Mothers' Boys

by Margaret Forster

  ‘Dad, I meant in himself, how did he seem, not how his clothes looked.’

  ‘All right. Same as alus. Bit quiet but then he alus was.’

  ‘And how had he managed, where’d he been, how did he get away?’ The questions poured out of her, though she would rather not have given him the satisfaction of pleading with him like this.

  ‘Niver said how he got away, wouldn’t say, for fear . . .’

  She didn’t enquire for fear of what . . . it was an expression he often used when he wanted to indicate vagueness and usually it meant he didn’t know something, but wanted to pretend he did. ‘He got on a lorry, after he’d ran miles and miles. Turned his clothes inside out and put his shirt on the outside, and nobody said nowt.’

  ‘Then what? When he got off the lorry?’

  ‘Walked, all night.’

  ‘What did he eat?’

  ‘Took his bread with him, in his pockets, lived on that the first day, bread and water, army rations, I remember when we . . .’

  ‘Dad, what then, after he’d finished the bread?’

  ‘You’d best not know.’

  ‘You mean he stole money, food.’

  ‘I’m saying nowt.’

  ‘So he’s a thief now as well. Dear God, there’s no end to it. It gets worse and worse, first violence then theft. . .’

  ‘I niver said the lad were a thief.’

  ‘How else could he have managed? It’s obvious.’

  ‘Ways and means, ways and means, things I taught him, army tricks . . .’

  ‘Oh, Dad.’

  It was silly for her to keep on about how had Leo got himself here when what was much more vital was to try to glean the smallest scrap of information as to what he had intended to do after he left his great-grandfather’s house. But she soon found out that Eric James had no idea. Leo had never discussed plans. He’d come to rest and hide for a while and to collect money. Definitely to collect money, without which he had no chance of really getting away, money Eric James was only too glad to push on to him. ‘I wish he’d teken the lot,’ he told Sheila. ‘What do I want with it? He should have teken the lot, it was all for him.’

  ‘If it was, it wasn’t fair,’ Sheila couldn’t resist saying.

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘You’ve other grandchildren, Carole’s girls. It wasn’t fair to give it all to Leo, to want to give it all.’

  ‘What’s fair got to do with it? You and your fair. Nowt’s fair. Leo needed it, that’s the point.’

  ‘Needed it to go on doing wrong.’

  ‘He’s not doing wrong, niver did.’

  ‘Did he say so?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘You know – did he say? Did he talk about it? Did he say what happened?’

  ‘He took summat.’

  ‘We know that.’

  ‘Well, that was it, he took summat he shouldn’t and that was that, out of his head.’

  ‘But did he do it?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You know – did he, did he – oh, I can’t talk about it, those things, those awful things . . .’

  ‘Mebbe he did.’

  ‘Is that what he said? Mebbe he did?’

  ‘Eh?’

  She saw him look at her almost in amusement, shaking his head and half smiling. She couldn’t stand it. If he hadn’t been so frail and sad, she would have hit him.

  ‘You mek it hard for yerseif,’ he said finally, ‘alus have,very hard. If the lad did what he did he’s sorry. He can’t undo it, none of us can. But yer won’t let him, eh?’

  ‘Let him what?’

  ‘Let him be. What’s done is done. You’ve only yerself to blame, lass. He’ll not come near you like this, he knows what you think.’

  ‘He does, does he?’ Distress and anger made her voice shrill. ‘He doesn’t know anything, and neither do you. Neither of you, you don’t know what I’ve gone through, what I still go through, and he just goes off.’

  ‘No other way.’

  ‘What do you mean, no other way? What do you mean?’

  But he just shook his head and then coughed and the moment passed, as it did again and again. Every time, over those two weeks, they would get near what she strained to hope was some kind of enlightenment, something he could tell her about herself and Leo, and it would disappear. They would sink back into platitudes or sit silent for hours, both somehow mourning. The muddled implication was that he understood something she didn’t and it enraged her. All that joined them was the loss of Leo, their love for him, and they never spoke of it openly, not even at the very end.

  Sheila and Carole knew that the end was coming by the middle of the second week after he came home. They could see it. It was remarkable how visible his approaching death seemed. The flesh was suddenly stripped not just off his big frame – he’d been thin for a long time now – but from his face. It became first gaunt then took on a transparent look, the skin stretched so lightly over the bony nose, over the large cheekbones, that it looked as if it would split at any moment. And his pulse was weak. The doctor told them how slow and faint it was and then looked at them to see if they understood the significance of this. They did. They were ready, they had been ever since their father took to his bed, on the Wednesday, and wouldn’t move. They took turns sitting beside him. He’d open his eyes and look at them, as though checking, and then close them again and keep them closed until an hour or so had passed and he felt the need to check again. By Friday he wasn’t eating, not even soup. He took sips of water, that was all. Sheila thought how dignified he looked, how an expected death was dignified. She thought of the phrase used on the wireless when the King died – ‘the King’s life is drawing peacefully to a close’.

  On what turned out to be the last day she’d gone in and out of his bedroom, and he appeared to be sleeping quite peacefully. There was no special atmosphere. At six, she came to tell him she was going home and Carole was taking over. He didn’t reply, but then he hadn’t spoken all day. The room was dim, but not dark, the curtains partly closed to keep out the sun. She sat beside the bed a moment. Any hour now and he might die, he would die. She wanted to be present but she had stayed last night, it was Carole’s turn, and if they did not take turns they would fall asleep. She didn’t know why she wanted to be with him when he died. It wasn’t as though there would be any last words. The time for words had long since gone and anyway her father was not a man of words. Or a man to demonstrate feelings. That had always been the trouble. He distrusted words, distrusted touch, and that had left him. only with actions. He believed he showed how he cared and what he thought by his actions. He took Leo in so it didn’t matter what he had said. He stayed close to her, he had been there all through what had happened, so it didn’t matter that he had never hugged or embraced or physically comforted her.

  She must go. Alan would be waiting. She squeezed her father’s hand but there was no response, his fingers did not curl round hers. When Carole appeared in the doorway she got up. Carole raised her eyebrows but she shook her head and whispered, ‘Sleeping.’ She went home and made Alan his tea and then the phone rang, and yes her father had died. Well, that was that. She felt tired, listless. She hardly had the energy to go back round to her father’s house but she couldn’t leave Carole on her own. Alan drove her over but she wouldn’t let him come in to pay his last respects, not yet, not before she’d paid her own. It bothered her, standing looking at the body with Carole, that she wasn’t absolutely sure she had respected her father. Maybe. She’d respected his strength and loyalty and independence but not exactly him. It was hard to believe that great domineering force had gone for good. There would be nothing now to push against, to resist, but instead of this relieving her it depressed her.

  Somewhere, out there, Leo didn’t know. He couldn’t possibly think his great-grandfather could live for ever, but he had last seen him astonishingly fit and well and couldn’t be expected to realise how quickly he had failed. He might try to get in touch with Eric Jam
es, his chosen link with his family, with her. Without Eric James, there would be no means, except the most direct, for him to make contact, when and if he chose. Instead of this depressing her it somehow lifted her spirits. He could never cast her off for ever, of course he couldn’t, and now he would be forced to realise this.

  He couldn’t hide behind his great-grandfather any more.

  *

  Harriet went to Edinburgh with Sam. She felt she had to. She knew he’d meant what he’d said, and without being able to admit there was some truth in his accusation, she knew she had to take heed and try. He was so happy when she said she’d go with him. They stayed in Northumberland Street, in a bed-and-breakfast place. Sam had promised her the term was a misnomer, conjuring up visions of some cramped, cabbage-smelling abode and a landlady in curlers reeking of kippers, and it was. The house was Georgian, the rooms high-ceilinged and spacious, the landlady gracious. They had a room at the back, prettily furnished in chintzy materials and full of flowers, all exactly to Harriet’s taste. She tried hard to feel happy but instead she felt adrift, completely adrift. All her thoughts were back at home, with Joe. She watched the clock all the time, working out what Joe would be doing. She wanted to telephone, just to say they had arrived safely, that was all, but Sam would not let her. His face went tense and angry when she lifted the receiver and so she put it back again.

  At least they were busy, rushing around from show to show, all chosen by Sam. They ran from the Assembly Rooms to the Pleasance and collapsed panting just in time for the play and afterwards walked on to George Square and a late-night revue. There was no time to brood, but Harriet found it, little chinks of time during performances less than gripping, minutes sitting in the dark surrounded by the audience, when she flew back home and thought of Joe, coming in, in the dark, on his own – but no, with Claire . . . then her attention would be seized again and she’d be grateful, until the next lull, and then she’d see Joe driving, and she’d be off again, pulled back, pulled to where she should be, wanted to be, to where her real life was.

  She didn’t tell Sam. He was enjoying himself whole-heartedly, loving Edinburgh, loving his first visit to the Festival since he was a student. No pulling back for Sam. She wished, as ever, she had his capacity for pleasure, that she could relish it when offered as he did. She didn’t ask him but she knew he wasn’t thinking of Joe at all. As they walked back to Northumberland Street from high up beyond the Royal Mile, with the city brilliantly lit all around them and the streets full of happy crowds and lights winking on the sea over the roof-tops of the New Town, Sam was talking only of the next day, of what they would see, of the art exhibitions as well as the shows, and of where they would eat, how he had booked lunch at Pierre Victoire and dinner at The Witchery in the garden room . . . ‘Lovely,’ she kept murmuring, ‘lovely, it will be lovely.’

  He was so glad to be there, just with her, and his happiness showed so clearly. He looked handsome again, his strength and size not threatening any more but attractive. Beside him, walking back, she felt deceitful. She was pretending she was happy too. She smiled, she took care to respond to whatever he said, she never once mentioned Joe. And in a way it worked. Because her mouth was smiling it did have an effect on her spirits even though she knew the smile was a lie. She managed quite well to convince Sam that she, too, felt liberated from the strain of the last year, that it was a relief to be free of Joe. Sam wanted her to say it, she knew he did, wanted her to say something vague but significant, something coded such as, ‘Isn’t it wonderful to be here, like this?’ But she couldn’t quite go that far, not even to please Sam.

  She wanted to please him, though. She was aware of that. He deserved her undivided attention. It was stupid to hold against him the fact that he had not been as wrecked by what had happened to Joe as she had been, and still was. A lesser man would have grown tired, perhaps even disgusted, with her obsessive grieving. Sam had been patient but his own breaking point had finally been reached. He was bewildered by the intensity of her suffering, but he had suffered too. Now was the time to show she understood, to show him she knew how fortunate she was that he had been able for the most part to stand her utter and absolute concentration on Joe. All Sam asked for was that she should shed her studied gloom and be light-hearted – nothing more, just light-hearted. Nothing needed to be said. No words were required. All she had to do was go with him, be once more really together with him without that black shadow of past tragedy between them.

  When they drove home, the weekend over, Sam sang most of the way. He looked ten years younger. As for herself, she didn’t know. Yes, she had had a good time too, but never without secret anxiety, never without, last thing before sleep, wandering down roads in search of Joe. Now, nearing home, she was rigid with apprehension, quite unable any longer to keep up holiday banter. Turning into their road her stomach churned and she had to take deep breaths to control her terror. The house, at least, still stood. No sign of life. She let Sam open the front door, not trusting her own shaking hand. All was still. The rooms were neat and tidy. There was a note on the kitchen table:

  Welcome home, you ravers. Hope you had a good time. Gone with Claire to a party. Back very late – don’t worry. Louis is back but has gone to Charlotte’s. He’s going to ring you after ten. Love, Joe xxx.

  ‘We needn’t have come back,’ Sam said. She was still looking at the note. ‘I said, we needn’t have come back.’

  ‘Yes, I heard.’

  ‘What’s the matter? Everything seems fine to me.’

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘You’re not going to start again, are you?’

  ‘Again?’

  ‘Worrying. About Joe. He’s at a party, he’s having a good time, for God’s sake.’

  She walked upstairs without speaking to him. She didn’t dare. Everything would be spoiled if she let him see it could never be over, not for her, she could never wholly suppress her terror in case anything else ever happened to hurt Joe. From the landing, she called down, sensing his despair, ‘I’ll just get changed. Why don’t you open some wine and we’ll have a late supper to celebrate everything being okay?’

  That was the way to do it, if she could, from now on.

  *

  The Crown Court was different. It didn’t look so different, since here, too, as in the Youth Court, everything seemed new and modern, but the atmosphere changed once the judge entered the court. No buzzer here, Sheila was pleased to note. Instead a woman in a black gown ‘prayed’ everyone to stand for the judge. It felt so much better, so much more proper. And the judge, in his purple, with his brilliant white cravat and his knobbly, grey little wig, impressed her, unlike the magistrates in the Youth Court. He was in control and the little knot on the floor of the court, of barristers and solicitors and clerks, knew it. They were wary, deferential, and Sheila approved. She had a sudden confidence in the law and wished Leo had appeared in this court.

  Harriet, sitting behind her, was similarly approving, though busy reflecting that the arrangement of the courtroom left much to be desired. She felt as if she were sitting in a bus, a very small and cramped bus. There was no spectators’ gallery, only four rows of three seats each, all close together near the entrance. If she had wanted she could have leaned forward and touched Claire, who sat in the very front, on the shoulder. The girl had been there when Harriet came in, hogging the limelight. That was how she thought of it – Claire was seeking to be prominent, more prominent than Joe’s own mother. There was no question of going to sit beside her. Even if Claire had turned round and beckoned to her she would not have gone to sit with her, but the girl did not turn round, not once. She sat there in her white blouse – a great effort had been made to look appropriate, Harriet felt – and black skirt, staring straight ahead, her hair severely tied back with a large black clasp. Beside her, one seat between them, was Sheila Armstrong, wearing the same drab coat she had worn in the Youth Court.

  Harriet sat at the back, next to two young girls, about Cl
aire’s age, she supposed. She wondered if they knew Claire or Joe, but neither of them spoke and she could pick up no clues. In the middle two rows there were four Chinese men and a woman, who seemed in charge of them. They must be a party, on some kind of tour of the city, perhaps. A court case in the morning, to see how British Justice worked, and a trip to the Roman Wall in the afternoon. That is how it would be, Harriet decided, Joe a mere entertainment for strangers. He was in a special room for witnesses. When she’d arrived and been unable to find him – he had been determined to come on his own, to drive himself and be by himself – she’d panicked. The reception area was like an airport transit lounge, full of people pacing about smoking, or sitting looking tense on the one row of seats, bolted to the ground, which ran down the centre. But one of the officials had guided her past the pay telephones and water fountain to the room where witnesses could wait. She saw Joe there, reading a newspaper, but she didn’t go in. She turned and came back and went into Court 4, content to have seen him safely there.

  She felt alone, isolated, and wished for a moment she had let Sam come. He had an important meeting, but he would have cancelled it with her encouragement. It was she who had insisted he should not, insisted there was no need for both of them to go. She noted Mr Armstrong was not there either and wondered if Sheila felt lonely too, sitting there by herself. It was silly that they were apart. If only Claire had not plonked herself there, if only there had been two spare seats’ next to Sheila, she would not have hesitated, she’d have gone and sat with her. It occurred to her that Gary Robinson could not have anyone present from his family, unless the two silent girls were related, which she somehow doubted. There was no mother of his here, that was for sure. No mother or father or grandparent to suffer. That was what made the atmosphere so different, Harriet decided, not the judge, not the regalia, it was the absence of the unbearable tension there had been in the Youth Court when everyone was so patently suffering, when all their nerve ends, hers and Sheila’s, and even those of the two men had felt so exposed. Here, now, the suffering was dulled, it had been grown used to, it had settled down to a dull ache . . .