The Pearly Queen

by Mary Jane Staples

  ‘What’s up?’ asked Dad.

  ‘It’s not good, Jack, and I’m sorry,’ said Mr Edwards.

  ‘Are you Mr Andrews of Manor Place, sir?’ asked the police sergeant, his expression very sober.

  ‘Yes, I’m Jack Andrews.’

  ‘Is your wife’s name Maud, sir?’

  ‘Hold on,’ said Dad, ‘are you goin’ to tell me she’s been arrested?’ He could visualize that swinging umbrella of hers landing her in trouble with the law.

  ‘I’m afraid it’s a little more serious than that,’ said the sergeant. ‘We found her private address in her handbag, and a neighbour of yours informed us where you worked.’

  ‘What d’you mean, you found ’er private address in ’er handbag?’ asked Dad.

  ‘I’m afraid, sir, there’s been an accident.’

  ‘To Maud?’ Dad’s stomach turned over. ‘What kind of accident? Where is she?’

  ‘Mr Andrews, I’m sorry, that’s a fact I am,’ said the sergeant, ‘but I have to tell you it was a fatal accident.’

  ‘Fatal?’ Dad hardly recognized his own voice.

  ‘I’m afraid your wife’s dead, sir.’

  ‘Oh, God ’elp us,’ said Dad, and sat down heavily.

  ‘It appears, sir, that she fell from a bedroom window of a house in Bloomsbury, where apparently she resided with some members of a religious sect. Well, as I understand, sir.’ The sergeant went on to say that the police had been called to the house by a distracted man that morning. In the large yard at the back of the house was the body of a woman, her neck and back broken. She lay directly below the window of a bedroom she shared with another woman. It would be appreciated if Mr Andrews could accompany them to Bloomsbury and identify the body. Would he be kindly obliging and come now?

  Dad was too numbed to do other than nod. All the way to Bloomsbury his mind was trying to accept the unacceptable. Maud dead? Maud, who had been sweet and pretty as a girl, and ardent in no uncertain terms while they were courting? Dead? It wasn’t believable. Those had been their best days, their courting ones, with her cousin Edie often around to add to the laughter they enjoyed. It wasn’t until after Patsy was born that Maud let religion begin to take its hold on her. And what had it led her to in the end? A kind of craziness, a craziness that looked as if it might have been responsible for her death. He remembered what he had said to the kids when they told him she’d gone off to Bloomsbury weeks ago. That’s mortal, that is. He’d said it jokingly. He’d felt sick, but he’d had to make a joke of it, he hadn’t wanted to upset little Betsy by getting worked up.

  He wished now he hadn’t said mortal. Had Maud fallen from her bedroom window or had she jumped? Numbly he put the question to the police sergeant.

  ‘We’ll talk to you when we get to the house, sir.’

  The Temple of Christian Endeavour was a place of shocked silence, the women in distressed retirement in their rooms, trying to come to terms with tragedy. One had departed in shock, saying she could never come back.

  Father Peter, darkly grieving, and Father Luke, agitated, were present. So was a plainclothes detective-sergeant, whose name was Harris. The dead woman lay on a mattress in the Chapel of Penitence. She was covered by a sheet. Sergeant Harris drew it down to expose her face, and Dad looked down at his dead wife. Her eyes were closed, her skin waxy. She was very dead. Dad was tough, physically and mentally, however much his cheerfulness hid this. But moisture pricked his eyes. When all was said and done, Maud had been a good mother, and for four long years of war she had had to be both mother and father to their kids. What if she had lost her way a bit in the end? She didn’t deserve to be lying here dead, not when she’d been in the prime of life at thirty-six. God help her. Rest in peace, love.

  ‘Mr Andrews?’ Sergeant Harris was gentle. ‘This is your wife, sir?’

  ‘Yes.’ What else could he say, what else was there to say? And how was he going to tell Betsy and Patsy?

  The sheet was drawn over the lifeless face again. A police surgeon came in with two men and a stretcher. Sergeant Harris touched Dad’s arm and Dad went with him and the uniformed men to a reception room. Father Peter and Father Luke followed. In the reception room, Mother Joan was waiting. She was pacing about. She was not a woman who could sit still under these kind of circumstances. She pulled up and looked at the man whom Mother Mary had disclaimed.

  Her breeziness absent, she said, ‘You really are her husband?’

  ‘This is Mr Andrews, yes,’ said Sergeant Harris.

  ‘God, I’m sorry,’ said Mother Joan, ‘what a terrible tragedy for you, Mr Andrews. Shall I explain, sergeant?’

  ‘Are you all right, sir?’ asked Sergeant Harris.

  ‘Let her go ahead,’ said Dad, his thoughts now on Betsy, Patsy, and Jimmy.

  Mother Joan said that when she retired to her bedroom last night, the one she shared with Mother Mary, she found the window open.

  ‘If you’ll pardon me, madam,’ said Sergeant Harris, ‘you’ll have to refer to people’s legal names.’

  ‘Yes, quite so, quite understood,’ said Mother Joan, and went on to say she assumed Mrs Andrews had opened the window earlier to let in some fresh air. The night was dark, she did not look out of the window, it did not occur to her that there was any reason to do so. She closed it and drew the curtains. She had had a long day, and went straight to bed, expecting Mrs Andrews to appear any moment. Mrs Andrews had gone up some time beforehand, to see Father Peter, Mr Wilberforce. Father Peter nodded in silent assent at this point.

  Mother Joan said Mrs Andrews had something on her mind, that she wanted to go up and see Mr Wilberforce and ask him to hear her confession.

  The three policemen looked wooden-faced at this. Dad came out of his racked world to say, ‘Confession?’

  ‘Father Peter – Mr Wilberforce – takes confession,’ said Mother Joan.

  ‘That is so, Mr Andrews,’ said Father Peter, his grief visibly haunting him. ‘It’s a responsibility I took on with many self-doubts but with a belief that the Lord would approve.’

  Dad, whose own belief was that everyone in this place was a religious crank, gave the dark brooding eagle a straight look. ‘What did my wife confess?’ he asked.

  ‘Sir, I would not normally break so holy a confidence—’

  ‘I think you can repeat what you told us, Mr Wilberforce,’ said Sergeant Harris. ‘We’ve established you’re not ordained.’

  ‘I am, nevertheless, a true servant of the Lord,’ intoned Father Peter. ‘However, because of the circumstances, I will answer Mr Andrews. His wife came up to see me last night and begged me to hear her confession. I did so, I could not refuse her deep wish to unburden herself. She confessed that when Mr Andrews called here a little while ago, asking that she return home, she denied that she was his wife and that she even knew him. It lay heavily on her conscience. I told her I was sure the Lord would pardon her, particularly if she made amends and did as her husband wished by returning home. All members of the League residing here are free to come and go. Mrs Andrews was still very unhappy with herself, very distressed, and it distressed me, too, that she seemed unable to believe the Lord would forgive her. I spent some time trying to reassure her, but when she left to go to her room, she was still an unhappy woman. I am inconsolable at what happened subsequently, and tormented by a feeling that I failed her.’

  ‘No, of course you didn’t, Father,’ said Mother Joan, ‘it was her state of mind, poor woman. Dear God, to think she was lying out there all night. When I woke up this morning, it was obvious her bed hadn’t been slept in, and as she didn’t appear at breakfast, we all assumed she had gone home last night. Not because we knew of her confession, but because some of us do go home for a while from time to time. But after breakfast our cook, Mrs Murphy, went out to the yard, to the dustbins. She discovered your unfortunate wife, Mr Andrews, lying on the ground below our bedroom window.’

  Dad was silent for a few moments. Then he looked at Sergeant Harris and said
, ‘Suicide?’

  ‘It appears so, sir. There’ll be an inquest.’

  ‘If yer’ll pardon me,’ said Father Luke, a sincerely grieving man, ‘might we offer – well, we do ’ave some in cases of shock – might we offer Mr Andrews a drop of brandy?’

  ‘Yes, if that would help a little, Mr Andrews, you are most welcome,’ said Father Peter.

  ‘Kind of you,’ said Dad, ‘but no thanks.’ He looked at Sergeant Harris again. ‘The funeral?’ he said.

  ‘After the inquest, sir,’ said Sergeant Harris, and grimaced. He liked the look of this man. The tragedy had hit him hard, that was obvious. Now he was going to be faced with the problem of finding a vicar willing to defy the canon and bury a suicide, if the inquest coroner returned such a verdict, which he undoubtedly would. ‘We’ll be in touch, Mr Andrews.’

  ‘That’s it, then,’ said Dad brusquely.

  ‘We all extend our deepest sorrow and sympathy,’ said Father Peter, head bowed, ‘and we are all greatly troubled by the tragedy, Mr Andrews.’

  ‘Yes. Right. Goodbye.’ Dad shook hands with Sergeant Harris and left. He walked with his mind in pieces.

  Someone called. ‘Mr Andrews?’

  He turned. A woman came hurrying up. He looked at her, a lady of gentle countenance, eyes full of sorrow. ‘Yes?’ he said.

  ‘You don’t know me, Mr Andrews,’ said Mother Verity, ‘I’m Miss Celia Stokes, I reside in that house. I knew your poor wife well, and want to tell you how dreadfully sorry I am.’ There was something else she wanted to tell him, but she was not sure she should, or even if it was right to. She only knew that it troubled her. ‘She was a good woman, Mr Andrews, and a tireless worker.’

  Dad wondered how good was good, and if this gentle-looking woman knew Maud had come to believe religion was more important than her children. ‘But what makes a good woman jump from a window?’ he asked.

  ‘Who could know she would do that?’ said Mother Verity. ‘She was a little eccentric, perhaps, but she walked happily with the Lord.’

  ‘Well, you look a nice woman yourself,’ said Dad, ‘so don’t get as happy as she did, or you might end up doin’ the same thing. Walkin’ like that with the Lord seems a bit fatal.’

  ‘That is true, Mr Andrews, as some of His disciples discovered. But will it help you to know that last evening your wife confided to me her belief that she had done you a grievous wrong?’

  ‘Like sayin’ I wasn’t her ’usband?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Andrews, like saying that. It really was troubling her.’

  A little sigh escaped Dad. ‘Well, I like you for tellin’ me that,’ he said. ‘Glad I met you. But I’ll get along now, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Goodbye, Mr Andrews.’

  ‘Goodbye, Miss Stokes.’

  Mother Verity felt acutely sad for him.

  Dad walked all the way back to the depot, trying to gather his thoughts and to decide just what he should tell the kids. At the depot, the manager told him to go home, and to take tomorrow off as well. He would lose no pay.

  ‘I’ll see to Patty an’ Cake first,’ said Dad.

  ‘They’ve been seen to. Go home, Jack. There’s your kids.’

  Dad walked some more. Should he go to the school and collect Patsy and Betsy? No, let them spend what was left of the afternoon in blissful ignorance. He went home and made himself some hot strong tea. He thought about Edie. She had to know. He penned her a brief letter and took it to the Camberwell house in which she had a flat, where he handed it to her landlady and so escaped that which he couldn’t handle at the moment, having to tell Edie in person.

  Then he walked and walked, thinking of Maud and their life together, and of the time when he took a Blighty wound in Mesopotamia and how she had said it was the Lord who helped him to get better. And that reminded him of his subsequent leave at home, and how, when out walking with her, she used her umbrella to make people get out of his way. Who could say that in her own fashion she had not been a good wife, as well as a good mother, until religiousness claimed her? Because of her religiousness they had ended up with not much in common, but she had been his wife for seventeen years and given him three of the best kids a man could have.

  He finally returned home at a time when he knew Jimmy would be there, as well as the girls. He began by telling them that their mum would not come home again.

  ‘Never?’ said Patsy, and Jimmy looked hard at his dad. There wasn’t a sign of his usual cheerfulness.

  ‘I’m afraid not, Patsy,’ said Dad.

  ‘Don’t she want us any more?’ asked Betsy.

  ‘Betsy love,’ said Dad, ‘I don’t reckon we could ever say that about your mum. She did what she ’ad to do, to go an’ work for the Lord, but that never meant she didn’t want you.’

  Jimmy looked harder at his dad. ‘Dad, why’d you say it like that?’ he asked.

  ‘Well, Jimmy, and you, Patsy, and you, Betsy, we’ve got to face up to the fact that the Lord’s claimed your mum.’ That was the kindest way Dad could think of to break the news. ‘That’s why she won’t ever be home again. She’s with the Lord.’

  They could have made it much harder for him than they did. Betsy cried, of course, and he took her up and cuddled her. She clung sobbing to him. Patsy was very quiet for a few minutes, then went up to her room without saying a word. Jimmy took it stoically, but Dad knew his son was going to ask him questions.

  Patsy came down after a while, her eyes red. She kissed her father. ‘I won’t make no fuss, Dad,’ she said, swallowing, ‘and it’s all right, you still got us, and we’ve all still got each other.’

  ‘Never mind supper,’ said Jimmy, ‘I’ll make a pot of tea. Betsy can help, can’t you, Betsy?’

  ‘I don’t want no tea,’ whispered Betsy.

  ‘Well, lovey, see how you feel when it’s been made,’ said Dad.

  Betsy had a cup when the teapot was brought to the table. Then Patsy asked if Mum had died of an illness. Dad said yes, it was the kind of illness some people did die of.

  Jimmy answered a knock on the front door. It was Aunt Edie, and Aunt Edie was looking stunned. ‘Jimmy, is it true?’ she asked in a strained voice.

  ‘I don’t think that’s a very good question, Aunt Edie,’ said Jimmy, ‘and how did you know?’

  ‘Your dad sent me a note. He told me not to come, but I ’ad to. Can I talk to him in the parlour for a bit? Jimmy, oh, I’m so sorry for all of you, I must speak to your dad.’

  Dad had another private conversation with her in the parlour. He was sombre, she was distressed. He told all that he knew from his visit to Bloomsbury and how it pointed to the fact that Maud had committed suicide.

  ‘Because of her conscience?’ said Aunt Edie, pale of face. ‘Because she realized what she’d done to you and the fam’ly, and worse, that she realized she’d said to you, in front of everybody there at the time, that you weren’t ’er husband, that she didn’t even know you? Lord ’elp us, Jack, there’ll be an inquest and that’ll all come out and be in the papers.’

  ‘I’m goin’ to ’ave to let Betsy and Patsy stay away from school for a while,’ said Dad.

  ‘Yes, you’ve got to, or they’ll be tormented by all the schoolkids, and kids can be cruel,’ said Aunt Edie. ‘I’ll come and look after them, I’ll take me summer ’olidays, which I ’aven’t had yet.’

  ‘Kind of you, Edie, but no,’ said Dad.

  Aunt Edie sat heavily down. ‘You don’t deserve a blow like this, Jack,’ she said, ‘you’ve got to let me come and look after the house and Betsy and Patsy.’

  ‘It won’t do, Edie love,’ said Dad quietly, ‘not a single woman like you. There’d be tongues waggin’ all round us, there’d be people sayin’ Maud committed suicide because of you and me. I think you can see that.’

  ‘Yes, I can see. I could say I wouldn’t care, but I would, because of you.’ Aunt Edie drew a sighing breath. ‘I’ve got a weight on me own conscience, and I don’t like what it’s doin’ to me. J
ust recent, I’ve wished Maud dead. All these years she’s ’ad you, and only ever been half a wife to you. I could ’ave married. I had a lover, Jack, and he wanted to marry me. Just before the war, it was. But I kept sayin’ no, I kept tellin’ myself there was always a chance Maud might get carried off by influenza, and that would let me in on your life. And this last month I’ve wished ’er dead. ’Ave I already said that?’

  ‘Don’t upset yourself, Edie,’ said Dad. ‘Most of us ’ave wished someone dead at times.’

  ‘They say some women are saints, Jack. I’m not one of them. All these weekends I’ve done me best to take you and your fam’ly over, to make you feel you don’t need Maud, that you could ’ave me even if you couldn’t marry me. Now I feel like one of them witch doctors that stick pins into dolls made up to look like someone they want to get rid of.’

  Dad put his hand on her shoulder. She looked up at him. He dredged up a smile. ‘That’s a sad song, Edie love, but it don’t apply,’ he said. ‘What ’appened to Maud is nothing to do with you, so don’t sing it again. You’ve been the best thing that’s ’appened to this fam’ly all these weekends. We both know, don’t we, that if Maud walked in now we could look ’er in the face?’

  ‘I don’t know that I could,’ said Aunt Edie.

  ‘I’d stand with you on it,’ said Dad. He was not a subtle man, but he did have an acquired maturity and he knew something about life and its pitfalls. He knew what made sense and what didn’t. He knew his feelings for Edie weren’t new, they’d been there for years, waiting to come to life. Maud was gone, Maud who’d been a faithful wife at least, and a good mother, all in all, but he couldn’t honestly say he’d been able to stay in love with her. All the same, what would Jimmy and the girls think if they knew what his feelings were for their Aunt Edie when their mother wasn’t yet cold?

  ‘You’re right, aren’t you, Jack?’ said Aunt Edie. ‘It won’t do for me to be here, will it? It wouldn’t look good, it wouldn’t even look decent.’

  ‘I’ll be in touch,’ said Dad. ‘D’you want to have a few words with Jimmy an’ the girls before you go?’