Facing the Light

by Adele Geras

  He and his aunt had driven up this same avenue less than an hour ago, but this picture made the place look … what? Mysterious and full of secrets, with every window like a closed eye, and the trees with leaves the colour of blood leaning towards the house. Sean shivered as he stared at the thousand colours on the canvas that seemed to have been used to produce the stormy sky at the very edge of the painting. The third picture was best of all, and showed a young girl of about six, sitting on a bed. She was dressed in lilac, or lavender, some pale, purplish colour, and the light was probably coming through a window, and the landscape of linen behind her, the sheets and pillowcases, looked like a mountain range: white peaks and dark valleys of cloth all the way up to the top of the canvas. A brass plate under this picture announced Leonora Walsh 1934. He had no idea then, but this was the woman he now thought of as his Leonora.

  He arrived at Willow Court at exactly the right time and there it was, the vista that had made him catch his breath all those years ago – a long line of trees crowned with leaves which held, deep within their greenness, the promise of scarlet. It was strange, and beautiful and somehow appropriate. Fitting.

  *

  Leonora herself had been standing at the front door when Sean drove up and he felt himself specially privileged. He looked round at the beautiful room he’d been given and checked to make sure his tie was straight. Then he picked up his portable tape-recorder and made his way to the conservatory.

  ‘Come in, Sean, come in,’ Leonora said, indicating that he should sit in the chair next to her. ‘You can put that machine down on this table. Is that all right?’

  ‘Perfect! Are you sure you’ve not been interviewed before?’

  Leonora smiled. ‘I am treating this as a conversation between friends. I hope you won’t be too busy with your equipment to have a biscuit with your tea? Mary’s made them specially. She’s our housekeeper. Oh, how silly I am, you met her last time, didn’t you?’

  ‘I did,’ Sean said, ‘and I am always ready for a biscuit. This is such a beautiful room.’

  It wasn’t a formal conservatory, but more like a sitting room with glass walls, and wonderfully quiet, with only the faint snoring of Gus coming from the depths of the sofa where his beautiful, long-haired ginger coat made a pleasing contrast to the green, white and pink cabbage-rose pattern of the upholstery. Sean knew that Gus had a brother, Bertie, who preferred the bedrooms to the public rooms of the house.

  The plants here were massed against the glass and some of them had grown and spread right up to the high ceiling, pressing against the panes there as though trying to escape. All the cushions had tapestry covers (Gwen’s work, he’d been told) and the table was covered with seed catalogues, books, and Leonora’s correspondence.

  ‘Shall we start, then?’ Sean asked.

  ‘Yes, I’m ready.’ Leonora folded her hands in her lap.

  ‘Let’s begin with your early childhood. Tell me about that.’

  ‘My mother died when I was eight.’ Leonora put her cup down on its saucer and gave a small nervous cough. ‘My father was always busy. Painting, I suppose. I was mainly brought up by Nanny Mouse. She was very young in those days, but they promoted her when I was born, to look after me. I think my mother was rather delicate. You’ll meet Nanny Mouse. She’s still alive, though very frail now, of course. She’s over ninety. She lives in the little cottage at the bottom of the drive. You must have passed it as you drove up here.’

  ‘Has the estate been in the Walsh family for many generations?’

  ‘Oh, no, dear!’ Leonora laughed in a way usually described in novels, Sean thought, as ‘silvery’. ‘My grandfather bought the land after making a fortune in some boring bit of industry – I’ve never been quite sure what – bits needed for various engines, I think. Frightfully important without being at all visible, if you know what I mean. And in fact when Daddy – Ethan Walsh, I’d better call him, hadn’t I? – told his father that he wanted to go to London and study to be an artist, there was the most enormous row. Well, in those days young men were expected to follow in their fathers’ footsteps and so forth, not go off to be bohemians and fritter their time away on what were called “daubs”, very often. It must be quite hard for you young people to understand.’

  ‘No,’ Sean smiled at her. ‘I think quite a lot of parents even today might consider art a rather uncertain career path.’ God, he thought to himself, how bloody pompous I sound! I must watch that. ‘May I turn to the subject of your mother?’

  ‘She was very quiet. Unassuming. He was the … what’s the modern word? The charismatic one. She never seemed to be there, that’s what I remember. Whenever I asked Nanny Mouse where she was, I was told she was resting or writing letters. Something like that. I’m rather vague about her death, because I was really quite ill around that time. I remember that. But everything changed completely after she’d gone. Daddy was terribly affected by her death. It was ghastly. He was most dreadfully, dreadfully wounded. I can’t recall him as particularly affectionate to her while she was alive, but of course children don’t see everything, do they?’

  ‘Where did he meet her?’

  ‘In London, at art school. She was quite a gifted watercolourist, I believe, when he met her, but of course once she was married, she had no more time for all that.’

  ‘So she gave up her art to be with him?’

  ‘Yes. Nanny Mouse told me once that they quite scandalized everyone by eloping to Paris and marrying there. Maude Cotteridge was a penniless orphan and my grandfather wouldn’t have been best pleased at the match. The gossip was …’ Leonora bent forward and lowered her voice ‘… that they lived together before they were married. Their affair was the talk of artistic London, apparently. You’d have thought she’d be miserable here in the country, wouldn’t you, after being used to London up till her marriage, but she loved the garden. She added all sorts of things; the gazebo and the Quiet Garden at the back are hers entirely. The border there. Have you seen it? Well, you’ll see it when you film it, won’t you? It’s as beautiful as any painting. And the espaliered fruit trees on the wall, they were her idea. In those days, when Ethan and Maude were first married, Willow Court had four gardeners. We have to manage with two these days, but of course I have very green fingers, so the garden has been a kind of hobby for me. A bit of luck for the estate, wouldn’t you say?’

  There she was again, flirting with him. He smiled at her.

  ‘That’s great,’ he said. ‘We’ve made a good start, but we’d better stop for now. I must go and change for dinner.’

  ‘I’ve rather enjoyed it. Tomorrow I’ll take you up to my father’s studio.’

  ‘Yes, I’m greatly looking forward to seeing that. And I’m most grateful to you for being so helpful to me. To this film. I hope it lives up to all your expectations.’

  Leonora looked up at him. ‘I’m sure it’ll all be wonderful,’ she said. ‘If you don’t mind, I’m going to sit here for a while. Drinks on the terrace at six o’clock.’

  ‘Lovely. I’ll see you later,’ said Sean, and left the room, shutting the door quietly behind him.

  *

  Leonora closed her eyes. For a moment, she had the impression that she wasn’t alone in the conservatory. Perhaps Gwen had come in to see where she was. She breathed in, and her nostrils were filled with a fragrance she recognized, lily of the valley. Who used it? Where did she know it from? Maybe James had brought it back for Gwen from one of his trips abroad. Or perhaps it was Rilla, or even Chloë, but why was it so familiar? She opened her eyes to see which of the women now at Willow Court had crept in here while she was sitting with her eyes closed, but she was quite alone. The fragrance hung in the air, and there was no one at all. Only Gus, snoring slightly and dreaming cat dreams. I imagined it, Leonora thought. It’s in my head. She shivered slightly and shut her eyes again. I’ll go up soon, she thought. I’ll just sit here for a moment.

  September 1935

  Leonora half-opened her eyes
. There was someone standing at the window, looking out at the garden. Rain beat against the panes, and the piece of sky she could see from the bed was horrid and grey and not blue and sunshiny, which was what summer skies were meant to be. The dark shape between her curtains wasn’t Nanny. It was too tall and sort of thick. Nanny was small and skinny. Could it be Daddy? Was it? He’d only ever come into the nursery once or twice before, and he hardly ever came into the night nursery as far as she could remember. She felt a sudden chill and pulled the quilt up around her shoulders. Then she sat up on one elbow and her head hurt. She tried to speak, but only a faint noise came out of her mouth, and she coughed to clear her throat.

  At once, the shadow at the window turned round and it was Daddy. He strode quickly over to the bed and sat down right next to her and took her hand. Leonora was so surprised at this that she fell back against the pillows. He was wearing a black suit and a white shirt and his eyes were rimmed with red. Leonora fixed her gaze on the shining gold watch chain that crossed his waistcoat. He said, ‘My darling child, I didn’t mean to wake you. You were so deeply asleep. And you need your sleep, do you not? You’ve been rather ill. Do you remember?’

  ‘Have I had my birthday yet?’ Leonora asked. ‘Was it measles?’

  ‘No, no, nothing like that. A fever, the doctor said, but we have been a little concerned. And yes, you are eight years old. Happy Birthday, sweetheart. We shall have to celebrate presently when you’re feeling better.’

  Leonora wanted to cry. How could she have missed her birthday and not even known about it? How could she? There were so many things she didn’t understand. Why was he here? Where was Mummy? And Nanny? Why were all his clothes black? Something was in the room with them, and it was a sad thing and she didn’t know how to ask about it. She said, ‘Where’s Mummy?’ thinking that if she knew the answer to that, everything else would be much clearer.

  ‘Don’t you remember, darling, how ill she was?’

  ‘Is she better now?’ Leonora said. ‘I don’t remember.’

  Her mother often kept to her room. She liked lying on the chaise-longue in the drawing room for hours at a time. Sometimes she disappeared altogether and no one saw her and Nanny said she was ‘indisposed’. That was like being ill, Leonora knew, although not with anything that had a proper name – measles or mumps or influenza. Suddenly, Daddy spoke.

  ‘Are you a brave girl, Leonora?’

  She nodded. Now that she was really eight, even though it felt just the same as being seven, she had to be very grown-up and being brave was part of that.

  ‘I’m so sorry to have to tell you this, Leonora. So sorry.’ Daddy started to cough, but it wasn’t exactly a cough and he took his handkerchief out and wiped his nose and eyes before continuing.

  ‘She’s dead. My darling, my beloved Maude …’ And then he was crying. Leonora stared at him, too shocked by his grief, his pain, to take in what he was saying. Daddy never cried. He was strong. He was the strongest, tallest, biggest, strictest person in the whole world and not this sobbing, wretched creature, whose shoulders were shaking and whose voice broke as he went on.

  ‘I had no idea. No idea that she’d been so … so ill. So ill. She kept it from me, of course, not wanting to worry me. She was unselfish. Yes, without a doubt the most unselfish person. And then she was gone, and now I’ve buried her, and we must be brave, Leonora. We must take care of one another, mustn’t we? So cruel. Such a cruel loss for you, my poor child. I will … you know I will … do my best, but it will not be the same. No, nothing at all will be the same. How will I bear it?’

  He stood up, and squared his shoulders. Leonora looked up at him and said nothing because she didn’t know what to say. Then he spoke again and sounded more like himself.

  ‘Nanny will be here shortly, to see if you want to get up today. Perhaps we’ll have tea together later. Would you like that?’

  Leonora nodded. What would she find to say to him as they helped themselves to sandwiches and scones from the cake-stand? Daddy made his way over to the door and turned to smile at her.

  ‘We’ll survive, Leonora, won’t we?’ he said.

  ‘Yes, Daddy,’ said Leonora, wondering what he could mean. Was he, too, in danger of falling ill and dying?

  As soon as he’d gone, she pushed back the covers and got out of bed. She felt wobbly. She remembered Nanny saying only two more days to your birthday, dear. So that was August the twenty-third. Now it must be after August the twenty-fifth. She’d been ill for days. How could that happen without her knowing about it? Tears filled her eyes when she thought of everything there was to feel sad about. Mummy’s dead, she said to herself. Under the ground, and stiff and cold. Something dark and heavy fluttered at the back of her mind, and she shivered. She tried hard to remember the last time she’d seen her mother and couldn’t think properly. Was it saying goodnight? Or maybe they were in the garden. Leonora knew what dead was. She’d seen Tyler, the gardener, carrying a rabbit once that a fox had killed and it was stiff and there was blood all round its head. She wasn’t supposed to see it, but she had, and she’d dreamed about it at night for a long time after that. Mummy wouldn’t be covered in blood, of course she wouldn’t. She must have died in her bed because that was where people did die. They weren’t a bit like rabbits. She imagined the body lying among the puffy pillows wearing one of her mother’s lace-trimmed nighties and it was her and not her at the same time.

  On the wall behind Leonora’s bed there was a portrait of her, painted by Daddy, and she turned to look at it. It wasn’t fair. Other people had mothers, and fathers and brothers and sisters. She was a little girl in this picture, and she was sitting on the floor beside the dolls’ house, the very same one that lived in the nursery and that she played with every day. It was a tall sort of a house. Daddy had made it himself, and Mummy had decorated every room to look exactly like real rooms in a proper house, and everyone who saw it admired it and said what a labour of love it was and how lucky Leonora was to have it. Leonora could see every detail on the wallpaper; all the little lamps and pieces of furniture arranged in the rooms and even the tiny, tiny dolls that Mummy had made to be them: her and Daddy and Leonora. The light in the picture seemed to be pouring out of the dolls’ house and it lit up the edge of the child’s, Leonora’s, cheek and made a golden patch on the dark carpet. I’ll go and look at it, she thought. My dolls’ house. The one my Daddy and Mummy made for me.

  She went into the nursery and there it was, standing against the wall. Every door was shut and every window too. She looked down at the roof, painted with a pattern of overlapping roof-tiles. A memory, like the wing of a white butterfly, fluttered briefly at the edge of her thoughts. For the tiniest part of a second, she saw her mother’s figure standing beside the dolls’ house in a long white nightgown and then she was gone. Leonora blinked and tried as hard as she could to bring the memory back, but it wouldn’t return and it felt to her as though a light had been extinguished somewhere inside her. There was no light coming from the dolls’ house either. No light at all. It looked as though no one had played with it for ages and ages. Suddenly, sadness filled her, like a flood of something cold rising up inside her, and she began to weep.

  *

  Leonora was growing fretful. Nanny Mouse had made her lie in bed and rest for what seemed like days and days. Perhaps it wasn’t such a long while after all, but it felt like years. Because she’d been so ill, Nanny Mouse let Mr Nibs, the big ginger cat, come into her room. He wasn’t usually allowed upstairs and the sight of him sitting on the end of her bed or curled up behind the curtains with just his tail sticking out from under the flowery material made her smile. He purred when she stroked him, and that made her feel happier, always. But sometimes the words my mummy is dead came into her mind and then her eyes filled with tears and her head started aching, but she couldn’t think of Mummy all the time, and it was then she started wanting ordinary things. If only I could get out of bed, she thought, looking at the square of sunli
ght in the middle of the carpet, I could go down to see the swans. I wish Nanny Mouse had taken me into the village with her. I could have bought some sweets from the shop. Liquorice allsorts, or a sherbet fountain. Nanny Mouse always chose barley sugar in twisted sticks, and Leonora had had too much of that to think it exciting.

  Where was Daddy? He came in every afternoon and sat with her for a while, but he was still sad and didn’t want to talk very much. Perhaps he was in the Studio, painting. The Studio was out of bounds. It was an attic really, the big attic that took up most of upstairs, next to the maids’ rooms. The door of the Studio was always kept shut when Daddy was in there working, but he wouldn’t be working now. She’d heard Nanny Mouse and Mrs Page the cook talking about it when Mrs Page brought up her supper tray.

  ‘The poor man,’ Mrs Page said. ‘He isn’t eating properly. And all he does is pace around the house like a caged beast.’

  ‘He’s not working, I know that,’ Nanny Mouse said. ‘He stands at the Studio window and stares out of it. I saw him when I set out for church yesterday and he was still there when I came back. I swear he hadn’t moved an inch.’

  Leonora thought that perhaps he was up there now. I’ll go and find him. I’ll talk to him and that’ll cheer him up. He won’t mind. He can’t. He’s not working. She pushed back the bedclothes and put on her dressing-gown and slippers.