A Death in the Family

by Hazel Holt

  They all looked so solemn, aware of the novelty of being photographed. I smiled as I remembered what my father, the youngest of the boys, had told me once, looking at the picture, about how difficult it had been to keep the boys sitting still for the length of time they had to wait while the picture was being taken, and how he’d nearly spoilt it by shouting out when his brother Arthur had pinched him at a critical moment. My father was dead now and so was Arthur, far away in Australia.

  There was another photograph of John, in uniform, just before he left for France. He was standing beside Sarah, the pretty girl he had married just six months before. He never lived to see his son. All the pictures of this period, formally posed, made their subjects somehow unreal, misleadingly so since I could just remember the stern paterfamilias of the group photograph as a jolly, laughing grandfather, cheerfully indulgent and willing to play childish games with me and my brother. The pictures of my parents were more casual and so more human. I looked with affection at one of them in the early days of their marriage, leaning one on each side of the old Lagonda that was my father’s pride and joy.

  I gathered them all up and took them downstairs for Bernard to look at. I felt a little reluctant, somehow, to expose them to what I thought of as Bernard’s critical gaze. Of course, most of them were his relations too, but because I didn’t like him I suppose I felt they would dislike him too.

  Monday came all too soon. I had an early lunch so that I’d have everything cleared away before they arrived, but even so they arrived a good quarter of an hour early when I was just about to treat Foss for a tick that he’d picked up in his perambulations through the long grass of the surrounding fields. I shut Foss into the kitchen while I went to let them in.

  ‘Oh good,’ I said as I led them into the sitting room. ‘You’re just in time to give me a hand. Can one of you hold my cat while I deal with a tick on his neck? It’s so much easier with two.’

  Janet looked apprehensively at Bernard who was disposing the papers from his briefcase on the table. I got the impression that she was appalled that anyone had had the temerity to expect him to do such a thing.

  ‘I’m sure Janet will be pleased to help you,’ he said, not looking up from his task.

  ‘Yes, yes, of course, I’d be delighted…’ Her voice trailed off.

  ‘It’s all right,’ I said reassuringly, ‘he’s quite good – usually. I’ll just go and fetch him.’

  I went out and gathered up an irritable Foss, brought him in and gave him to Janet to hold. She held him confidently, lovingly even, and I was surprised because I imagined she’d be unused to animals.

  ‘Oh, he’s a Siamese,’ she said. ‘Isn’t he beautiful! My mother had a Siamese, a seal-point, named Ming. He used to be able to open doors with his paw.’

  Since this was practically the only time I’d ever heard Janet make a remark on her own behalf, I regarded her with interest and even Foss turned his head to look at her.

  ‘I think I’ve killed the tick,’ I said. ‘I put some stuff on it last night so it should be dead by now. There it is, on his neck, just by his collar. I think I can just pull it off now.’ I gave it a tug with the tweezers. ‘Yes, it’s come right away. If you’re not careful you can leave the head in and then it can be nasty.’

  I took Foss from her and I fancied she gave him up reluctantly.

  ‘I’ll just go and give him a treat for being good,’ I said, ‘then I’ll be right back.’

  When I got back into the room Bernard said, ‘Well, if you’re quite ready, perhaps we might get on.’

  I looked at Janet sitting at the table opposite him, her notebook open and ready, once again the perfect amanuensis, and wondered if I’d imagined the brief moment of rapport between us.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said. ‘I’ve got the photos for you – the formal ones, anyway. I believe there’s an old album somewhere, with snapshots in it. I haven’t had a chance to look it out for you yet, I’ve got a nasty feeling it’s up in the attic in one of the old suitcases there. But I will have a look. Anyway here are the ones I expect you’d like to see.’ I laid them out on the sofa and he came over to look at them.

  ‘Yes, these are certainly useful. What I would like to do is take copies of them.’ He reached over to the table. ‘Now I do have a digital camera here,’ he said producing it, ‘so I propose making copies with that. If, however, I cannot get the quality of reproduction I would like, I will ask you if I may borrow them so that they can be taken out of their frames and reproduced professionally. I imagine there is a competent photographic shop in Taviscombe that could do such a thing.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘there’s a very good one in the Avenue.’

  ‘Good.’ He picked up the group photograph. ‘I myself have a copy of this. I believe each member of the family was given one and mine, of course, belonged to my father.’ He indicated a boy of about ten dressed in a sailor suit, the collar slightly awry. He looked a pleasant child, not staring straight at the camera, as the others were, but casting a sidelong glance at what was going on somewhere out of the picture. I wondered if he had ever, in later life, cast that clear gaze upon his son and, if so, what conclusion he had drawn.

  ‘Now,’ Bernard was saying, ‘if you could kindly draw back the curtains so that I have the optimum light, I will see what I can do myself.’

  Taking the photos took a very long time. They had to be arranged, rearranged and arranged again in different lights. The curtains had to be drawn, put back and drawn again. Fortunately Janet did most of the arranging, but it made me feel tired just to watch her. Finally, when he had exhausted every possible combination and actually taken the photos he called me over to look at some of them through the little viewfinder at the side.

  ‘They’re very good,’ I said, ‘absolutely marvellous. It must be an exceptional camera to get that sort of result.’

  ‘It was given to me by the staff as a retirement present,’ he said.

  ‘How lovely,’ I said. Though inwardly I wondered if the large sum of money necessary to buy such a splendid camera was an index of how delighted they all were to be rid of him!

  He fiddled about with the camera for a little longer and then pronounced that some of the pictures weren’t as clear as they might be so he proposed taking the originals away. I agreed readily, hoping that this might be the end of the exercise but, alas, he then produced one of his charts with names and dates and began to cross-question me about them. What little family history I did know was completely obliterated as he droned on about all the Samuels, Johns, Williams, Marys, Marthas, Janes and Louisas. It was not helped by the fact that the same names occurred in successive generations, so that after a while I was utterly confused and gave up trying to make sense of any of it.

  ‘According to my sources it would seem that John Prior married twice,’ Bernard was saying, ‘firstly in 1865 to Charlotte Mavor, born 1847. They had issue: John, born 1866 and Edward, in,’ he consulted his papers, ‘1868, which is the same date that Charlotte died, presumably in childbirth. He then married in March 1872 Elizabeth Lindsey, born 1849…’

  But I wasn’t attending. I was thinking of poor Charlotte, dying at 21, leaving her little boys to be brought up by a stepmother, almost as young. I hoped Elizabeth had been as kind as the young stepmother in Charlotte M. Yonge’s book.

  ‘The entry in your Bible, however,’ Bernard was saying, ‘has the marriage taking place in July 1872. Can you account for this discrepancy?’

  ‘Perhaps one of the people got it wrong,’ I suggested.

  Bernard gave me a cold stare. ‘I will, of course, check what I can at the County Record Office. I have made an appointment to see some of the relevant material on Wednesday, but it would have been helpful if we could have settled such matters first.’

  ‘I’m very sorry,’ I said defensively, ‘but I’m afraid I’ve never really given much thought to any of this.’

  ‘That, so often, is the problem,’ Bernard said, ‘and that is how
valuable information is lost, simply by default.’

  I didn’t feel able to comment on this so I said, ‘Oh, before I forget, I must give you the details of the talk at Brunswick Lodge. It was so good of you to help us out at such short notice. I think the best thing will be for you to have a word with Anthea Russell who’s in charge of the whole thing. I’ve written her address and telephone number down for you.’

  I handed him the piece of paper and thought with some satisfaction of the conversation that would ensue: Anthea’s acerbic manner versus Bernard’s impervious self-satisfaction.

  Fortunately, after that they did actually go, not, however, without Bernard promising to give me the full details of his research at the County Record Office.

  ‘How lovely,’ I said faintly, waving them off with false bonhomie at the front door.

  I closed the door behind them, resisting a temptation to lock and bolt it in case they came back, and went and made myself the cup of tea I should have offered them, but hadn’t.

  I spent the next few days answering the telephone cautiously in case it was Bernard. I did hear from Anthea.

  ‘That cousin of yours doesn’t half go on,’ she said. ‘I told him the talk can’t be more than half an hour and then half an hour for questions. You know what the over-60s are like. An hour is about as much as they can manage. After that they get restive and want their tea and biscuits.’

  ‘Well,’ I said, ‘you’ll be in the chair, won’t you? And I’m sure you’ll be able to control the timing. You’re always so good at that sort of thing.’

  Which is perfectly true. I’ve known Anthea ruthlessly cut short a very eminent musicologist in full flow when she thought he’d overrun his time.

  ‘Oh, by the way, Sheila,’ Anthea went on, ‘I don’t suppose you could make a couple of your sponges. Biscuits are all right for coffee mornings but I always feel cake is more suitable in the afternoon.’

  Feeling that I’d got off lightly from the whole affair I agreed to make the cakes, as Anthea knew very well that I would.

  When I took the sponges along to Brunswick Lodge on the afternoon of Bernard’s talk, I saw that Anthea had also ‘persuaded’ other people to provide a chocolate cake, a large ginger cake and a dozen iced fairy cakes.

  ‘Oh, there you are, Sheila.’ Anthea appeared suddenly in the kitchen. ‘I’d like you to make the tea – if you sit at the back you can just slip out five minutes before the end and get things going.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ I’d planned to sit at the back anyway and I was delighted to have a valid excuse for ‘slipping out’.

  ‘Most of the cups are set out already,’ Anthea said, ‘but you’ll need to fill the sugar bowls and get the milk out of the fridge in good time. It’s such a pity,’ she went on, ‘that we haven’t been able to raise funds for a new tea urn.’

  I made a non-committal noise in reply, thanking heaven that I wouldn’t be required to wrestle with one of those temperamental monsters. ‘Oh, those large teapots are fine,’ I said, ‘it’s just a bit slower that’s all.’

  ‘Perhaps I’d better get Peggy Broom to help you,’ Anthea said, ‘or there’ll be an immense queue and people will get restless.’

  ‘Oh, I expect I can manage.’

  ‘Well if you’re sure. I’d better go and see if Denis has put the chairs out properly.’

  There was a good audience for Bernard’s talk; the main room was pretty well full, so I was able to be quite unobtrusive at the back. I felt that perhaps I ought to be sitting with Janet who was ensconced in the front row, but then I saw that she’d been taken over by Angela Watson who has this thing about ‘making newcomers feel welcome’ so I didn’t need to feel guilty.

  Bernard’s talk was well received. I must admit that, after the first five minutes, my attention wandered and I began to think about the changes I was planning to make to my garden and the new shrubs I wanted to buy. Halfway through the question period I heard Bernard telling Jennifer Morris more than I’m sure she wanted to know about parish records. I made my escape into the kitchen and put the kettles on.

  There was the usual scrimmage for refreshments after the talk and the usual group who always buttonhole the speaker to go on asking questions. I saw Anthea approach Bernard with a cup of tea, but, absorbed as he was with an audience, he waved her away. This didn’t go down at all well and Anthea came over to me bearing the rejected cup.

  ‘Your cousin,’ she said crossly, ‘doesn’t seem to want this tea. Perhaps you would like it.’ She put the cup down on the table and went away, her back registering extreme umbrage.

  Raymond Poyser, who was standing nearby, moved towards me and said, ‘Is he your cousin then, this Bernard Prior?’

  ‘Yes, he is,’ I said.

  ‘And is he the Bernard Prior who was headmaster of a school near Bristol?’

  I looked at him in some surprise. ‘Yes, as a matter of fact he was.’

  ‘The school,’ Raymond persisted, ‘where there was that scandal?’

  ‘What? What scandal? I haven’t heard anything about that.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry – perhaps I shouldn’t have said anything, since he’s a relation…’

  ‘No, really, it’s quite all right. What scandal?’

  ‘He was cleared of all blame,’ Raymond said. ‘The parents were unhappy about the result of the enquiry, but I suppose that was only natural.’

  ‘What enquiry?’ I asked. ‘What happened?’

  ‘One of the boys tried to kill himself – it was all right, they found him in time, but, of course, it was all very upsetting.’

  ‘How dreadful!’

  ‘They said he’d been bullied – well you hear a lot about bullying now, don’t you, and he was a sensitive boy, an only child and all that.’

  ‘And the staff didn’t realise what was going on?’

  ‘Partly that.’ Raymond paused for a moment as if considering the matter. ‘I think what people thought was that the headmaster didn’t take that sort of thing very seriously. From what I heard he was the sort of person who doesn’t have much sympathy for people, and boys who don’t stand up for themselves.’

  ‘Yes, I can see that,’ I said.

  ‘Not,’ Raymond said hastily, ‘that he was actually held responsible for what happened, but, you know how it is, people have to blame someone and there was quite a bit about it in the local paper – I don’t think it got into the nationals. I expect that’s why you didn’t hear about it.’

  ‘Yes, I expect so. I don’t see Bernard very often. In fact this visit is the first time I’ve seen him for, goodness, it must be over fifteen years.’

  ‘He doesn’t live down here, then?’

  ‘No, he’s just down here to do some research. He’s renting a holiday cottage at Avill, just outside Dunster.’

  ‘I hope you didn’t mind my mentioning it,’ Raymond said, ‘but I was struck by the coincidence. The boy concerned is the nephew of my neighbour, Tony Pritchard, so naturally I was interested.’

  ‘No, I’m glad you told me…’

  Anthea reappeared at my shoulder. ‘Sheila, would you mind helping Peggy with the washing up, she’s all alone out there.’ She turned to Raymond. ‘Just the person I wanted to see. When will you be able to move those trestles for the Bring and Buy sale?’

  As I stood at the sink, automatically drying the cups and saucers that Peggy Broom was washing, I thought about what Raymond had been telling me. As a bully himself (and it was perfectly obvious to me that he was a bully; one glance at poor little Janet made that clear), it was no wonder that Bernard had no sympathy for the victim. He’d been extremely fortunate that there hadn’t been a fatality and I hoped he’d learnt his lesson. But somehow I doubted it.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Since the autumn winds had died down for the moment I thought I really ought to get out into the garden and sweep up the leaves. It’s hard work and I can only do it in short bursts, but I do quite enjoy it. I have a fair number of trees and the
recent rain had brought down a lot of leaves, and as I swept I enjoyed their various shapes and colours: small yellow leaves of the silver birch that fall in showers like handfuls of golden coins; pale lemon heart-shaped leaves of the balsam; red ones from the spindle, whose cyclamen berries the birds always take before I can enjoy them; so many leaves and all so different. It was a chilly day but the exercise kept me warm, as, indeed, did the glow of virtue at the performance of a necessary task, and soon I had a satisfactorily big pile of leaves waiting to go onto the compost heap.

  My sylvan mood was broken by sharp barking from Tris and I turned to find Bernard and Janet approaching me from the side gate.

  ‘Ah, there you are,’ Bernard said. ‘There was no reply but we assumed you were in since your car was there.’

  ‘The side gate was open,’ Janet said apologetically. ‘Oh you have a little dog as well as your Siamese!’ She stooped to stroke Tris, but straightened up at a severe glance from Bernard.

  ‘Oh, right,’ I said, laying aside my rake and broom, ‘you’d better come in.’

  They followed me into the house and I sent them into the sitting room while I took off my coat and boots and washed the dirt from my hands.

  Bernard was back in his usual place at the table sorting out his papers, some of which he was handing to Janet who arranged them in order.

  ‘Now then,’ he said, ‘I expect you would like to hear what I have been able to find out at the County Record Office. I was able to view the relevant sources and, although there were certain lacunae, I managed to piece together a fairly accurate overall picture.’

  ‘Oh, good,’ I said, feeling that some response was called for. Evidently it wasn’t sufficient since Bernard looked at me sternly and continued.