by Susan Sallis
He was laughing. She knew now that he had been goading her all along; his laughter was even more galling. She snapped, ‘Oh, shut up! No wonder Daddy couldn’t stand you!’
Unexpectedly that did shut him up. He lumbered to his feet, put his hands on the table and leaned on them.
‘I wonder whether Mark knew about my doubtful origins. There was certainly something that put him off. He liked everybody.’ Rory pushed himself upright and sighed a single irritable puff. ‘Doesn’t matter now, of course. Too late.’ He crossed the yard to the steps, then turned and looked back. ‘You’re not as beautiful as Zannah, but you’re very like her. Please go and see her, Gussie Briscoe. She was as mad as me and slept with everyone … but Mark was always number one. You must know that.’
Gussie pulled a shirt from the clothes basket and began to peg it on the line. ‘Goodbye, Uncle Rory,’ she said firmly.
‘Goodbye … August.’ He emphasized the last syllable, making the month into a pompous adjective. It was childish but he enjoyed it. She could hear him chuckling as he walked down Mount Zion and on to the wharf.
So they were in New York, staying at the hotel just off Times Square where they had always stayed, though when Ned took the trouble to count how many times, there were very few. ‘Actually only four: that first time, when they unveiled the St Patrick icon, then the next three unveilings. Then you were at Cardiff, Gus, Jannie was getting over chickenpox and went to stay with Grannie, and I wasn’t really interested.’
As they got out of the yellow cab and wheeled their luggage through the plate-glass doors into the foyer, which was milling with people like the concourse of a railway station, they captured instantly the familiar feeling of sheer energy that rose like the steam jets from the pavements.
They had booked a family room; for three instead of five. It had seemed the natural thing to do but as they each signed the register it suddenly felt … odd. However, nothing was said by the desk clerk and there were very few porters; the clientele wore backpacks and needed help with map reading rather than portering.
Gussie took the keys and the three of them made for the elevators. They were whisked up to the twentieth floor and emerged almost opposite the door to their room. It was, of course, smaller than their old rooms had been: a king-size bed and two double ones, but the bathroom still sported two showers, two basins and two lavatories. Unexpectedly, on the low table opposite the beds was an exquisite flower arrangement: roses of all colours in a mist of gypsophila.
Jannie exclaimed delightedly and rushed to read the card aloud. ‘“With love and sympathy shared. From the Friends in Bereavement.”’ She looked up at the others. ‘Isn’t that wonderful? Look, there’s a phone number in case we need help. Will the others get this sort of thing?’
‘I should think so. We’ll soon find out.’
Gussie was unaccountably weary. She sat on the enormous bed and stared at the blank television. She wished wholeheartedly they were not meeting a load of strangers in six hours’ time. She had been able to contain her grief and horror at home. Going through her father’s things, informally with Jannie and then formally with the solicitors, she had kept walls around her emotions. They had been hers. She had shared them with Ned and Jannie, but others who had called, and who nearly all told her that they ‘understood’ or ‘could imagine’, had been outside; they were nothing to do with the horror, or the grey sadness that would go on for always. These people, these strangers, however, they knew. They could not be pushed away.
Ned said, ‘All right, Gus?’
‘Yes. I’d forgotten the bleakness of this place.’
Jannie claimed the bed directly opposite the television. ‘How can you call New York bleak? All those people – going places – doing things. Made me realize that I might be able to take a gap year next year.’ She discovered a fat pot of snowdrops on her night table. ‘Look at this! Snowdrops – my flower!’ She picked up another card and read again. ‘“To January Briscoe. With love from all the Trustees of The Spirit of America.”’ She looked from Gussie to Ned. ‘I didn’t think I was going to cry so soon but …’ Then suddenly she lifted her chin. ‘Dammit! I am not going to cry! I feel … I don’t know … proud.’
‘Attagirl!’ Ned took the last bed in the row and discovered a pot of cyclamen. ‘My God, they’ve done it for me too!’ He skirted the beds and picked up a pot of sturdy hyacinths. ‘And for you, Gus.’ He showed her. ‘Jannie’s right, we should be proud – and all that energy – that’s what I remember from before: the sheer energy. We’re going to survive this, Gus. Stop looking so woebegone! We’re here. With a shedload of other people all in the same boat. Go with the current – that’s what we have to do. Go with the flow!’
She managed a wan smile.
They met at the Florabunda as arranged and were introduced to their fellow mourners. The meal was long and elaborate, but at least each course was manageable. As children they remembered using one of the Howard Johnson outlets round the corner from the hotel where the food was overabundant.
Sheila and May Smith were on their table: single sisters mourning a third, the adventurous one, Rose. They seemed timid at first. ‘Rose was the outgoing one,’ they explained apologetically. They had always been together, first with their parents and then on their own. ‘A threesome. As you seem to be. Perhaps you feel frightened. All the time. As we do.’ Sheila had introduced both of them, obviously forcing herself to overcome her shyness. Ned and Gussie smiled ruefully but Jannie responded unexpectedly.
‘Oh, yes. I did. And having to get on with life seemed … wrong. Cruel. I wanted to be unhappy. Always.’ She leaned across the table almost eagerly. ‘It’s so much better since we arrived here. Everyone is grieving. It’s the right thing to do.’
Sheila Smith raised her brows. ‘I hadn’t thought of it like that. Had you, May?’
‘No. But I am so glad you spoke … Jannie, did you say? Yes. It makes one feel less … isolated. Perhaps.’
Sheila nodded emphatically. ‘It does. And less angry, too. We always took our holidays together. Devon. The Lakes. Even Scotland. Rose was determined on this trip to New York. Five days all inclusive. Broadway show. Radio City. The Empire State Building and the Twin Towers.’ She stopped speaking and swallowed convulsively. ‘If we’d agreed to it we would all have gone together. But we stuck our toes in. Stubborn. We have been angry with Rose, angry with ourselves.’
May said in a low voice, ‘Sheila dear, don’t be upset. These young people … long lives ahead of them, we hope …’
But Jannie leaned forward further and actually touched the back of Sheila’s hand. ‘Thank you for being so honest. I was angry too because I had lost both parents. But now – at least they went together.’ She looked round at the other two. ‘We hadn’t thought of that, had we? Daddy couldn’t have managed without Mummy. They had to be together.’
Before they could respond, the Reverend Eric Selway leaned between them and started to ‘firm up’ the following day’s arrangements. An area had been allocated for such occasions, anyone could join them – friends, relatives, general well-wishers. The service sheets, which were in their pack with street maps and other information, would be handed around. His wife and two other members of the group had brought their violins so that the hymns could be accompanied. He smiled at Jannie. ‘As you see from the programme, we are meeting at the hotel at nine tomorrow. Two hours before the coach is due to take us to … the site. You do not have to join us for a run-through but you will be most welcome if you’d like to.’
They had made up their minds not to attend the rehearsal but Gussie looked doubtfully at Jannie. Ned said quickly, ‘I would prefer to walk down. So count me out.’
Gussie waited. Jannie sat back in her chair. She smiled at Ned. ‘We already decided to walk down – the three of us.’ She looked up. ‘It’s all right, Vicar, we’ve gone through the Order of Service lots of times.’ Gussie added her reassurances that they knew the area and would meet the others a
t the coach park.
Sheila said, ‘We would walk with you. But I’m not too good on my feet these days.’
‘We’ll look for you.’ Jannie gave the Smith sisters each a smile, then looked at the menu. ‘Is it time for puddings?’
Ned suddenly grinned at her. He said in his mother’s voice, ‘A sorbet first to clear the mouth. Then your Alaskan pie.’
‘Voice no good but ten out of ten for the effort,’ Jannie acknowledged.
They all announced what they were having and, under cover of the babble, Ned said, ‘Well done, Jannie. You were right. We needed to come here for something like this.’
The next day was heavily overcast but, blessedly, not raining. Ned called the chairman of the Trustees while the girls showered and dressed. He sat hunched on the side of his bed, head down. None of them had met Harry McKinnon. He had joined the board since they had given up on the New York visits and they had been unable to become as close over the phone as they had with the first chairman. Mitchell Liebermann – ‘call me Mitch’ – had visited them several times and had guided them all through that first amazing white-water ride of success. They still quoted from the nuggets of wisdom he had handed out: ‘You’re the same people you were before, right?’ ‘This is a separate thing – you’re lucky it’s far away – of course you don’t have to leave your cottage. In fact, it would be the worst thing you could do.’ And to Ned he had said, ‘Watch your mother – she knows how to handle this.’ He had come out with them in Forty-Niner Two and eaten pickled mackerel with relish. He had been at the Annual General Meeting on 11 September and died with his friends. Harry McKinnon had been in hospital having his appendix removed and was still alive.
Ned bent low over the telephone, his forehead almost touching his knees.
‘It’s very kind of you. We sort of booked the trip with a group and … no, we’re on a regular flight … no, not exactly committed.’ He listened, his head now supported by his free hand.
Gussie, dressed in what she called her office suit, put her hairbrush carefully on to the glass-topped dressing table and went to sit by Ned. He flicked her a glance and she saw with a shock that he was close to breaking down.
The buzz of the telephone voice stopped and they both registered Jannie singing from the shower, a jazzed up version of ‘Show Me the Way to Go Home’.
Ned said, ‘Well … there are three of us here, sir. I need to … sorry – Mack – I need to see how they feel. May we phone you this afternoon?’ He waited again and then put down the phone and looked at Gussie. ‘Something unexpected,’ he said hoarsely, and covered his face with his hands.
Jannie emerged from the bathroom looking as fresh as a daisy and rushed to him, her face wide with questions. Ned dropped his hands then held them up helplessly. He said hoarsely, ‘There’s a tape. Mum and Dad – they phoned. There’s a tape.’
He told them about it as they walked along Fifth Avenue.
‘Sorry, girls. When he said that Mum and Dad actually phoned him that day … God, I didn’t know what to do. I should’ve let you talk to him. I suppose I thought it would come better from me.’ He made a ghastly face. ‘Anyway … then … at the time, you can imagine what it was like to be here, actually seeing and hearing it all. The phone rang. His wife was there. He was in hospital, of course. When she realized who it was and why. It was coming through on the answer machine. I don’t know why they didn’t tell us before now, Jan. Sorry. I was so … oh God, I don’t know. He didn’t give me much time for questions. If only it had been Mitch.’
Jannie was bouncing like a rubber ball. ‘But we’re going to hear them, we’re going to hear them!’
Gussie held her arm. Ned’s voice became stronger. ‘I’m not sure whether it will be a good thing. We’re on some sort of even keel now, but this might capsize us. I don’t know whether I want to hear Mum’s voice like this – from the grave. And he wants us to go there after the service. Listen to the tape together. He’s had copies made for us to take home. To keep them alive, he said!’
Jannie held his arm. ‘I know what you’re thinking, Ned. He’s a businessman first and foremost. He wants to keep the sales alive. Perhaps. Probably. But that’s part of his job. It was part of Mum and Dad’s job too. Never mind that. This is beyond that – beyond the world, even! Don’t you understand? We’re going to hear them. When we listened to those messages on television – I mean, awful but wonderful too. None of them was panicky; they were messages of love – all of them! How wonderful for us to have one, because that’s what it will be. A message of love. For us.’
He looked down at her face. Her eyes were shining brilliantly and this time not with tears. He managed a wry smile. ‘You’re a strange mixture, Jan,’ he said.
Gussie squeezed her arm. ‘A very special mixture.’ She forced a smile. ‘We didn’t expect this, did we? We’ll have to go.’ She frowned slightly. ‘More than that, we want to go. Desperately. But, right after this service? Perhaps we’ll be expected to have lunch together? Then there’s dinner again tonight at the Florabunda. Couldn’t we make it tomorrow for the McKinnons?’
‘That’s the other thing. He – Mack – and his wife are off to California early tomorrow. They’re behind schedule – that’s what he said – because of the appendix and Nine Eleven. This was how he talked – sorry. So it’s today or in a month’s time.’
‘We can’t wait that long,’ Jannie stated.
Gussie capitulated. ‘No.’
‘I told him we’d ring him this afternoon. After the service.’
Jannie said, ‘I wish this had happened the other way around so that we could hear their voices before we see where it had all happened.’
‘Tell you what,’ Gussie said. ‘We’ll listen to it often, of course, but when we get home, let’s listen to it while we’re standing on the Island by the chapel and let’s face out to sea. D’you remember what Dad said every blessed time we did that walk?’
‘Of course,’ Jannie replied. ‘He told us that the next landfall from the Island was the United States of America!’
They tried to laugh. And then Jannie said, ‘That’s Sheila, waving her umbrella at us.’
Ned tried to sound like his mother. ‘Best foot forward, troops!’
Six
THE DUST HAD settled over everything, disturbed in wide swathes by machinery still searching … for something … anything. The perimeter was fenced and the exclusion zone beyond it was wide, but there were designated spaces for mourners, and in several of these groups were gathered, obviously praying together. The British group was being led by a man in uniform towards an area canopied with canvas and identified with a wooden cross. Beneath the cross was a table and in front of that, bench seating.
They settled themselves, a few self-consciously but mostly wide-eyed and rigid with the horror at this macabre reality. The depth of the pit in front of them was shocking, the area of devastation was vast, the smells, which had gathered power as they left the bus, were familiar as coming from any building site, yet underneath that familiarity was something else. Perhaps it was different for each person there, but for ever in each memory was the smell of death and total destruction.
Gussie shrank in her seat, head bowed as if in prayer but actually in an effort at self-control. Ned sat next to her. Jannie was next to Sheila and May Smith and was reaching over to hold both their hands. The low cloud seemed to seal them off from the sounds of the city so that, as they all became still and able to look around them, they could hear the chanting of a group of monks in saffron-yellow robes, and see them, oddly misty, in the distance.
The Reverend Mr Selway was standing, leaning on the bench that would become the altar, sharing the shock they were all feeling. His wife touched his arm and he turned and smiled briefly at her, then lifted a case on to the bench and opened it. Between them they prepared the table with a cloth, then the traditional bell, book and candle; the chalice and plate. It was blessedly familiar to most of the people there. They breathe
d the polluted air and opened their service sheets, which told them that an appropriate silence would be kept for private prayer. They bowed their heads and waited for the first greeting, ‘The Lord be with you.’ To which they would respond, ‘And also with you.’ Their personal silence mingled with the chanting and for the first time the outside world could be heard as a police siren screamed its way alongside the barriers. Another bus disgorged its passengers: skull caps, dark suits, an all-male group. They filed towards the monks. Far below them an enormous digger roared into life. The small pocket of near silence began to crumble. May blew her nose.
Suddenly, when Gussie could feel her nerves stretching physically, Eric Selway flung his arms wide and lifted his head towards the solid lid of cloud. The group stared, caught unawares; this was not the normal Anglican procedure at all. Gussie and Ned exchanged glances. Jannie appeared to lengthen her arms so that she was almost holding Sheila and May Smith together.
Selway’s voice was loud, inappropriately so.
‘Open wide the gates of glory!’
The words boomed over the pit, circled it and came back to them like a boomerang. Gussie gasped and clutched at Ned, Jannie looked round at them both wide-eyed. It was as if Father Martin’s words came to them, magnified into a command rather than a plea. And they were everywhere, fragmented, then coming together. Open … gates … glory. As the final ‘glory’ hammered back at them they all, as one, rose to their feet.
The clergyman turned to face them and smiled. ‘The Lord be with you,’ he said. His voice was normal, friendly; it did not reverberate, it was just for them, the living. They all looked at him. ‘And also with you,’ they said in perfect unison. And the service continued conventionally except that the chalice and plate were passed from hand to hand just as they had been in the chapel on the Island back home.
The violins were produced. ‘Abide With Me’ was sung shakily, ‘Morning Has Broken’ with certainty. As they all filed back to the bus, praise was almost fervent. It was as if the sheer horror of the occasion had melted away. No one mentioned the dramatic deviation from the service sheet.
