Consider the Lily (56 page)

After that, growling like an animal, leaving grievous wounds in her wake, she whirled out over the Atlantic and headed east.

Carrying a bunch of dew-soaked lily-of-the-valley and a string bag, Matty walked up the avenue of limes in the churchyard. Sappy and fresh, the flowers smelt of spring and soaked her cotton gloves. She left them on the wooden ledge inside the porch alongside a collection of drums and bugles left by the Odiham-Nether Hinton Scout band who had been practising for the June parade. (Matty always meant to ask the vicar what the ledges were for — sinners who were not allowed into the service or latecomers?) and went inside to say good morning to Mr Pengeally whose bicycle she had spotted.

Looking hairier and more stick-like even than usual, he was inspecting the wood in the main doors. ‘Dear, oh dear, there is always something that needs repairing,’ he said, after greeting Matty. He refused to meet her eyes and wrote a line of muddled-looking script in his notebook. Something in that polite evasion told Matty that this was a preamble. She was right.

‘We have also got to the point, Lady Dysart, where we must tackle the stonework in that arch.’ He pointed over-dramatically. ‘And there.’ Obediently, Matty looked. ‘Shocking decay, Lady Dysart.’

Exuding the odour of mothballs, he swivelled in the direction of the arch above the main window and flapped a hand at the south transept wall, which did, indeed, bulge. What can we do? said his gesture. We need help. The implication was clear.

Matty observed that Mr Pengeally had tufts of hair on his fingers as well as in his ears. ‘Yes, indeed, Mr Pengeally,’ she said, fascinated and repelled, wondering if she sounded as she did to herself: a parody of the lady of the manor, one in the long line of good ladies who presented a befrocked, united Anglican front, and hid yearnings and griefs under Sunday hats. ‘We must talk about it. Perhaps we should draw up a plan of action. I am sure my husband will have a view.’

‘It’s not so much ideas, Lady Dysart,’ said Mr Pengeally pointedly, risking a great deal – but, then, God was worth a risk.

Having agreed to contact Mrs Pengeally about the Women’s Institute cake-making contest, Matty murmured a platitude and left him gazing fixedly at the structure of his church, feeling treacherous. Perhaps if she had found the vicar more sympathetic, Matty might have been tempted to confide a little of her turmoil over her marriage.

The lily-of-the-valley had stained the wooden ledge. Matty picked them up and trod over the grass to Rupert’s grave, pausing to pick up a stray cigarette card of the sort that the boys in the school opposite collected. It was a colourful card depicting the new Sunbeam car and she could not bear to waste it. She put it in her pocket, intending to dry it out and send it over to the school for their noticeboard.

Rupert’s grave was situated in the south section of the churchyard, and the earth heaped over it was still raw and unsettled-looking. The headstone that Kit had chosen was grey and inscribed with Rupert’s name and his dates. That was all.

Mrs Pengeally had questioned its brevity — dear Sir Rupert, she said, had done so much more, should they not suggest his standing, his rank? – but Kit had been unexpectedly stubborn. Privately, Matty felt Rupert would have minded not having his army rank indicated; but no inscription could make up for... not so much the loss but the space left by Rupert, around which tiptoed his remaining family.

Someone had visited the grave recently, someone who had tidied the straggling grass, pulled out weeds, left a bunch of lily-of-the-valley in a pot and driven a small wooden cross of the sort seen in war cemeteries into the earth. On it was printed in block capitals: ‘Boisselle, July 1916. He kept faith.’ Matty dropped down onto her haunches and touched a faded petal.

Danny.

She arranged her flowers in the vase she had brought, and filled it with rainwater from the butt. Then she stepped back to consider the effect. The grave looked neat and ordered, unlike her father-in-law, who had tried to contain his life within a slot, only to find that, tangled and unpredictable, it escaped from the tag written above it. Now that Rupert’s uncomfortable presence was no longer there, Matty could see that.

The Scouts were playing tag in the field below the church, shouting at each other, pounding over the grass like young horses. The sound floated back to Matty. High-pitched. Excited. Young.

She took one last look at the grave and picked up her string bag.

At home in Dippenhall Street in her freshly painted morning room, Flora was working at household accounts. She was dressed in a terrible old tweed skirt and an overall from a stall in Farnham market. Matty eyed it with disapproval, but lack of elegance could not hide Flora’s happiness.

‘Goodness,’ she exclaimed on seeing Matty, jumped up and ripped off the overall. ‘I wasn’t expecting callers this morning.’

‘I thought you wouldn’t mind. I’ve walked over from the churchyard.’

‘No, of course not. You’re family.’ Flora rang the bell. ‘Elevenses?’

While they chatted, the phrase ‘You’re family’ resonated like evening bells in Matty’s head. It was such a simple phrase to indicate such a complicated arrangement of people and associations. The ease with which it had slid off Flora’s tongue made Matty feel sad when she reflected that soon it would no longer apply. She was going, of course she was going. After Kit’s latest telephone call from Antibes, there was no question.

Daisy’s in trouble, he had said. Understand, Matty. Please. I have to help. I’ll be home as soon as I’ve sorted it out. When she went silent, he said, You have
got
to understand. The old demon gave the reply. There’s no ‘got’ about it, Kit.

Please, Matty.

I don’t understand.

‘Did I tell you Kit has been in France and is on his way home?’ she said.

Flora took a large bite out of her second biscuit. ‘Lucky chap.’

Matty sat back on glazed cotton and sniffed at the lingering paint smell. ‘Did you write to Polly about the new baby?’

‘Ye gods.’ Flora clutched her head. ‘I didn’t. And a miffed Polly is more than I can bear. As for her children.’ A thought struck her. ‘If I have children, I suppose Polly will come and stay more often.’ She reached for the teapot. ‘I don’t think I can bear the thought.’

Too late, she saw Matty flinch at the mention of children. ‘Oh, Matty,’ she said. ‘That was tactless of me.’

‘Don’t be silly. I brought up the subject.’

Flora drank more tea. ‘Can I ask you a searching question, Matty? Do you mind very much? About... about no babies.’

‘Do I mind?’ Matty folded her hands and pressed them into her stomach. ‘I’m not sure how to explain it, but if I said that I minded like a river not having water, or a garden not having rain, would that convey what I mean? Does that sound very silly?’

Flora looked remarkably like her brother when put on the spot, taking refuge behind dropped eyelids, embarrassed, trying to understand. ‘I’m sorry, Matty,’ she said, clearly feeling inadequate to comment. Without the usual clatter she replaced her cup on the saucer. ‘Don’t talk about it any more.’

Matty’s lower lip made her look very young. ‘Funnily enough, Flora, it’s a relief to talk about it. I’ve bottled it up for so long.’

‘Is it?’

‘Sometimes, I’ve found myself hating women with babies and wondered if I was going crazy. Once when I went into a shoe shop in Farnham there was a woman in there with twins. I hated her. And I hated her so much, I had to leave the shop.’ Matty’s eyes widened at the recollection. ‘Stupid, really.’

Flora examined the delicate face in the chair opposite – not so delicate now that country living had freshened Matty’s skin and plumped her out a bit. ‘Matty, I’m going to be very tactless, but it might appeal to you.’

‘Go on.’

‘You know my pet project, the family planning clinic for the village.’ Flora had practised the words and enunciated them with care, watching for Matty’s reaction.

‘Oh, yes.’ Matty also made a brave attempt to sound at ease with the idea. The two women stared at each other solemnly and then Matty flopped back in her chair and began to laugh. ‘You’d think we were talking about murder, Flora.’

Flora pulled herself together. ‘I want to get it going in Nether Hinton. I
know
it’s a good idea.’

‘Go on,’ said Matty.

‘It’s important that the clinic is easy to reach but reasonably tucked away. No one wants to be watched as they go in and out. I need help running it
and
to make it respectable so that the wives will feel easy about coming for help and advice. That is where you could help.’

‘I see.’

‘Besides, there aren’t many people I dare discuss it with.’

It only needed one more request to make a hat-trick for the morning, thought Matty. Stone arches, Dutch caps, what would be next? The requests pleased her, though.

‘It will be uphill work, I don’t doubt,’ said Flora. ‘Possibly we could find ourselves very unpopular. Jezebels in tweeds.’

‘What does Dr Lofts think?’ asked Matty.

‘Why don’t you call him Robin?’ Flora looked soft, happy and released. ‘He and I agree absolutely.’

As they spoke, Hurricane Betsy was half-way across the Atlantic, gathering speed and force. She sent out forerunners of thick cloud which spread over the morning sky and curdled into black junket. Gradually, under the quickening breeze, the new leaves on the trees turned their silvered backs to the onlooker.

Ned was in the walled garden, checking the cloches. He looked up at the sky and made a mental note to tie in plants at risk from the wind. Do it now, boy, he told himself and got rather stiffly to his feet.

‘Weather looks odd to me, Lady Dysart,’ he said when he saw her later. ‘You don’t get a sky that colour unless something’s brewing.’

She looked up at the sky. ‘I hope you’re wrong, Mr Sheppey.’

‘I’m right.’ He paused and wiped his fingers on some sacking. ‘I drive Ellen hopping mad because I’m always right.’

When Ellen had been ill, Ned never mentioned her in conversation. Now that she was better he dropped her name in frequently. Matty helped Ned to lift the heavy cloches into place, leaving footprints in the green-speckled, spring earth.

Ned settled a cloche and collected up his tools. Matty handed him the dibber and his trowel.

‘I’m so pleased that Mrs Sheppey is better,’ she said, running her fingers along the smoothed handle.

Ned sighed gustily.

By tea-time, the sky looked worse and the wind picked up. Thankful there were no afternoon callers, Matty retreated into the drawing room and ate her tea in front of a fire of applewood logs. Mrs Dawes did her conjuring trick with the tablecloth and placed a plate of scones wrapped in a napkin on top.

To her surprise, Matty ate three and washed them down with Lapsang Souchong. Sleepy and full, and content just to be, she watched the fire and listened to the house creaking with the wind. Odd bangs filtered through to her as it blew into corners and caught at loose objects. She almost made the effort to telephone Tyson in the stables to check that the horses were under control, but felt too lazy.

She supposed that none of these things would be her concern in the future.

Minerva had taken to following her about, and whimpered in the basket Matty had had placed in the room. Matty snapped her fingers and the dog pattered over and settled beside her chair. A little later, she concluded drowsily that the weather was how she felt about Kit and herself, lashed and turbulent. She imagined him as she had last seen him three months ago – pale and irritable because it was five o’clock in the morning, a cut on his chin from a too-hasty shave, surrounded by a mountain of luggage. But he had been eager to be off, quivering with the prospect of the East.

Then, in a wilful rubbing of salt into wounds, Matty picked over the puzzle as to why Daisy had sent for Kit. Perhaps she was in trouble, or had quarrelled with Susan... It was possible. Perhaps Daisy wanted Kit to leave Matty and was going to persuade him in person. Although Matty was thinking of doing precisely that it did not stop her from feeling outraged, and her face burned with indignation.

The fire shifted over the logs and, half sleeping, half waking, Matty was aware of a change. A ripple of gooseflesh over her skin, a surge of blood at the base of her neck. With it, Matty’s conscious perception of the room and its objects altered — as if she had flowed through a mirror and was looking at herself and the room from inside out. Heavy and inert, her body was anchored into the chair but her brain spun.

At Matty’s feet, Minerva twitched and whimpered.

The air felt charged with an electricity Matty could not place. She looked down the length of her legs to her feet and went very cold. Winging in from another dimension, a familiar note pricked and reverberated, needle-sharp and foreboding. Matty willed it to stop, rolling her head, which felt as heavy as stone, towards the fire.

Outside in the garden, the wind swelled and whined around the corners of the house. Rattling in counterpoint was the slap, slap of branches against other branches.

A flash of colour, a movement, something, caught in the corner of Matty’s eye and hung, frozen. As if pulled by an unseen puppet master, Matty turned away from the fire, eyes wide and brilliant with unease. The wind screamed down the chimney and she heard herself cry out, sharp and despairing, ‘I know who you are.’

The girl sitting quietly in the tapestry chair by the window looked up from the needlework in her hand, and Matty stared into a version of Kit’s face. A long, thin nose, thick, fair eyebrows, flaxen hair caught back in a severely neat plait. The sort of plait a nanny might make.

‘You’re Rose, aren’t you?’ asked a wooden-lipped Matty from her chair. ‘Why do you keep coming back?’

Rose bent her head and pulled the needle through the half-worked canvas. The steel glinted and made a popping sound as it pierced the material. Rose’s childish bones were outlined under her skin with each movement. Matty swallowed. At the point where the child’s chin met her cheek, in the confluence of fresh skin, soft hair and uneven hairline, there was innocence – and a suggestion of later beauty in the features which neither Flora nor Polly possessed. Absorbed in her task, Rose pulled the thread through the canvas, her head cocked to one side.