The One I Was (20 page)

Running away to Fairfleet probably hadn’t been the best way of nurturing our relationship. And it was, as people had persistently reminded me, a high-risk strategy. If Sarah found out who I was she might terminate my employment. No danger of that for now, though. Who’d remember a pale, thin girl who’d lived here for a period of months back in the early eighties? The old woman in the shop? Perhaps. But she wouldn’t be able to link Rosamond Hunter, forty-something nurse, with Rose Madison, not yet thirteen.

When we’d recovered from the immediate fallout of what had happened here at Fairfleet, Dad had settled us in schools in another county. There’d been no time to say goodbye to the few people we knew locally.

When I’d abandoned my medical career, I worked in Europe: Italy and France, mainly, teaching English and looking after children.

There was another message on my phone, from my brother:
Hope you’re all right. Still worried about why you’re doing this. Nothing that happened back then was your fault.

All going well at Fairfleet
, I replied.

A noise outside the kitchen window made me look up. A man was shovelling snow off the path.

‘Did I tell you?’ Sarah asked. ‘I found someone to clear all the paths and the drive. It may snow again, I know, but at least we’ll be ahead with the job.’

I watched the man, who brandished the shovel in jerky movements, a balaclava over his face. I wondered how cold it was out there now. I hadn’t been out today. The sun was appearing, weak and pale, but a welcome presence. This might be the day’s last half-hour of sunshine.

The front door bell rang. ‘That’ll be Benny’s friends.’ Sarah went to let them in.

I bundled myself up in scarf, hat and boots. The air was harsh on my skin to start with, but as I walked I could feel my head clear. I made for the lake, admiring the effects of the low-lying pink-tinted sun on its icy surface. The water rarely froze all the way over like this. I could only remember a couple of occasions in my lifetime when it had happened. A heron flew over the water, very low, as though hunting out a break in the ice, but finding none. The bird continued on to the shore, perching on the small jetty.

Once, when Mum, Dad, Andrew and I had been staying here with Granny, we’d found old skates in the basement and gone out onto the ice. I’d been very small, perhaps only four or five. We formed a line, Andrew and I in the middle, with Mum and Dad skating on the outside, all holding hands. Mum balanced on her skates with perfect poise, holding my hand and keeping me upright.

The heron watched me from the jetty as I remembered all this. But it was too cold to stay still for long, so I made a loop of the lake, striding out to make my blood run warm, passing beside the hedge and fence separating Fairfleet from the houses built in the eighties. From this position the house looked blood-stained by the sunset. I walked more quickly.

I was almost back at the kitchen door when the snow-shoveller shuffled into view. All I could see of his features through his baklava were his eyes: red-rimmed but still very blue. I noticed that the hand holding the spade shook. He moved stiffly, as though the cold had eaten into his bones.

‘Are you all right?’ I asked. ‘Would you like a hot drink?’

He shook his head hastily, muttering something but continuing to stare at me for a moment. I put a hand to my arm, rubbing the scarred skin through the layers of winter clothing.

‘He must be frozen,’ Sarah said when I came into the warm kitchen. She must have watched the exchange. ‘But he was very keen to take on the work. I was surprised by his quick response. I suppose people are eager for any kind of work these days.’ She was loading a tray with tea cups, saucers and a plate of mince pies for the guests.

I peered outside. The man was shuffling off, holding the spade awkwardly, as though it hurt his hand. Easy to forget that there were people in such need of cash. Especially this time of year. I was fortunate; I had money. Work in a warm and comfortable house with an intelligent and likeable client. People in my life who loved me.

‘Shall I draw the blinds?’ I asked, keen to block out the dying afternoon.

23

‘Tell me more about yourself.’ Benny sat back, observing me. His friends’ visit the previous afternoon had boosted his spirits but wearied him. I’d heard them all laughing in his room and felt a moment of near-envy. Now he was sitting up in his armchair, looking as alert as he had in his television days, but very gaunt. His hands shook as he placed his newspaper down beside his laptop. ‘Where did you live as a child? Did you have brothers and sisters?’ He rolled his eyes and the professional in me noted how yellow the whites had become. ‘Listen to me. I’m back in investigative mode. Or just being plain nosy, as my wife used to say.’

I was prepared for this and had composed an edited version of my life, jumping straight from Mum and Dad’s separation to us going to live with Dad, mentioning Mum’s death only in passing. I said nothing about Fairfleet.

I talked about the times spent away at boarding school, or working in Lyons for six months before university so that I could learn to speak French fluently. I told him more stories about my working life in France and Italy: the families I’d loved and those I’d struggled with. I described the Milanese family who’d tried to marry me off to an errant nephew because they thought I’d straighten him out, and the family who fed me one small meal a day, forcing me to subsist on croissants from the bakery across the road. I didn’t mention my original career choice and what had brought it crashing to a halt.

His expression was sharp as he listened. I finished and ran my fingers over the cover of
Great Expectations
lying in my lap.

‘Is your father still alive?’ he asked.

I told him about Dad and his second wife, the tennis player, Marie, who’d become a loved stepmother, and their house in the French Alps.

‘And you have a flat in Docklands?’

I nodded. He was silent for a moment. Probably wondering how my job financed a property of that kind.

‘Sometimes I think I’ve seen you before,’ he said, matter-of-factly.

I stared back at him, meeting his eyes, not flinching.

‘You weren’t in a studio audience for one of my TV interviews, were you?’

I shook my head. ‘Perhaps I’ve got a doppelganger.’ I smiled breezily, but it struck me that I well might have: a ghost version of my old self hanging around Fairfleet. Perhaps Benny had glimpsed this alternative me: the me who might have evolved if Cathal hadn’t turned up, the adult version of the girl who’d lain out there on the sunny daisy-covered lawn with my brother and mother.

Then memory shot me an image so sharp that I almost cried out. I prayed Benny hadn’t noticed my shock. He
had
seen me before. He had entered my childhood briefly. It had happened on that summer afternoon out on the lawn.

Just before Cathal’s bike had squeaked its way towards us I’d spotted a man in a white suit, with a Panama hat. Standing across the lake and staring at us. He’d smiled and waved at me. The day had been perfect: warm air shimmering over the lake, the smell of flowers from the overgrown flowerbeds. Cathal had still been whole minutes away from reaching Mum. If I could only travel back in time and poke a stick into his bicycle wheels to prevent him from cycling up the lane.

But surely Benny couldn’t link me to a thirteen-year-old he’d glimpsed briefly? There must be something about me that reminded him of my grandmother.

I needed to be on my guard. I didn’t want to be guarded, though. I wanted to tell. My mouth was opening.

Someone knocked on the door. Sarah came in. ‘The doctor’s here,’ she said. ‘He was passing and thought he’d come early to avoid the snow that’s forecast later.’

With a mixture of relief and regret I stood up to fetch Benny’s medication and notes.

The doctor, a tired-looking man nearing retirement age, listened to Benny’s heart and took his blood pressure. He asked Benny some questions about his eating and what he termed outputs and whether he was in pain. Benny answered in curt sentences.

‘I hate all this, you know. Oh, not you, doc,’ he gave his sudden dazzling smile. ‘But the whole business of dying. Not the thought of death itself. That I can handle.’ He glanced at the photograph of his wife, perhaps acknowledging that she’d gone this way before him and he’d be following her. ‘But everything that might come first.’

The doctor touched his arm. ‘I promise you, Benny, that as a team we will do all in our power to make sure you’re never frightened or in pain.’

‘I promise too,’ I said, the words coming out more vehemently than I had expected. The doctor and I exchanged glances. I knew we were thinking the same thing: death was coming closer.

‘It’s not that.’ Benny sighed. ‘Though obviously not being in pain is good. It’s the damn dreams.’

‘It might be the medication.’ The doctor was examining Benny’s notes.

‘They’re real,’ Benny muttered. ‘The things I see. They happened.’

The doctor studied him silently. ‘I know only very little about the circumstances of your leaving Germany as a young boy. It doesn’t surprise me that it might come back to haunt you. Would you like to see a –’

‘No priests or shrinks, thank you,’ Benny said quickly.

‘I can prescribe something to help with the agitation,’ the doctor said.

‘I don’t want sedatives either. My subconscious and I will just have to find some way of getting along together.’

It was a comment lightly made, but I sensed that Benny was rattled. Whatever it was that was haunting his sleep needed driving away, exorcising. I wondered whether he’d confide in me, whether it would help him if he could.

‘Let me know how it goes over the next day,’ the doctor told me as I showed him out. ‘He’s going to need the pump soon, for the morphine.’

We discussed painkillers, delivery methods and antipsychotics. I wrote notes and asked questions.

The doctor gave me an appraising look. ‘You’re very well informed on pharmaceuticals.’

I smiled, saying nothing. I went back to Benny and saw he was sleeping again, tranquilly enough, it seemed now.

My first husband hadn’t understood why I enjoyed the closeness I built up with patients. James, I felt, had an inkling of why this aspect of the job appealed. Perhaps because he also had a job that required trust from people: teenagers, in his case, some of them troubled, difficult young people.

James still didn’t know I’d given up on the search for my mother’s letter. I went to my bedroom to ring him, but his phone was on voicemail. I sent him a text instead.

All well. Seem to be building rapport with Benny. No sign of Mum’s letter, but this doesn’t matter any more. I’ve put demons behind me now.

I felt better having sent the message. The snowfall had slowed. Fitful sunshine lit the garden, though more clouds clustered, threatening a fresh snow dump. I decided to take a few minutes’ fresh air and wrapped up to go outside.

A few minutes out in the garden revived me. It was impossible not to respond to this winter perfection. Someone would need to shake branches and bushes free of their white drapery before they were damaged, but it would be a shame. The box-tree shapes were particularly enchanting. I took photographs on my mobile. As I went back inside snowflakes were falling again.

Benny’s room was tidy and there was nothing that needed doing, so I sat watching him until he woke. I showed him the images on my phone.

‘Winter perfection,’ he said. ‘I do miss the topiary animals, though.’

I knew what he meant. I also missed my childhood friends: the fox, the elephant, the pig. And the Spitfire.

‘You’ve still got rosy cheeks, Rosamond.’ He handed me back my mobile. ‘Can you help me to the window? I’d like to look at the trees in the front with the snow on them. I’m fond of those old oaks and chestnuts.’

I wrapped his dressing gown around his shoulders and helped him out of the chair. He winced as he stood, looking irritated when he realized I’d noticed. We stood at the window looking out at the white trees. The snow was covering the tracks in the drive left by the doctor’s car. I tried not to replay my mother’s toboggan ride down the same route, when Cathal had driven too fast and she’d fallen off.

‘I hope Sarah doesn’t need to go out in the car today,’ Benny said. ‘But she’s sensible.’ He shook his head. ‘So sensible I was surprised she didn’t throw me over when I became ill, go and work somewhere more fun. We used to have dinner parties here. Weekend guests. People coming and going.’ He smiled, remembering it. ‘Sarah and Lisa spent hours planning menus and preparing bedrooms, poring over every detail, Sarah worried they’d missed something.’

Yet sensible Sarah had missed something when she’d let me into Fairfleet. I shivered, imagining her response if she found out who I was. James and Andrew had probably been right: if I’d been open at the beginning they might have let me come to Fairfleet as a nurse anyway. My hidden identity would look much more suspicious if the truth eventually slipped out. They might think I’d come back to make some kind of claim on Benny. I hoped he’d forgotten about the conversation we’d had earlier.

Benny stood there for nearly five minutes, probably learning the scene by heart in case it was the last time he saw such snow.

‘It reminds me of Germany,’ he said.

‘You probably had proper winters out there every year,’ I said. Only that one particular English winter thirty years ago really stuck in my memory.

‘I remember being out in the garden with a friend one snowy night. The moon was out and the white bushes and lawn shone with light. It was almost like daylight. We had to hide because …’ He stopped. Perhaps another memory he couldn’t face was surfacing. He stared at the snowy scene for another moment.

‘I’d like to go back to bed now,’ he said. ‘I don’t think I’ll get up again today.’

I helped him lie down and returned to the window to draw the curtains. Sarah’s snow man was pushing a wheelbarrow full of salt and grit across the front of the house. He stopped, rubbing the top of his arm. Heavy physical work like this in freezing air must make his muscles ache. And he wasn’t young, either, I could tell. He moved on stiffly. His hand rubbed the side of the balaclava, as though his head was aching in the cold.