The Road to Lichfield

by Penelope Lively

  Anne said ‘Would you mind very much if I asked you a few things – about your mother?’

  ‘I don’t see why not. It’s a funny situation, isn’t it? Wait, though, I’ll make us a cup of coffee.’ Turning at the door, she said ‘You should have brought your husband in – you didn’t have to send him off, I wouldn’t have minded.’

  Returning with a tray of coffee things, she began to talk with less restraint. ‘They met, oh, in about nineteen forty it would have been. My father was killed right at the start of the war and mother was working in the Ministry then, where your father was, not the same part but they met on committees or something, and it must all have started then. I was evacuated with the school to Wales, so I didn’t see all that much of mother but in the holidays she’d take cottages or whatever, where we could be together, and he used to come then. That’s when I first remember him. I was an only, of course, there was just me and mother. It’s funny, isn’t it, the way things repeat themselves – now it’s the same with me and Jan. I sometimes wonder …’ she broke off for a moment. ‘You can get a bit enclosed, but there it is, nobody can do anything about that.’ She looked up at Anne. ‘My husband went off with someone else when Jan was four.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Anyway, you don’t want to hear about me. I’m not much like mother. Here.’ She went over to a desk and brought out a photograph. ‘That was taken in the war.’

  Not a pretty face, but a memorable one. Dark hair; dark, slightly heavy eyebrows; wide features; an abstracted look that might just have been a response to the camera. Anne put the photograph down and said, ‘What did she … What was she like? I’m sorry – that’s an impossible question for you to answer.’

  ‘She was a nice person, I can tell you that. Everybody liked her – she had lots of friends. She was always busy, she had plenty of interests, she was always involved in this and that. Lively, you know …. And a cheerful sort of person – she’d make you laugh, even up to the end when she was so ill she’d make you laugh. She made your father laugh – she used to tease him a bit. Make fun of him – nicely, though, you know.’

  Anne said, ‘I can’t really imagine that. How long ago did she die?’

  ‘Nine years now. I miss her a lot. But there it is …. More coffee?’

  ‘Thank you. What did they talk about?’

  Mrs Barron stared for a moment. ‘Oh, you mean her and your father. Goodness, it’s hard to remember now. They were always talking, though, I can tell you that. They’d argue, too – she had strong opinions, mother. Politics, they’d talk about. Pictures and that kind of thing. Music – she loved music, mother, she played the piano very well when she was a girl but she rather let it go later on, and of course your father was keen on music, wasn’t he?’

  ‘No,’ said Anne, ‘I hadn’t thought he was. But I seem to be wrong.’

  Mrs Barron said, ‘It’s funny, talking like this brings things back. I can see them now, sitting out in the garden of the house we had in Twickenham, not long after the war, listening to a Prom on the radio. I’d just gone to training college – your father helped me a lot over that too, finding out about courses and things. That’s what Jan hasn’t got, and the school’s not much help, I can tell you.’ She stared morosely out of the window for a minute. ‘Do you have a job, Mrs Linton.’

  ‘I wish you’d call me Anne. I did teach until recently, and I expect I shall again.’

  ‘My name’s Shirley. I keep on at Jan about her As – I daresay I go on at her too much – but she’s got to look after herself, it’s no good thinking otherwise. They don’t realize, do they, at that age?’

  ‘I’m sure she’ll be all right – if as you say she’s working quite hard.’

  ‘I hope so.’

  ‘When did … You say you didn’t see my father all that often, recently?’

  ‘No, not really. We always kept in touch, after mother died – he’d ring up, every now and then, or come over for a Sunday. They were always friends, even after – well after they stopped being quite so close. I used to think that was funny, when I was older, a man and a woman staying friends like that. Do you think that’s usual?’

  Anne said, ‘I don’t know. I honestly don’t know.’

  ‘Well, it seems funny to me. But you can’t help feeling kind of envious – no, not envious, admiring it in a way. Mother always had him to turn to, to talk about things to – long after, well, long after there wasn’t really anything else. I think that’s nice.’ She looked sharply at Anne. ‘I used to wonder about you sometimes. And your brother.’

  ‘Then you knew …’

  ‘Oh, yes, we knew about you. Mother never mentioned it. I think she felt – well, you know – guilty.’

  ‘Yes, I know.’

  ‘But I used to wonder about you. I suppose I was jealous, a bit. I was fond of your father – oh, I suppose you could say I wished he’d been mine, when I was a kid.’ She went on, diffidently, ‘I hadn’t ever realized you didn’t know about us. That’s a bit hard. And you must feel badly – well, for your mother.’

  There was a brief pause, awkward. Anne said ‘I don’t think, really, you or I having feelings about it now is very sensible – at least feelings on other people’s behalf. Yes, I suppose I do. But she never knew, it seems, so that’s one thing.’

  Shirley Barron said, ‘Well, I’m glad of that too.’ After a moment she added, ‘You can’t judge other people, can you? You don’t know what goes on.’ In the hall, the girl’s voice, on the telephone, kept up an almost inaudible monologue. Her mother said, ‘I’ve told her time and again to make her calls in the evening, when it’s cheaper. Excuse me a minute.’ Beyond the half-open door, they argued in barely-subdued tones. ‘It wouldn’t take you five minutes to walk round to Hilary’s, rather than waste a phone call.’ ‘I’ve got my maths to do, haven’t I?.’ ‘There’s nothing that couldn’t wait till tomorrow.’ ‘Why shouldn’t I talk to my friends – you do.’ The small, lacklustre house enclosed them, setting them apart even from the life of the suburban street – small children on bicycles, women with prams and shopping-bags. It was hard to see how the allegedly extrovert, popular woman in that photograph could have produced this uneasy household. Thinking this, trying not to listen to the squabble beyond the door, bland clichés came into Anne’s head: someone has to suffer, you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs. When Shirley Barron came back she said quickly, ‘I mustn’t take up too much of your day. And I do hope, really, that you didn’t mind my coming.’

  ‘I didn’t mind. I won’t say I’m not surprised – but I don’t mind. There’s never been anyone much I could talk about things to – she wouldn’t be interested’ –jerking her head towards the door – ‘my husband couldn’t have cared less. Mother never liked him, she always said at the time I was making a mistake. I was very young, of course, nineteen. I’m afraid sometimes she’ll do the same thing – Jan – trying to show me, you know, that she’s grown-up and doesn’t need me.’

  Anne said, embarrassed, ‘I’m sure you don’t need to feel that things repeat themselves quite so much.’

  ‘Well, let’s hope not.’

  ‘How much time did they have together?’

  ‘Mother and Uncle James? Not a lot, really, when you add it up – over the ten years or so –just an odd night now and then that he could manage. Sometimes I suppose she didn’t see him for a month or two. But I’ve told you, she wouldn’t sit around moaning, she wasn’t that type. Mind, it’s funny she didn’t ever marry again but I suppose in a way she didn’t want to. She could have. But I think it wasn’t because of him, your father. She could manage on her own and she liked it best like that.’

  Anne said, ‘What was her name?’

  ‘Mother’s? How odd – you not knowing. But you wouldn’t, of course, would you? Mansell. Betty Mansell.’

  They are all, Anne thought, either dead or beyond remembering what happened. Mother. Mrs Mansell. Father. But because of them we sit here,
two people otherwise unconnected, talking about something that is only our affair at one remove, and yet, somehow, matters very much to us both. She felt suddenly dejected. Shirley Barron was scrubbing with her handkerchief at a cup-ring on the polished top of the table, talking again about her daughter; the clock on the mantelpiece chimed for half-past three; a gust of rain scudded against the window. Anne explained that she had to go, and they walked together to the door.

  ‘I’m glad we’ve met,’ said Shirley Barron. ‘And– well, if he can take it in at all, give him my love. And look, tell his bank not to send that money any more. He’s done quite enough for me and there’s better uses it could be put to.’

  Anne began, ‘I’m sure he …’

  ‘I’d rather. Please. And I would like to hear how he goes on – if, if you wouldn’t mind.’

  ‘Of course I’ll let you know.’

  Walking away down the street, Anne realised that she had no idea in which direction to go. Coming, she had been too preoccupied to pay attention to the place. Now, she wandered for a few minutes aimlessly from road to road until the cathedral reared suddenly beyond a break in the houses, and she was able to navigate her way towards it. Cloud filled the sky, a leaden backdrop to the wild green of trees and the cathedral’s flaming stone; she felt quenched still by Shirley Barron’s lifeless home. Reaching the cathedral square, she saw David standing at the porch, and for a moment the sight of him evoked no feeling, as though he were a stranger among others.

  Ten

  Judy sat impassive in the car. Once, she said ‘I’m missing French and P.E. and two Englishes and two Maths.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘I know. Are we nearly there?’

  Anne said, ‘Getting on. Shall we have a break? Would you like some squash?’ They pulled off the road and sat on a verge exuberant with flowers. ‘Look,’ she said. ‘Look at all these – red campion and stitchwort and meadow crane’s-bill and this little yellow thing – what’s it called, Judy? Do you remember that time in the Lakes, when you were about eight or nine? You were mad about wild flowers, we collected everything and you used to look them up and make lists.’

  ‘Did I? I’ve forgotten.’

  ‘Have you honestly? You used to get cross with me because I couldn’t remember the names of things. You must remember that?’

  ‘I suppose so,’ said Judy, ‘sort of.’ She stared at the flowers. ‘Can I go youth hostelling next year, with Mary and the others, on bikes?’

  Going into the nursing-home Anne said, ‘I’m afraid grandfather may not know who you are – you mustn’t mind about that. Or about how he looks. He isn’t like he used to be.’ And as they went into her father’s room she saw the sudden shock on the girl’s face and felt compunction at having brought her. But it was right, she thought, she should see him once more, and you cannot pretend that things are other than what they are, to children, that is wrong. And it might, too mean something to him. She said to the old man, ‘Here’s Judy, father – you know who Judy is. Your granddaughter.’

  The old man turned his head and saw a woman with a girl coming towards him. He was worried about the girl. She was not his responsibility, and yet she was. She was not his doing, but it seemed to him that her situation might well be his doing. He said to the woman, in silence, with querying glance: trouble? And Betty with nod and quick grimace said: Yes, ructions again. ‘Tell you what,’ he said to the girl, ‘why don’t we have a jaunt together, you and I? Your mother won’t mind if we abandon her for once. How about an afternoon at the coast?’ And the girl glowed at him, her resentments dispelled, so that he thought: poor thing, it’s not easy for her, not easy for any of us, all one can do is see the least harm’s done that need be. Down at the coast, in a streaming spring wind, he swam with the girl, and after, in a smoky cafe, watched her tuck into a plateful of food and chatter, for once, he thought, like any child. Like, for instance, his Anne. I’m sorry, he wanted to say to her, I’m sorry for that part of it which is my fault – if there was anything more I could do, I would. Instead, he talked to her about the school she resented and the friend who had gone off with someone else and (obliquely) the mother she could not manage to be like. All right, he said, I’ll have a word with your mum, see if you couldn’t give up Latin and concentrate on science, you’re better at that, aren’t you? And in the evening they drove home, the girl sleepy and content, and he projecting forwards, so that already he was with Betty, first chance in weeks, delighting in her.

  Judy said, ‘He didn’t know who I was, did he?’

  ‘I’m afraid not. I think actually he was mixing you up with someone he knew a long time ago. That happens to old people, sometimes. It’s easier to remember long ago than recent things.’

  ‘I wish he wasn’t ill. I liked grandfather.’ There were tears in her eyes.

  ‘Oh, darling …. Look, don’t feel like that, he’s not unhappy in himself, you know.’

  ‘Isn’t he? Are you sure?’

  No, Anne thought, I am not at all sure, I am just saying that, like the matron and nurses offer bland and tempting reassurances. She got into the car, against that backdrop of rook and lawn mower that, like the sound of the river at Starbridge, seemed more real now in savoured recollection than when heard again. She wound the window up, clipping off the noise, and sat staring at the mutely planing birds. Judy said, ‘Why are you biting your lip like that? You’re always doing that lately, you’ve made a red mark. Where are we going now?’

  ‘To Starbridge. Oh, and I forgot to tell you – there’s someone coming in probably who used to be a friend of grandfather’s. A Mr Fielding. He comes out to fish – he’s got grandfather’s rod. I daresay he’ll have his son with him – Tom’s a bit older than you.’

  They walked down towards the river, flanked by their children. To five of David’s questions – or proffered starting-points for conversation –Judy had said ‘No,’ and to two ‘Yes.’ Now, they were silent, except for Tom, who whistled, tunelessly, demonstrating knowledge and efficiency and, perhaps, comradeship with his father. Judy sat pulling buttercups to pieces. ‘Here,’ said David, ‘we’ve got knot trouble – whoa a minute.’ He stood with his head close against his son’s, bent over the line, and Anne, a smile locked on her face, turned away and hunted the surface of the water for a rise. Or dippers. Or reflections.

  ‘Wouldn’t you like a go?’ said Tom (a thoughtful boy – or patronizing, just a bit?) and she said, ‘Yes, please – but I’m hopeless, I always was.’ Standing in the cold river, ineffectually casting, she felt his silent contempt (or amusement?) and thought irritably: could your mother do any better, I wonder, or would she even try? And then she felt ashamed.

  ‘Judy,’ she called, ‘your turn now. Remember how grandfather used to teach you?’

  But Judy, scowling on the bank, shook her head, rubbing her leg.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘I’ve got a horsefly bite. Are we going in soon?’

  ‘Presently. Judy, you might just try to be a bit more forthcoming. Please.’

  ‘It hurts. It’ll probably go septic.’

  Anne moved further down the bank and sat watching mist smoke up from the fields on the far side. On the river, the line hissed forward, drifted back with the current, hissed out again. She slapped midges on her ankles, thought of Graham, who had phoned and sounded depressed, watched Tom and David and noted with sad disquiet the way in which their hair grew identically at the back, making a ducktail that lay thickly on their sweaters. ‘Hey, Dad’ called Tom, ‘there’s something rising further up – see?’ Moving like a spaceman in his waders, David crunched past her on the river bed, not looking her way, and vanished round a bend. Out of sight, from time to time, she heard his voice, and Tom‘s. The mist thickened; it got cold; ten yards away Judy sat morosely.

  She got up and walked down the river towards them. ‘Would some coffee be nice?’ she said. ‘Back at the house? It’s getting a bit chilly.’

  David
said, ‘Oh, d’you want to go in? Right you are. Tom – pack up now. We’re going in.’

  The boy, turning, began to say something and swung sharply back as David called out, ‘There! You’ve got a bite!’ The fish flipped the water and he struck too late, the empty hook flying back to catch in an overhanging alder. Angrily, he tugged it free and clambered up the bank to them. David said, ‘Bad luck, Tommie.’ ‘That’s the nearest I’ve ever been to getting one. What was it you were shouting about?’

  ‘The ladies are getting a bit chill.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Anne, ‘I didn’t mean …’

  Tom said, ‘It’s all right. It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Look, do let’s stay out a bit longer.’

  ‘No, honestly,’ he said, ‘I don’t mind. Could you just hold the rod a minute, Dad.’

  As they walked up the field Tom said, ‘Can we come out tomorrow?’ ‘Yes,’ said David. ‘Yes, of course.’

  Back in the house, getting coffee, Anne said, ‘What’s the matter, Judy?’

  ‘I don’t feel very well.’

  She was hot and flushed, her leg, around the bite, swollen and throbbing. Anne hunted for a thermometer and took her temperature; it was over a hundred. She saw her up to bed while David and Tom drank coffee in silence. When she came back David said, ‘Best if we leave you in peace, really, I think.’

  Tom, at the door, said ‘Thank you very much for lending us the rod, Mrs Linton. It’s very kind of you. It’s a much better one than ours.’

  ‘I’m sure my father would like to know someone’s getting some fun out of it.’

  ‘Yes,’ said David. ‘Well, I hope she’ll be all right …’

  ‘I’m sure she will.’

  ‘Did she get a chill, do you think?’

  ‘I don’t think so. She’s a bit allergic to insect bites. I’ll get her to our doctor tomorrow.’

  ‘Well, let me know how she is, anyway. Goodnight.’

  ‘Goodnight.’