The Stopped Heart (7 page)

I could buy you some boots, if you want, he said.

What?

Boots. Boots for your pretty little feet.

I looked at him.

I know what boots are.

Well, then?

No, thanks.

You don't want them?

No.

His face went soft and sad.

But look. Look at what's on your feet, Eliza. I'm telling you, you do need some.

I didn't need to look at my feet. I knew what my boots were like. I knew that they were torn and scuffed and muddy and coming apart so they flapped wide-open at the toe and heel.

They're not my Sunday ones, I said.

Still, he said. I could get you some.

I stared at him. The house was empty. Everyone was either at school or else out in the fields. He should have been there too. I knew he'd come back on purpose. There was no sound but the clock ticking.

I wish you'd go away, I said.

I heard him suck his teeth.

Where are your manners, Eliza?

It's the truth.

It's very rude when here I am offering to get you some boots.

You can't get me boots, I said.

I can. I can get anything I want. You'll see.

You've no money.

Who said anything about money?

I looked at his eager dirty face and I remembered the new boots he'd had on that first night, the night of the storm. Boots that no man had ever walked anywhere in. I looked down at his feet. They were old now, those boots, old and worn as if he'd been wearing them for two years or more.

What? he said. You won't let me get you some? You won't do me the honor?

No.

All right, then, Princess Eliza. Have it your way.

I will, I said.

He stuck his hands in his pockets and he didn't say anything and when I didn't either, he turned and walked away.

But a moment later, he was back.

I could take you to the sea, he said. What about that? I bet you've never seen the sea. Tell me right now, have you ever seen the sea, Eliza?

I have seen it, I said.

I don't believe you.

Three years ago. We went to the sea at Yarmouth. Father took us. We took the kiddies in the cart.

It was true. I remembered it well. The loud excitement of the kiddies and the wild, smashed feeling I got as my father drove the cart around a narrow bend in the road and there it was in front of us, glittering and vast, the boldest, most astounding thing you ever saw.

Well then, said James Dix. How about I take you there again? We can make a proper trip of it this time.

It was a proper trip last time, I said.

All right, but this time we can ride on a donkey and dip our feet in the cold water and walk on the promenade and look at all the fancy tricks on the pier.

We did all of those things last time, I said, even though I knew we hadn't.

What, even the pier? You went on the pier?

I looked at him and I said nothing. And I thought of the pier at Yarmouth that I hadn't ever been on and how much I would have liked to do all of those games like the one where you brought the hammer down as hard as you could and the thing slid up and hit the bell and showed how strong you were. I also thought how frightening James Dix looked when he talked about wanting to make me do things.

Well, we had to come home, I said at last. Because Lottie fell in.

James smiled.

Fell in what?

She fell into the lake. The boating lake. She walked right in and the water was higher than her head and she got a mouthful of tiddlers and our father had to pull her out. She was ever so upset and her clothes were sopping wet. Father put his coat around her but we had to come home in case she got a chill. She was only one year old at the time, I added. It wasn't her fault.

James laughed.

Maybe I'll take young Lottie to Yarmouth, he said. If you won't come with me. Maybe I'll take all the little kiddies and show them what a good time really is.

I looked at him. I realized I didn't like the way he talked about the kiddies.

How long are you staying here? I asked him. What I mean is, when will you go?

He was still laughing about the kiddies but that stopped him. So as not to look surprised, he stuck his hands in his pockets. I saw him shrug.

I don't know how long. What does it matter? Just as long as your father wants me, I suppose. Why, Eliza? Why do you want to know?

I felt my heart start to race.

He doesn't want you, I said.

What?

He doesn't want you here, James. Don't you see? He's just being kind. My father is a very kind man and he feels very sorry for you, that's all.

Now at last he looked quite angry. His face grew pale and I saw him swallow hard.

Why would your father feel sorry for me?

I tried to shrug.

Because of how you've no family or work and you're all alone in the world and all that.

He rubbed at his hair. He seemed to be thinking hard about this.

I'm not alone in the world at all, Eliza. You're quite wrong about that.

Who's your family, then? Where are they?

That's none of your bloody business.

I wanted to laugh then, but I decided not to. I thought again of that day by the sea at Yarmouth and how happy we'd all been even though we hadn't gone on the pier. And I thought that even if I didn't like James very much, I ought to feel very sorry that he didn't have any of what I had—family and memories and small brothers and sisters and always the happy possibility that one day something good or interesting or new might come along.

But still my heart was thumping.

We don't know anything about you, I said.

His face grew careful.

Who is it that says that? Does your father say that? Does your mother?

I shook my head.

It's only me who's interested. And I suppose Jazzy and Frank and Lottie are quite interested too.

Not the twins?

The twins are only interested in each other.

And Honey?

Honey? It made me shiver that he knew all our babies' names.

Honey's just a baby, I said. She doesn't even know to be interested in things yet.

He seemed to relax.

One day, Eliza, I'll tell you my whole life story and then you'll be sorry.

Why will I be sorry?

Because it's a very sad one and if you've any heart at all inside that pretty little breast of yours, it will make you feel ashamed to have been so unkind.

I looked at him. I didn't know if I was being unkind or not and I wasn't sure that I cared.

I'm sure your life story is very sad indeed, I said. But I'm also sure that it's none of my business.

And because I'd had enough, I began to walk away. But as I walked, he called out to me and what he said next made my heart jump.

It's called the High Striker, by the way, Eliza, he said.

I stopped.

What? I said, blushing to my roots. What is?

That thing.

What thing?

The thing that you hit with the hammer to show how strong you are.

B
ACK HOME
G
RAHAM SHOWS HER THE THINGS HE
'
S GOT FOR THE
dog, things he's been hiding in the old apple shed at the bottom of the garden, a place where he says he knew she would never dream of looking. There's a bed made of soft brown furry fabric. Metal bowls. A bag of dried puppy food. A plush toy that is supposed to be in the shape of a bone, but which they both agree looks more like a legless rat.

For a quick moment this makes her laugh and she sees how eagerly he jumps on that fact, his whole face brightening.

“Look,” he tells her as they sit together on the bench in the kitchen and watch the little dog potter around on the sheets of
newspaper they've had to put down. “I knew it was a risk; obviously I did. But I also knew that if I asked you, you'd say no before you'd even thought about it.”

Mary says nothing. His arm is around her. He squeezes her shoulder.

“Well?” he says. “Isn't it true?”

She doesn't look at him. Is that what she's turned into? she wonders, a person who says no to everything without even thinking?

She holds out her fingers to the dog, who sniffs at them, tail moving gently from side to side. Feeling Graham watching her.

“But you were right,” he goes on. “The other day—when you said all we do is watch TV. It's true. It is all we seem to do. We need to do other things. We need stuff in our lives, even difficult stuff. We need to start living again.”

Mary looks at him.

“By getting a dog?”

He glances back at the dog for a moment as if he expects it to answer the question.

“Well, it's a start, isn't it?”

Mary says nothing. She allows herself to touch the animal's dark head. The softness behind her ears, the sprinkling of dark freckles on her white nose. Two black patches around her eyes.

“Has she got a name?”

Graham shakes his head, but she can feel his delight at the question.

“The woman said they've never called it anything. What do you think? What should she be called?”

Mary hesitates.

“We can't keep her. I mean it. We just can't.”

He keeps his eyes on Mary—soft, apologetic.

“Just give yourself some time, darling.”

She shakes her head. “I won't change my mind.”

Graham sighs. He passes his hand over his face.

“All right. Three days. Can you just give me three days? Will you do that for me? I told her we'd decide in three days.”

He says he'll take the dog for a walk around the garden. She watches them both go, the little dog leading him as it sniffs and pulls and wanders. She thinks that they both look very content.

But ten minutes later, glancing out of an upstairs window, she sees him sitting on the white bench with the dog at his feet. His head is in his hands. She watches him for a few more moments, then she moves away.

T
HAT NIGHT IN BED, HE TURNS TO HER AND FOR THE FIRST TIME
in as long as she can remember, she lets him in. He does what he hardly ever does these days: holding her to him, kissing her, putting his lips on the parts of her that are nearest to his mouth. She hears him telling her he loves her. He licks her bottom lip, tasting her, and then she feels him nudging at her, pressing and parting, gaining ground. A sigh, a little moan—the old familiar sounds and rhythms, breath and body, skin and hair, fingers, lips, tongue. The bright, warm taste of his saliva. The skin of his thighs, his belly, hot against her. A quick nip with his teeth.

Afterward, she lies there. Calm. Wet. Breathing. Thinking that perhaps she won't take a pill tonight. She'll just stay very still and see what happens without.

She gazes at the slit of sky just visible under the blind—put up recently to replace the too-short curtains. Navy blue, edged with something. Past ten o'clock and the sky not yet black.

His hand comes over, reaching for her, coming to rest on her thigh. His breathing tells her that he's not asleep.

N
EXT TIME SHE OPENS HER EYES, THE ROOM IS DAZZLING, ALIVE
with sunshine. At first the voices are very quiet, a man and a
woman, coming from somewhere else, close or far away, she can't tell, not in the room, maybe the lane—

What you don't think about, you don't know.

But I do know—

You need to forget what you know—if you value this little beating heart—

Mary tears herself from sleep, sitting up, crying out, hands clenched as she grabs at the sheets, eyes wild, heart banging.

“What?” Graham, eyes still closed and clutching at her, putting his arms out. “Darling—what? What is it? What's the matter?”

She stares around her. Trying to breathe.

“It's that place.”

“What? What place?”

“The shed. Where you put the dog things.”

She stares at him, her throat hot and tight.

“The apple shed? What about it?” He's sitting up now, eyes open, looking at her. “Mary, wake up. You're making no sense. I've no idea what you're talking about. Seriously, what's the matter?”

She gazes at him.

“I don't know.”

“What?”

“I don't know what I'm talking about,” she says, beginning to cry.

His arms now, coming around her, closing around her, shushing her. He holds her.

“Darling, my darling—you were asleep. Open your eyes now—I mean it—look around you. Open your eyes and look at me. Look at where you are.”

She does it. Still clinging to him, she opens her eyes and she looks. Sees the old chest of drawers, the brown cardboard boxes
still to be unpacked. Her jeans and bra flung on a chair. Yesterday's scrunched-up newspaper and his bottles of pills, a comb, his loose change. The wavy light coming in through the window.

He kisses her head.

“There,” he says. “All right now?” And when she still doesn't speak. “That hasn't happened in a very long time, has it?”

I
T WAS
M
AY AND IN THE LANES YOU COULDN
'
T MOVE FOR FOLK
going on about how overjoyed they were to see the blossoms and the sunshine and the birds and the bees and so on. The lambs were growing fat on blossoms. Mother did all our beds with turpentine and salt to get rid of the bugs. The days got longer and the night frosts stopped and small brown birds bathed themselves in the dust pockets in the lane where the puddles used to be.

A wren started to build its nest under the eaves of the shed and as usual the cat sat and watched, waiting to kill the fledglings just as soon as they hatched. And as usual Minnie and Charlie moaned and cried about it and said it wasn't fair and why didn't God stop it? Maybe God has better things to do, our father said.

Bees drifted over the garden, and hollyhocks unfurled their hairy buds and stood in their lemon and salmon rows. Slowly, our mother seemed to wake up and start eating and thinking and talking again. She took the baby into the garden and laid him on a piece of sacking under the apple tree, where he kicked and cooed and watched the light flicker around in the leaves. She sat and watched him, and I saw our father watching her very hard—
careful always to glance away the moment she saw his eyes were on her.

Honey found a dead rat lying by the tap in the orchard, its pale, hairless feet curled and flies crawling over its face, and we told her not to touch it and she didn't. The air was full of mown grass and the ripe, baked scent of the wallflowers that grew by the back door. One day Jazzy's freckles weren't there and the next day they were, as if someone had crept up in the night with a paintbrush and done them while she slept.

Each warm morning the Narkets hung their birdcage outside so the parrot could bask and preen in the warmth of the sun, except that this year old Mrs. Narket, who had died at Christmas, wasn't around to see it.

But it doesn't matter, Lottie said, waving her fingers around as if she was enjoying a merry tune that no one else could hear. Because she's coming back and she's on her way right now!

I was darning Frank's socks. I pulled the thread from my mouth and held it up, stiff and wet in the air. I looked over at our mother, who was sweeping the floor.

Coming back? What do you mean, Lottie, who's coming back?

Lottie blinked at me.

The old lady. The one that was dead. She's coming back. She says we don't need to worry about anything, 'cause it won't be long now.

Lottie always did have special ideas about the dead. Once, when she was two or three, she pointed, laughing and smiling, to the darkest corner of the room and shouted, Man, man! in her loudest voice. When we asked her what man she was talking about, she said it was her friend who'd come looking for his old family.

What old family? we said.

His old family from when he used to be alive, of course!

Another time she insisted that a dark-faced hawker that came to the door selling tin toys was a little boy she used to know.

How ever could you possibly know him, Lottie? You're only three.

I knowed him when I was his age, she said.

His age? But he's even older than Father.

Lottie smiled, but something about her face didn't look quite right.

Just like I used to be, she said.

Sometimes weeks or months went by and Lottie seemed to forget her queer ideas. Now and then she'd just be a plain old ordinary little child for a while, larking around with Honey or the dog or the twins and playing Susie Go Around the Moon and fighting and shouting and stopping all the nonsense about dead people. But something about James Dix's arrival in our lives seemed to have stirred it up again: as if the simple sight and sound of him had rattled some sour old memory in her and got her going.

You mean old Mrs. Narket? I said now as I tried again to thread the needle. Poor Mrs. Narket's in heaven, Lottie. Even if she wanted to, she couldn't come back here.

Lottie shot me a look. Her face said I didn't know a single thing.

She's comin'. She says that nothing's going to stop her because—because—because she misses her parrot too much. She don't much care for it there anyway.

I smiled, twisting the thread and pulling it through the needle's sharp slit.

Doesn't care for it where?

Lottie narrowed her eyes.

In heaven! She don't like the color of it and she don't like
God one little bit and, anyway, she says the poor parrot is very sad without her.

Our mother stopped sweeping. Leaning on her broom for a moment, shaking her head.

What a lot of nonsense, Lottikins. Since when were you talking to old Mrs. Narket anyway?

Lottie frowned and tapped her finger on her forehead.

Um, let me see—I think it was when she was crawling on the floor under my bed.

Now I couldn't help laughing. It was hard to think of old Mrs. Narket, who had never been the sprightliest of persons at the best of times, crawling around on her hands and knees on the floor under Lottie's bed.

Our mother picked up the broom again.

Now you just stop telling boomers, she said. And you too, Eliza, you ought to know better than to laugh about the dead. Poor Mrs. Narket was put in the ground on Christmas Eve and everyone knows she's with her maker now and God bless her.

Lottie frowned.

What's her maker?

It means the same as heaven, I said.

Now Lottie stamped her foot and shook her head, blowing air out of her mouth.

Not in heaven, she ain't, not anymore—I told you! She only went there for a little bit of time and that was only because she wanted to see her boy.

What boy? I said.

Lottie shut her eyes and opened them again.

Let me see: I think it was the one that was hit by the cart.

Now our mother straightened up and stared at Lottie.

How do you know that?

What?

About Mrs. Narket's lad. How do you know it?

Lottie yawned.

I don't know how I knowed it. I just did know it.

I looked at my mother, who was still gazing at Lottie with her mouth open.

I didn't know Mrs. Narket had a lad, I said, because as far as I knew, all the Narkets since way back had been girls.

My mother stood the broom up against the wall and took her shawl, winding it around herself. She seemed to shiver.

He was hit by a hay cart when he was small. Years ago. I was only a girl myself. She never spoke about it. She didn't like to. No one in the family did. It's been years since I heard anyone speak about it.

My mother sat down by the hearth. Shock all over her face. And I looked at my naughty sister, who was bobbing around the kitchen now, lifting her petticoats and jigging around on the spot and looking a bit too pleased with herself. She glanced at me then and a quick blast of surprise shot across her face and she started to laugh. Pointing her finger at me. I felt my skin grow cold.

What? I said. What's the matter, Lottie? What is it?

Lottie nodded at something just past my shoulder.

There, she said, and she narrowed her eyes as if she was staring at something.

What?

Eliza, look! There. It's her—she's just behind you.

I couldn't help it. I shivered.

What do you mean? I said. Who's behind me?

Her. The lady.

I tried to look behind me. Lottie was laughing, very amused now.

There's no one there, I said.

Yes, there is.

Where?

I watched as Lottie's face went cool and intent, as if she was trying even harder to look at something.

There! By your neck—

My neck?

No, your hair. Oh no, now she's right by your hand!

I pulled my hand back sharply and looked at our mother. I tried to laugh.

What? Now you're saying you can see old Mrs. Narket standing next to me?

Still gazing at the space around me, Lottie shook her head.

Not Mrs. Narket, no. The other lady.

What do you mean? What other lady?

The one with the long black hair. The one that cries all the time and doesn't have any skirts.

Our mother seemed relieved that it wasn't Mrs. Narket. She let out a laugh.

No skirts? A lady in the altogether? Now that would certainly be enough to make anybody cry.

Lottie gazed at our mother and chewed her lip as if she was considering this. Then she shook her head.

No, she ain't in the altogether. She don't mind about the skirts. She has other clothes. She has breeches.

A lady in breeches?

For a moment Lottie looked upset.

And she's crying because of the man.

What man?

The man that took her little girls away and did—this!—to them.

Lottie raised up her hands and brought them down so hard on the table that the spoons and knives rattled in the drawer. I gasped. I saw a flash of fear go across our mother's face.

Don't do that, Lottie, she said. I mean it. You just stop it right this minute or you'll break something.

Keeping herself very still, Lottie blinked.

It's what the man did.

The man. A cold, dark pain in my chest. For a quick moment I couldn't breathe.

What man? I said. What little girls?

Lottie didn't look at me. She had a look on her face that I didn't recognize: you would think she was staring at something that was going on a very long way away from us.

I don't know if they're in heaven or not but I don't think they're coming back ever again.

I
T
'
S
M
AY.
T
HE SKIES ARE BLUE AND THE DAYS ARE LENGTHENING
. They had a week or two of coolness and cloud, but now every morning they wake to the same wide, steady sky, the same swelling promise of heat.

Leaving the back door open, Mary walks down the garden to hang the washing. The dog follows her, bobbing in and out of the flower beds, sniffing at leaves and shrubs, squatting always to pee in the exact same, yellowing place on the edge of the lawn where the grass is mostly moss and scrub and dandelions.

She hasn't named it yet. But for Graham just the fact that she hasn't made him take it back is enough. Three weeks now they've had it.

A week ago, Ruby phoned up and said if they didn't want it, she'd take it. She said that her mother had agreed to seriously consider it if it would make her work harder at school.

Mary heard Graham laugh.

“If she really said that, then she's an even bigger fool than I thought she was. The only thing that's ever going to make you do any work at school is you, Rubes. And anyway, that dog was
Mary's birthday present and we're keeping it, thanks very much.”

Ruby must have asked if Mary really wanted to keep it, because she heard Graham hesitate.

“Yes. Yes, she does. She's coming around to it anyway.” He paused, listening. “Oh, she did, did she?” Then he laughed. “And anyway, I seem to remember that you don't have the best track record when it comes to looking after animals,” he added, reminding Ruby of the hamster that she took to school that drowned in a bucket of glue.

When he came off the phone, he looked at Mary.

“She says it wasn't her fault.”

“What wasn't?”

“The hamster and the glue. She says she was seven years old and the supply teacher left the cage door open.”

Seven years old. Feeling Graham watching her, she tried to smile. Heard him sigh.

“Did you tell her you didn't want the dog?”

Mary remembered the phone call. Ruby, clearly put up to it by her mother, ringing to wish her a sullen happy birthday.

“I didn't say that.”

“But you said something?”

Thinking about that morning, something inside Mary seemed to collapse.

“Oh God. I don't know what I said. I can't remember. You know what she's like. She hears whatever she wants to hear.”

Graham looked at her with pain in his eyes.

“I don't mind. It doesn't matter if you said it or not. I was only making conversation.”

“All right.”

“I was, you know.”

“I know you were.”

He took a breath.

“She's not having it anyway. I'd rather take it back to the breeder than let her and her mother get their hands on it.”

“Come on,” Mary says now to the dog as she makes her way down the garden with the washing basket. “Come on, let's go and hang up the washing.”

They thought about having a line in the yard—there's even a handy iron hook on the old brick wall. But she's come to rather like this short walk—down the shallow stone steps, brushing past the tired and leggy old lavender and on through the long, unmown grass, down toward the huge old tree trunk that looks as if it's lain there for a hundred years or more.

The line is strung between two apple trees. On a hot day, the washing is dry in less than half an hour. She can get a couple of loads done before lunch.

They haven't done anything to the garden yet, though they keep on telling each other they will. In the old house, she grew anything and everything. Roses, delphiniums, hollyhocks, sweet peas, anything she could get past the slugs. She used to say it was her passion, gardening. She meant it, too. She'd lie in bed reading gardening books and fall asleep dreaming of chitting potatoes and digging rich manure trenches in which to sow broad beans. Graham has said he wouldn't mind making a cut flower patch, with robust, old-fashioned blooms like dahlias and chrysanthemums. She likes that about him, that he can talk about flowers. And yet it's May and neither of them has lifted a finger.

He did at last clear an area around the old white bench so they could sit with a drink in the evening. But that was weeks ago and the weeds are already knee-high again. Most mornings she sits here with her tea among the giant nettles and the henbane and the other tall, springy plants she cannot even name and she can't see more than a couple of feet in front of her. She has to take
it on trust that the cottage still exists on one side, the seemingly endless, bottomless garden on the other.