The Sister

by Poppy Adams

  I’m not at all interested. I’m staring at the marble fireplace I can see across the room, just to the left of Eileen’s shoulder, two thick columns of stippled gray surrounding the painted tiles, and a mantelpiece above, and I start to explore the wispy white crystal streaked through the darker gray. It reminds me of a section of neurons through an electron microscope, like the ones I’ve seen in scientific journals, with their long axons and dendrons reaching out to one another, trying to find a connection. While Vivien and Eileen talk of old age and the new cinema complex with a bowling alley in Crewkerne, I allow myself to go on a little journey through the fireplace’s nervous system, following the splayed out neurons and leaping over synaptic gaps like a neurotransmitter. They lament how bowling has changed because it always used to be played by the elderly on the village green and now it’s in the pubs, hijacked by the young. In the way that when you stare at patterns for long enough you can make them move about and change their form, I am trying to join up the maze of streaky lines within the marble, to mass them together into one dense brain, as if I were tying up the loose ends of different lengths of string. Infuriatingly, as soon as I join up several strands they start to untie and move off of their own accord, until the entire nervous system begins to unravel and I lose control of it. All of a sudden I’m aware of Vivien getting up from her chair.

  “I’ll get you one,” she’s saying to Eileen, as she walks out of the room.

  I look at Eileen and she meets my gaze. I’m not afraid of her being here anymore. We both know there’s nothing to say, that we were put here together against our better judgment, so we remain silent. She picks up her handbag from the floor beside her chair and rummages in it. Finally she pulls out a packet of Benson & Hedges and a small white lighter. She takes a cigarette, lights it with a couple of short, sharp puffs, then draws pleasurably from it in one lengthy inhalation. I’m amazed a frail body like hers holds such a powerful suck. She risks a glance at me. I’m watching her. I’m curious about the way she smokes, the way the smoke streams out of her nose and snakes upwards, swathing the front of her hair, staining it yellow. She takes the cigarette out of her mouth and studies the burning end intently, judging her satisfaction by the length of ash she’s created. She puts it back to her lips and draws again and I’m searching her face for clues to what she’s thinking or feeling, but I have no idea. She’s expressionless. Her blank features remind me of something, someone…

  The picture on the card, of course. How could I forget it? A cartoon picture of a granny knitting in a chair. It’s from the card games I barely remember playing with Dr. Moyse when I was little. Then all the other cards come back to me in a rush of memory, pictures of a cartoon family in lots of different places: the girl in the bath playing with bubbles, Daddy flying an airplane, Grandpa swimming (or was he drowning?) in a river, the boy on a bike or balancing on an upturned bucket, Daddy smashing his fist on a table, Mummy behind a school desk, the girl in the jungle next to a tiger…

  It was quite simple, really. I’ll tell you what you had to do. The idea was to guess what they were thinking by the expressions on their faces. But it wasn’t as straightforward as it sounds because the cards were purposely misleading. For example, the girl about to be ravaged by the tiger was scared in some, and in others quite happy. Daddy was banging his fist on the table sometimes in anger and at other times in delight. But it was the card with Granny sitting in a chair knitting that always stumped me. It was like the trick one, the joker in the pack. Is Granny happy or is Granny sad? Happy or sad? Happy or sad? A little of both, I’d always thought, a little of both. But she couldn’t be both. Dr. Moyse said she wasn’t allowed to be both. Well, it’s not like real life, is it? It’s just a game, I know, but it’s nothing like real life if I’m not allowed to mix Granny’s feelings even though they would be. A woman of great age with all her life behind her was bound to have contradictory feelings. But it always had to be one. You had to choose. Happy or sad?

  Vivien marches back into the room and hands Eileen an ashtray. Once she’s sat down she tells Eileen about a fantastic dentist she’s found in London, through a friend called Ettie. Actually, he’s not a dentist but a hygienist and he’s managed, finally, to stop her teeth being so sensitive. He’s given her a special brush that made her gums bleed at first but now she’ll never use any other kind. She can eat anything.

  It’s the first time I’ve heard her mention anything about her life in London. Now I know she has a friend called Ettie and a dentist called a hygienist.

  Eileen accepts another top-up and they start to discuss their time together yesterday afternoon. They try to remember what they had talked about yesterday afternoon. Then they move onto yesterday afternoon’s weather and compare it to today’s downpour, which, they agree, is thankfully easing into drizzle. Or is it spitting? Not once did anyone ask about my research.

  A while later, Eileen has left, and Vivien and I are in the kitchen preparing lunch together. Vivien starts to dress a small chicken to roast while I peel and chop a squash at the sink. Now and again one of us will remind the other of something from our childhood, someone we used to know, songs we used to sing or the clothes we wore that now seem absurd. It’s a delight to hit on something we can both recall, that we eagerly begin to elaborate on, jogging each other’s memory with every comment, building up the details for each other. But for every memory we share, there are many more that we can’t bring together, that we can’t seem to evoke in each other, that turns out to be something only one of us remembers or the other only vaguely recollects or, sometimes, remembers completely differently.

  With the back of the knife, I scrape the bright orange chunks of chopped squash off the chopping board into a pan of cold water, then sit at the table with a colander to pod some broad beans.

  “Well, darling, wasn’t that nice to meet Eileen?” Vivien says, bringing the conversation back to this century. “Nice to know someone in the village.”

  “I suppose so,” I say, not thinking particularly.

  Vivien pauses and annoyance flicks over her face. “Ginny, you really shouldn’t presume that everyone knows about your research,” she says sharply, cracking rosemary over the chicken’s breast.

  “I don’t presume—”

  “It might embarrass them if they don’t,” she continues. I don’t say anything, although I think she expects me to. “And, to be honest, I’m not sure anyone cares that much,” she finishes.

  It was cruel of her, I agree, but I know she’s only stirring for a reaction. Don’t ask me why she’s suddenly launched into this attack. I have no idea, and I’m not sure which direction it’s going in either. Vivien stops what she’s doing and rests both hands flat on the table at either side of the bird.

  “I’m not being unkind, but it’s been a very long time since you retired, Ginny. That’s all.”

  I burst open another pod with a pop, and scrape the beans out of their furry jacket with my overgrown thumbnail. I wonder when Vivien retired. She’s told me nothing about her life even though she’s obviously told Eileen, so why should she come back and make all kinds of guesses about mine? She doesn’t know anything about my line of work.

  “It’s not the kind of career you ever really retire from, Vivien.” I try to put her straight. “It’s a vocation, not a job, and I’m afraid I’ll take it to my grave.”

  Vivien is quiet and I can feel her looking at me hard.

  “Well, what moth work are you doing right now?” she says casually, taking a lemon and stuffing it right up inside the bird.

  “Well, right now, Vivien,” I say, a little bored by her line of questioning, “I’m not doing as much. I don’t know what you’re getting at.”

  “I know all the knowledge you have is incredible, I just didn’t realize you’d been doing proper research…”

  “Proper research?”

  “I mean, I thought you’d finished all that a very long time ago.”

  “I’m always in research,”
I correct her. “One project invariably leads to another. That’s the nature of it. You can never finish research. There’s always more to discover.”

  Vivien leans over the table towards me. “Ginny,” she says softly, almost in a whisper, and as she starts to speak I lean in too, to catch what she’s saying, “you are extraordinary…” She laughs suddenly.

  “Extraordinary?” I whisper, pulling back, another long pod ready to split in my hand.

  “Yes. Extraordinary,” she says, in a more serious tone. “I mean, why don’t you ever get it?”

  I didn’t say anything. If she was looking for a reaction, I couldn’t work out what kind she was waiting for. As for being extraordinary, well, you’ve probably gathered by now that I’m pretty straight down the line, sometimes, I’ll admit, a little too guarded, a little too taciturn, too serious, perhaps, but I wouldn’t call it extraordinary. I’m not impetuous like Vivien and I don’t go around cloaking my thoughts and feelings in the elaborate costumes of hidden meanings, abstruse subtexts and sly insincerity. It’s Vivien who’s always been frustratingly complicated, whose equivocating you need to decipher. She’s always saying things she doesn’t really mean or pretending to be someone she isn’t. I don’t know how she can see through all the confusion she creates in her head.

  “Oh, I see, I suppose you don’t think you are. Is that it?” she goes on as if she’s read my thoughts. “I suppose you think you’re just like the next person, as normal as the neighbors. Well, isn’t it remarkable that the rest of the world thinks you’re extraordinary?” she adds spitefully.

  Well, one thing I’m absolutely sure of is that the rest of the world can’t be thinking about me very much. I never see them. I don’t go out. She must be furious with me about something, but I can’t think what I’ve done. It’s lucky I find it easy to ignore her gibes.

  Then she seems to have a change of heart. She comes over and holds my face in her hands and strokes my hair, as a mother might her child. She brushes a wayward gray lock behind my ear.

  “Ginny, what I am getting at is…” That’s a promising start, I think, but she’s stalled.

  “Is what?” I prompt her.

  “I don’t understand why they felt you needed to be protected all your life,” she says, making herself no clearer. “I don’t see why they presumed you were incapable of understanding. You were this delicate and rare flower that a little truth would bowl over and crush. They both tried to build a high wall round you and patrol it all your life. Well, I don’t think it’s right anymore. I think it’s your right to know the truth.”

  Ah, she’s drunk. I recognize it now. She’s ebullient, excited, even. All the signs flood back to me. I know she doesn’t mean anything she’s about to say or do. It’s the alcohol. I close my eyes.

  “I’ve got an idea,” she says cheerfully, changing tack.

  I open my eyes. Her face is reddened by the drink, her eyes bright with exuberance. She’s standing next to the table, alongside the seasoned bird, and for a moment I’m transported back to a different time: she’s about to pick up the bird and fling it at me, or even to take the edge of the table in both hands and upend it, with everything on it, on top of me. I grip the side nearest me with both hands so that, as she overturns it, I will be able to deflect a little of the weight to save me being crushed.

  “I’ve decided I’m going to invite the president of the Royal Entomological Society in Queens Gate”—she pauses—“and also, yes, how about the curator of lepidoptera at the British Museum?” she says, gesturing in the apparent direction of London. “I’ll invite them down here to lunch and they can look at the collections and you can talk about what you’ve been up to all your life,” she finishes grandiosely. “How about it?” she asks flatly, putting her hands on her hips. “What do you think of that?”

  I’m dumbfounded by her behavior. It’s exactly at times like this that I find I’m left adrift, without any real understanding of what she’s thinking and why she’s behaving as she is—utterly unpredictably. It can’t be me. I refuse to believe that anyone could decipher Vivien right now.

  “Well?” she asks again.

  “I don’t really know.”

  Only yesterday I would have dismissed the idea out of hand, but meeting Eileen had been much easier than I’d thought, even though we had nothing in common. Besides, I’m still confused if this is Vivien or the drink I’m talking to. I can’t tell whether she’s got to the point I could recognize so easily in Maud when I used to say she’d turned. The last thing I want to do is rile her.

  “You don’t know, darling? But, Ginny, they’d think it such an honor to lunch with one of their most famous members. Imagine—they must have been dying to visit. They’ll be full of praise for you and your work throughout lunch and fascinated by everything you have to show them. I doubt you’ve seen them for ages, or shown your face in Queens Gate for a while. Am I right?”

  She is. I haven’t been to Queens Gate for a long time and they’re bound to be intrigued by my research. Actually, I can’t think why I’d not thought of it before.

  “Okay, if you’re sure they’d like it.”

  Vivien picks up the roasting tray with the chicken and carries it to the Rayburn. The more I think about it, the keener I am on the idea. I hadn’t had an awful lot to say to Eileen but it’s a little different when you can talk with colleagues about the topical debates in the entomological world, especially when I haven’t had a chance to get up to London recently. Vivien opens the top right oven and shoves the tray deep inside.

  “Have you heard the British Museum has moved its collection out of London?” I say, once she’s banged the oven door shut. “To a new Entomology Museum in Tring, I think. Somewhere in Hertfordshire.”

  “Yup.” Vivien sighs. “That was years ago.”

  “Shame, really. They asked for some of our collections but it’s not the same, stuck out in the middle of nowhere, whatever anybody says.”

  “I remember. It’s what Clive said.” Vivien sits down opposite me and studies me. “Who are they anyway?” she asks.

  “Who?” I say, looking at the final pod in my hand.

  “Well, if I’m to invite these people down here for lunch, I need to know their names—the president of the society and the curator of the British Museum—who are they?”

  “Well, the…” Do you know? For the life of me, I cannot remember their names. It’s ludicrous. I’ve known them for years. There was a new president not so long ago, I remember, but the curator’s definitely been there forever. Goodness me, I must be losing my mind!

  Vivien has got up and is wiping the counter in front of the window and next to the sink where I’ve been chopping. She washes the cloth under the tap, spreading it out in the water’s stream like a sail, then slowly squeezing it before she starts to wipe again, round the taps and along the window ledge, carefully lifting the vases and bottles that are kept there. Then she plugs the sink and runs the hot water, squeezing soap into it, until the basin is full and frothy. As she plunges in the first few utensils it occurs to me that I should check all the collections and lay out some of my most significant research in time for their visit.

  “When do you think you’ll invite them for?” I ask quickly, a little alarmed by the preparation I’ll need to do.

  Vivien stops washing up but doesn’t turn round. Instead she puts both hands on the front of the sink for support, her back towards me.

  “Oh,” she says casually, “I don’t know…Tuesday?”

  “Tuesday!” I exclaim. “What—this Tuesday? Two-days’-time Tuesday?”

  “Well, why not?!” she says in a cavalier manner, but she doesn’t understand the panic that’s brewing in my stomach. That’s not nearly enough time for me to prepare myself, let alone look through all the collections.

  Chapter 18

  The Bobble-Hat Woman and the Leaflets

  I’m in the library when I hear the front-door knocker. For a ludicrous moment I think of the curator
s and wonder if they’ve arrived already. We finished our lunch an hour and a half ago and since then I’ve been here, picking off the dried mud from my slippers that I wore outside when I followed Vivien to church this morning. She retired to the study to work on a small piece of needlework—a tapestry, I think—but as soon as I hear the knocker bang, her flat rubber soles are squeaking across the hall parquet. I’m in awe of the immediacy of her response, the spontaneity with which she answers the door. There’s not a moment’s hesitation, no fleeting uncertainty. She strides purposefully towards it, her steps strong and insistent. I watch her pass the library door, which I’ve pulled ajar, and I’m still watching as she gets to the front door, her hand up and ready to open it as she arrives—no pause to gather her thoughts or to prepare herself to confront the unknown. I retreat a little so that when the door is opened I can’t be seen.

  “Hello. Can I help you?” I hear Vivien ask the unknown.

  “Virginia Stone?” It’s a woman’s voice. Who can be wanting me?

  “I’m Miss Stone’s sister, Mrs. Morris,” Vivien says curtly. “Can I help you?”

  “Hellooo,” the woman says, drawing out the fulsome greeting as if they’d been friends once long ago. “It’s so nice to meet you. I’m Cynthia from Dorset Social Services….”

  Oh my God. I pinch my nose. It’s the bobble-hat woman. Our family has always had an intense distrust, a fear even, of social workers. I heard Maud complain more than once that they were meddlesome people, though I can’t think she had many dealings with them. Maud was one of those people who believed that a community should be able to look after its own, and that state-funded help simply gave one an excuse to avoid one’s responsibility. She was also most vociferously opposed to the new lunatic asylums that were opened in the fifties, which she said social workers had helped fill with misfits just after the war.