A Song in the Night (31 page)

Rosie frowned slightly.
Lauren?
Was she supposed to know who he was talking about?

Jonathon caught her puzzled expression. “Sorry, Rosie. I was thinking aloud. Lauren’s my girlfriend – she’s at Durham doing a Ph.D. She’s a bit of a local historian on the side though. She’d probably know where to get some further info on Boxer.”

“Oh right, I see.” Rosie felt an inexplicable tinge of disappointment. Somehow she hadn’t been expecting that. The revelation made her feel suddenly awkward. She tried to show interest. “Is she from round here?”

Jonathon shook his head. “No. She’s from Cornwall. She’s there at the moment actually, spending Christmas with her family. I’m planning to go down and join them on Friday for New Year. A quick break before work starts up again.”

“Where’s work then?” Rosie interjected, glad for the diversion.

“I’m a teacher. Primary school.”

Rosie was genuinely surprised. She’d never imagined Jonathon doing anything like that. Perhaps it was the memory of her first encounter with him that had thrown her off the scent. Something to do with the duffle coat and scruffy hair.

Jonathon accelerated gently as they pulled onto a country lane. “Lauren’s wanting to become a lecturer. Bit of one-upmanship, I reckon.” He grinned.

Realising that she hadn’t managed to change the subject, Rosie reluctantly rejoined the flow of his conversation. “Do you get to see her often?”

Jonathon shook his head again. “It’s an e-mail and phone romance, I’m afraid. We’re both pretty busy. It’s hard to take time out to travel at the moment. But she only has another few months in Durham. We’re hoping things will change after that.”

Rosie nodded. Well, it all sounded pretty serious anyway. No mention of wedding bells, but she knew how to read between the lines. She couldn’t help envying them. She couldn’t help envying anyone who had positive plans for the next year. She tried not to think about Beth, but she knew that Beth’s departure was the only sure thing looming up in her own near future. As for Gavin – it was hard to hold out much hope on that one.

“Could I ask you a tremendous favour, Rosie?” Jonathon’s voice jolted her from her thoughts. “You know as you type up the diary entries for Beth, would it be possible to e-mail a copy through to me? I’d so love to read it.”

Rosie shrugged. “Can’t see any problem with that. I’d better check it with Beth first. The diary’s hers after all. But I wouldn’t think she’d object.”

“Great!” Jonathon’s face lit up. “When we get back to Oak Lodge, I’ll give you my e-mail address. Then if she agrees, you’re all set up.”

Yeah,
thought Rosie absently.
Super.

“
Well?
Is it him?” Beth was waiting in the hallway when Rosie arrived back. She looked very pale, but curiosity had animated her countenance with a certain glow.

“Looks very much like it is.” Rosie couldn’t help grinning. “Right down to his Right Reverend brother. Jonathon’s pretty chuffed about it.”

Beth’s face broke into a smile. “Ooh, that’s brilliant! I could see us getting on the telly with a story like this.” There was a sudden catch in her throat and she began to cough. Rosie could see her whole frame shake with the effort.

“Come on, you – you’re getting overexcited.” She led Beth into the living room and sat her in a chair by the fire. After a couple of minutes and a few sips of water, the coughing died down. Beth lay back in her chair.

“He’s nice Jonathon, isn’t he?” She spoke into the air.

Rosie wasn’t sure if it was a trick question. She decided to play safe. “Yeah. He thinks his girlfriend might be able to help us find some stuff on Boxer. She’s into history apparently.”

Beth looked disappointed. “He’s
attached?
That’s a shame.”

“Shame for who?” Rosie’s eyes narrowed.

“Well – I thought perhaps …” Beth’s voice tailed off and she smiled sheepishly.

“If you’re meaning me, forget it. I’m attached too, remember.” Rosie tried to sound convincing. She felt about as attached as a loose awning in a force ten gale.

Beth sighed. “Ah well. Should have realised he’d be spoken for. The good ’uns always get snapped up.”

Despite her best efforts not to be, Rosie was curious. “Did you ever go out with him? When you were at school, I mean.”

Beth shook her head. “No. But it certainly wasn’t for lack of wanting to. I remembered him from primary school. He grew up round here as a kid, but then his family moved away for a few years ’cause of his dad’s job. They came back when Jonathon was about fifteen. That’s when he joined our class. We girls didn’t know what had hit us.” She laughed as she remembered. “I confess I had him lined up for myself. But then, I suspect, so did every other female in my form. He did go out a couple of times with one girl – Loretta Hurst I think her name was. The rest of us just sat tight, hoping he’d do the rounds – y’know, so we’d all get a turn. Then suddenly he just changed.” Beth’s face became serious. “Started getting really into God. Started going to
my
church. To be honest, Ros, I found it all a bit much. Specially on Friday afternoons when he’d shout
‘See you Sunday, Beth!’
at the top of his voice.” She rolled her eyes at the memory.

Rosie couldn’t help smiling. “So he started to lose his appeal then?”

“Yeah, I’m afraid so. At that time I was pretty switched off spiritually. Y’know – the whole rebellious teenager thing. So it wasn’t long before I went off Jonathon too. I didn’t fancy going out with somebody who was starting to sound like Tim the vicar.” They both laughed. After a few moments, Beth became quiet. Her eyes seemed to glaze as she stared into the fire. “He said something to me once, Ros. It seemed a strange thing to say at the time.”

Rosie waited for her to continue.

“I remember going to Saint Edwin’s the Sunday before I left for music college. I went more for Mum’s sake than anything. When the service was finished, people started coming up to me, wishing me all the best, offering me bits of advice – that kinda thing. Then, just as I was about to leave, up came Jonathon. He wished me well and we made a bit of small talk. Then he came out with the funniest thing. He looked me straight in the eyes and said,
‘Whatever happens, don’t forget who you are, Beth.’
Just like that. Then he turned and went. I’ve never forgotten it.”

Rosie tried to picture the scene. A disconcerted teenage Beth struggling to hold onto her cool as Jonathon’s blue eyes bored into her soul. It wasn’t hard to imagine. Those eyes could leave a girl in pieces.

“I guess I was a bit narked at first. I thought it was his roundabout way of telling me not to get above my station – y’know, if I ever made it big or anything. Remember your humble beginnings and all that. It niggled me if I’m honest, Ros.” She stared into the fire again and the room became silent.

As they sat in the quietness, Rosie became aware of the steady ticking of the clock. Every moment registered by a tiny note … then gone. Forever gone. Life ticking away, so quietly yet so surely. And for Beth, so quickly. Rosie wondered how she could stand the sound of it.

Beth shuffled in her chair. “It’s funny, Ros. After I first got diagnosed, I found myself thinking about his words more and more.
‘Whatever happens, don’t forget who you are, Beth.’
Suddenly I realised I’d done exactly that.”

“How d’you mean?”

“You remember that day in the church at Applemarket? When you asked me if I still believed in God?”

Rosie nodded.

“I guess that was the first time I’d faced the question in years.”

Catching sight of Beth’s troubled expression, Rosie shifted awkwardly in her seat. She wasn’t sure where this was leading, but she had a feeling confessions were on the way. Conversations like this usually made her uneasy.

Beth twisted a strand of hair distractedly round a finger. “I never told you, Ros, but I had a dream a few nights after that.”

Rosie straightened. “Dreams now, eh? This gets better.” She tried to sound light-hearted about it, but a sudden nervousness had gripped her.

“I dreamt I was on a beach,” Beth began slowly, ignoring her sarcasm. “It was a lovely beach. Not one I could identify in real life, but in the dream it was somehow familiar. You know what dreams are like.”

Rosie nodded but said nothing.

“The place was perfect. Blue sky, not a cloud in sight. Sea like a millpond. There were people all around, swimming or playing in the sand. But I wasn’t taking too much notice of them to be honest. I was just lying there soaking up the sun. It was all too gorgeous to do anything but enjoy.” She went quiet for a moment and Rosie noticed a shadow pass across her face. “Get this, Ros. There I was, perfectly happy in my own little world. Sun on my skin, sea lapping in the background …”

“Buckets of sangria –” Rosie quipped, keen to lighten up the conversation.

But for once, Beth seemed in no mood for levity. “Skip the sangria on this occasion,” she retorted flatly. She twirled a tendril of hair round her finger again. “Suddenly, Ros, without any warning, I heard someone shout out. The voice was loud, agitated – a man’s I think. It hardly matters. Before I even managed to open my eyes, other voices started up. Within seconds people were shouting, screaming. Within seconds – literally. It all happened so fast, it took me a moment or two to get my brain in gear.” Her face furrowed as she played the memory back. “Then sheer panic set in. At that point I jerked upright to see what the heck was going on. That’s when I saw it.”

“Saw what?”

Beth shuddered slightly. “Stuff coming in from the sea.”

“
Stuff?
” Rosie frowned. “
What
stuff?”

Beth was shaking her head slightly. “Don’t know what it was exactly. It was like fog, I guess. But it seemed to be rolling in from the horizon like a huge wall. You just knew that when it hit that beach, everything was going to disappear into it. You could feel it even before it got there. So cold, so terribly cold.”

Rosie shivered despite herself. “So what happened then?”

Beth had closed her eyes now. Her face grew taut as she continued to relate the strange dream. “I realised that people were starting to run. Running off the beach they were, yelling as they went. But me – I couldn’t move. It was like I was riveted to the spot. And all the time, I could see this thing getting nearer and nearer. I was so terrified, I couldn’t even scream.”

Rosie could detect the distress in her friend’s voice. She wanted to get this dream thing over and done with, yet somehow, she was reluctant to break Beth’s flow.

“I knew the exact moment the thing hit. One minute, there was blue sky above me … the next, everything was plunged into a chilling greyness. I just stood there, paralysed. I couldn’t even see my own feet, the fog was so dense. It felt like it was going to suffocate me. And silent! I’ve never known a silence like it. All the shouting had disappeared and I realised everyone else had managed to escape. I sensed I must be totally alone on that beach now. But for me there seemed no way out. Somehow, I knew that I was the one the fog had come for. It was horrible, Ros, it really was.”

Rosie needed no convincing. She was finding Beth’s story pretty unnerving. She forced a grin. “I hope you’re going to tell me you woke up at that point.”

“No, not quite.” Beth gave a weak smile. “I seemed to stand there for a few minutes, waiting. Waiting for something to happen. I knew something had to happen; I just wasn’t sure what. Then slowly, in the midst of the fog, I began to make out the shape of a figure. It was standing about fifteen yards from me. Just a black figure at first – I had no idea who, or what, it was. Then I saw the figure look upwards and point. I looked up. But I could see nothing. Just thick grey. The figure pointed upwards again, this time with more agitation. Still I could see nothing. I heard muffled shouts coming through the fog, as though this person was trying to tell me something. And then I realised. The figure was my mother. I called out to her, but the moment I did, she was gone. And then I woke up.”

Rosie was relieved. “Weird,” she commented as breezily as she could. “Totally weird.”

Beth shrugged. “The weirdest thing about it all happened when I did wake up. Jonathon’s words were running through my mind –
‘Don’t forget who you are, Beth, don’t forget who you are, Beth …’
– like an old record that had got stuck. That was the weirdest bit. I lay in bed for ages trying to put the whole thing together. It was only when I got diagnosed that any of it began to make sense to me.”

Rosie frowned. “Well, I’m sure glad
you
managed to figure it out. I can’t say it makes one iota of sense to me.”

“Don’t you see, Ros?” There was a fire in Beth’s eyes now. “When I found out I was ill, my mind seemed to go back to some automatic default setting. I started praying again, just as I had when I was a child. At first I felt bad – like I was only using God because my life was all screwed up. But then I realised. It was exactly as Jonathon had said. I
had
forgotten who I was … but suddenly I was remembering. The fog had come to swallow me up. But suddenly, it was as if I could see more clearly than I’d ever seen. D’you understand, Ros?”

Rosie shook her head. “At the risk of looking completely thick, I have to say I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.”

Beth suppressed a sigh. “Ros, I …”

The muffled hum of approaching voices sounded outside the door. Rosie was almost relieved. As the door swung open to reveal the speakers, Beth turned to her with an anxious smile. “We’ll have to continue this some other time.”

Rosie pretended to smile back.
Not if I can help it.

____________

It was the following Thursday. New Year’s Day had come and gone, hardly observed by the Simmons’ family. For all its highs, the old year had signed off with such dreadful tidings, it was hard to welcome in the new, knowing it was about to reap the harvest of its predecessor. The week had passed gently, a startling contrast from the frenetic pace of city life. Yet already, their stay in Yorkshire was almost at an end. In two days’ time they would travel back down to London. Beth had an appointment to see Michael Romily first thing Monday morning. Still, sitting in the drowsy-warm living room at Oak Lodge, listening to the steady rhythm of the clock and the hum of the afternoon fire, all that seemed a million miles away.