‘Come on, Irini. There’s not much time. I need to explain so many things. Like why I thought it best to let you settle with Aunt Jemima, not to disrupt you by turning up out of the blue. You must try to understand, we had to keep you apart,’ he says, edging towards me. This time I don’t move. ‘Surely you must understand that.’ He tries again to reach out. Again I back away, but this time with less conviction. ‘Irini, I have something I want to give you. It’s important. But I can’t do it while she’s around. It’s not good for her,’ he stammers. He takes a look back at the house. ‘She mustn’t know that we are talking, I realised that last night more than ever. You must understand what she is like. There’s not much time,’ he repeats.
‘I never wanted anything from you but the truth, and now I’ve got it. I shouldn’t be here, remember? Your words.’ I am almost shouting. ‘What happened all those years ago?’
He winces, looks back to the house. ‘Please, keep your voice down. If you are quiet, we can talk. Come on, let’s go for a walk together, away from the house.’
‘Irini, are you still there?’ We both hear Elle calling. We look to the house and see her standing on the porch. My father pushes me behind a conifer tree.
‘Just me, Eleanor. Irini’s already halfway to the village,’ he shouts, and then turns back to me, whispering so quietly that I can barely hear him. ‘It’s too late now, there’s no time. But I have to give you something. Later on. We must find a moment.’ He swallows hard, wipes a bead of sweat from his brow. He reaches out a hand and touches my hair. ‘Your mother, she loved you, but the depression, it was—’
‘No.’ I pull away. I don’t believe him. Nobody would give away a child because they were depressed. ‘It’s just another one of your lies.’ I break into a poor effort at running, putting as much distance between us as I can.
As soon as I step on to the main pathway that heads towards Horton, I take out a cigarette and smoke it fast. I manage two more during the twenty-minute walk to the centre of the village.
The green blanket around me is broken up by a multitude of grey houses, all made fancier than they once were with the addition of garages, hanging baskets and neatly trimmed lawns. The sickly scent of honeysuckle drips through the air. The church stands proudly in the middle of the village, flanked by green fields and punctuated by decrepit gravestones covered in ivy and moss, as if nature is trying to reclaim them.
I rest against the church wall and watch the activity at what I think is the post office. Beyond that I can hear the cries of children. Perhaps a school or nursery nearby. Perhaps the school I might have attended, should I ever have been allowed to live here. After a few minutes and one more cigarette I push on, past the village pub, the Enchanted Swan. I’d be in there if it wasn’t closed. There is a man outside it, ruddy-faced and rough around the edges. He looks like what I would expect from this part of the world: weathered by the winters, battered by the wind. If he was a boat, his sails would be torn and his paint peeling. Yet still he would sail true, returning his passengers to shore. He tips his flat cap to me and hollers, ‘G’morning.’ He sets out a stand that advertises Haggis pie with neeps and tatties, stretches an overworked back with his hands on his hips.
‘What time do you open?’ I ask, waving back across the road from the edge of the graveyard. A good measure of whisky would really help, maybe followed by a wine or vodka. Whatever they’ve got. I had a glug of sherry before I left the house, but I kept off the Valium and there is still an edge that could tip the wrong way if I was pushed.
‘Twelve today, usually eleven.’ He taps the board. ‘Do a nice dinner too.’ He offers a half-wave and I check my watch. That gives me two hours to kill.
I follow the noise of the children, letting my hand drag along the cold, sharp surface of the stone wall. I’m drawn by their cheer, and the carefree sound of childhood happiness. I pass the post office and corner shop, arriving at a small grey-brick building with a sign outside that reads Foxling’s Nursery and Infant School of Horton. I glance past the fencing and see little red jumpers charging around in the school yard. The teachers who stand along the perimeter look casual and relaxed, not a care in the world as they sip at their cups of tea. I rest against the fence a while, watching and listening to the sound of a childhood I never knew. After a few minutes I take a step away, wondering where I can kill a couple of hours. But curiosity gets the better of me. Maybe this place would have been my school. I could have grown up here, had I stayed. Behind these walls I might have become somebody different.
I push open the front door to the school and a little bell rings out. Inside the overheated lobby there are children’s self-portraits taped to the walls. The eyes are misplaced, the mouths drawn gaping wide. The hair is shaped with wool, glued in place. Gavin, 6. Isabella, 5. Theo, 7.
‘Can I help you?’ a voice asks from behind me as I gaze at the children’s work, suspicious of the stranger who has entered the school. I think about running but decide that will most likely result in a worried phone call to the police. So instead I stay, turn around, smile at the wiry receptionist, and begin with a lie.
‘Good morning. My name is Gabriella Jackson.’ I reach out my hand as the lie glides easily from my tongue. She takes it, but I see that she also takes a good look at my chewed thumb and the four nail marks on my wrist from where Elle dragged me in to see our mother last night. ‘I was hoping to discuss schooling for my children. We are moving to the area.’
Her suspicious attitude softens, and the worry is replaced by a smile. She is thinking, How dangerous could she be? She is a mother, after all. The international stamp of goodness.
‘Oh, in which case, please forgive me. You know, you can never be too careful.’ She shakes my hand with extra vigour to negate any offence she might have caused. ‘I didn’t realise you were a mother. Let me fetch our headmistress.’
The woman scurries away, and after a moment of mumbled conversation behind a partially closed door, she returns with a fierce-looking schoolmistress. Not head. Not teacher. Mistress, her torso overtaken by breasts, tamed behind a tight, high-necked blouse. Her thick calves balance on wide ankles, bound in sensible shoes. Proper, unrelenting.
‘Good morning,’ she says curtly, her Scottish accent soft and breathy. ‘I understand you would like to discuss the potential schooling of your children.’ I nod agreeably, but lose my smile and replace it with seriousness. ‘Usually such meetings are organised in advance and occur by appointment. Especially since we have just got started with the new school year.’ She wants to remind me who’s in charge, but the very fact that she has bothered herself, wriggled those hips out of a chair no doubt too small for her, means she isn’t going to turn me away. I try to be charming.
‘I know, I am terribly sorry.’ I augment my accent, try to sound a little more upmarket than normal. Like the kind of woman who doesn’t have to work. I hold out my hand and she takes it, somewhat reluctantly, but her grip is firm. ‘I happened to be in the area and just stopped by in the hope that you might be able to see me. Not to worry if it is too difficult.’ Her exterior cracks a little, a simper of a smile breaking through like sunlight after a storm.
‘No. It’s all right.’ She reaches behind, pulls her office door closed. ‘If you are going to join us, let’s not get off on the wrong foot. My name is Miss Endicott. Schoolmistress for thirty-five years. It’s a long time, but I have plenty of years left in me yet.’
Miss Endicott marches down a corridor and into a large hall with parquet flooring set in a dogtooth pattern. I follow. It reminds me of my first school. The one where I hardly spoke, despite the speech therapy the school provided, and where I walked with a frame I christened Henry.
‘As you can see, we are a small school. It was not the case when I began my working life here. But slowly, as the years pass, families are enticed by the towns and cities, and therefore there are fewer children left in the village who require schooling.’ We arrive at a galleried corridor that looks out over
the school yard. Although it is difficult to count the moving targets, I estimate there are probably no more than twenty pupils. ‘We used to take in many more children from a much wider catchment area, but there are newer schools now.’ She says it like there is a bad taste in her mouth. Newer schools, like what do they know? ‘I won’t lie to you, Mrs . . .’
‘Jackson,’ I say.
‘Mrs Jackson. There are other options. Larger schools closer to the city. But what we offer here is focused learning, developed with your child in mind. Individualised educational programmes. We have five members of staff. That is only five children per teacher.’ She opens another door to reveal a bright room that smells faintly of mud. She takes a quick sniff. ‘The children have been creating clay pots in the style of the Aztecs and Egyptians. Very good for dexterity with their hands and development of creativity. Plus, we are keen to enrich their learning with a taste of other cultures. It’s important they learn empathy for all, especially those who are different.’
‘I agree, very important,’ I say, wishing that somebody had taught such a concept at my school. I was different, and I don’t remember a single child who demonstrated any empathy for that. Not until Elle showed up and taught one of them a lesson he would never forget. ‘I really would like my children to attend the local school. I want to get to know the village, Miss Endicott, and build our lives here.’
She smiles and looks flattered as we head up the corridor. She opens another door, presenting the science room. ‘Three science sessions per week, per child. There is no larger school that can replicate that at this key stage in development.’ I have a nose inside, spot a few Bunsen burners and battery packs left lying out on the laboratory benches. They even have gas taps, which I’m sure can’t be safe for such little kids. ‘You have come to the right place, I can assure you. I have been teaching here for nearly all of my thirty-five years of working life, and I am Horton born and bred. I have lived in the little end cottage just along from the post office all my life. That’s why the garden is so well developed.’ She stops herself, giggles at her own apparent naivety. ‘What I’m trying to say is that you will not find anyone who knows the village and its history quite like I do.’ She closes the door and takes a good look at me. ‘I’m sorry to intrude, but are you all right? Your eyes are very red.’
‘High pollen count,’ I say, reaching into my pocket for a tissue. I dab at the corners of my eyes and she carries on up the corridor with a sympathetic hand placed on my shoulder. ‘As you were saying, Miss Endicott, about knowing the village so well . . . that’s most fortunate for me.’ I wonder if perhaps my father is not the only person who can answer my questions. If the people at Mam Tor believe that things are best left behind closed doors, I’ll find someone who knows how to open them. ‘I’m sure there are many questions you could help me answer.’
We continue the tour and she shows me the classrooms, the computer area where they have just installed a PC with Windows; Miss Endicott announces this with an inappropriate sense of pride, as if they have made a revolutionary development. I wonder why anybody would choose this school and rely on this dinosaur for their child’s education. ‘The village must have changed a lot over the years,’ I say, driving the conversation in my chosen direction.
She nods in agreement as she plods forward in her heavy lace-up shoes. ‘We have seen many children come and go. All on to bigger and better things. That’s what I like to think, at least.’ She turns back and flashes me a big smile, full of brown teeth from the cigarettes she smokes in her office. I can smell them on her clothes. ‘I like to create memorable childhoods, and an environment that enriches the children’s emotional development.’
‘And I assume you share a special relationship with the local families. For generations, perhaps,’ I suggest. We pass a set of entrance doors from the yard and she stands aside to let the rowdy band of sweaty children hurry inside. She pats each one on the head as they race past.
‘Of course,’ she announces as she closes the doors behind the last one. She almost looks offended that I should even have questioned it, her gaze lingering a little too long. ‘There isn’t a child that has gone through this school whom I don’t remember. But I must say, I am surprised you are here today. As far as I was aware, there are no houses for sale in the village. Where did you say you were moving to?’
I stumble briefly as I cobble together an answer, borrowing from my surname and mother’s first name to create a couple of imaginary children. ‘We are still looking for a property. We found the village first and just fell in love with it. We were here only a few weeks ago, and little Harry and Cassie were running around . . .’ I look off to the ceiling as if I am lost in the memory of them gambolling in the fields like a couple of von Trapps.
Miss Endicott steps back, her face pale. She ushers me forward, and for a second I wonder if I have offended her, although for the life of me I can’t think how. I try to move the situation on.
‘We just have to settle on a house. It is very hard to find one in such a small and beautiful place. But there are some wonderful properties nearby. There is one in particular I saw on the way in. A fairly new place, double-fronted, with a large circular driveway, set back from the road. That would be perfect for us.’
She stops just before the reception area, smoothes her hands over the dog-eared corner of a child’s wall-mounted painting. ‘I’m not sure of the property you mean.’ Her inability to make eye contact intrigues me. It’s impossible to believe somebody who can’t look you in the eye. That’s how I knew my father really meant it when he told me that I shouldn’t have come here, because he looked straight at me.
‘Oh? You can’t miss it,’ I push. ‘The last house on the right before you hit the main village, if you’re coming from Edinburgh. About twenty minutes on foot from here. It has a name plaque outside. Mam Tor.’ I have to make her admit she knows my family home. There is no way she can’t know the house, which means there is no way she doesn’t know my sister. She remembers every child, after all, and where else would Elle have gone to school?
‘Oh, that one,’ she says unconvincingly. ‘Yes, I know the house you mean.’ She takes a long look at my face, twitches her nose, shakes her head before adding, ‘But I don’t think it’s for sale.’ I consider pushing it further, suggesting that I have seen people coming and going. I want so much to ask her about my sister, my family, whether she remembers me and if she knows why I was given away. Somebody must know. Before I can think up the next question, she is speaking again. ‘Anyway, Mrs John—’
‘Jackson,’ I interrupt, as if the facts of my fictional life are important.
‘Sorry, of course, Mrs Jackson. I really must be getting back to work. Should you wish to make a further appointment, I would be more than happy to see you again. If you would like to leave a number, I will contact you if I hear anything regarding properties for sale.’
She escorts me through the lobby and we chat about the weather, the forthcoming church fete, and the local topiary club, of which she is president. I add that I can’t wait to show Harry and Cassie where they will go to school, and she smiles, although I note less enthusiastically than before. I leave my actual telephone number and take the steps from the building, past some very nice topiary planters for which, no doubt, Miss Endicott is responsible. Just before I reach the pavement, she calls out to stop me.
‘Mrs Jackson, may I ask you something?’
‘Yes,’ I say as I turn around. ‘Of course.’
‘Do you by any chance have family in Horton? Any distant cousins or aunts, for example.’ She tries to make her question sound casual, like the answer is irrelevant and she doesn’t really want to know. Yet I doubt there is anything casual about Miss Endicott.
‘No. Not that I know of. Why do you ask?’
‘No reason in particular. Just a final thought.’ She holds up the paper on which I have written my telephone number. ‘If I hear of any properties for sale, I will be in touch. I hope
your eyes get better soon.’ Without waiting for an answer, she closes the door.
14
The morning of the funeral has a buzz about it much like I would imagine a family wedding would, should I ever have been to one. Frank and Joyce jostle about the house; him out of place, unsure of where anything is, her hindered by her gammy leg and weak hand. I can hear Elle bellowing instructions, the first resounding up the stairs as though she is using a megaphone at about 6.25 a.m., by which point I am wide awake with all the lights on. Put a table here. Locate some flowers in this alcove. Move the Chinese urns from the hallway. No, you are doing it wrong, you stupid, stupid cripple.
She flaps into my room before I am out of bed and catches me in the jumper she bought me. I haven’t taken it off since the trip to the gym; I still can’t bring myself to undress, because to do so would mean slipping into an ordinary routine. Something natural, an acceptance of being here. After my father told me I shouldn’t have come, I just couldn’t bring myself to pretend that anything about this place was normal for me. I haven’t even showered, and as I hide myself under my dusty covers, I catch a whiff of my armpits. It isn’t good.
She sweeps in, black dress in one hand, carrying a small leather box in the other, here to ready me. The last time I saw her was as I ran from the living room two days before. But there is a seriousness about her this time, refined and businesslike. This isn’t supposed to be fun like Sisters’ Day.
‘Don’t think you’re going like that. They will all know who you are and we cannot have the whole village talking about you.’
Following my trip to the school, I spent most of the day in the Enchanted Swan. The pub was full, with interested eyes cast towards my seat at the bar for most of the night. They were all wondering who I was, an outsider in their midst. I think I stumbled back to the house around 9.30 p.m., no doubt already the subject of village gossip. And that’s before they realise I’m a Harringford.
My Sister Page 10
