Uncle Albert had listened benignly if uncomprehendingly (Jenny guessed) to Nell’s story. The mention of the church service caught his interest. He chuckled.
“So you’re a bishop now,” he said. “I wonder what odds the bookies would have given me on that—Terry’s little Nell becoming a bishop. When’s the service, then? I’ll come and see you do your stuff.”
Nell looked at her watch.
“Evensong’s at half past six,” she said. “I shall need to go in twenty minutes. Of course you can come if you want to. What do you think, Jenny?”
Jenny had enjoyed the outing, but by now she was beginning to ache for home, alone for the evening with Jeff. And a church service …
“Suppose I were to run Bert back to Hastings after the service,” said Nell. “I shall need to cancel an appointment, but it isn’t urgent. Then you could go straight home after the service, and you would be no later than you had intended. Or you could leave now, and I will find someone reliable to look after Bert until I have ‘done my stuff.’”
“Are you sure?”
“I’ll be glad to. Bert, Jenny must get home to her family, so you will stay with me for a little and then I’ll take you to the church, and when the service is over I’ll drive you home and we can talk some more. First I want a quick word with Jenny, so if you will sit where you are and finish your tea, we’ll go into my study. It’s just across the passage if you need us. Is that all right?”
“You go ahead and do what you want, Nell,” said Uncle Albert.
With his usual formality he rose and held the door for them. Nell led the way into a room which, though far more of a mess than the sitting room, was in its very mess more coherent, a room with a purpose, a workplace, with stacks of papers, piles and shelves of books, and a PC on the desk. She turned to Jenny.
“This will take only a moment,” she said. “I have thought about your letter, and having seen you both I would like to think about it a little more before making up my mind how much I feel I can help you. I’ll write to you in the next few days. I hope this isn’t a disappointment after the trouble you’ve taken bringing Bert to see me.”
“Oh, no. It’s been absolutely worth it. Uncle Albert’s having a wonderful time. Perhaps I can bring him over again one day. And I’m terribly grateful you’re taking him home. I never seem to get enough time with Jeff, and it’ll be worse now I’m working again.”
“You must bring him next time. I will arrange for a cat-free environment. Now, if you will just tell me how to find the place where Bert is living—I know Hastings reasonably well.”
3
“What do you mean, unnerving? That’s what you said about Mrs. Matson.”
“Did I? No, I said she was disturbing, or something. They’re completely different. Nell was very friendly and polite and wonderful with Uncle Albert, and she’s obviously very bright, brainy, brainy as you are, but … I didn’t feel easy with her, somehow … I think she’s probably a bit like me … too like. People don’t feel easy with me either … Has it ever struck you how different we are, you and me? I’ve been thinking about this. You are you from the inside outwards. You grew that way. Like a tree or something. I’m me from the outside in, like a bit of luggage. There are these bits inside. I’ve packed them as neatly as I can, and they sort of belong together—I mean they’re all mine and they fit me, but they wouldn’t be a bit of luggage without the suitcase round them. I’ve got my name on the suitcase. You can tell me apart from all the other suitcases waiting to be collected …”
“Stop there! This one’s mine. I’m taking it home.”
They were at the sink preparing mixed vegetables for one of his fry-ups. He put his knife down, bent, and heaved her not very gracefully into his arms.
“You should’ve got yourself a trolley,” she said.
“Couldn’t get it up the stairs.”
“No. Not now. I’m hungry. It confuses me if I keep thinking about food. Anyway, making love to a suitcase is kinky.”
“I rather like being hungry.”
“Well, you can take yours up and eat in bed. I’m having mine now.”
“Typical suitcase,” he said, putting her down. “Then Nell’s one too? Easy to spot on the carousel, by the sound of it.”
“Yes, but … I don’t know … I wonder … suppose what’s in there isn’t just a jumble of stuff. Suppose it’s just one thing, and it’s alive. And watching you.”
“You’re telling me you aren’t alive inside? Just underwear and stuff?”
“No, of course not. Forget about suitcases. I wish I hadn’t started it. She must have had a really extraordinary childhood. It wasn’t any worse than mine, but it was a lot weirder.”
The letter came on the Wednesday, Enclosed with it was a sealed envelope with Mrs. Matson’s name on it.
Dear Jenny,
First, I must thank you again for bringing Bert to tea with me. It was wonderful to meet him, and see him looking so well cared for, and loved and respected. He seemed to enjoy the service, and to remember afterwards who I was. That is to say that without being reminded he told me that I had done very well for myself, and Terry would have been proud of me. I am hoping to arrange for one of my congregation to pick him up sometimes on Sundays and bring him over for tea and evensong. I hope that you and your husband will see fit to join us occasionally.
Now to business. I accept your decision to help Mrs. Matson find out what she wants to know, as far as you can. For my part I propose to compromise. From what you tell me it sounds as though Bert and my uncle may have witnessed Major Stadding’s death, and were then asked, or decided, to keep the matter confidential. By your account Bert was prepared to make a considerable sacrifice of his self-esteem in order to do so. Since my uncle though he liked at least to drop plenty of hints about various episodes in his career, never mentioned the subject to me, except perhaps very indirectly, I believe he would have taken the same line as Bert. I therefore do not feel justified in trying to persuade Bert to break that confidence.
Within those limits, however, on the basis of my own memory of Mrs. Matson as well as what you tell me of her, I am prepared to help. Bert too, when I mentioned her name, was full of her praises, though he spoke as if he had not met her for years. I therefore feel justified in passing on to her a few things that Terry told me that might have a bearing on the matter. They are all trivial and tangential and though they were in some sense said to me in confidence. I do not feel constrained by Terry’s presumed promise of silence.
I have, as you see, written to Mrs. Matson separately, and must ask you to be so kind as to add her address. This is not out of any distrust of you but in order to respect her privacy. I am sure you will understand.
Yours very sincerely.
Eileen (I mean Nell)
“She’s been reading too much Jane Austen,” said Jeff.
“That’s just part of the trim on the suitcase.”
RACHEL
1
“The most peculiar letter for you, I’m afraid I opened it—it looked like a begging letter—you know they’ll try anything just not to look like begging letters—and that’s probably still what it is. I mean it’s from a vicar somewhere in Kent—at least he’s writing from a vicarage, St. Martin’s Vicarage—he was the one with the cloak, wasn’t he?—and he’s a reverend, or he says he is—the Rev. E. J. Cowan, though he might pronounce it the other way—you can’t tell. Have you ever heard of him? I haven’t. Jack hasn’t. What makes it so peculiar is there’s another letter inside, addressed to you too, I haven’t read that of course. That’s why I’m not sure it isn’t a begging letter after all. But listen …”
She started to read, interjecting her own comments, with no variation in the gabbling monotone.
“To whoever opens this letter dear friend—a bit pushy, but I suppose it’s better than Sir or Madam—dear friend the enclosed concerns a matter which Mrs. Matson may wish to keep private I am aware of her condition—it gets more and m
ore peculiar. I mean the man’s a total stranger. Do you think he’s mad?—her condition I have therefore written it in large type so that it can be held by another person for her to read—he must have done that on a computer. Everyone has them nowadays, even vicars—her to read if that can be arranged if however having read the first few lines she indicates that she is content to have it read to her I for my part have no objection yours truly E. J. Cowan. At least he doesn’t say it isn’t a begging letter. If he did, we’d know it was. What on earth is this about, Ma?”
“Don’t know. Show me, please.”
“You want me to open it? Let’s get your specs on first, shall we? Now I’m going to shut my eyes so you know I’m not cheating. I say, isn’t this rather fun! Here goes. Help, it’s pages and pages. I don’t think I’ve got time now. There, is that the right way up?”
“Yes. Higher. Stop.”
The print was as large as a child’s first reader. How Jocelyn would have enjoyed a computer, Rachel thought—not just as a toy to be played around with, but as a tool he could use, an extension of his competence to deal with the world.
Dear Mrs. Matson,
Mrs. Pilcher has recently asked me on your behalf about my uncle, Terry Voss. I have no direct knowledge of the episode in which you are interested, but on the other hand I recall an incident that I now believe may be connected. I will describe it in some detail.
Despite the large print the lines filled less than half the page. Presumably the writer had stopped there so that Rachel could decide whether she wanted to keep what followed to herself.
“Too long,” she whispered. “Thank you. Dilys.”
Dutifully Flora folded the letter and slid it into the envelope before opening her eyes.
“Well,” she said. “Is it a secret, or isn’t it? Oh, Ma, don’t be so provoking! You might at least give me a hint.”
“About Terry Voss.”
“Terry Voss …? Oh, that funny London spiv Da was so keen on? What on earth has a vicar in Kent got to do with him? He can’t still be alive. Can he?”
“Nephew.”
“How extraordinary, but I suppose it takes all sorts, even in the Church of England, these days, anyway. I really do try to be broadminded, but I absolutely wouldn’t feel comfortable about having my grandchildren confirmed by a gay bishop, so I suppose I can’t blame Mr. Cowan for wanting to keep quiet about Voss. It is good of you, Ma, to keep up with these people after all these years, in spite of everything, just because they were on the Cambi Road with Da … oh, of course! That one! Da saved his life when the Japs beat them both up and left them by the road. And the first time anyone ever told me about it was Archdeacon Donnelly at Da’s funeral, and you said how Da would have hated that, which of course he would, but really it’s something people ought to know about. But Voss wasn’t there—at the funeral, I mean.”
“In prison.”
“Oh yes, and you tried to get him let out on compassionate grounds and they wouldn’t wear it—doesn’t it all seem ages ago?”
“Not to me.”
“No, I suppose not. Now I’ve got to run. I only came up, really, to bring you the letter. Di Grindle’s starting another of her Good Works, not as loony as last time, thank heavens—it’s getting pets into old people’s homes because it’s good for them having an animal around, and she wants me on the committee, except she doesn’t—she wants Jack, because he’s so organised, but he refused to play and who can blame him so she’s got me. Shall I ask Dilys to come and help you read the letter?”
“No hurry.”
“Right. Then I’m off and you can tell me later if there’s anything amusing in it. I do think you’re a wonderful old thing, Ma!”
Rachel closed her eyes and listened to the receding monologue. Yes. Jocelyn would have loathed Archdeacon Donnelly. It had to be him because his brother had died on the Road, but the way he had milked the story for heroism … Hateful! And made more so by the fact that the trick had worked, even on her, so that she had wept, along with most of the others. Not that it had been the first time she’d heard the story. Jocelyn, of course, had never mentioned it, but she’d picked up hints and suggestions at Cambi Road reunions, often in a tone that suggested that Jocelyn had asked people not to talk about it, so that in the end she’d asked Fish Stadding directly and unrefusably, and he’d told her without fuss, in his own manner, of course—oh how much more tolerable he would have been than the archdeacon to give the address!—so that she was aware of the strong streak of farce that seemed to have been inseparable from the fearsome cruelty of their captivity.
Later, choosing her moment one evening, she said, “I made Fish tell me what you did for Terry Voss.”
“Blast him.”
“I said I made him. I didn’t give him a choice. It’s all right, darling, I don’t want to talk about it. I’m just telling you so you know I know.”
He’d grunted and refolded his newspaper to start the next page, but then had looked up and said, “If Voss had come round before me he’d have tried to do the same thing. He wouldn’t have made it, because I weigh twice what he does, and he was in bad shape after his first beating, but he’d have tried. I’m not saying any of ’em would—we’d the same share of mullocks as you’d get in any other grab-bag of humanity—but by and large it was the ones who stuck by each other who made it through. I’d have picked Voss over quite a few of the others, officers among ’em, as a chap to trust in a pinch. I still would.”
“I like him too. I wish he wasn’t always on his best behaviour with me. He must have some fascinating stories to tell.”
Rachel had been thinking, incessantly, uselessly, about Voss since Sergeant Fred’s visit and Mrs. Pilcher’s brief but desperately unsettling return to her bedside. There was one particular moment, one remark, on which, she now felt, everything inexplicably hinged.
She hadn’t known Voss at all well-nothing like as well as she’d known Sergeant Fred, for instance. There’d been no reason why she should. He’d been a conscript, and after the war had returned to his own, hidden, alien, way of life, only occasionally attending Cambi Road reunions. Her few conversations with him had been brief and banal. But after Jocelyn’s funeral she’d decided to try and visit him in prison, not for anybody else’s sake but her own, because it had been something Jocelyn would have liked her to do, and that was what she needed more than anything.
The visit had been surprisingly difficult to arrange. In the end she’d had to tap into Jocelyn’s network of influential contacts to be allowed to make it at all. Furthermore, as she’d been dismayed to discover, Voss was now in Parkhurst on the Isle of Wight, serving a longer sentence than usual for taking part in a break-in during which an elderly nightwatchman had been seriously injured. She’d hesitated, but in the end drove down, stayed with cousins near Winchester, and took the ferry over to the island and a taxi to the prison.
Once there she waited for almost two hours among prisoners’ families, groups and faces that cried out for the lens, images of despair stoically endured by women who were always tired. Eventually she was taken into a big, bleak room with a kind of counter running its full length. Each prisoner sat on one side of the counter, and his visitors on the other, with a grille between them so that they couldn’t pass anything across. Shallow screens gave them a little privacy from their neighbours but a warder stood behind each prisoner to see that the rules were kept.
Once Rachel was seated there was some kind of hitch, unexplained. She waited numbly. She felt in herself the same sort of hopelessness she had seen on the faces in the waiting room. Her man too had been “put away.” She too had been betrayed by happenings beyond her sphere, and now she was expected to live and behave like a normal citizen, despite that.
But when Voss was brought in her mood immediately lightened. He must not have been told who his visitor was, but when he saw her his puzzled frown cleared into obvious delight. He looked little different, the same too-large head on a scrawny, hunch-shouldered tor
so. He’d always been a sharp dresser, and even now had somehow managed to iron and adjust the amorphous prison uniform into something resembling tailoring.
“Why, it’s Mrs. Matson!” he said. “Couldn’t think who …”
His grin faded.
“Ah, he’s dead, then?” he said.
She had no idea how he had made the leap. Jocelyn had once said, after a visit from a recent widow formidably in mourning, “You won’t wear black for me, Ray, will you? I suppose you’ll have to at the funeral, but that’s all.”
She’d accepted it as one of those odd, strongly held quirks that dotted his apparently conventional outlook. (Detestation of cream stationery was another.) She’d found it no hardship to do as he wished.
Perhaps Voss had seen her loss, visible in her face, or perhaps it was hard for him to imagine any other reason for the visit. Surely he knew that Jocelyn had been ill …
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’d have written, but well, there’s been a lot to think of and there was a special issue of the Newsletter, or don’t you get that here?”
“No one to send that sort of stuff on,” he said. “Niece writes to me Sundays, and that’s it.”
“I hope someone visits you sometimes.”
“You’re the first … lessee … six and a half months. Nell—that’s my niece—can’t come on her own that easy, and there’s no one else wants to. Can’t blame them. It’s a hell of a distance.”
Some Deaths Before Dying Page 21
