by David Park
She remembered the day the photographer came to school, his great box of a camera balanced on spindly wooden legs. The line of excited children standing under Mr Simpson’s stony gaze, trying to suppress the bursting, exhilarating desire to laugh. And when it was her turn, the sudden splash of apprehension, her unwillingness to look in the camera’s eye. He’d asked her name, then told her her face was as good as anyone else’s face. And wasn’t he right. Afterwards her father had sent the photographs back – there was no need of them, he’d said, for didn’t they have plenty of their own.
Of course, when she was older she’d had lots of boys interested in her – if she’d wanted she could have had any number of suitors but she was never that type of girl. She had standards and some of those who might have come calling didn’t share all of them. A girl had to be careful, a single mistake could ruin you for ever. She’d known plenty of those along the way and felt no sympathy for their shame. She prided herself that she was entitled to wear white, wear the white dress, even after all these years. No one could deny her that, no one could take it away from her.
Going to the sideboard she took out the photograph album, handling it carefully because it was precious. Before she sat down by the fire she went and checked again in case she hadn’t heard it, but there was still no sign. She stared at the fire and thought of someone who wrote you letters and sent you all his love. Someone who walked with you down the country lanes where spring hedgerows were loaded with blossom. The warmth of his arms. Someone who told you you were beautiful, his breath warm against the tremble of your skin. She turned the pages, looked at the faces. Young, linked by their smiles, the closeness of their bodies pressing into the lens of the camera. And the dresses, of course. White and crisp as that spring blossom, billowing and flowing round the slender shapes of their bodies.
As always, she paused at her favourites – the one with the little lace cap and veil; the couple so young and so alike that they might have been brothers and sister; the couple standing under the trees with the breeze flustering her dress a little. Soon she would add her own photograph, cut it out more carefully than she had ever cut one from the newspaper and paste it into the album. And who could say that it wouldn’t be the most beautiful of them all? They’d have it taken not on the plain stone steps of the church but in the grounds of the hotel, where there were trees and flowers. At Easter the daffodils would be in bloom. That would be the thing to do, have it taken against a spread of yellow flowers, amidst the trees.
He’d always brought her flowers. Her first real love. Sometimes John, sometimes Peter or Andrew. For some reason Bible names seemed best. His face changed, too, for sometimes he was blond and others dark, his brown eyes fixed in the flux of her memory. But what did any of that matter, for he always brought flowers. Sometimes he picked them from the hedgerows or meadows on the way up to the farm – once he’d brought her bluebells and she’d pressed one later between the pages of a book. That was the type of thing lovers did: they gave each other secret things, little private tokens of their love. She imagined some of the things she had received. A book of poems, a little red Chinese purse, a ring, and of course the letters. He couldn’t send them to the house so they must have had secret letter boxes. Like a film. Like a story in a book. She saw them clearly – a hollow in the big oak tree with the spreading branches under which she sat to read the declaration of his love; beneath a marked stone – the one with the weathered whorls of yellow and white in a dry-stone wall near the lower pasture. In the little graveyard of the church. That would be a good place. She saw herself slipping surreptitiously through the black iron gates and past the yew trees, then looking under the base of an urn.
All those words of love. She recited them to herself with tenderness, putting different faces to the speaker. And then she spoke aloud, touching herself with the soft brush of the words, letting them caress her with the gentleness of the love they bore. Her voice rose a little, fell into a whimper and then grew silent as the newspaper rattled in the letter box and dropped on to the carpet.
She’d be a bride soon. The thought warmed and comforted her as she scurried on through the morning’s sharp snatch of cold which squeezed the features of her face into a tight immobility. The people who passed her were plumped up like fat parcels, all trying to protect themselves from the plummeting temperature by additional layers of clothing and sometimes with scruffy, belted overcoats. No one went bareheaded. She didn’t want to arrive too early and give the impression that she was desperate, but neither did she want to run the risk of arriving too late and missing it. It had been a long wait; such ads appeared at regular intervals but she didn’t want an address which was either too far away, or too close to her own home and which might lead to future awkward encounters. Now she had the right opportunity and she was sure this was the best way. Of course, it would have been nice to have picked her own but there was the expense to consider and going to a shop presented too much potential for difficult questions.
Occasionally as she walked she checked the wording of the ad, which she had carefully transcribed on to a small piece of cardboard. The price seemed reasonable. She turned the words ‘Never worn’ over and over in her mind and sometimes she felt sympathy for the sadness of them but then told herself that she was too soft. Probably for the best. Some slip of a girl who’d rushed blindly in without weighing up everything, some foolish young girl whose head was full of nonsense off the television or cheap magazines. Well, better now than later and wasn’t it only right that someone older and wiser who had waited longer for love should wear it? But she tried not to let herself dwell too much on the dress because she didn’t want to build up her expectations, to hope for too much and then be disappointed. And even if she liked it and decided that it was right, there was still the business to be done and for it to be completed successfully it would be better not to appear too enthusiastic.
The road felt lengthened by the cold and there weren’t as many people about as usual. Was it just her growing anticipation or was there a feeling of expectancy enfolding everything? As she passed the bakery the sweet smell of bread perfumed the air in a sudden surge that stirred her senses. Perhaps she was wrong, perhaps there wasn’t something foolish in the house she was going to but something tragic. The type of tragedy that had touched her own life. She shivered as she thought about it, sifting through the memories until she stumbled into the image of the boy who had loved her lying in a hospital bed, his hand holding hers until the final vestiges of love drained away and the nurse putting her arm round her before gently separating them. His final whisper of love, the same words he had engraved on the ring he was to put on her finger in the church. What would the words be? She tried to think of them, to construct a line or verse in her head, but they got confused and frittered away again.
She looked again at the number on the card, matched it up with the house then walked slowly by, fleeting it only the slightest of glances. It wasn’t grand but quiet and tidy – a respectable terrace house with careful paintwork and neat blinds and curtains. Then despite the sudden press of panic she stopped and walked back until she stood at the front door. If things didn’t feel right or the dress was wrong she could always make an excuse and leave. But she had to stay calm, not do anything foolish or say anything that might arouse suspicion.
The knocker was cold to the touch and as she let it drop, its sound clattered deep inside the house. The woman who opened the door wore a blue pinafore over a jumper and black slacks. One of the buttons was missing.
‘I’m sorry to trouble you,’ she said, ‘but I’ve come about the dress – the one in the paper.’ The woman stared at her, her eyes not appearing to register any understanding. ‘Am I too late? Is it still for sale?’
‘The dress – yes, it’s still for sale. I wasn’t expecting anyone this soon. I wasn’t with you for a second. I was just getting rid up.’ Then she hesitated, looking out past her into the street.
‘It’s for my daughter,�
� she said, peering into the hallway. There was the smell of cooking.
‘Aye, right. Well you better come in then. No point standing out here in the cold.’
She stepped into the hallway and the woman closed the door behind them. The house was quiet except for the sound of something simmering on the cooker. The lid of a pot rattled slightly.
‘I’ve some broth on,’ the woman said. ‘They’ll all be needing a hot meal when they come in after a day like this. It’s bitter cold. Have you come far?’
‘No, not too far,’ she replied, looking round the living room she’d just entered. It was nothing fancy but it was clean and tidy. ‘Up the road a bit.’
‘So it’s for your daughter, then. Will she not need to see it for herself? To see if she likes it.’
‘No, it’ll be all right,’ she answered, staring at the family photographs on the mantelpiece, ‘I know what she likes – she’s happy for me to choose.’
The woman excused herself to turn the soup down. She sat on the settee, listened to the movements in the kitchen and looked at the photographs while the voice filtered through to her.
‘You’re lucky to have a daughter who trusts you that much. I never know what’s going on in the head of mine and any time I guess I get it wrong. Sometimes there’s no fathomin’ them.’
‘We’ve always been very close,’ she said, ‘always very close. And we don’t want too much of a show, nothing too grand. Just quiet, like.’
‘Sure isn’t that the best way,’ the woman said, returning to the room. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’
‘No thanks, I don’t want to put you to any trouble. I’m sure you’re busy.’
‘It’s no trouble. I had the kettle on. Won’t take a second. I think we need it on a day like this.’
‘Well that’s very good of you,’ she said, ‘but don’t go to any trouble now.’
‘Sure take a cup and then you can have a look at the dress, see what you think.’
The tea was a delay but she didn’t want to rush things and it would keep her calm, settle everything down. It came in a china cup with a saucer. She looked at the rose pattern and thought she recognized it. She’d have nice things in her new home – delicate, beautiful things but they wouldn’t just be ornaments, they’d be for everyday use. She wouldn’t be one of those women who stored everything away in china cabinets or in drawers for an unspecified future date. Her wait for the future had been too long and now that it was nearly over she was going to live for the moment, make the very best of things.
‘Your daughter’s getting married, then?’ the woman asked.
‘At Easter,’ she replied, balancing the cup carefully on the saucer.
‘That’s when Shauna was set for. Everything arranged – church, reception, the lot.’
‘It’s a nice time of year,’ she said, then wondered if she’d said the right thing. Roses, red roses, she’d have in her bouquet and the softness of the petals and the sweetness of their scent stirred her with pleasure.
‘Depends whether Easter’s early or late what weather you’re likely to get. But it hardly matters now one way or another.’
‘You must be disappointed,’ she ventured.
‘I’ve got over it. Shauna hasn’t but I suppose that’s only natural. For the best, really.’ She hesitated, stared at the fire then towards the window. ‘Better finding out now than later when it’s too late.’
‘Things not work out?’ she asked, nodding in sympathy, her question prompted not by curiosity but by a desire to know if the dress was stained with something sordid that would make it impossible for it to become hers.
‘We never really took to him – Alex thought he was a waster from the start – but you know how it is with young girls. What can you do? Say anything bad and it’s you who’s the worst in the world and it just makes them more determined. So I bit my tongue and next thing they announce they’re getting married. Afterwards when I’d the house to myself I cried my eyes out. But she never knew – I never let her know, so she can’t blame me for anything.’
She watched the woman smooth her hair flat with a jerky, nervous flutter of her hand. She didn’t think the colour was entirely natural – it was too dark.
‘So your daughter’s getting married,’ she continued. ‘Well, it’s an expensive business, that’s for sure. Maybe you can save a bit on the dress, then, and after all when all’s said and done it’s only worn the once and then left to hang in the back of a wardrobe. Your daughter’s got more sense than mine by the sound of her.’
‘She’s a good girl,’ she answered. ‘Just wants things done quiet and simple. No fuss or anything and she could have anything she wanted. Within reason, of course.’
‘We had everything booked – the church, the photographer, the reception. Everything. ‘Money down the drain,’ Alex called it, but I told him whatever we paid was cheap at half the price, for what price can you put on your own daughter’s happiness?
‘And he was no good?’ she asked.
‘No good – that was one thing Alex was right about. Said he could read it in his face. I don’t know about that but I never took to him, either. I couldn’t put my finger on it but there was always something about him you couldn’t warm to. And he was never reliable, no matter what way you look at it he was never reliable. Some nights she’d be sitting where you are now and she’d be waiting half the night for him to turn up. And good with the excuses he was, too, but I bit my tongue, said nothing. For say anything and you’re the worst in the world.’
The woman offered her a top-up out of the teapot and she accepted. Sometimes it was important to listen.
‘To tell the truth, I’ll be glad to see the dress out of the house. It’s a reminder, isn’t it? I’ve caught her looking at it a couple of times and there’ll be tears. I tell her he’s not worth it but it’ll take a while, I suppose.’
‘It can’t be easy, for any young girl. Can’t be easy. But she’ll get over it in time – I’m sure she will.’
‘And your daughter, has she found anyone nice?’ the woman asked.
‘Very nice. He works in a bank. Has his own car.’
‘You’re very lucky. And he won’t mind about the dress? Not being new, I mean.’
‘No need for him to know, really, and I’m a widow – you can only do your best. He’s happy with a small wedding,’ she said. ‘And like you say, it’s only something you wear the once. No point pushing the boat out when the money could go to other things.’
‘That’s right, and anyway it’s a nice dress. It was her choice but I thought it was lovely.’
She felt her impatience now and she set the cup and saucer down on the side table beside her chair. She wanted to see it.
‘Well look, thanks for the tea – it was very good of you – but I’ll not keep you back any longer, I know you’re busy.’
‘I’ll just bring it down,’ the woman said, standing up and lifting both cups and saucers away. As she listened to her footsteps on the stairs and in the room above her head she felt the shiver of her heart and for a second it was almost too much to bear and she thought of running into the street to escape the moment. But the woman was coming back down and she forced herself to straighten in the chair and assume a composure she did not feel.
She returned with the dress draped over her arm, its hem almost brushing the carpet, and carefully hung it from the top of the living-room door. Standing up she walked towards it, trying to steady the tremble of her hand as she lightly touched its whiteness. White as snow. She had never been this close before, and even though the woman was talking to her the words blurred and faded in her head as she stood staring at it. She touched it lightly again as if to make sure it was real, touched it gently with the lightness of love. It was more beautiful than she could ever have imagined.
‘Yes it’s nice, right enough,’ she said, fingering the filigree of lace and bead on the bodice, then tracing the tips of her fingers down the flow of the sleeves.
‘Would it fit all right?’ the woman asked, staring at it as if she, too, saw something beyond the dress.
‘Yes, it’ll fit all right – I can tell by looking at it. Is there a veil?’
‘I’m stupid – I left it upstairs.’
As she listened to the footsteps hurry up the narrow stairs she encircled the dress in her arms and slowly buried her face in its folds.
‘There it is,’ the woman said, shaking her head at her own foolishness. ‘Don’t know how I forgot. It just sets it off, doesn’t it?
The veil was fastened to a silver comb and reached to waist height. It bore the same pattern and print as the dress. She was given it to hold in her hands.
‘The price is what was in the paper?’ she asked.
‘Yes, that’s right – I couldn’t really let it go for any less now. We lost so many of our deposits.’
She didn’t try to haggle, for arguing now over a few shillings would demean the dress and her impatience could no longer be resisted. She was reluctant even to set aside the veil for the few moments it took to count out the money. When it was done the woman produced the white cardboard box the dress had come in and she watched her lay it flat then carefully smooth and fold it in.
‘I hope it brings you more luck than us,’ she said as she tied it shut with string. Will you be able to manage all right? It’s quite heavy.’
