Burden of Memory (15 page)
“Resistance is futile,” Brad chuckled, echoing his favorite TV show.
“Terrible, terrible. They could all have burned to death in their beds,” Mrs. Josepheson muttered to no one in particular, once again.
“Time to take Mother home,” Greg suggested to his father.
Mr. Josepheson was puffing happily away at one of his enormous cigars. Lizzie threw him a look that would frighten small children, but with none of the senior members of the family present to back her up, she clamped her lips shut and said nothing.
“Nighty night, then,” Dave said, having released Amber’s butt. “Leave the bottle will you? There’s a good boy.”
Kyle crossed the room in two enormous strides and grabbed Dave by the arm. “We’ve outstayed our welcome. Time for us to go as well.” His smile was as strong as his grip. The bare flesh on Dave’s white arm stood out in sharp contrast to the deep black of Kyle’s hand. “Ladies, as we have only the one boat, I suggest that we all leave together.” He practically dragged Dave to the door. Rachel and Karen scurried after them. Lizzie followed with offerings of cookies and half-cooked pastries.
Amber burst into tears and fled the room.
“Horrible people,” Megan said. “I’ll have another brandy, please, dear. Can’t imagine why Moira allows them to stay. She’s too kind hearted by half, I’ve always said.”
“Seems quite handy the way they turned up like that,” Alison said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Lizzie turned on her.
“They say that an arsonist always likes to hang around and watch the fire trucks arrive.”
“If you’re making an accusation, you should be prepared to back it up with something stronger than what ‘they’ say.”
“It’s my family that’s threatened here. I intend to speculate as much as I want. Aunt Moira is crazy to let those people stay over there. Particularly after what happened Labor Day.”
“What’s that got to do with anything? Donna’s death was an accident, didn’t you hear? And Moira isn’t crazy in any way. I’ll thank you to remember that.” Lizzie’s hands were placed firmly on her hips, her legs apart.
The phone on the wall beside the back door shrilled like an alien presence, and everyone turned to look at it. Alison was the closest. Her hand shook and she took a deep breath as she picked it up.
“Hello? Okay. Fine. Good. Thank you.” She placed the receiver back onto its cradle. “That was Uncle Charles. They’re okay, and he and Elliot are on the way home with Aunt Moira and Ruth.”
“Just Moira?” Alan asked.
“Mom was apparently quite disoriented when they got there, so the doctors want to keep her in for another night.”
“The poor dear,” said Megan. “She absolutely hates hospitals. A bit more brandy if you please, young Greg.”
Grateful for the interruption, they all pretended to forget about the argument. Alison stared at Lizzie, her eyes throwing daggers, but the cook turned her back to check a tray in the oven.
All the time that family, friends, and staff had been in the kitchen, the dim howling of dogs trying to force their way out of the cab of Alan’s pickup truck echoed around the property. Unable to resist any longer, Alan gave in and with a curse he stamped out into the yard to release the beasts.
They immediately found their way into the kitchen in search of offerings.
Brandy bottle and coffee pot were emptied, cookies reduced to crumbs, and pastries nothing but a memory, but no one wanted to take to their beds until the rest of the Madisons returned.
“Amber seemed a bit touchy,” Phoebe said, nursing the last grains in her cup. “Not like her.”
“Affects us all in a different way,” Lizzie said, wondering if she should bring out the sweet rolls she had intended to be tomorrow’s breakfast.
Unnoticed, Elaine left the room and crept up the stairs. The walls were tinged with a faint residue of smoke, but the fire itself hadn’t reached the old wooden building. Ralph, Augustus, and Elizabeth were, fortunately, quite safe. And, thank goodness, the smoke hadn’t reached the precious paintings lining the walls of the main hall.
Not knowing what to expect when offered a chance at the job and summoned north, Elaine had packed a flashlight. She found the heavy instrument in the back of her cupboard, pulled her coat on over her dressing gown, and ventured outside.
In the courtyard she dropped to her haunches and flicked the powerful beam of her flashlight over the desolation. Fortunately the papers still packed into boxes, those they hadn’t yet read or put aside until another day, were relatively unscathed, a bit of singeing to the edges of cardboard, but little damage to the precious contents inside. A couple of the boxes had shattered on hitting the ground, and the wind had spread papers around the yard. Elaine did her best to collect all the scraps of paper.
The accounts that Phoebe had been examining when they called it a day had been consumed by the flames and were now regaled to disgusting piles of muck and sludge and ashes.
“Quite a mess, eh?” Phoebe stood behind her.
“Not irretrievable, I hope.”
“They’re saying it was my fault.”
“Who’s saying? What’s your fault?”
“The fire. That I left the old electric heater on. Which caused the fire. They’re all accusing me.”
“I didn’t hear anyone saying anything of the sort. I heard them wondering how it started, that’s all. Did you leave the heater on?”
“Of course not.”
“Then the fire investigator will discover so. And that’ll be the end of it.”
“Do you think?”
“Of course I do,” Elaine said with no conviction whatsoever. “Let’s see what we have here. This bunch seems to be in good shape. Tomorrow, we’ll dry out every scrap of paper that’s a bit damp and try to get it all sorted out. Not much seems to be lost. Fortunately, the papers I was studying last, I took into my room to read later.”
“You think most of it can be salvaged?” Megan appeared out of the dark, so unexpectedly that both Phoebe and Elaine started and clutched hands to nervous chests.
“I do,” said Elaine. A full armory of jewelry weighed Megan down. Strings of pearls, diamond broaches and earrings, and gold bangles sparkled on or dangled over her frothy nightgown. Must make an awful racket when she makes love. Perhaps her husband liked to be reminded of all that money he had married. Elaine scolded herself for being mean: the old woman probably grabbed everything she could on her way out of the burning building. Easier to wear than to carry. “Such a waste of time and effort,” Megan said. “Never mind storage space. If it were up to me, I’d get rid of the lot. What’s past is past. And best forgotten.”
“History is important,” Elaine said. “To know where we’re going, we have to know from where we’ve come.”
“Modern nonsense,” Megan said, taking a sip of her drink. “A woman like you—you’d be better off at home with your husband than chasing my sister’s memories.” She stepped out of the light and was swallowed up by the darkness. Only the clatter of her jewelry marked where she had gone.
“Weird,” Phoebe whispered.
The sky was dark, without a trace of moon or stars, and Elaine feared that rain might accomplish what fire had failed to do. She and Phoebe prevailed upon Alan to help them lug the cartons of papers into the kitchen.
They finished just as a weak sun was wondering whether or not to bother peeking its head up over the horizon. A creature of habit, eventually it did, in time to greet Charles and Elliot returning from the hospital with Moira and Ruth.
“My mother’s letters, my papers?” Moira touched the button to roll down the back window and called out before Charles’ Lexus had even come to a halt.
“We’ve saved most of it,” Elaine assured her. “I’ll have a good look at everything tomorrow, this morning I mean, but I think your mother’s letters are safe.”
“Thank heavens for that.” Moira extended a hand out of the car window. “And no small thanks to you, Charles tells me. Well done, dear.”
“No thanks to me at all,” Elaine said, squeezing the hand as tightly as she dared. It was icy cold and the fragile bones were tangible beneath the skin. “Alan fought the fire until the truck arrived.”
“We must be getting you to bed, Miss Madison,” Ruth said, her mouth settled into a tight line.
“Stop fussing, you stupid girl. I don’t have to be packed off to bed like a delinquent child.”
Ruth recoiled as if she had been struck.
Alan and Greg helped bundle Moira out of the car and into the cottage. Charles shouted to Alan to get a roofing contractor over first thing, and to call him as soon as the fire inspector arrived.
Elaine was much too wired to go back to bed. She wanted only to dive into the boxes and check the damage.
Alison refused to return to the second floor, insisting that she would be safer in the rooms over the boathouse. She sent Alan up to her room to fetch toothbrush, towels, duvet, and pillows.
The rising sun highlighted an ugly jagged wound in the roof above the storage building. Where only hours before there had been a tiny dormer window, exactly like those in illustrated volumes of nursery rhymes, there was now a gaping hole, surrounded by raw blackened beams.
“M?”
“Um?”
“Do you miss home?”
“What a silly question. Of course I miss home. Why do you ask?”
“Just wondering.”
“Well, stop wondering and enjoy the day. Isn’t this heavenly?”
“I guess.”
“Oh, for mercy’s sake, Ralph. Stop being so melancholy.” Moira pushed her dark glasses on top of her hair and peered at her brother, her eyes recoiling from the harsh sunlight. “You’re ruining my day.”
“Sorry.”
“So you should be.” She pulled the glasses back down and snuggled deeper into the warm sand. The skin at her throat, face, and arms was still pale yellow. An interesting contrast to the acres of white skin exposed by her borrowed bathing suit. “I’m about ready for another swim. Coming?”
May 1944. The Isle of Capri. Moira had never been anywhere so beautiful. The sun baked their white bodies and the warm sand cradled their war-saturated souls. Ralph and Moira lay on borrowed towels watching the gentle rolling of the azure waters and clouds that moved lazily across a sky almost too blue to behold. Far in the distance, on the rim of the horizon, past the towering limestone rocks reaching up out of the sea like the thumbs of giants, she could see the smoking plume of a ship, heading east through the Mediterranean. A war ship, no doubt. Maybe a troop carrier. En route to God knows where. She shivered in the sun and cast her thoughts to the men it carried, watching until it disappeared over the rim of the world.
She pulled herself to her feet. “Come on. Let’s have one last dip. Almost time to be on our way.”
“You go without me. I’ve had enough.”
“Ralph.” Moira sunk to her haunches beside her brother. “Something is bothering you and I do wish you would talk to me about it.”
“Nothing.”
“Suit yourself.”
She padded across the hot sand and around the rocks and slipped into the water. For a few moments the gentle caress of the soft, warm water on her battledress-roughened skin was enough to make her forget her brother and his unnaturally dismal mood. She flipped onto her back and floated, eyes closed. It was almost possible to believe that she was back home at the family cottage on Lake Muskoka. Taking a quick dip off the end of the dock before supper.
The sharp tang of salt water stung her cracked lips and the image disappeared with a poof, like the end to an insipid amateur magic show.
The beach was not crowded. A few Allied soldiers with their new Italian girlfriends, a handful of local families—only women and children and old men left—several groups of nurses, like Moira herself, on leave at the Number 1 Canadian Nursing Sisters Rest Home at Amalfi. The home was a delight; comfortable, soothing. A wonderful Italian cook lovingly prepared dishes the women had never even heard of, much less eaten; tagliatelli and zabaglioni were Moira’s favorites. The rest home was close to Naples and the Isle of Capri so the sisters and their guests took every advantage of the change to have a real holiday.
Moira was absolutely thrilled to see Ralph, for the first time since the weekend in London. So much had happened, and she was a different person than the girl she had been two years ago. It was perfectly wonderful to be grounded in her family again—even if the family representative was only one self-obsessed brother—to be reminded of who she truly was; not always Nursing Sister Madison, but also Moira: daughter, granddaughter, sister. And the woman who loved Grant Summersland.
Ralph had been bad tempered and distracted the entire day. It was unlike him to be moody. Her heart felt like a lead weight in her chest as she watched him sitting despondently on the beach, clutching his knees in his arms and staring out to sea as though he was seeing nothing at all.
Or perhaps he was seeing too much.
“The ferry will be leaving soon.” Moira clambered out of the water and picked up her towel and beach accessories. “I’m going up to the hut to change. Coming?”
He shrugged.
“Suit yourself. Be right back.”
Reluctantly Moira pulled off her bathing suit, toweled the warm salt water off and struggled into her uniform. She was still on the Isle of Capri but the familiar flat hat, the hated tie, the neatly fitting brown jacket and skirt whisked her back to the war. She would walk in her bare feet for as long as possible before finalizing the uniform and slipping into the thick, practical, ugly shoes.
Ralph was sitting exactly as she had left him. Moira walked up silently; she wasn’t meaning to “sneak up,” but the sand muffled the sound of her bare footsteps.
“All ready.”
He started with as much intensity as if, rather than his sister, a German soldier with a thick accent and thin bayonet had spoken behind him.
“Oh, Ralph.” Moira sunk to the sand and grabbed his shoulders in her hands. Tears streamed in a ceaseless river down his cheeks, his chest heaved and he sobbed into Moira’s loving embrace.
“You have to talk to me, dearest,” she said, when the gasping breathing had stopped and Ralph pulled away, deeply embarrassed. “I refuse to leave until we do. If we have to be sitting here when the rest of the army marches into Berlin, then so be it.”
“For God’s sake, Moira.” He rose to his feet in a single fluid movement, shouting. “You can be such a nag, let’s get the hell out of here.” Further down the beach and on the stairs leading up to the road, Italian families, Allied soldiers, and Canadian nurses looked their way.
“Sit down, Ralph,” she said in her best ward-sister voice. “You’re making a scene. People are looking.”
Trained by mother and grandmother to respond to the words “making a scene” like Pavlov’s dog to a bell, he sat.
She picked up a handful of sand and watched the grains dribble between her fingers.
“I’m so scared, Moira. So scared.” His words had the weight of the world behind them. She watched the gentle movement of the sand.
“In Sicily Paul Redmond had his head shot off. God, it was awful. He was right beside me, fell into me and knocked me off my feet. I went down into the mud with Paul on top of me. I yelled at him to get up, but he didn’t move. I pushed him off, cursing him for a goddamned fool. Then I saw. Half his head was missing.” Ralph buried his own head into his hands and sobbed. “His brains were all over my chest. Everywhere. Gray and lumpy and mixed with thick blood. He came from Winnipeg. Had a wife and two little kids. He talked about those kids all the time. How big and grown up they would be when he got home. He was so proud of them.”
Moira gathered him into her arms once again. There was nothing she could say, so she said nothing. She rocked her older brother while the sun fell in the sky. All along the beach, people gathered up the remains of their picnics, collected tired children and, as Moira had done, put their war clothes back on.
“I’m afraid I’m going to die, M.,” he said at last. The tears had stopped and his voice sounded strong once again. “But even more, I’m afraid I’m going to be a coward. When I saw what remained of Paul, I ran. I ran. Can you imagine what Father would say to that?”
“Oh, damn Father.”
He actually chuckled. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you swear before, little sister. Father would be shocked.”
“Well then damn Father, again. What would he know? Father is safe and sound in Ottawa making lots and lots of lovely money. Doing precisely the same as he did during the first war, I believe. You could have stayed at home, helped him with the business. We both know it. But you didn’t. So Father has nothing to say to you. Never again. But never mind Father. Please don’t worry about what might happen. Anything can happen, and we will only destroy ourselves if we keep thinking about it. I’ve seen a great deal as well.”
“I know you have.”
“And I’ve learned that people can be amazingly strong. I have also learned that fear is natural and the men who aren’t afraid are either lying through their teeth or there is something seriously, dreadfully wrong with them.”
He stretched his long legs out on the sand, and snuggled back into Moira’s chest. “Thank you, dearest. But M?”
“Yes.”
“If I die….”
“You won’t die. You’re Ralph Madison. Grandfather would never forgive you.”
He didn’t laugh. “If I die, I want you to know one thing.”
She stroked his hair.
“I killed her. And I’m sorry.”