by Nicola Slade
‘Do you want to rest, Mrs Marchant?’ asked Gemma, pushing the last drawer shut. ‘Or you could come down to the drawing-room for coffee if you like, to meet some of the other guests?’
‘That would be lovely, dear,’ agreed Christiane. ‘If you could just help me a bit with my chair? I’m sorry to be such a dreadful old nuisance.’
The practised pathos she put into this remark had something of its usual effect though not all. Her eyes narrowed as she looked closely at Gemma. I don’t think the girl is all there, she decided.
In fact Christiane did the girl an injustice. Gemma was properly concerned about any nice old lady who had to get about in a wheelchair and she had never had any qualms in her previous job at the nursing home about the bedridden ladies either; sponging bedsores, changing soiled sheets without complaint, it was no trouble. We all come to it, she thought with a philosophical shrug.
No, it was something else that was on her mind, something nagging at her that might upset this lovely job away from Mum, with these lovely old people, especially that nice Miss Quigley who really talked to Gemma as if Gemma was a proper person. That was what impressed Gemma. Mum shouted at her and treated her like a dummy, Ryan said he loved her but she knew that all he really wanted was sex and he was horrible sometimes, like he’d been last night on the phone.
She wrenched her mind back to the present and, as she negotiated Mrs Marchant and her wheelchair into the lift and out again into the hall, she thought about Miss Quigley who had taken to having long, comfortable chats with Gemma, chats about all kinds of things but mostly about what Gemma wanted to do with her life. That was something nobody else had even considered worth discussing and it was a pleasant new experience that raised questions and avenues Gemma had never thought of exploring.
‘Just push me up by a table, dear,’ suggested Christiane, glancing round the drawing-room with a bright social smile. ‘Over there will do, by that lady in the pink cardigan.’
Ellen Ransom felt numb as her past rose up and smacked her in the face. Encased in ice she heard Gemma give a general introduction: Matron Winslow was very hot on that kind of good manners and Ellen watched as Christiane Marchant smiled and nodded all round. Then came the moment she had dreaded in her dreams, but this was a waking nightmare. The woman was real enough, and so was the memory. And the threat.
‘Good morning.’ It was the same voice, the same accent she remembered so clearly even after more than sixty years. ‘Pleasant weather for the time of year, isn’t it?’
‘What?’ Ellen jerked her head up meeting a bland smile. Was the woman going to pretend she hadn’t recognized her? Was it possible, by some blessed miracle, that she hadn’t recognized her? ‘Um, yes, yes, very nice and sunny today.’
As Ellen Ransom sank back in her chair, fiddling with her cardigan sleeve and looking dumbfounded, Christiane nodded pleasantly and turned to her other neighbour.
‘It seems very comfortable here. Have you been here long?’
The man hunched in the wing chair came out of his reverie and stared at her blankly, then, as he came to himself he shrugged.
‘A veek, maybe two? I don’t know, it’s all right. It could be vorse.’
He looked away, obviously wanting to discourage any further intrusion but she persisted.
‘I see you’re another foreigner, just like me,’ she chirped merrily, her eyes snapping with dark amusement. ‘Where do you come from? I’m from France, myself, but of course I’ve been over here for a good many years. How about you?’
He shifted impatiently in the big tapestry-covered chair, trying to ignore her but the high-pitched, sharp voice with its very slight trace of an accent, bored into his consciousness.
‘Well? Cat got your tongue, has it? Where do you come from?’
He stood up and glared at her.
‘I am from Eastern Europe and I do not vish to discuss my past vith you.’ His voice, strongly accented, grated and he shot her a savage glance as he turned on his heel and limped out of the room.
‘Oh dear.’ Matron Winslow had just looked in to check on the new arrival. ‘I do hope poor Mr Buchan isn’t too upset.’ She frowned slightly as she spoke but Christiane was oozing sympathy and regret, so Miss Winslow went on: ‘We ought to have explained to you, Mrs Marchant. He won’t talk about his wartime experiences but it must have been pretty bad. We think he was in a concentration camp, that’s what his son told us, but poor Mr Buchan won’t say a word about it.’
‘Oh how sad,’ Christiane sighed, her syrupy tones belying the sparkle of interest in her eyes. ‘Clumsy old me, putting my foot in it. Mind you, I don’t suppose any of us had a very easy time in the war, or after it either.’
She glanced at Ellen Ransom as she spoke and was gratified to see the other woman shudder very slightly. With a tiny nod, Christiane turned her attention to the other occupant of the wide bay window.
‘Why, it’s Mr Armstrong, isn’t it? The bank manager? Remember me? I used to know your wife. Such a pity she passed away, wasn’t it.’
‘Passed away?’ Tim’s brow furrowed as he looked anxiously at the stranger. He had, up till now, been having one of his good days, engaging in a perfectly lucid conversation with Harriet Quigley for a long time this morning. She had just slipped upstairs to fetch a book from her room, and without her protection Tim Armstrong looked as though his hold on reality was beginning to slip. ‘Jane is … Jane is going to come and see me soon.… Today, she’s coming to.…’
Christiane’s smile was sweet but with the tail end of a sneer and her victim floundered deeper and deeper. ‘It’s true.’ The words of protest were blurted out as Christiane allowed a trace of scepticism to show. He clearly struggled to contain his emotions and started to shout at her, hands flailing. ‘Jane is coming to see me soon; you don’t have to look at me like that. I’m not stupid. Or … or mad.’
As Christiane assumed her misunderstood expression and opened her mouth to deny the charge, a cool voice broke into the conversation.
‘It’s all right, Tim, leave it to me. Why don’t you come and give me your arm round the garden? The sun’s shining for once but I really could use a bit of help.’ Harriet patted Tim’s arm and gave him a nod of approval as he pottered off obediently to fetch his coat, then she turned to the other woman, a stern expression on her pleasant features.
‘Look, I’m sure you didn’t mean to upset Tim, Mrs, er,’ she began. ‘But it’s much kinder not to argue with him. Most of the time he knows perfectly well that his wife is dead but sometimes it gets too hard to bear so he shuts it off. He doesn’t harm anyone by it and he has enough other problems to worry about, so please, do me a favour and let him alone, will you?’
Before Christiane could protest her innocence, Harriet smiled politely and went in pursuit of Tim, obviously hoping to catch him before he started to worry about why he was wearing his coat indoors. Christiane was left staring after Harriet, whose words and tone had both been perfectly friendly and reasonable. So why did she have the impression that she had received a reproving slap on the wrist? And why did she feel even more strongly that she should watch her step with that one?
Kieran was singing as he worked. His redoubtable mum had found him a job as a packer and to everyone’s astonishment he was good at it, his stubby fingers capable of swift, deft movement, and the rhythmical monotony of the work suiting his temperament. He was proud of his work, proud to have a job and he enjoyed working with the older women who were his workmates.
He worked in a warehouse for a small promotions company, packing items like airline toilet bags, tucking in sample sized bottles of cologne, tiny soaps, mini toothbrushes and toothpaste, and so forth, into the First Class bags. The Grannies, as the women packers were affectionately known, all enjoyed having him there to mother, his slowness and gentle nature reminding them of their own sons as little boys, but with the tarnish of adulthood left off. There was nothing wrong, it was only that he was just a few steps behind everyone else.
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Today he was happy. Ryan had let him have a ride on his motorbike last night and it was dead good. I want a motorbike too, he thought, then pouted. Mum won’t ever let me. His thoughts flickered towards Gemma and he perked up. Tonight Ryan was going to sneak into the garden of Firstone Grange and try to get Gemma to come out. Ryan didn’t know it but Kieran was going to follow him and try to watch him with the girl. Maybe they’d, you know, kiss and stuff and he might get to watch. That’d be dead good.
Kieran sang loudly, his split melon grin and carroty curls a delight to the Grannies.
‘Bless him,’ they crooned.
‘I’m free,’ Alice whispered then, with a tremor of excitement: ‘I’m free,’ she shouted aloud. Alone for the first time in years she made herself a cup of tea and a ham sandwich for lunch. This afternoon she would go in to the office as usual but she would be a different person. ‘I’m free,’ she said it again, quietly but firmly.
Without thinking at all, her mind a complete blank, she drank her tea and ate her sandwich, then she went into what had originally been the morning room when the house was new. Formerly her father’s surgery, for the last few years it had been her mother’s bedroom. She stripped the bed and put the sheets into the washing machine.
The room smelled of her mother, a compound of French perfume and a warm, musty smell, the smell of old woman. Alice stared at the bed, her thought processes kicking back into operation. I simply will not think about her, she decided and, with a determined slam, she shut the door behind her and went upstairs to get changed for work.
The thought of the office sent a shaft of sunshine through the gloom. Neil! She recalled his kindness when she stumbled over the words as she tried to explain her reaction to his offer of promotion.
‘I’m not taking that as final,’ he told her. ‘I know what it’s like, living with an invalid,’ he had explained and told her a little about his own mother.
Alice’s mouth twisted into a bitter smile. Neil’s mother and Christiane Marchant sounded as much alike as Maria von Trapp and Lucrezia Borgia but plainly Neil meant her to take the job, come hell or high water. ‘These invalids can be tyrants,’ he had observed as he drove her back to Chambers Forge that day. ‘But you mustn’t let her get you down. You have to try and keep a life of your own.’
Neil had given a wry smile then himself, she recalled now, then he had laughed abruptly, shaking his head. ‘Just listen to me,’ he conceded. ‘It’s easier said than done; I know that only too well.’
Today Neil was expected in the office to discuss the final details of the handover with Barry Williams and to go over some of the files with Alice. Instead of wearing her usual depressed navy, Alice found herself putting on her best jumper, the daffodil yellow one and the good wool and cashmere cocoa brown skirt that she had found last week in a charity shop in Winchester.
Alice adored clothes, good clothes, and she loved charity shops, thrilling to the excitement of the treasure hunter stalking a designer label. Hitherto, though, she had gone for hard-wearing quality rather than colour and beauty.
Idiot, she chided herself, looking at her reflection with dissatisfied eyes, then she squared her shoulders. Why not? What was wrong with trying to look half-way decent? Better, surely, than sinking into a depressed, premature middle-age and withering away.
Pauline Winslow was an evangelical in her chosen field of geriatric nursing and the unexpected but entirely deserved legacy from a grateful patient, of the large Edwardian house, Firstone Grange, had enabled her to set up her dream enterprise. She had inherited a modest amount of cash along with the house but her financial prayers had been answered when she discovered with delight that an old nursing colleague was already in charge of the existing residential home next door.
‘As you know,’ her friend had explained. ‘Hiltingbury House caters exclusively for nursing cases at present which, of course, is why we were happy to make no trouble over your planning permission. After all, Firstone Grange is in a quite different category, comfortable short-stay visits, so there’s no clash of interest. However, we would like to upgrade and move into permanent residential facilities for the less infirm; you know the kind of thing, reasonably able-bodied people but too frail to want to go on living alone. Sheltered flats with all the benefits of a community and care at hand but a degree of privacy and independence as well.’
Pauline Winslow had been interested, wondering where this was leading.
‘We have plenty of land at the back of the house,’ explained her friend. ‘But we could do with more. Our most pressing need is for a decent driveway from the proposed new building out to the main road. We don’t want to use the existing entrance. Now do you see what we’re after?’
The money from the sale of land at the side and rear of Firstone Grange was a godsend and Pauline Winslow was happy to give all the credit where it was due. ‘Thank you, Lord,’ she acknowledged on the morning of Christiane Marchant’s first day. ‘Thank you for giving me this chance, and please, dear Lord, please look after poor Mr Buchan and don’t let him have been too upset.’
She frowned and prayed aloud with renewed fervour. ‘And please, Lord, forgive me for not taking to him; help me to find something likeable about him. And the new guest, Mrs Marchant,’ she added as an afterthought. ‘Please let things continue to go well, it’s all so lovely, so perfect. I’ll die if anything goes wrong.’ The frown deepened. ‘I think I’d kill anyone who spoilt it.’
There was no official rest period after lunch at Firstone Grange. ‘They’re not toddlers,’ Pauline Winslow had been quite fierce when someone suggested it to her. Some of the guests disappeared to their rooms for an hour or so but others preferred to sit in the drawing-room, either reading or nodding over the paper until the two-thirtyish time suggested by Matron to potential visitors.
Today Doreen and Vic Buchan arrived promptly on the dot of half-past two and sat down beside Vic’s father in the bay window. Stifling an exclamation of dismay Harriet Quigley shrank back in her corner chair, lest Doreen Buchan spot her, hoping the shadows would conceal her. If her cousin Sam found out where she was holed up he’d be ringing the door bell in record time, along with friends from Locksley village, and Harriet was uncomfortably aware of her straggling hair and roots showing grey. Time to fish out the semi-permanent wash-in colour that was tucked into her sponge bag. It should be possible, she thought, to do that in the hour or so between tea and dinner. In the meantime she twitched the heavy cream brocade curtain and leaned back out of sight behind its loosely hanging folds.
Doreen Buchan gave Fred a cool peck on the cheek and sat down with her back to Harriet, who relaxed into her corner and reached for her book. Vic tried to engage his father in conversation, with little success, so he indulged himself by slipping into his favourite topic, talking about the business.
Doreen sat back and tried to look happy about her surroundings. I hate these places, she shuddered, they’re all the same. Oh, I know I’ve been telling everyone how nice it is here, and I suppose it is, it ought to be, costs enough, but it’s still a Home, still an Institution. In the end it all boils down to the same thing, just dressed up pretty. Prettily, she caught herself up, it’s a place to put people who aren’t safe outside, because they’re ill, or old, or … not right. Her thoughts panicked around inside her head. Don’t think about Mum, she urged, don’t let yourself remember; it’s all over, all gone and nobody knows. Especially Vic, he’ll never know, he mustn’t know. Ever.
‘Hullo? I know you, don’t I? From a long time ago?’
The voice was in her head and her head was going to split open at the shock, coming so pat on her tangled thoughts. It was in her head, wasn’t it? Doreen gasped and looked round, straight into the shrewd, glittering black eyes of an old woman in a wheelchair. A woman whose face had an eager, almost lustful look, curious and waiting for her answer.
‘No, no, I don’t think so,’ she stammered, pleating the fine blue wool of her Country Casuals skirt wit
h troubled fingers.
‘Oh, I think I do, dear,’ the woman went on, her voice warm, interested, curious. ‘Didn’t you live in Surrey Road when you were little, dear? In Bournemouth? With your auntie?’
The shock knifed into Doreen, icy fingers twisting her stomach, her heart juddering as she stared, anguish glazing her eyes, at the older woman. Did she know? What did she know? How could she, how could anyone here possibly know? Her aunt had kept herself to herself, never gossiping. Besides, the name had been different, but secrets had a way of seeping out through the cracks. Doreen said nothing, was hardly capable of speech anyway, and slumped in her chair in a frozen terror.
‘Not feeling well, dear?’ The concern sounded false to her tormented listener. ‘I say, excuse me, but I think your wife’s feeling poorly.’
Vic turned round. ‘You all right, Dor? You’re looking a bit green.’
Wetting her lips, but not capable of attempting speech, Doreen flapped a hand and shook her head.
‘Thanks, love,’ Vic nodded to Christiane Marchant. ‘I’ll keep an eye on her. Time of life, you know,’ he added, not noticing his wife’s cringing at the booming explanation. ‘We won’t be long anyway, got to go for a test drive. We’re looking at a new Mercedes.’ Swelling with pride he bent towards his father and raised his voice. ‘You hear that, Dad? We’re off to look at a new Merc in a minute, top of the range. What d’you say to that then?’
Fred Buchan raised his eyes from silent contemplation of the bare-stemmed silver birch outside the window, graceful and starkly silhouetted against the pewter sky. He looked out at Vic from heavy, hooded lids, pale-blue eyes faded and chill. ‘Good, my son, very good.’ He went back to staring at the tree and Vic shrugged. The day Dad took an interest in anything beside himself would be the day Vic put up the flags. Mum had been the one to talk to, to praise, to admire. Never Dad. Vic sighed, raising his eyes to the ceiling; thank God for Doreen, at least she took an interest. She was a good wife, Dor, a real good sort, never any secrets with Doreen, just straight up front.
