Sweetheart, Sweetheart

by Bernard Taylor

  “What about De Freyne?” I said. “Was he interested in the garden?”

  He answered me quite shortly. “I don’t think so.” Then he smiled suddenly, but it was a forced, slightly awkward smile. “Well, both of them being artists, like—well, they’re not the most practical type of people, are they?” He pointed to some roses that trailed down among the branches of an apple-tree. “See, wherever you look—flowers everywhere. And all got so out of hand.” He sighed, and then smiled—this time with real pleasure. “Now there was a gardener for you—Gerrard.”

  “Which one was that? There were several, weren’t there?”

  “I’m talkin’ about Bill. The last one—that’s if you don’t count his daughter. He was a master where this garden was concerned. A wonder with flowers.” He waved a hand, taking it all in. “Mind you, there was a lot more to it once.” He pointed off beyond the fruit-trees, beyond the thicket into the distance where the fields lay. “That all belonged to the cottage once. Them fields. Shrunk through the years. Bits sold, hacked off, piece by piece, till this is all that’s left.”

  “The little wood . . .” I indicated where I had been walking, where the rambling roses and rhododendrons grew, “. . . That still belongs to the cottage, doesn’t it?”

  “Oh, yeh, that’s yourn, all right. Though I doubt there’s much you can do with it. Clear it, maybe—extend the garden a bit—if you wanted to.” His tone told me he didn’t think it would be a good idea.

  “No, I like it as it is.” I thought of the clearing where I’d sat on the stone bench. “There’s a little part of it that’s already been cleared.”

  “Oh, yes.” He nodded. “That’s where the old summer-house was.”

  “It’s a good spot for a summer-house. Very secluded.”

  “Yeh. Bill Gerrard built it for his daughter. Your brother was going to build one right next to it, he said.”

  “Ah, yes . . .” I remembered the drawings I’d seen on his desk.

  “He marked it all out, and made a start, but he didn’t get very far. I s’pose he had other things on his mind.” I looked quickly at him at these words, but there was nothing to read in his face.

  “I guess,” I said, “the house has seen quite a few occupants in its time.”

  “Ah, a few . . .” He pressed his left thumb with his right forefinger, counting off names. “There was Adam Gerrard at first, o’ course—who built the main part of the place. Then you got his son, Tom, who lived on here afterwards, and then you got his son, William—Bill. Bill was a bit different from the others. He wasn’t content to marry any local girl. He ups and marries a Welsh party. They didn’t have no sons—just the one daughter.”

  “Bronwen,” I said. “The one in the painting, with the dark-haired man.”

  “Right—Temple.” He nodded. “He was her father’s handyman.” He gave a little chuckle. “Handyman,” he repeated, and chuckled again. “He was known locally as Handyman Temple—partly on account of he only had one hand—or part of one. A little incident with an axe. I think Gerrard felt somehow responsible, so he kept him on. Even let him marry his daughter.”

  “But he—Handyman—went off and left her, right?”

  “Ah, buggered off to America. Just three-four years after they was married. Went off with a dairymaid from one of the local farms . . .” He gave a little shake of his head. “Oh, you don’t want to hear about all the sad things of the past . . .”

  I inferred from that that he felt I had enough sad happenings of the present to think about. But it couldn’t hurt me, anything that had gone so long before; my sadness over Colin was the only real thing, and whatever Timpson told me of other people, of other times, was like so much fiction. “I want to know everything about the place,” I said, and he nodded, “Well, natural, I s’pose. Your brother was just the same.”

  Turning, I looked back through the trees and saw, through the green, green leaves, the walls of my house. Reese had said, of my brother: “I wanted him to go away—leave the house for a while—get away from all its sad associations . . .” Had Reese meant that those associations had got Colin down . . . ? All I had found in the house was an atmosphere of warmth and welcome . . .

  “Tell me about them,” I said, “—those sad happenings in the past . . .”

  “You mean the Temples and the Lanes . . .”

  “Ah, yes—Margaret Lane. What happened to her?”

  He gestured towards the thicket. “The summer-house got burnt down. She was trapped inside.”

  “My God, that’s terrible. But how could a thing like that happen?” I thought of her sampler on the living-room wall . . . “Was it an accident . . . ?” Her death wish was stitched in all the colours of the rainbow.

  “Nobody really knows. For sure. There was talk at the time; you know how it is. But there’s always talk.” He sighed. “Anyway, it was a very sad business. A young couple they were. Just moved in. Hadn’t been married very long. After that happened he—John Lane—turned a bit—funny, you understand? Like he didn’t go out hardly at all. Kept hisself to hisself all the time.”

  “How come you know so much about it all? I guess the stories get passed on.”

  “Yes. Partic’ly the scandals.” He chuckled. “My family’s been here for ages, and they didn’t have no wireless or telly then.”

  We had turned at the lower end of the orchard and now began to walk slowly back. Timpson said:

  “If you really want to know about the house or the village you should go and have a chat with old Jim Pitkin. His folks have been here since the year dot. Farmers. Though not him. He’ve got a shop in the village. Sells antiques. Oh, ah, what old Jim can’t tell you about Hillingham ain’t worth knowing, I don’t reckon.”

  “I’ll look him up,” I said.

  As we neared the orchard gate I saw, close to the hedge, what looked to be part of a small stone pillar. I went over to it and pulled aside the branches of the rambling rose that nearly obscured it. It looked very old.

  “It was a sundial,” Timpson said. “Got broke when a tree come down. Worst storm hereabouts for ages. In the summer of 1902. My mother remembered it, talked about it. Also that was the mornin’ that Handyman skedaddled.” He paused, added, “Just as well he did too, I reckon.”

  I let go the thorny stems and turned back to him. “Why do you say that?”

  “Well . . . if he wanted to save his neck . . .”

  “Oh—because of his wife—Bronwen?”

  “Yes . . . A few days after he went somebody went into the house and found her lying on the floor. Dead. She was in a terrible state, too—I mean the look of her. Her clothes all stiff with dried water and mud, and bits of dirt and leaves sticking to her.”

  “Somehow I gathered—from Jean—that her ending was a—a more—romantic one,” I said. “More like—pining, dying of—well, a broken heart . . .” I smiled as I said it. The old man shook his head at the notion.

  “Her heart? No, it was her skull that was broke.”

  “And they reckon her husband did it . . .”

  “Ah.” He nodded. “Course, they couldn’t catch him. It was too late by then. He was gone. Safe on his way to America.”

  “How do they know he went there?”

  He gave me a little sideways look. “Ah, well, if you wants to know any more you ought to go and have a talk with Jim Pitkin.”

  I smiled at his closeness. We were just passing through the orchard gate onto the lawn. My house, before me, stood drenched in sunlight. Looking as it did it was difficult to associate it with the tragedies that had occurred there. Margaret Lane had died horribly in the burning summer-house; Bronwen had been struck down and left dying from a broken skull—dying deserted and alone. And then Helen . . . and then Colin . . . Was it possible, I wondered, for a home’s past history to influence the lives of its inhabitants? I thought of Helen’s restlessness and strange behaviour. And not only hers. John Lane’s, too, for that matter. And Colin’s­ . . .

  �
��Tell me about Miss Merridew,” I said, “What was she like? What’s her story?”

  “She came after the Lanes. Here over sixty years. A funny old biddy, but nice enough. Bit eccentric, I suppose. All she thought about was her cats.”

  On the grass I halted, looking up at the steep roof and then down into the sunken garden. I thought of that night. Helen falling. Colin cradling her in his arms. The other woman there . . .

  “Did you know their friend, Mrs. Barton?” I asked.

  “She used to live in the village once.” Then after a moment he said,

  “Jean’s right disappointed that you’re going so soon. She took it very bad when Mr. Warwick died . . .” He paused, then said in a tone that would deny any contrary opinion:

  “She’s a good girl, Jean. She’s been—lonely. She’s had her share.”

  Share of what? I wondered. Loneliness? Unhappiness? Troubles? Sympathetically I nodded. He went on:

  “She’ve got no real friends. Not in the village. She don’t mix with them—hardly at all. Well, neither do I. There’s things they don’t understand. Things they don’t know the ins and outs of. And what they don’t know they’d as soon make up.” He sighed. “Ah, well, we manages all right, one way or t’other.” He was silent, thoughtful for a moment, then he added:

  “Course, they talked to her then, all right. Never had more’n a couple of words for her before, but when that happened—to Mrs. Warwick, well, they was all ready with their questions then.” He shook his head. “She didn’t say nothing, though. She kept quiet. Let ’em think what they likes.”

  I wanted to ask what those questions were. And what had she kept quiet about . . . ? Instead I said:

  “Does Jean have any kind of regular job?”

  “Not any more. She used to work at the stables for a time. A long time. But that came to an end. More’s the pity.”

  We moved on in silence. From behind us came the sound of a thrush. It heightened the stillness that hung there. I stopped to listen. Timpson stopped at my side. “That sound,” I said, “it’s so pretty . . .” I could see the shape of the thrush against the leaves of an apple-tree. The old man nodded. “Ah. Not much to look at, but most of the good singers never are.”

  We turned and I led the way round to the front of the house. There we discussed terms, settled on an hourly payment, and he promised to let me know how much time he put in on the work.

  “I won’t be able to make a start for a week or so,” he said, facing me across the gate, “but rest assured everything’ll be done.”

  We shook hands, sealing the bargain, and I watched him as, back straight as a board, he walked away down the hill.

  In the kitchen I put on the kettle for coffee, sat down, kicked off my sandals and let the cool tiles get to my bare feet. My right leg ached slightly. From the stairs I could hear Jean Timpson at work with the vacuum cleaner. It was just as I’d begun to pour boiling water into the cup that the telephone began to ring.

  The sound, next to my ear, was so sudden, so unexpected that I jumped. Scalding coffee slopped over onto my thumb, and I cursed, almost dropping the cup, and spilling even more. As I turned, much too quickly, the cat was suddenly there, weaving between my feet, and I lurched, reaching out for balance, my other hand connecting with the milk-pitcher and sending it spinning to smash on the floor. I followed it down, falling heavily, awkwardly, cup and kettle clattering and sending up splashes of coffee and boiling water. Next moment I lay sprawled on the tiles, feet tangled in the rungs of the kitchen stool, and a deep cut, made by the broken milk-pitcher, in my left arm. The cat, startled by the catastrophe, had fled. The telephone went on ringing.

  With the blood welling from the cut in my arm I got to my feet and lifted the receiver.

  “Hello?”

  A man’s voice came on the other end of the line. It said with deep loathing:

  “You bastard, Warwick.”

  8

  I was so stunned that I momentarily forgot the searing pain in my arm.

  “Who are you?” I managed to say at last. “What do you want?”

  “Don’t play the innocent with me,” he said, “you bastard.”

  I said again: “Who are you? What do you want?” and the sneer in his voice came over quite clearly as he answered, “You sound like a fucking gramophone record.” After a short pause, he added:

  “Well, are you happy now? Now that you’ve got what you want?”

  “Look,” I said, “I don’t know who you are, and I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You’re sitting pretty now, aren’t you? Now that you’ve got everything. And you’ve also got your freedom.”

  “. . . Who are you?” My hand holding the receiver was wet with sweat. I could feel my heart thumping.

  “I heard about her death,” he said. “An accident. Very convenient, that. Leaves you all set up, doesn’t it? Or so you think.”

  “Listen,” I said—I was starting to get control of myself now—and not before time—“I don’t have to stand here and listen to all this crap. None of it makes any sense to me. What are you—some kind of madman?” While I spoke now I was aware of the blood that was running down my arm and dripping onto the floor. “If you’ve got anything to say,” I said, “I suggest you come round here and say it in person.”

  He gave a short, humourless laugh. “Yes, you’d like that, wouldn’t you? Well, maybe I will, one day. But in the meantime there’s one thing you can be sure of: you haven’t heard the last of it.” There was a deathly little silence for a second, and then he finished:

  “I’ll get you for this, Warwick.”

  He hung up, and I stood there with the dial tone in my ear and my blood making patterns on the floor.

  Jean Timpson poured hot water into a bowl, added disinfectant and, with cotton-wool, gently bathed the cut. After she had blotted the wetness away she held a pad of gauze and lint to the wound and secured it with a bandage. Then I dialled Reese’s number and told him about the accident. He said he’d see me right away, and then asked me if I could get there under my own steam.

  “It’s my arm,” I said shortly. Much too touchy.

  When I went upstairs to change out of my ruined, bloodstained shirt I noticed again how neatly Jean Timpson had laid out my clothes in the wardrobe and drawers. Shame—I’d have to start packing it all up again as soon as I got back from the doctor’s.

  On the landing I paused, looking in at Colin and Helen’s room. I saw his face smiling at me from the frame on the bedside table.

  Downstairs I found Jean Timpson hard at work clearing up the mess I’d made on the kitchen floor. I stood watching her for some moments, then I said:

  “I haven’t seen any photographs around the place of Mrs. Warwick . . .”

  “No . . .” She was crouching, carefully picking up bits of china and glass.

  “But they used to be around—on his desk, in their bedroom. I know because of the snapshots he sent me. Was he . . . in that much of a state?”

  “Pardon?”

  “My brother . . . All her photographs being taken down like that . . .”

  “Oh,” she said, “Yes . . .”

  “I mean . . . was he in that much of a state after she died . . .”

  “I wasn’t here afterwards. Don’t you remember? I told you.”

  I nodded. “Yes, of course . . .”

  “He sent me away.” Her back was towards me; I could see nothing of her face. I moved to the door. Her voice came, stopping me as I reached for the latch.

  “The photographs was before . . .”

  “. . . Before . . . ?”

  “He . . . he took ’em down before Mrs. Warwick was . . . before that night.”

  “. . . Are you sure . . . ?”

  She nodded, got to her feet, stood looking down at the dustpan in her hand. I could hear the gentle hum of the refrigerator.

  “She was crying, Mrs. Warwick was, I remember. I heard her say something like, ‘All my p
ictures—what have you done to them . . . ?’ Something like that . . .”

  “. . . And . . . ?”

  “Nothing.” She shrugged. “He didn’t say nothing. She asked him again, but he didn’t answer.”

  “He must have said something.”

  “No. No, he just—just turned and—walked away.”

  “Let’s have a look at it . . .” Reese was unwinding the bandage. “Did you put this on?” he asked.

  “Jean Timpson.”

  He nodded approval. “She did a good job.” Now he studied the cut. Nodded again. “You don’t do things by halves, do you? I’m afraid you’ll need a couple of stitches.”

  “How many is a couple?”

  He grinned sympathetically. “In your case, seven or eight.”

  “Damn.”

  There was a knock at the door and his wife entered bearing a tray. She smiled at me, set the tray down and quietly went away again. She had set out two cups, I noticed. “So, I interrupted your tea-break,” I said to him.

  “It happens.” He gestured towards the tea. “Help yourself to sugar.”

  “Is this under the National Health Service as well?”

  He chuckled, drank from his cup and finished setting out antiseptic, a hypodermic needle and other items over which I didn’t allow my eyes to linger. I didn’t look, either, when he started work on my arm; I kept my head turned as far away as possible. His hands were large with broad-ended fingers, yet his touch was surprisingly gentle and sure. As he worked with the needle he hummed softly under his breath.

  “What do you use for stitches?” I asked. Any question to pass the moments.

  “Silk.”

  “Not catgut.”

  “Isn’t that what they use for tennis rackets? Or is it violins?” He went on humming. I said:

  “Do you know whether my sister-in-law was very happy with my brother?”

  I felt his fingers falter, very slightly. His tune came to a halt. I prompted him.

  “Do you know?”

  “Why do you ask such a thing?” He resumed his work. “Don’t you know? He was your brother.”