The Mill on the Shore (10 page)

She turned and threw another pile of garden waste on to the fire. He was still standing beyond the gate. ‘I know it’s not really eco-sound,’ she said defensively. ‘And there’s a shredder at the Mill which I usually borrow, but sometimes, with diseased wood, it’s the only way …’

The garden was small and there were only a few misshapen trees in the shelter of the house but George did not argue. He wanted to be invited in.

‘Therapeutic too,’ he said.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I suppose it is.’ They watched as a scrap of charred paper flew out of the fire and above their heads.

‘Had you heard that we were coming to stay at the Mill?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Meg explained to Phil …’ She stooped and shovelled a pile of leaf mould on to the fire. It steamed gently. ‘That’ll be safe now,’ she said. ‘I’m rather cold already. I think I’ll call it a day.’

She was about to turn away from him and walk into the house.

‘I’d like to talk to you,’ he called.

‘Phil’s at work,’ she said. ‘I expect you’d like to talk to him too so perhaps it would be better if you came back later.’

‘I’d like to talk to
you
,’ he insisted. She hesitated and could not quite bring herself to be rude enough to send him away.

He wondered again at the change in her. ‘You’d better come in then,’ she said at last. ‘I was going to make some coffee.’ He would not have thought her capable of this shyness, this blushing awkwardness. Perhaps she had been altered by her daughter’s death as deeply if not as dramatically as Jimmy.

She led him through a tidy garden cleared for the winter to the kitchen door. There was a moment of farce when George, trying to take off his wellingtons by standing on one leg, toppled over and put the stockinged foot into a puddle of ice-covered water, but although he laughed at the fool he had made of himself, she remained tense.

‘You’d better come in,’ she said. ‘There’ll be a dry sock of Phil’s you can borrow.’

He stepped into a square kitchen. Breakfast dishes remained piled on a draining board. A washing line was suspended from the ceiling over a range which must have been there since Phil’s parents had lived in the place. She unwound a rope from a hook in the wall and lowered the line until she could reach a hand-knitted sock. She handed it to George without a word.

‘Where does Phil work?’ George asked.

She filled an electric kettle and plugged it in. Even such a simple question seemed to disturb her and she did not answer immediately.

‘Mardon Wools,’ she said. ‘It’s a textile factory in Mardon, the town up the river. You’ve probably heard of it.’

He had of course heard of it. The Mardon logo could often be seen on television on jerseys worn by sports people, the county set at play and even the royal family. It represented quality and gracious country living.

Cathy spooned coffee into a pot. ‘Phil’s production manager,’ she said. ‘He’s been there since he left school.’

She paused, as if she expected George to continue the conversation but he seemed engrossed in pulling on his clean sock. The silence seemed to increase her discomfort, and she added: ‘That’s where we met. When I first separated from Jimmy I knew I’d have to get away from London. By that time, despite my career, I seemed to be known to everyone just as “Jimmy Morrissey’s wife”; I wanted to work somewhere where my work would be judged on merit. Mardon approached me because they wanted to develop a younger, more fashionable image. I suppose the connection with Jimmy helped – ironically they suggested that the first year’s designs should be on an environmental theme – but I felt at least that I had space to breathe here. I introduced brighter colours, looser styles and they sold very well. The company were pleased.’

‘But you don’t work there now?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘ I run my own business from home. It’s not very lucrative but it gives me something to do.’

‘Didn’t you enjoy working at Mardon?’

‘Of course I enjoyed it,’ she said bitterly. ‘But after Hannah died I went to pieces. Nothing seemed important enough to get up for.’

‘I suppose that’s how Jimmy felt,’ George said. It seemed a good time to introduce him into the conversation.

She looked at him sharply then let go the coffee spoon she’d been twisting between her fingers so it clattered on to the table. ‘No,’ she said. ‘ That’s not how Jimmy felt. He felt guilt, responsibility. And so he should. He caused her death. But he was never close to Hannah. Even while we were married he hardly saw her. He would be out of the house in the morning before she got up and he was seldom home in the evening before she went to bed. And then there were all the foreign trips when he was away for months. I sometimes thought that if he saw her in the street with a group of other children he wouldn’t recognize her.’ She stared ahead of her. ‘Of course he was depressed,’ she said. ‘The idea that he might have been careless or incompetent, the cause of the crash, hurt his pride and shattered his confidence, but you can’t grieve properly for someone you hardly know.’

The outburst had surprised her as much as it had shocked George and she turned away from him, pale and shaking.

‘So you blamed Jimmy for Hannah’s death?’ George asked gently.

‘Of course I blamed him,’ she said. ‘He killed her. Who else would I blame? Myself, I suppose, for trusting her to someone so obviously reckless. And I’ve done enough of that too.’

‘Meg told me that you and Jimmy stayed friends,’ George said. ‘How did you manage to get on with him if you felt so strongly?’

‘We were friendly enough after the divorce,’ she said. ‘Jimmy didn’t care much either way. My leaving him was just a minor inconvenience. And I thought it would be better for Hannah if we stayed on good terms. But after Hannah died I never wanted to see Jimmy again. I made that perfectly clear.’

‘But Meg told me that they came to visit you,’ George persisted. He needed to sort out exactly how things had been between the two couples. ‘ You were married to Phil and living in Salter’s Cottage. It must have been after the accident. Meg said that was when they first realized the Mill would make a field centre. She implied you were all close friends.’

‘Meg remembers things as she would like them to be,’ Cathy said. ‘They turned up once on their way south from a trip to Scotland. We had no warning and I could hardly turn them away. We gave them a meal, that was all, and Phil took Jimmy for a walk along the shore. It was spring, I remember, a beautiful day. Phil was like a big kid showing off the place. He thought Jimmy was doing him a great honour by going out with him. He would have asked them all to stay the night but I wouldn’t have it. Meg had all the children with her. I couldn’t imagine how anyone could be so insensitive.’

‘So it came as a shock when you heard they’d decided to buy the Mill?’

‘It was a nightmare. We’d heard rumours in the area that it had been sold for development, and we’d been concerned that there would be a horrible holiday camp or hotel. Then Meg phoned up, full of her plans, expecting us to be excited too. Phil was relieved but I would have preferred a night club and a row of concrete chalets. I was starting to be happy again, Phil was training me to be a ringer, I was making new friends. It wasn’t the exciting roller-coaster of a life I’d had with Jimmy but it suited me.’ She paused, determined to make George understand. ‘I knew that if they came here to take over the Mill
everything
would be different. It wasn’t only that I was still bitter about Hannah. It was more trivial than that. I thought, I suppose, that they’d take Phil away from me too. That he’d change. He’d already been taken in by the myth of the glamorous Jimmy Morrissey. And then Meg is such a dominating character that I thought our relationships with friends here would be thrown out of balance. I was afraid I’d be reduced to competing with her in some way. I didn’t want them here. I even hoped that they’d be refused planning permission.’ She smiled. ‘If I’d known how to go about it I’d have bribed the council.’

‘But the plans went ahead without any problems?’

She nodded. ‘I suppose they were relieved at last to find someone who was willing to take the place on. The fact that Jimmy had a good green image was an added bonus.’

‘What did Phil think about your opposition to their moving here?’

She gave a little laugh. ‘He had some strange notion that I was still in love with Jimmy. “ I can handle that,” he said. “ You mustn’t think I’d be jealous. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t all get on together.”’

‘And there wasn’t any truth in that idea?’

‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘ If anyone was in love it was Phil. He was in love with the idea of being part of the Morrissey clan. He was like a star-struck teenager. There was no way I could make him see sense.’

She hesitated, came to a decision to speak:

‘I went to see Jimmy,’ she said, ‘ just before they signed the contract on the place. I never told Phil He thought I was going to London to meet some old friends. But I arranged to see Jimmy on his own and I tried to persuade him to change his mind …’

‘What happened?’

‘He agreed to meet me and that was surprising enough. The old Jimmy would have been too busy. I should have known then that he had changed. We went for a walk in Battersea Park, along the river. It was probably the longest conversation we ever had without interruption but I could see straight away that it would do no good.’

‘Why?’

‘Not because he’d made up his mind to take on the Mill and was determined nothing would make him change it. I’d expected that. But because he refused to take any responsibility for the decision. He left all that sort of thing to Meg, he said. It didn’t matter to him one way or the other but Meg had made up her mind so he supposed that they’d go. I couldn’t pin him down to anything, couldn’t even provoke an argument. All my anger just washed over him. Meg would do what was best, he said, and that was that. I was astonished. I knew she wanted him to spend more time with the family but I never thought he’d give up
Green Scenes
, all the telly appearances, without a fight.’

‘Don’t you think it was the accident which changed him?’ George asked.

‘Partly,’ she said. ‘But there was more to it than that. Remorse was never his thing and whatever else you might think of Jimmy he could always put up with physical pain.’

‘But the depression?’ George said. ‘That must have been real. He was treated for it.’

‘I think the depression was the result of the move, not the cause of it.’

There was a silence.

‘Did you ever approach Meg to try to persuade her not to move?’ George asked at last.

‘No,’ Cathy said. ‘I knew it would be no use.’

‘How did it work out with them living so close to you? Was it as bad as you’d expected?’

She shrugged. ‘I suppose not. Nothing ever is, is it? Nothing ever quite lives up to the fears you create in your imagination. Except losing Hannah and I’d never imagined for a moment that could happen. Meg doesn’t bother with us much. When Jimmy was alive occasionally we’d receive a royal summons to Sunday tea and sit in the flat eating crumpets and making polite conversation.’

‘You went then?’ George was surprised.

‘I was never keen but Phil liked to go. He could never see what she was up to.’

‘What was she up to?’

‘She was showing the world how civilized and reasonable she was. As you’ve said, she liked to pretend that we were all close friends …’ She paused. ‘And there was another reason for the invitations too. She wanted to show off her family, her miraculous bloody children. We had to listen to their music, admire their art, hear about their school work. It made me sick because of course it wasn’t them we were supposed to admire, it was Meg for having created such a tribe of geniuses.’ She smiled bitterly. ‘I suppose I’m just jealous. They’re really quite nice kids despite their mother.’

‘It was hardly the most tactful way to carry on,’ George said. He was encouraged by Cathy’s openness. The shyness seemed to have gone.

‘Oh no,’ Cathy said. ‘ Tact’s never been one of Meg’s virtues. She’s too self-centred for that. Tact requires the appreciation that other people have feelings.’ She smiled at him. ‘ I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘What must you think? I’m getting bitchy in my old age.’

She leaned across the table to refill his coffee cup. He saw that her hand still shook slightly. She noticed too. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said again. ‘I get so wound up because there’s no one I can moan to. Phil thinks they’re all wonderful.’

‘I’ve only spent a day there,’ George said slowly, ‘but I find it hard to imagine Jimmy at the Mill … Tea and crumpets and polite conversation … Not really his thing.’

She grinned and there was pure delight on her face. He saw the old Cathy of the London dinner party. ‘He hated it,’ she said. ‘ I suppose it’s not charitable but it was a sort of revenge …’

‘Did he always hate it?’ George said. ‘How did he stick it for so long?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I think he always hated it. In the beginning he was really apathetic. Nothing seemed to matter. More recently I had the feeling that he was prepared to do something about it. I never thought he’d take his own life of course, but I thought he was looking for some way out.’

‘When did his mood change?’

She shook her head. ‘I’m not sure,’ she said. ‘As I told you I didn’t see him very often. The last ritual. Sunday tea was just before Christmas and he was certainly more his old self by then. When we arrived Meg was trying to persuade him to do something domestic and he told her to fuck off. He disappeared off to his study and didn’t emerge until we were about to leave, all charm and apologies because he’d been too busy to talk to us. You know, the old Jimmy.’

‘Could his new assertiveness have coincided with the decision to write his autobiography?’

‘I don’t know anything about that,’ she said shortly. ‘I wasn’t even aware that he proposed to write one.’

‘Didn’t he discuss it with you? Surely you would have featured in the book. It would have been courteous to mention it to you, especially if he intended to include an account of the accident …’

‘Courtesy never featured largely in his range of responses,’ she said. ‘You should know that, George.’