The Mirrror Shop

by Nicholas Bundock

  ‘I should think so. Will you go?’

  ‘I think I might. You’re away. The shop’s quiet in August. It could be fun.’

  ‘Who is this newcomer to Russ’s drama group?’

  ‘Alden Mills. Typical amateur enthusiast. A solicitor who’d rather be an actor. His wife bought a mirror from us recently.’

  Russ appears at the workshop doorway. ‘Coffee?’

  Eva feels an urgent need to check out these facts with Agnes. The story seems to have two versions. Not quite contradictory but somehow . . . ‘So Russ, what are you scheming for Luke? You’re not trying to turn him into an actor are you?’

  ‘I’m hoping he’ll be close at hand to prompt me every time I blank.’

  ‘I shall have to meet this Alden and his wife. It’s not everyone who could make you close the shop for a week.’

  ‘You’ll soon have a chance,’ says Luke. ‘Alden phoned half an hour ago inviting you and me and Russ to dinner on Wednesday. We’re not busy, are we?’

  ‘I must check my diary,’ says Eva, thinking, try keeping me away.

  As soon as Eva has left the shop, she texts Agnes: Phone asap. Things have happened. Before she has reached home she receives a reply: At work. Difficult. R. in room. Will phone 6.

  Back home Eva wonders how she can possibly fill the day until 6.00pm. There is only one way. She pulls on some old clothes and goes into the garden. Finding a hoe and a fork, she walks to the far end and looks beyond the hawthorn hedge to the adjoining meadow where bullocks are grazing. Turning back to an uncultivated patch, she sees alkanets which seem to have sprung up overnight. Annie is right: they too easily take over. She sets about uprooting them, surprised at the depth of their cordlike white roots. Although partially shaded by the horse chestnut in next door’s garden, she soon runs with perspiration, and in need of less strenuous activity, moves to the vegetables where she hoes the rows of leeks and parsnips. But today the task lacks its usual pleasure. Vegetables have always been grown to be shared with Luke. For how much longer? Two hours later, when there are no more weeds with which to drive out thoughts of Rhona, she surveys her work. She wants to be proud of this cherished, well-designed, productive garden; today it is no more than a diversion. By the back door she kicks off her gardening boots and goes in for a shower. Afterwards, in dressing gown, slumped in an armchair, she attempts to give full concentration to a pile of seed catalogues, in a losing battle against sleep.

  A subconscious clock wakes her at 5.50pm, lifting her from a dream of her childhood bedroom on the outskirts of Worcester with its view over the Malvern Hills. Before she is fully awake her mobile rings.

  ‘So what’s happened?’ Agnes asks.

  ‘Luke’s told me about his trip to Corsica. Apparently it was only finalised today.’

  ‘That’s not what Rhona told me.’

  ‘I called into the shop to have it out with him, but it seems Russ is the one who’s arranged things.’

  ‘That’s not the impression I got.’

  ‘Who do I believe? Luke or Rhona?’

  ‘At this stage,’ says Agnes slowly, ‘neither of them.’

  ‘Some comfort that is.’

  ‘No, don’t say that. You are still ahead of them and I shall continue to relay to you everything Rhona says.’

  ‘You don’t suppose, do you, that a lot of this is in Rhona’s head? I mean she may think she’s lined Luke up, but in point of fact Luke believes he’s simply joining Russ for a few days abroad.’

  ‘It’s possible. Theoretically. With Rhona the boundary between fantasy and reality can be very blurred.’

  ‘I can’t wait until Wednesday night.’

  ‘Why Wednesday?’

  ‘Hasn’t Rhona told you?’

  ‘Told me what?’

  ‘Luke and I are having dinner with them.’

  ‘First I’ve heard.’

  ‘She didn’t mention it?’

  ‘No, but then she was so excited about Luke going to Corsica . . .’

  ‘I’m dying to meet her.’

  ‘Be warned, she’ll be absolutely charming.’

  ‘Won’t you be there?’

  ‘I haven’t been invited. Shall I phone tomorrow?’

  ‘Only if there are developments. We don’t need to speak until after the dinner party – unless I’m desperate. Can I phone you on Thursday?’

  ‘Ring at eleven-thirty. I’ll make sure I’m out of the studio. By that time I will have heard Rhona’s account of the evening. We can compare notes. Now remember, if you need to call me before then, do so. I know what you’re going through.’

  Assured, Eva hangs up. Perhaps, perhaps, she tells herself, the affair to date has been conducted only in Rhona’s head. If this is true, Luke has been judged and found guilty without cause. Has she allowed unfounded suspicions to go viral in her mind? By the time she is ready to leave the house for supper at Luke’s, she is determined that she will suspend all doubt until at least Wednesday night. And as she walks towards Back Lane she feels she is not alone: Agnes is at hand to supply facts and down-to-earth advice, while tomorrow’s appointment with Stella will no doubt produce its own insights and wisdom.

  13

  Mid-morning on Tuesday Luke, holding a wrapped cartouche mirror, opens the shop door so a customer can leave. As the summer heat strikes his face he looks up into the clear sky before, with some reluctance, he closes the door, walks to his desk and places a cheque in the top drawer. It has been a satisfactory morning following a good night. In the last twenty-four hours he has regained control of his life. The supper he and Eva enjoyed at his house was the pleasure it had always been, as was the night he spent at her cottage. And they had lingered over breakfast as they always did on days when she had no early client. And she showed, he thought, no hint of suspicion. But then, why should she? He has spent many hours fantasising about Rhona but what in fact has happened between the two of them apart from a single innocent kiss? As for fantasies, who doesn’t fantasise? And in the world of reality a mirror has been sold and a cheque will be paid into the bank at lunchtime. True, tomorrow’s dinner appointment may be awkward, but surely the very transparency of it will be only for the good.

  He sits at his desk and searches online for a map of Santa Marta. He is zooming into the Corsican mountains when the ringing phone provides the first annoyance in a perfect day.

  ‘Hello,’ he answers curtly.

  ‘Luke, hi. Have I phoned at a bad time?’ It is Rhona.

  ‘Not at all. Right now I’m staring at a map of Corsica.’

  ‘Santa Marta is so small it’s probably not even marked. Look, I’m really sorry Alden sprung that invitation on you. He hardly discussed it with me before he phoned you. But all the same I’m so glad all three of you can come. Meanwhile, have you a spare hour this evening? I’d like to take you somewhere.’

  Luke smiles in the knowledge that tonight Eva is seeing Stella. ‘No, I’m sure I’m doing nothing.’

  ‘Wonderful. Can we go in my car? I can be outside your shop at seven-thirty.’

  ‘This is very mysterious.’

  ‘I thought you liked mysteries. I’ll see you this evening.’

  Luke is not sure whether Russ has overheard the conversation or not. He doesn’t care.

  Prompt as ever Eva rings Stella’s doorbell, waits and looks at the green and maroon trumpets of the Nepalese lilies either side of the doorstep.

  ‘You see, your cure for them worked,’ are Stella’s first words as she opens the door.

  ‘Those colours are so soft I think I shall buy some for myself. I tend to overdose on my Casablancas.’

  ‘Go ahead upstairs and I’ll find some wine – not the least advantage of an evening appointment.’

  Waiting in her usual chair in Stella’s drawing room, Eva realises that yesterday’s gardening and the afternoon’s shopping in a stifling Norwich have exhausted her. And, of course, worry. In the early evening light the room’s atmosphere is different from other visi
ts here, always in the morning or afternoon. Apart from the unfamiliar angles of shadows, the room, always a place of quiet, has assumed a stillness, as if the furnishings have been moved to induce tranquility. But every chair and table is in its familiar place, the only discernible difference from her last visit being that the vase by the hearth now contains pink and mauve stocks. Eva closes her eyes and inhales the scent.

  She opens her eyes to see Stella placing a glass of white wine on the table beside her. Stella leaves the bottle by the stocks, sits and raises her own glass in a silent toast. They both drink and as ever remain wordless for several minutes. Wanting the silence broken – there is so much to say – Eva is content to focus on the summer dress in the chair opposite. Stella’s hands rest on her lap so that her red fingernails are absorbed by the dress’s abstract design. Eva watches her readjust one of her cushions, a signal that the time for talking has at last arrived.

  ‘Luke is having . . .’ Eva falters. ‘I am almost certain Luke is embarking on an affair. I know because . . . I’ve a broken a cardinal rule. I’ve been in contact with my client, Agnes – on a social basis.’

  Stella remains silent.

  ‘We met by chance in a shop. I wasn’t assertive enough to prevent a conversation. Since our last counselling session she has discovered that the new man in her employer’s life is Luke.’

  Eva recounts to Stella her conversations with Agnes, in café and church and later on the phone. Stella, listens, once or twice rolling a finger on one of the beads of her necklace. Eva, determined to omit nothing, snatches gulps of wine as she talks. Stella leaves her own glass untouched on its octagonal table.

  Eva concludes, ‘I know you only told me about your client Esther to give me a possible course of action, but that is the path I shall take. There will be no confrontation.’

  In his garden Luke, his head awhirl, paces the lawn, his heart hammering in his chest. The accumulated sun of the day radiates from the old brick walls around him, as he struggles to accept that soon he is to meet with Rhona, and at her suggestion. It is a reality, not a dreamed-up hope of a middle-aged man. But the question remains which has plagued him every minute of the last seven hours, nagged away when he was trying to distract himself by helping Russ with gilding, stayed with him during a lunch hour at the allotment, pressed itself on his brain during an unbearably long afternoon in a hot shop. And now. Where does she plan to go? A pub? A restaurant? An exhibition? Not to her house, surely? Isn’t Alden there with his guests? Or has Alden taken them out for the evening, leaving the house free for Rhona? This is the most enticing option – Rhona and he alone at Saffold Farm. But hadn’t she said, ‘Have you a spare hour?’ Didn’t that imply a short visit? Foolish to speculate – perhaps she merely wants one of the mirrors moved? No, surely, she would have said so, wouldn’t she?

  He drops onto an iron bench at the end of the garden where he notices some petunias wilting in a border. He goes to find a watering can, but halfway to the back door forgets about the flowers, asking himself, why go, wherever it is, in her car? He walks back to the bench. No, the mention of an hour must definitely rule out a restaurant . . . unless Rhona, for whom vagueness is a leitmotif, is being vague about time. He notices the flowers again and makes another attempt to find a watering can.

  Walking back towards the end of the garden, carrying a full can of water, he wonders what he should wear for the evening. He goes indoors and settles for jeans and a green check shirt, and having little faith in the weather, even on the hottest day of the year, throws a Guernsey sweater around his shoulders. Again he wonders if they will be going to a pub or restaurant. Not that he feels hungry, even though he hasn’t eaten since lunchtime when up at the allotments Alf had once again forced on him a doorstep sandwich.

  At 7.15pm he locks the house and walks back to the shop. In the forecourt of the Queen’s Arms half a dozen tables are packed with drinkers, and at the hotel opposite customers from the bar have flowed out to the benches in the market place. By his shop there is no-one and no car parked. He does not remember waiting here before, not for any reason. Standing in the doorway, a feeling of alienation descends: he is an outsider in his own town, by his own building. He checks his watch, looks to his right, the direction from which he expects her car, sees nothing and turns round, a newcomer to Cantisham, a visitor seeing this shop for the first time.

  He hears a car approaching the market place and in a tremor of excitement jumps forward. But it is not blue, not Rhona’s Citroen. He drops back to the doorway, where the evening light is striking its glazed upper panels. He looks at his reflection and straightens his shirt collar, embarrassed to feel like one of the local boys who hang around the market place on Friday nights, out to impress the girls. Another car approaches from Rhona’s direction.

  For some time after Eva has finished speaking Stella says nothing, but Eva reads in her face an understanding devoid of criticism or reprimand.

  Business-like, Stella says, ‘So you have settled on a strategy regarding Luke?’

  ‘I have. I almost discarded it. I’m glad I didn’t.’

  Stella runs her fingers along her necklace. ‘You had planned a final session with Agnes and you have pointed out to her that this is no longer ethical. You had already suggested she might like to see one of your colleagues. This being so, you have no reason to feel bad about developing a friendship with her.’

  ‘But surely it goes against so much we are taught. Contact with clients outside the counselling environment should be avoided. Apart from Luke, I have never before struck up a friendship with a client. Even when he was my client, I ceased to be his counsellor before we had a relationship. This didn’t prevent my colleagues in London making life impossible for me, but certainly, since then, I have adhered to the rule. And if I see a former client in the street and they walk past – perhaps they don’t even recognise me – for me that’s a sign I’ve done a good job. I’ve helped them. I’m no longer needed.’

  ‘That can be the case. It may even be the norm.’ Stella smiles, shrugs, picks up her glass and downs half of it. ‘In human relationships outright generalisations are seldom possible, and there is nothing necessarily unprofessional about your meeting Agnes. Now whether it is wise or helpful for Agnes to be your ears and eyes, this is a different matter. Have you thought about her own motives?’

  Eva relaxes, her professionalism not a matter for censure. She says, ‘I remember you once spoke to me about some clients wanting to hurt a counsellor. If this is true of Agnes, I suppose she could be relishing my predicament. No, I think she genuinely wants to help.’

  ‘There is another possibility.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Agnes, having been, as it were, in your care for some time, the child to your parent, is now relishing the chance to reverse the roles. To be your equal.’

  ‘Is that an issue?’

  ‘Not necessarily, especially if you are aware of the possibility.’

  ‘I really think Agnes believes she is helping me. After all, her advice that I should not go storming into Luke’s shop and have a showdown is not so different from what your Esther counselled herself to do in similar circumstances. I certainly don’t think Agnes is on a power trip. Now it’s me who needs some help and she finds herself in the position to give it.’

  ‘Will you continue to see her?’

  ‘Her phone calls certainly help. What would you advise? As a friend?’

  ‘As a friend I would say, if you feel uneasy about her phone calls or meeting her, simply say you don’t need them. If, on the other hand, you sleep better at night having talked to her, continue. It’s better than insomnia or pills. Some more wine?’ Stella rises from her chair and refills both glasses. Before she resumes her seat she says, ‘One great lesson you seem to have learned already: what Rhona tells Agnes is not necessarily true, or at least not the whole truth. And to discern the truth from the embroidery is probably impossible. So you will never totally dispel your doubts.’


  ‘I’m learning to live with that, but it will be a relief to meet Rhona. We’re having dinner there tomorrow.’

  It is a Citroen. Luke checks the number plate before he looks towards the driver. Yes, it is her car. He raises his eyes to see Rhona behind the wheel. She waves and pulls up by the shop.

  As he opens the passenger door she says, ‘Luke, how wonderful you could join me at such short notice,’ and squeezing his right arm with an inscrutable look, bends towards him so he thinks she might kiss him. But she presses the play button of the CD player and Magical Mystery Tour begins to play. ‘You’ll have to guess where we’re going,’ she says.

  ‘I’ve been trying to all day, but a trip lasting about an hour defeated me.’

  ‘Did I say an hour? Well, maybe an hour or two. Unless you have to get back home.’

  ‘No, no, I’m free all evening.’

  As the possibilities of a restaurant, pub or exhibition reassert themselves, Luke looks at Rhona’s clothes for a clue, but her rust denim dress, with floral buttons at the front and her brown leather shoes tell him nothing. As they leave town on the Norwich Road a city destination suggests itself, but soon they turn off on a side road and head north.

  ‘Still guessing?’ she smiles.

  ‘I’ve ruled out the city. Any clues?’

  ‘Not until the next piece of music.’

  When Magical Mystery Tour is over, she ejects the disc and inserts another, reducing the volume to inaudibility with a look which says, you’ll have to be patient.

  Luke relaxes into his seat. It occurs to him that he must have been driven by Eva hundreds of times, but it was never like this. He no longer wonders where they are going or how long the journey will be: this drive can last a lifetime.

  ‘Have your guests arrived?’ he asks as they stop at the junction to a main road.

  ‘Not arrived – taken over. I’ve been hiding myself in the studio while they talk, argue, have mini-rehearsals, drink endless coffee. Alden becomes a different creature on these occasions. The full actor-manager-director side of him takes over. A man possessed. And he becomes ridiculously extravagant. Tonight he’s taken them off by taxi to some gastro-pub. I could have gone with them but . . . now I mustn’t miss my next turning.’