The Winter Children (40 page)

‘I’m sure that would sort everything out for you very nicely indeed,’ Francesca retorts. ‘As usual, you’re trying to work it all out so that you get exactly what
you want. But what if I don’t want to play ball?’

Dan’s mouth tightens and he seems to wince. ‘All right,’ he says after a moment. ‘Tell me what you want. I thought we had an understanding when we went into this. You
would donate eggs but that was the limit of your involvement.’

‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’ she puts in. ‘Keeping me in my box as usual!’

He’s exasperated now. ‘So tell me what you want, Cheska! How do you see this working? Tell me what it is you want me to do!’

Francesca gets to her feet, shaky but full of passionate strength. ‘I want you to acknowledge me,’ she says loudly. ‘I want to be noticed, and acknowledged. You’ve rubbed
me out. You scrubbed out everything that happened between us and I let you. But I’m not going to be your meek little doormat anymore. You have to say it out loud.’

‘Oh, I see.’ Dan nods. He’s turning scornful. He knows she can’t bear his contempt so he’s going to try that on her now. ‘It’s about that, is it?’
He bangs his plate down on the counter. ‘All of this pent-up anger and resentment because of one night twenty years ago? All because of that?’

She feels in control but when her voice comes out, it is trembling. ‘It wasn’t one night. You know that. You know how I felt about you.’

He takes a deep breath and holds it. When he releases it, he says with an air of magnanimity, ‘All right, yes, I did know. Of course I did. You had a crush on me, Cheska, we all knew that.
I was flattered but perhaps I should have been stronger and more decisive about it. Maybe we shouldn’t have been friends, if it was going to cause you so much pain. But I was fond of you, you
know that. You meant something to me. I’ve never pretended otherwise.’

‘You always wanted me to be grateful for scraps,’ she says bitterly. ‘You still do. Throwing me the bone of being godmother. Telling me that you were fond of me. Thank you so
much for that, Dan! Thank you for the dog-ends of your affection. Well, you know what, I’m here to remind you that it wasn’t like that. You loved me too! You told me! You know what
happened and I won’t let you pretend anymore.’

There’s a silence, heavy in the room. He is blinking rapidly in the way she knows so well, as he absorbs this piece of truth
spoken out loud. Now it is out there, he will be forced to react. That’s what makes him uncomfortable.

She can’t bear the tension of the silence. She is longing for an answer to what she has said. ‘Well?’ she demands.

At last he says something. His voice is quiet and low. ‘I didn’t say that.’

‘You did! You did!’ she bursts out. ‘Don’t lie to me.’

‘I never said I loved you.’

‘All right, you pedant. Let’s say you never said those exact words – even though you said you were in love with me—’

‘In love?’ He jumps on it swiftly. ‘That’s not the same as love.’

‘But what about what happened between us?’ She is panting, almost pleading. She is desperate for him to confirm what she has remembered all this time. Sometimes that night in the
garden in Cambridge seemed like a fantasy, something she only imagined. If he says it out loud, at least there will be relief in the validation of her memory. ‘What about what happened
between us, Dan?’

He sighs, and says, ‘We got carried away that night. You know how it was. We were young and full of craziness because we were leaving Cambridge, and we got too drunk and acted on impulses
that we should have restrained.’

She wants to crumple. So that’s how he saw it. Not the romance of it, the joining of twin souls, the great revelation that they loved each other and were meant to be together. ‘It
wasn’t like that,’ she says almost in a whisper, her head drooping. ‘You know it wasn’t.’

‘Cheska, darling . . .’

She turns a swift, fierce gaze on him. ‘Don’t patronise me,’ she warns, her voice still trembling. ‘Don’t do that.’

He shrugs. ‘I don’t mean to patronise you. I’m sorry. Look, it’s a lovely memory for me too. I don’t regret the enjoyment of it, but I regret the effect it had on
us. The way it interfered with our friendship.’

‘Because,’ she says, her voice cutting through the air with resolution, ‘you said you were in love with me. You said we would be together. You promised we would be together.’

It hangs there, almost vibrating in the air, the thing that they have never said to one another. Even afterwards, when he destroyed her dream and ruined her life, she never threw his promise in
his face. She accepted it, took her pain and went away with it. Then she returned to let him go on, never having to confront the way he had treated her.

Dan looks confused. She has a feeling he hasn’t thought about this for many years and that in itself is a source of pain. It was all she could think about for so long, and he was able to
brush it aside and dismiss it.

‘Did I?’ he says, almost wonderingly.

‘Yes you did,’ she raps out. ‘You said we would be together. Have you forgotten? Do I have to remind you?’

He frowns as though things are coming back to him now. ‘That night . . . yes. We were close after that. You’re right. I’d kind of . . . forgotten.’

His words stab her. She feels physical pain that something that was so important to her meant so little to him.

‘And have you forgotten the rest?’ she asks in a hollow voice.

His gaze slides over to her. His eyes hold something like guilt within them, and that’s when she knows he has not forgotten the rest. He remembered all along.

There is a knock on the door and they both jump as though they have been caught out in something forbidden. Then Dan collects himself, goes to the door and opens it.

‘Sorry to disturb you, sir. Is Mrs Huxtable about?’

Francesca recognises the voice. ‘Mr Ellis? Is everything all right?’

The builder steps into the kitchen, looking out of place with his high-vis fluorescent jacket and hard hat. ‘Well . . . there’s been an interesting development. One I think you
should see.’

1960

In the warmth of the caravan under its blanket of snow, Alice is panting, her expression hopeful. Julia has pulled a blanket over her to keep her warm now that her exertions are over. She has
re-emerged from the animal state that possessed her while she was giving birth, though her lips are tinged with blue from the effort.

‘Where’s the baby?’ she asks. ‘Can I see it?’

Julia looks down at the little boy in her arms. He is utterly still and silent. They used Donnie’s knife to cut the cord and unwrap it gently from the infant’s neck, and then they
saw that he is a perfect little boy, but he is lifeless, now swaddled in a pillowcase, his eyes closed as though he is sleeping; only the pallor of his face tells them otherwise.

Alice groans with an after-pang. Her body is still contracting, still pushing. Julia wonders why, when the baby is here. When the pain has passed, Alice says, ‘Please, I want to see the
baby.’

‘Oh, Alice.’ Julia’s voice breaks on the words. Her heart is aching for the dead child and for Alice who, she understands, is gripped by the ancient emotions of motherhood: a longing for her baby, an urgent physical need to nurture her offspring.

‘What’s wrong?’ Alice says, pushing herself up onto her elbows. ‘Something’s wrong. What is it?’ Her eyes fall on the little bundle in Julia’s arms.
‘Why isn’t it crying, don’t they cry?’

Julia cannot find any words. She offers the baby to her. It was warm with Alice’s body heat when it came from her womb but now it is cooling. She knows instinctively what the child should
be: warm, pinking up, squirming, its mouth eager for milk as it cries for something it does not yet understand. It should be helpless but demanding, waiting for its needs to be met by the greater
force that it senses is there to protect it, feed it and love it.

What happens
, she wonders,
to all the tiny babies who have no one to care for them? What happens to all the mothers who do not have their babies?
She sees suddenly a huge sea of
human grief, of wailing and mourning and crying; the devastation of loss and sorrow of the left behind. It’s too much. Her eyes are blinded with tears. ‘Oh, Alice,’ she says
with a sob. ‘I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.’

Donnie has retreated to the back of the caravan, staring out of the window at the sparkling snow. He is as still as stone.

Alice closes her eyes and shudders with another after-pang. When it’s over she opens her eyes and looks at Julia. ‘When will it be over?’ she asks plaintively. ‘Why hasn’t it stopped?’

‘I don’t know.’ Julia sobs again.

Alice lowers herself back to the floor, not looking at the bundle that Julia is holding out to her.

Julia asks, ‘Don’t you want to see it?’

Alice sighs. ‘I know that it’s dead.’ She turns on her side and stares away into the distance. ‘Things would be different if it weren’t. You wouldn’t be
crying for one thing.’

‘Yes . . . yes, he’s dead. The cord was around his neck. Perhaps he was dead for a while, I don’t know, but . . . Alice, he’s perfect but for that. So small but perfect
and beautiful. Don’t you want to see him?’

Alice lies there for a while, blinking into nothingness. When she speaks, her voice is flat and heavy. ‘No. He wasn’t going to be mine anyway. He was going to be Roy’s. His
consolation.’

‘How did you know about the other baby?’ whispers Julia. ‘The one his wife lost?’

Alice turns to her, a spark of something in her eyes that quickly dies. ‘I didn’t know. Perhaps I did – but not from Roy. Maybe I felt it in the universe. But it’s all
pointless now that my baby is dead too.’

Julia looks down again at the child in her arms. Then she looks up at Donnie, who has turned at the mention of Roy’s name. ‘What are we going to do?’ she asks wonderingly. The
reality of the situation is beginning to sink in. Alice is here, still in the aftermath of labour. Julia is holding a dead baby. She cannot begin to understand what must be done.

‘What are we going to do?’ she asks again, now with an edge of fear in her voice. All she can think of is that they mustn’t be found out.

‘You can’t stay here,’ Donnie says roughly. ‘I know it sounds harsh, but there’s a lot at stake if you’re found. We can’t afford to lose our jobs. And
if they find out that Roy is the father, he’ll be arrested.’

‘Arrested?’ Julia echoes.

Donnie nods. ‘Your girl is under age.’

Alice stirs at this. ‘Will they arrest Roy? I won’t let that happen. I won’t let him and his family suffer because of me.’ She starts to push herself up from the floor.
‘I’ll stop it.’

‘Lie down,’ Julia soothes, trying to keep calm. ‘It’ll be all right, you’ll see. No one will be arrested.’ But she turns frightened eyes on Donnie.
‘She’s just had a baby. What will we do? How do I get her back to school?’

Donnie looks out to the night beyond. ‘It’s still early. There’s a few hours yet before you’ll be missed. Give her a chance to get her strength back and I’ll carry
her to the school so she doesn’t have to walk.’

‘What then?’ Julia asks, bewildered. ‘What do we do after that?’

‘You’re on your own after that. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is.’

Alice says in her flat tone, ‘Don’t worry, Julia. I’ll be all right. You’ll see. I always knew I’d go back without him. I’m ready for that.’

Julia wonders if she is talking about Roy or the baby.
She must mean the baby.
She turns her gaze again to the little body in her arms, wrapped in the flimsy pillowcase. The thought crosses her mind that if she could get a blanket for it instead, perhaps she could warm him back to life. No wonder he’s so cold in this piece of cotton. Then she remembers.
Nothing will ever warm him.

She lifts her eyes to Donnie. ‘What about the baby?’

He gazes down at them. Then he says abruptly, ‘Leave him with me. I’ll look after him.’

‘Will you . . . be kind to him?’ she asks, her voice wavering.

‘Of course I will. You’ll see.’

The hours pass in quietness. The pangs continue until Alice’s body delivers a mess of blood and tissue and then they are over. Julia wraps the strange livid wobbliness and the remains of
the cord in layers of newspaper for Donnie to bury somewhere. Alice does not say another word but lies staring into space, not wanting to see the tiny body that Julia has placed carefully on a
cushion from the bench. It is as though everything has been drained from her and left her a heavy, dull weight that nothing can animate.

Julia cleans up as well as she can, warming water on the hot ring to wash Alice down. Alice lets her do it, neither helping nor hindering, with no sense of shame or embarrassment as Julia
tenderly wipes her thighs free of blood.

While Julia does her best to make Alice comfortable, Donnie goes out and comes back with some small planks of thin wood. Julia makes them all tea and he sits at the back of the caravan with a
hammer and some tacks, lightly tapping the boards. When he has finished, there is a small box prepared, with an ill-fitting lid.

‘There,’ he says, putting it down on the floor. ‘It’s the best I can do.’

Julia understands he has carefully made a coffin for the child. ‘It’s very nice,’ she says, her eyes full of tears again. ‘But it’s bare. Not very comfortable.’

‘Then we’ll put in a cushion,’ Donnie says. ‘You choose one.’

There is some comfort, Julia finds, in preparing the little box for the baby. She selects the softest of the small sofa cushions and wraps it in a clean pillowcase, then lays the little body,
swaddled in another pillow case, upon it. It’s somehow not enough. Her gaze falls upon a picture on the wall, an arrangement of dried violets and pansies under glass, and she jumps up to get
it. They prise the back off and take out the little flowers. Julia scatters them over the baby and on the cushion.

‘That’s better,’ she says. But there is still something missing. She turns to Alice. ‘Do you want to give something to the baby?’ she asks gently.

Alice has her back to the coffin, though she has been listening carefully to the proceedings and knows what they are doing. ‘No,’ she says. Then after a second she says,
‘Wait. Yes. Do you have any scissors?’