The Juniper Tree (13 page)

The word ‘police’ seemed to terrify the young man because he shot down the stairs and out of the house leaving the front door open, swinging in the winter wind. Bernard threw the shoes and smelly looking socks after him and there they remained on the pavement until the road-sweeper swept them away in the morning. Afterwards we learnt that he was a South American waiter whose permit had expired nearly two years previously and he particularly wanted to keep clear of the police.

On Monday morning, as Bernard drove us home, he said in a casual way, ‘I suppose you wouldn’t give up the shop and look after Johnny instead? Of course, I’d make it worth your while.’

Feeling a selfish monster, I refused his offer in spite of all the kindness and friendship I’d received. I couldn’t give up my present life which suited me so well. Bernard took my refusal very calmly and said it was only an idea that had suddenly come into his mind – he hadn’t even mentioned it to Charlotte. But I still felt guilty.

A middle-aged nanny was engaged to look after Johnny. She was absolutely reliable and a kindly woman, they said. But Johnny didn’t love her as he had loved Nell. He’d thrived in her rather slapdash care and had looked on her as a mother, and now there was this sudden change. Charlotte did her best, but she wasn’t really at home with babies, it was older children she was interested in. Johnny cried a lot the first two weeks in nanny’s care, then he settled down and became a rather reserved baby who seldom smiled, except when my daughter was around every other weekend. Even then they didn’t see as much of each other as they used to and it appeared to me that nanny kept the children apart. Marline wasn’t included in the stately walks, with nanny deliberately pushing the large perambulator she insisted on using in spite of Richmond’s steep hill and often crowded pavements. Sometimes I saw her charging through the town and it looked as if she were about to mow down any pedestrian that got in her way.

It took me some time to realize that nanny didn’t approve of my poor little Tommy-Marline and that she didn’t want to be seen in the streets with her and preferred not to have her in the nursery, although it was rather difficult to keep her out of it. If I were there she’d mutter remarks like, ‘I was really engaged to look after one child, not two,’ or, ‘It’s better for Marline to leave baby alone; she only excites him.’ Sometimes Nell and I had bathed the children together surrounded by floating toys; but when I suggested this to nanny she was appalled. ‘Certainly not,’ she said. ‘It might end in a nasty accident.’ But what she really meant was that the darkness of my daughter’s skin might contaminate the water.

I tried to conceal nanny’s aversion to Marline from Bernard and Charlotte because it would only create bad feeling and could even cause nanny’s dismissal and another change for Johnny. But it hurt me when Bernard said, ‘Why doesn’t Marlinchen go for walks with Johnny any more? She seems to have lost interest in him and is hardly ever in the nursery these days.’

I said, ‘I think she is a little shy of nanny because she has never met a real British nanny before. She is happy enough with Johnny when they are downstairs together.’ And so they were when nanny wasn’t in the room. Even then I felt that I might have said too much and that Bernard was growing aware of nanny’s antipathy.

Then one Sunday afternoon, when she was arranging Johnny in his great perambulator, Marline came running out of the house, struggling into her duffle coat: ‘Wait for me, nanny, let me come too.’

Bernard and I were standing by the gate and heard Nanny say crossly: ‘Certainly not. One child is all I can manage on these hills and I don’t want you chattering all the time.’

Marline finished her struggle with the duffle coat. ‘But I won’t chatter, I’ll help. I’ll push really hard.’

Nanny said coldly, ‘I think you would be more of a hindrance than a help. Shut the gate after me, please.’And she sailed through with this great pram before her, even ignoring Bernard.

Marline turned her quivering little face away and walked dejectedly towards the house, her red stockings twisted round her skinny legs adding to her piteous aspect. Bernard hurried after her and caught her up in his arms and said they were going for a walk in the park together – and I asked her if I was allowed to come too, which she thought very funny. So we went to the park together and froze in the early March wind. Neither of us had waited to put on coats; but it was worth being cold to see Marline happy again – even the twisted stockings looked rather jolly now.

A week or two later Charlotte was putting linen away in the great chest on the landing when she heard nanny ordering Marline out of the nursery. The door was open and Charlotte said she had one large hand on Marline’s shoulder and was saying in a threatening way: ‘How many times have I told you I don’t want you in here interfering with baby? I won’t have him contaminated. Go down to the kitchen, that’s the best place for you. But remember, I don’t want to see you in here again.’ She gave her a final push through the door, then slammed it. Charlotte took Marline by the hand and ran down the stairs with her to tell Bernard what had happened and ask his advice. I was in the town at the time doing some weekend shopping and returned to find nanny had been dismissed and was sulking in her bedroom, Charlotte, with Johnny clasped in her arms, was crying and there was Bernard looking fearfully gloomy, with a glass of brandy in his hand, Bernard who drank little and never in the afternoon. Even the log fire had gone out and the room smelt of bitter smoke. But Marline was happily sitting on a pile of cushions munching chocolate biscuits, quite oblivious of the general air of despair around her.

Chapter Seventeen

B
y the time Johnny Forbes was seven months old he had had four different nurses. The last and best was a Spanish girl called Catalina, who had settled into the household far better than we had expected although her English was poor and Charlotte and Bernard did not know a word of Spanish. The main thing in her favour was that both the children loved her from the day she arrived with her scarlet imitation leather suitcases. She was a good-looking girl, with beautiful dark eyes glowing in her slightly heavy face. Her hands were soft and dimpled, very feminine. In some ways she resembled me in appearance. She had the same thick, dark hair that fell into good shapes and the fine white skin – but, of course, without my scar. Our figures were similar too, a little on the heavy side. My legs were longer than hers, but she made up for this by usually wearing very high-heeled shoes on her small, pretty feet. The thing that appealed to us all, including Johnny, was her warmth and cheerfulness: she was like a dear little fire warming our rather sad hearts.

Now Johnny was all smiles and already trying to crawl. He had been like a little zombie under nanny’s care, and a clockwork zombie at that. Now time meant little in his life. If he awoke early in the morning, Catalina took him into her own bed and played with him. He had no fixed time for rests during the day, he just fell asleep when he felt tired, and in the evenings his bedtime varied from around seven to ten o’clock. Charlotte did insist on him having his meals at regular times that fitted in with ours and Catalina soon saw the wisdom of this. She liked to dress the children up before taking them out and sometimes they were drenched with ‘colonia’, and Marline had her hair drawn up into a little topknot decorated with beads, looking odd but very sweet.

Monday was Catalina’s day off and Charlotte said she spent hours over her toilet before she left the house. She would meet her Spanish friends in London and they would go from shop to shop until they closed. Then they’d go in a group to some friend’s bedsitting-room and have a picnic meal and play records, the group growing larger and larger. Sometimes she gave her friends a miss and I took her to places of interest like the London Museum, Hampton Court or Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament. Unfortunately she wasn’t interested in art galleries or most museums and we often ended up looking in shop windows or spending an hour or more in Harrods, her favourite shop. At least twice a week Charlotte gave her an English lesson which they both enjoyed, particularly Charlotte, who loved to teach. Bernard, not to be outdone, tried to interest her in paintings and she said they were all ‘
Muy bonito’
and gave her a pretty smile. Then he tried classical records, without much success. She would listen with her head a little on one side and a simulated expression of interest on her charming face, but all too soon she’d say she could hear Johnny crying and bolt from the room. Bernard, who had read some Spanish literature in translation, tried to discuss books with her; but the only book she was interested in was
Don Quixote,
which she insisted was true. ‘I’ve seen the window Dulcinea looked out of, Mr Bernard, I’ve visited La Mancha with my cousins. Of course it’s true.’ And she laughed at Bernard’s ignorance. Quite soon he left her education to Charlotte, which pleased me because I was becoming a little jealous. I looked on myself as Bernard’s special pupil and did not want to share my teacher.

It gradually happened that Marline and I spent most weekends in Richmond. They seemed to need my help there and we were made to feel very welcome. Marline was happier there than in the shop and she had come rather to despise the small park where we used to feed the ducks on sunny Sundays. When the weather was bad we spent most of the time shut up in the room behind the shop where I cooked and we ate and lived and occasionally looked at black and white television. But we preferred to climb the twisting staircase and from the upstairs windows we would look down on the traffic and people splashing round the Green exercising their dogs, the well fed pigeons and the seagulls skimming over the grass as if they were on wheels. On special days we’d see a squirrel darting about in the tree in front of the house. I really loved our little house, but it did feel rather cramped after Bernard’s stately home.

On the other hand, he had become quite fond of our simple cottage and, I hoped, fond of us too. He visited us quite frequently in the evenings before he went home. He seldom stayed more than an hour and, if my daughter was already in bed, he’d sit in his special chair and I’d sit very close in some chair that was perhaps already sold and waiting to be collected. We’d sit there sometimes hardly speaking, and occasionally he would absent-mindedly stroke my hair as if I were a cat. Other times he would talk about his business and paintings he hoped to buy or sell and associates I knew nothing about. He could almost have been talking in a foreign language, I understood so little, and I had the feeling that he was really talking to Gertrude. He would say things like, ‘You remember that painting we half hoped was a Gustave Moreau; well, it definitely isn’t. I must tell you what old Harrison said about it, it’d amuse you, darling. You know how outspoken he is.’ And he would ask my advice about having the house redecorated or renewing the lease of his gallery. He didn’t seem to notice that I remained silent except for an occasional ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. Indeed, he would have been very surprised if I’d given advice of any kind. Although I did not understand all that Bernard was saying it made me extraordinarily happy that he should confide in me. I really honoured him; there was no other word for it.

On a spring morning when Charlotte and I were drinking coffee in the drawing-room with the windows open to the sun and birdsong, Bernard came in with Johnny in his arms and handing him to Charlotte said he wanted us all in the garden. Then he dived back into his study – I thought for a camera to take our photographs, but it was the silver box filled with Gertrude’s ashes he was holding when he returned. As if in a dream I collected Marline from the swing and we followed Charlotte carrying the baby and Bernard to the edge of the thicket where the cherry and apple trees were in blossom. Bernard gently scattered some of the ashes there and the rest on and around the juniper tree in Gertrude’s special place, just as she had wished. And as the ashes fell around, both the magpies settled on the little tree and watched us silently for a few moments. The hen then returned to her nest, but the cock magpie stayed watching us with his bright, knowing eyes.

Bernard said, ‘I’ve been waiting for a day like this, the kind of day she loved so much. She’d have been pleased about the birds too.’ He spoke quietly, as if to himself, but not with great grief.

The scattering of the ashes was a symbol, the fulfilment of a promise; but it did not ease his sorrow, which was with him all the time. Charlotte was openly crying and, seeing that Marline was about to follow her example, I took her by the hand and quickly walked away before she started asking where Gertrude was, as she did from time to time. At first I used to tell her that she had gone to Germany to join her mother, but Bernard did not approve of this feeble lie and told her firmly that Gertrude had gone away for ever. It was a relief to me that the ashes had now been scattered where Gertrude had wanted them to be and that it had turned out to be such a simple ceremony, even with a kind of charm. I didn’t know at the time that some of Gertrude’s ashes had already been sprinkled in a German garden that used to belong to her parents. All I knew was how beautiful Bernard’s hands had looked as he scattered, one holding the silver box and the other scattering.

Chapter Eighteen

C
harlotte began to wilt and say it was time she had a holiday. She longed to travel around Germany and Belgium and visit various members of her family she had not seen for several years and she confided to me that she wanted to be free of responsibility. It had all come on suddenly: one day she was a happy teacher in her early thirties with her own little flat and the next she was in charge of a large house with servants to manage and a baby to help look after. ‘I’ve never cared for domestic life. Of course I love little Johnny, he’s adorable, and I’m fond of Bernard; but I’m so tired, mentally and physically. Have you noticed, I haven’t even the heart to argue with Bernard these days? Well, we did have a little quarrel about Kitaz’s paintings and Bernard insisted he came here as a GI during the war – most unlikely, I think. But that was over a week ago. I really must get away.’ And, looking at her, I could see she was right. The colour seemed to have drained away from her and she was almost as pale as Gertrude used to be, but without her classical beauty.