towards the back, pushing the button recessed in the handrail, so that the driver would let her off at the next stop. People were staring.

  Two telephone boxes glowed a short distance away from where she got off the bus. Without thinking, she went into the first of them. She fished in her bag for change, then, hand shaking, dialled. The receiver felt very heavy as she pressed it against her ear and waited for an answer.

  ‘Hello?’ said Jacob. He always sounded more Canadian than she remembered.

  ‘Fred Astaire’s died and I … I …’ She was unable to speak, for crying.

  ‘Isobel? Are you all right?’ said Jacob.

  ‘No,’ she wailed. ‘I’m not all right.’ Again she sobbed, without words, into the mouthpiece.