by Nicola Upson
The murmur of voices inside the cottage was growing steadily louder now as more people arrived for the wake and drink loosened the tongues of those who had been there for some time. He knew he should go back in, but another few minutes of air might clear his head and give him the confidence to face everyone again. What would his life have been like, he wondered, if he had never been shown an alternative path to the one that was expected of him? Easier, certainly, especially in those early days. His parents had always assumed that he would work on the farm like his brothers; when he finally plucked up the courage to talk to them about his future, they greeted his intention to enter the Church with a mixture of consternation and pain. Nathaniel understood their concerns – the present incumbent of St Winwaloe’s was hardly well placed to defend the institution against accusations of corruption and greed, and people of his class were not obvious candidates for ordination – but he was intelligent and dedicated, and he stubbornly stood his ground. Gradually, with patience and a conviction which astonished them all, he brought his family round to the idea. Each time he returned home from his hard-earned college training, happier and more settled than ever, they softened a little, and were won over completely when they realised that his commitment was to the estate and not to the souls of strangers, that – rather than alienate him from them – the Church would bind him to his community more tightly than putting a spade in his hand ever could.
On a day like today, though, such certainties seemed to belong to another life. First alive, and now dead, Harry Pinching had managed to undermine everything that Nathaniel had ever been sure of. They had been friends for as long as he could remember, drawn to each other’s company by a shared love of the Loe estate and by contrasting but complementary personalities. The bond was strong and undemanding, and had fitted easily into each of their lives until one morning, just a few months earlier, when they were out riding together, racing along the sand at Loe Bar as they often did in fine weather. Nathaniel was a good horseman, one of the few people on the estate who could match Harry stride for stride. On this occasion, he had gone one better, reaching the line of rocks which acted as a finishing post a good ten seconds in front. As his friend caught up with him – his eyes bright with the exhilaration of speed and competition, his smile generous in defeat – Nathaniel was astonished to realise that what he felt for him – what he had always felt for Harry – was love. It was a moment of conviction as powerful and overwhelming as when he had first opened the prayer book, but so utterly at odds with it that he had been unable to do anything other than turn his horse and ride quickly for home, flustered and convinced that his shame was written all over his face.
Harry had known, he was sure of it, and could not resist using the power it gave him. For the first time, Nathaniel noticed a self-consciousness about his friend’s easy sexuality; perhaps it was his imagination, but Harry seemed to go out of his way to slap him on the back or shake his hand, until the briefest of touches was enough to send a jolt of desire right through him. Bewildered by his own feelings, Nathaniel found it impossible to read Harry’s. He was unwilling to believe that Harry would taunt him maliciously, but the thought that his love might be reciprocated was too dangerous even to contemplate. Eventually, unable to stand it any longer, he had simply kept away. When his family asked what had happened, he blamed his own commitment to the Church for the estrangement; the unjustified slur on Harry’s loyalty seemed a small act of betrayal in comparison with the truth.
If Nathaniel had not suspected – albeit reluctantly – that his own vulnerability had laid bare a spiteful streak in Harry, he would have dismissed outright the revelation that had come his way two or three days before the accident – a revelation which had left him wrestling with lust and guilt, love and disgust. At first, he had turned to denial as the best antidote to them but, once the suspicion was there, he could never quite convince himself that Harry was innocent of the charge laid against him. Perhaps Harry’s death was the best possible outcome – for everyone. Certainly, his own first reaction to news of the accident had been relief, and he had seen God’s hand in a situation which was beyond human intervention. But if that was the case, why did it feel so wrong, and so painful? Was that his punishment for feelings which should never have been acknowledged? Despite the words of comfort that he delivered so sincerely to others, he realised now that it was only possible to make your peace with the dead if you had reconciled your differences with the living.
He took another swig of the whisky, hoping that the sour taste in his mouth might temporarily overshadow the bitterness in his head.
‘Don’t think that will help.’ Morwenna could barely keep her fury in check, and the contempt in her voice hurt him far more than any physical blow could have done. ‘How could you let him down like that? You were supposed to be his friend.’ Nathaniel turned to look at her and, for a moment, it was as though Harry were standing in front of him. How alike they were if you looked closely, he thought, although anger – which had always brought a sulkiness to Harry’s mouth, detracting from the strength of his face – seemed to enhance his sister’s beauty, alleviating the exhaustion which made her look a decade older than her twenty-six years. He could see why so many people were attracted to her. How much easier life would be if only he could have been one of them.
‘I know you’re upset about the funeral,’ he began, ‘but you can’t expect me to stand in church and lie now that I know the truth. I’m sorry if I let you down, but I can’t pretend that my feelings for Harry are straightforward.’ That was an understatement, but he had no intention of letting Morwenna see how much he had loved her brother, or how deeply he was grieving for the loss of everything he had believed Harry to be. ‘I couldn’t find the words you wanted to hear,’ he added, knowing he was doing no better now, ‘and I wouldn’t have trusted myself to speak them anyway.’
‘It’s a shame you haven’t always been so tongue-tied,’ Morwenna said bitterly. ‘Why did you have to say anything, Nathaniel? Couldn’t you just pretend you hadn’t heard and carry on as normal? Isn’t that what they teach in your Christian schools – how to turn the other cheek?’ She looked away from him, and he could see what an effort she was making to prevent her anger from dissolving into tears. ‘I thought you were different, but you stand up there like all the rest of them, armed with your self-righteousness and your phrase-book of forgiveness, and when you have the perfect opportunity to practise what you preach, you don’t have the strength even to try to understand. Well, let me give you a lesson in absolution – there is no atonement for what you’ve started. Harry’s dead, and it’s too late to make amends.’
Nathaniel’s head was heavy with heat and whisky, and his temper got the better of him. ‘So ignorance is best, is it?’ He was shouting now, and the change in him took Morwenna by surprise. ‘You’d rather I let him get away with it than shatter your fantasy of a perfect brother? There’s a big difference between turning the other cheek and blindly refusing to see – and Harry went too far for either.’ He softened a little, trying to put himself in Morwenna’s shoes; if he was guilty about his estrangement from Harry, how must she feel? The memory of those final, angry words she had exchanged with her brother would be almost too much to bear. ‘Look, I told you what I’d heard because I thought you’d want to know. You can’t blame yourself for the accident or anything that happened before it.’
She rounded on him suddenly and, for a moment, he honestly thought she was going to strike him. ‘I don’t blame myself for Harry’s death,’ she replied, her face just inches from his. ‘I blame you. And according to your precious textbook of right and wrong, the way he died was as great a sin as anything he did in life.’
Archie took a cup of tea out to the garden and waited for Morwenna to seek him out. She had been continuously surrounded by people since the funeral party arrived back at Loe Cottage, and he hadn’t even tried to speak to her: what she wanted to say to him could clearly not be said in public. In any case, the
silence during the long walk back from the church had been uncomfortable rather than respectful and he was glad of a moment or two on his own, free from the tensions that had seeped into a community which he remembered as harmonious and good-natured. A lot seemed to have changed here in just a few months – but then he only ever came home fleetingly these days, so perhaps it had been different for some time and he had simply never noticed. More than ever, he looked forward to seeing Josephine; things might have been difficult between them, but at least the awkwardness was familiar; the drama that he sensed here made him feel like an understudy who had learnt the lines for the wrong play.
As brief as his visits were, though, he was sure he would have noticed how shabby and neglected the cottage had become if it had been that way when he was last here. The flowerbeds which Mary and Sam Pinching had taken such a pride in, and which Morwenna always tended meticulously as a tribute to her parents, were now overgrown and full of weeds; terracotta pots remained empty and covered in the dark-green moss of a damp winter, and the trailing honeysuckle which covered the south-facing gable end seemed to have given up hope of anyone noticing that its trellis had come loose from the wall and was crushing the branches into the ground with its weight. The house – which his uncle and some of the men from the estate had restored after the fire – had fared no better. Stubborn orange rust marks circled the hinges of doors and windows, weeds grew out of the thatch, and the paintwork looked tired and dirty. Loe Cottage seemed to Archie to share the family’s grief, although he couldn’t help feeling that to get to this state the deterioration must have begun some time before Harry’s death. He had always admired the strength with which the twins had kept the family together after their parents’ death, but lately they must have let things go. Why, he wondered? Some lines from Tennyson came into his head – one of those merciless evocations of sadness and isolation that the poet was so good at. This was hardly a moated grange but the dreariness was the same, and Morwenna certainly looked every bit as weary as the Mariana of the poem’s title – weary, and tired of life.
Archie had no idea what she needed to talk to him about so confidentially, but it would take more than kind words and sympathy to alleviate the depth of misery he sensed in her. He finished his tea and decided to go inside: on such a hot day, he and Morwenna might stand more chance of finding some peace and quiet there. In the front parlour, where all the food for the wake had been laid out on borrowed trestle tables, he found yet another crowd of people but Morwenna was not among them. He tried to push his way further into the room, but his path was blocked by two of his fellow bearers. The elder man, Joseph Caplin, was obviously drunk – although as far as Archie could remember, he had not been truly sober since the break-up of his family – and it was the younger of the two who spoke first.
‘Well, if it isn’t the famous Inspector,’ he said sarcastically. ‘We are honoured, although I’d have put money on the fact that you’d come sniffing round Morwenna again the minute she was on her own.’ Archie ignored the bait. Simon Jacks – or ‘Kestrel’ as the gamekeeper was usually known – had always hated him and his friendship with Morwenna was top of a long list of reasons. Jacks had always wanted her and, just after the fire, when he thought Morwenna was vulnerable, he had pursued her so relentlessly that she had begged Harry to make him back off. Usually, Jacks took his resentment out on the woman he eventually married, but today he seemed happy to share it with Archie. ‘She’s got friends here, you know, and she certainly doesn’t need you, so do us all a favour and fuck off back to London.’
Jacks’s wife – a tired-looking woman with thin, mousy hair and no light in her eyes – opened her mouth to say something but Jacks silenced her with a look. For her sake, Archie tried not to let his diminishing patience get the better of him. He turned his back on the insult, and noticed with relief that Lettice and her father were over by the food, talking to Mrs Snipe. Before he could join them, though, a child’s voice cut through the room with a lightness more appropriate to a birthday party than a wake.
‘Don’t forget to leave some food for Harry.’
Everyone turned to look at Loveday with the same mixture of embarrassment and horror that had greeted her laughter in church. In the stillness that followed, Archie could hear the ticking of the clock from the hall and the insistent tapping of a fly against the window. In the end, it was Mrs Snipe who broke the silence. ‘Don’t you worry, my love, there’s plenty to go round,’ she said breezily, as if the girl had said nothing out of place. ‘Why don’t you come through to the pantry with me and I’ll show you what we’ve got in there.’
She led the girl away and the sound of voices built gradually again. Lettice grimaced at Archie from the other side of the table. ‘I know actresses who’d kill for an exit line like that,’ she called, picking up a bread roll smothered with jam and cream. ‘Isn’t it nice to be back?’
He laughed, glad to share a moment of normality, but the respite was short-lived. Joseph Caplin had climbed unsteadily on to a chair and was striking an empty whisky bottle with a knife to get the room’s attention. What was it about the British that made them insist on this excruciating moment at any wedding or funeral, Archie wondered, trying to remember if he had ever been to one which did not reduce somebody’s past or future to a drunken display of emotion.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Caplin slurred, not quite sober enough to focus on anyone in particular. ‘I’d like you to raise your glasses – to the death of Harry Pinching.’
‘To Harry Pinching.’ A number of voices spoke up loudly around the room, as if volume could compensate for Caplin’s drunken slip of the tongue. The farmer got down from his chair, smiling to himself and apparently oblivious of what he had said. Wondering how much of a mistake it had actually been, Archie left them to their drink and went through to the kitchen, glad that Harry’s sisters had at least been spared the awkwardness of the moment. He opened the back door just in time to catch the end of an angry exchange between Morwenna and the young curate. Surprised, and aware that he had walked in on a private conversation, he hesitated. Morwenna had her back to him but Nathaniel saw him instantly and disappeared quickly round the side of the cottage, though not before Archie had noticed how pale he was.
Morwenna turned to face him and, as she showed no sign of embarrassment, Archie decided against pretending not to have heard. ‘What’s Nathaniel done to make you so angry with him?’ he asked gently. ‘Is it because he and Harry had fallen out?’
‘God, how quickly word gets round – even as far as London,’ Morwenna said sharply, then seemed to regret her sarcasm. ‘I’m sorry – you didn’t deserve that, but it’s been a long day and I’m sick to death of sympathy, particularly the sort that comes tied to a dog collar.’ She paused for a moment and pushed her hair back from her eyes. ‘No, it’s nothing to do with that – boys will be boys, won’t they? It’s just that Nathaniel and I have different ideas of comfort, and I don’t want him to keep passing his on to Loveday. I’ve spent the last few weeks preparing her for the idea that she’s never going to see her brother again, and he wrecks it all by filling her head full of nonsense about the resurrection and eternal life. It’s a lot to ask of a normal fourteen-year-old to understand the difference between a pretty fable that makes adults feel better and a literal promise that someone’s immortal, but Loveday’s not a normal fourteen-year-old. You know how it is – she lives in a world of her own, and half the time I’ve no idea what goes on in her head. She idolised Harry, and it won’t take much to make her believe he was invincible. That’s just not fair – on either of us. It’s me that has to deliver the cold, hard truth and pick up the pieces afterwards, and I’ve got my own grief to deal with.’
Archie understood the resentment that certainties about life and death could create in someone whose whole sense of purpose had just been destroyed – he had felt it often enough himself – but there had been more to the exchange between Morwenna and Nathaniel, even in the brief snatch that he h
ad heard. ‘Sin is a big word to use, though – is that what you wanted to talk to me about?’ he asked and, when she nodded, added: ‘Let’s go somewhere a bit more private.’
They walked away from the house, down to the edge of the garden where a narrow lane separated them from trees that marked the northern boundary of the Loe estate, still in sight of the cottage but far enough away to be able to talk freely. The soft afternoon light filtered through new leaves on to a sweep of bluebells which seemed to drift like smoke through the woods, and Archie wondered if Morwenna, like him, was thinking of the last time they had sat together in this very spot. It was more than eight years ago now, not long after her parents had died, but the time of year was the same and then, too, she had been racked with grief and in despair about her future. They were already good friends – some people guessed there was more between them, but he was still fighting his feelings for Josephine and Morwenna, who was never short of suitors, treated him more like an older brother – and she had asked him to go with her to salvage what was left of her life from the burnt-out shell of the cottage. Afterwards, he had sat outside with her, holding her as she cried and waiting until she felt ready to leave. He remembered looking down through the bluebell woods: the view had been much as it was today, except for two dead magpies which the gamekeeper of the time had strung up by the neck on the fence – a deterrent to other vermin and, it seemed, a potent denial of the rhyme which he had learnt by heart as a boy. The birds moved gently in the breeze, and the green and violet sheen of their feathers mirrored the flowers that covered the ground, but the lifelessness in their eyes mocked any promise of summer. The image had stayed with him, allied to Morwenna – a pairing of beauty and death which made each the more powerfully felt, and which now seemed more poignant than ever.
