The Stopped Heart (3 page)

I was about to get it, but then there was a quick wet spattering on the floor.

Oh, Lottie! my mother said.

Lottie looked down at what she had done. She blinked.

But later I will be, won't I? she said.

M
INNIE AND
C
HARLIE PICKED UP FEATHERS FROM THE FLOOR
and blew them around while I mopped up Lottie's mess. Jazzy was sat under the table singing to herself and undoing the tassels of the big heavy cloth. Honey was on Frank's lap, though he kept trying to push her off. He asked if the dog could come out of the cupboard yet and my mother said yes.

But what if she bites the man? Jazzy said.

She won't do that.

But what if she does?

Look at her. She's afraid to go near him, I said.

I was right. The dog went straight over and sat by the door with a rattled look on her face. My father had to go and get the animals up. He was getting his boots on. My mother looked at him.

We should get the doctor, she said.

He doesn't need a doctor.

Why? said Jazzy. Is he going to die?

We're all going to die, said Isaac Roper. Praise Jesus but it's the truth that we will all die.

Like me, I died, Lottie said, but no one was listening because we all knew it was a great big booming lie.

My father left the room, slamming the door behind him. A quick, unhappy silence, then the air closed up around it.

Well, if you want my opinion, I reckon we should get the constable, Isaac Roper said at last.

My mother cupped the baby's head in her hand as if it were the softest piece of fruit she had ever held.

The constable? Whatever for?

Isaac scowled and rubbed at his chin. The rasp of his nighttime beard made my teeth hurt.

Who is he, Sally? What do we know about him? How do we know he's not escaped from somewhere? He could be a murderer. A swindler. A housebreaker.

Oh, come on, my mother said.

How do you know he's not dangerous? We've no idea at all about him.

My mother yawned.

He's just a young man, she said. I don't think we need to worry about him. I'm sure he'll be on his way in the morning.

I looked at the man. His eyes were shut, but he had the fierce tight look of someone not asleep.

The baby was whickering and my mother began to undo her chemise. Isaac Roper watched her. Honey, too, seeing it was undone and wanting the milk, got up off the floor and lifted her arms in the air and started to cry. My mother ignored her and at last she stopped her noise and fell asleep on the rug.

The night was almost over, but the blackness was still there; it wouldn't be light for a while. Apart from the sound of the cows across the yard, the kitchen was quiet. My mother changed the baby over to the other side. His small hand stayed up in the air while he sucked.

All you children should be in bed, my mother said.

Isaac Roper was filling his pipe. I watched him: a quick bad memory of walking past the scullery door on a hot afternoon and seeing my mother with her face buried in him. His hands strung through her hair, pressing her down against the flap of his breeches.

I don't like the look of him, Isaac said. If it was my house I wouldn't want him in it for a moment longer than was necessary.

T
HE NEXT DAY, ON HIS WAY TO
B
LAXHALL,
I
SAAC
R
OPER WAS
struck by a train and died on the spot. No one expected it. But lots of things happen in this life that are not expected.

It was easy enough to look for reasons. Maybe we should have covered up the bedroom mirrors during the storm, as Miss Narket's married niece later suggested. Or maybe Isaac should not have been in such a hurry to cut down the old holly tree in Glebe field that winter, since it had been there for fifty years and everyone knew that felling a holly could change a person's luck.

Maybe we should have listened when Jazzy said she'd seen a single magpie shrieking and hopping like a mad thing in the lane that morning. And maybe we should have sent one of the kiddies to seek out another one quick before the bad luck of the singleton could take root.

Or maybe, it occurred to me later, Isaac should have thought twice before he accused a perfect stranger who was lying on our kitchen floor of being a housebreaker or a murderer when he didn't know the smallest thing about him.

T
HE FIRST TIME
G
RAHAM LEAVES HER ALONE THERE,
M
ARY IS
lost. She does what is necessary. Puts the breakfast things in the dishwasher. Wipes the table. Stands looking at the crumbs sticking to her hand, then goes over to the tap and rinses them off.

Drying her hands on a tea towel, she finds herself opening the front door. She stands there, looking out, feeling the heat on her face. Not unpleasant. Sunlight and warmth pouring in, showing the dirt on the old stone floor.

In the lane, birds are singing. A white van goes past. A kid on a bicycle shouting. Somewhere far off across the fields, a dog barking. A little way away she can see a man. Red-haired. Young. Her heart stirs at the sight. His lean, quick shape moving along the hedge.

She comes back in and shuts the door. Standing there, waiting, she doesn't know for what. After a moment, without knowing why, she bolts the door. A sudden, velvety silence. She likes it.

When the landline rings, she jumps. Her mother.

“I wanted to see if you were all right.”

“I'm all right. How are you?”

Her mother hesitates.

“Really? You'd say if you weren't?”

“We are. We're fine. We're doing OK.”

“Really? What are you up to?”

“Well, Graham's at work.”

“And you?”

“I'm just here, sorting things out.”

“And the house?”

“It's fine. It's good. A bit of a mess still. You'll have to come and see it.”

“I will. I'd like to do that. Maybe without your father. If you don't mind looking into trains and having me for a night or two—”

She is about to tell her mother that would be fine and then try to fix a date as far in the future as possible, when her tone changes.

“I'm sorry—I'm so sorry”—sobbing now—“I've been trying not to call you. Your father told me off. He was really quite angry with me. He said I should wait. You've no idea. I've been trying so hard to leave you alone.”

Mary stares at the old pine kitchen table with its marks and its knots and whorls. Placing her hand on its rough, cool surface.

“You don't have to do that. I never said you had to do that.”

“Do what?”

“Mum. Come on. You're allowed to call.”

She is about to continue when something—a sound from upstairs, a sudden heaviness on the floorboards, the quick shudder of a door closing—makes her stiffen and turn. Her mother sniffs.

“It's a new life for you, darling. I understand that. I do, you know. I know you both want a fresh start.”

Holding the phone, Mary walks to the bottom of the stairs, pulls open the door. Staring upward, eyes on the shadows.

“That doesn't mean not talking to family.”

She hears her mother take a quick, wet breath.

“But we don't really talk anymore, do we? Not the way we used to. It's not that I expect you to call me. I know how busy you are. But this is very difficult for us too, you know. Your father said—”

Mary shuts her eyes. She sees her father's long, pale face, his hands, his trousers belted a little too high. The raw, bloody, animal sound he made when they sat him down that rainy night and told him.

She gazes at the staircase, straining to listen. Thinks she hears a tap dripping in the bathroom. She tells her mother that it's not a good moment, that she'll call her at the weekend.

T
HERE
'
S NO ONE UPSTAIRS.
T
HIS BECOMES VERY CLEAR AS SHE
wanders quickly from room to room, her own bare feet sticking to the dusty boards, the sound of her own breath in her chest, her throat. Throwing a pile of towels onto a chair, she kicks off her shoes and lies down on the bed. She lies there and watches the sun make its slow way across the walls. Reaches out and flicks the radio on. Hears a man's voice going on and on. Flicks it off again. She feels very calm. She realizes without much surprise that she has been crying.

Outside, she can hear children shouting, playing. Several of them, two or three at least, maybe more. A whole crowd of little children. The sound comes and goes, very loud sometimes and then for a while barely audible. She thinks that one of them seems to be crying. Nothing dramatic—more a toddler's fed up chuntering. Silence, then a shout, and then laughter again.

She holds her breath, not upset, just mildly curious, wondering whose kids they can be. Their nearest neighbor, who they've nodded at once or twice, is an elderly man, apparently alone and without children or grandchildren, and she remembers how heartened she was to discover that. The shouts grow louder, though the
crying has stopped. Mary waits, listening. At last, unable to resist, she gets up and crosses the room, floorboards creaking under her bare feet, and goes to the window to look.

Out in the sunny lane, there is no one, nothing. Only a very large magpie, wings half-spread and dragging in the dirt, hopping backward and forward, clucking and screeching.

She watches it for a moment and then she walks back across the room and lies down again on the bed.

H
E COMES HOME TO FIND HER THERE.
S
IX HOURS AT LEAST HAVE
passed, maybe seven.

“Darling?” His voice on the stairs. “Didn't you hear me? I was knocking and knocking. The door was bolted. I couldn't get in. I had to go around the back.”

She does not speak. Something heavy and warm in her arms. Not wanting to wake. Trying as hard as she can to hold on to it.

“Why on earth did you bolt it? What's going on? Did you realize you'd done it?”

He comes and stands over her. Keys in his hand, his jacket still on. She hears his worried breath.

“Mary? Are you all right?”

She says nothing. Lifting her hands to cover her eyes. He stands looking at her for another moment, then she feels the bed sinking as he sits down. His arms around her. His face on her neck.

“You've been here all day, haven't you?”

When she still doesn't speak, he lets go of her. Twisting around and sitting up. His head in his hands.

“I heard someone say my name,” she says, realizing only as she says the words that they might be true.

He looks at her.

“What? You mean like before?”

Mary blinks. She's almost forgotten that odd, shrill morning with the estate agent.

“Yes. Like that. I heard it again. The same thing. Like someone calling out—they called me.”

He shakes his head.

“I don't know what you're talking about. Where?”

“I thought there was someone in the house.”

“What? It's not possible.”

“I know. It's not possible, is it? It was weird.”

Graham puts his head back in his hands.

“There's no one here.”

“I know.”

“So what are you talking about?”

“I don't know.”

He is silent for a moment.

“I thought you were better,” he says. “I thought you liked it here. I honestly thought you were getting better.”

She looks up at him with interest.

“I do like it here.”

His eyes back on her.

“You do?”

“I do.”

He sighs.

“I think you need to see someone. Just an hour a week or something. What do you think? I could ask at the clinic.”

“The clinic?”

“The doctor's surgery. In the village. I'm sure if we asked they could fix you up with something.”

She thinks about this.

“There's nothing to talk about,” she says.

He makes a noise of impatience.

“For Christ's sake. You need to tell someone about this. Talk about how you're feeling.”

“I'm not feeling anything.”

He takes her hand. Her warmth in his cold one. She can feel him thinking. Hears him sigh.

“Darling. My darling. Look at me.”

“What?” She looks. His face—once so alive and familiar to her, now alien with worry and sadness. He shuts his eyes for a moment.

“I can't live like this. Neither of us can. We can't live like this.”

She blinks at him. Pushing herself up on her elbow.

“But we are.”

He reaches out and lifts her hair, holding its dark, hot weight in his hand, looking at her.

“Are what?”

“We are living like this.”

He lets go of her hair and looks at her, exasperation—or is it relief?—in his eyes. I can't read you anymore, she thinks. She knows it's what he's thinking too. She almost smiles.

“You're cold.”

“What?”

“You're cold. Come here. I'll warm you up.” She laughs, taking a breath—reaching out with her other hand. “Come here,” she says, trying to pull him onto her, tugging at his belt, beginning to undo him.

He hesitates, still looking at her, then he lets her pull him down. She smells the warmth of him, his skin, the roughness of his chin and jaw, his neck.

“I don't understand you at all,” he says.

She says nothing, laughs to herself.

“I'm concerned about you. You can't lie in bed all day. Am I crushing you?” He tries to shift his weight off her.

“No.”

“No?”

“I like it. Crush me.”

He sighs.

“What are you doing now?”

Mary does nothing. Says nothing.

“Seriously, darling, what are you doing?”

She shakes her head. Lies there. Feeling him on her. His warmth. The crushing of her. Tears at last beginning to come.

H
IS NAME WAS
D
IX.
J
AMES
H
.
D
IX.
W
E KNEW BECAUSE HE HAD
it written on a small silver box that he kept in his jacket pocket. The box was in the shape of a diamond, and the name was carved into the metal with some very fancy slopes and flounces.

When Jazzy tried to ask him what the box was for, he wouldn't say.

It's just a box, isn't it?

He turned it over and over in his hands, looking as if he'd only just laid eyes on it for the first time himself.

All right, said Jazzy, but what do you keep in it?

He scowled.

None of your bloody business.

Then what's it for?

He made a face.

You don't give up, do you?

Jazzy smiled. The smile was wobbly because of all the teeth she'd lost. Our father said she looked like a bat and had the habits of one too. Hanging upside down by her legs at dusk from the nut tree by the henhouse, or climbing the old metal gate and tipping herself upside down till her hair hung in the dirt.

Is it for pennies? she said.

Pennies? Ha!

Snuff, then?

Snuff? James reached out with his finger and thumb and tweaked the end of her nose.

Ouch, she said. That hurt.

That'll teach you to talk about a man and his snuff, he said. And he pushed her down on the ground and tickled her till her legs flew up in the air and she kicked him in the teeth.

When he'd stopped cursing and she'd got her breath back, she asked him what the
H
was for.

H?

James H. Dix. What's it for?

Hargraves, he said, still rubbing his face.

Hah—what?

Graves. Hargraves. You know? Like the big dark hole where they chuck you in when you're dead.

Jazzy's eyes grew large.

But is it yours?

James snapped the box open and shut.

What d'you mean, is it mine? What kind of a question is that? Why wouldn't it be mine?

She rolled her eyes.

I mean the name. Is it really your name?

Now he looked very angry.

What is it that you're accusing me of now? he demanded to know, and he fixed his eyes on her as if he was considering whether he should box her ears.

But then along came Frank, who punched her so hard on the arm that she forgot all about James and got into a fight with him instead.

Next time I saw them together, James was back to being all
soft and smiles. But when she asked if she could have a go at holding the box, he wouldn't let her.

You ask a lot too many questions for a little squitty nothing of a girl, he said as he tucked it back in the pocket of his jacket and patted it to make sure it was there. You need to learn to shut up. Be a nice quiet kid who lets others get on with their business. Like your smart big sister over there.

Jazzy looked over at me.

She's not smart.

Oh yes she is. Smarter and a whole lot prettier and if I had to bet, a whole lot more difficult too.

When he lifted his eyes to see if I'd heard, I looked away. And when he seemed like he might be working up to say something else, I turned on my heel and walked out the door.

M
ARY GETS AN E-MAIL FROM
L
YNN
M
ARKHAM.
C
AREFULLY
worded, upbeat, generous, kind. It has a PS.

“It goes without saying that if you ever find yourself missing the good old, permanently thankless world of PR, we could fling something your way. Rufus never stops moaning about his workload, and Fiona has a couple of little projects coming up that would hardly involve any meetings in London. Just a thought, in case you want to give me a ring once you're settled. I'm pretty sure we could set you up with something.”

She knows Lynn only means to be kind. She imagines her sitting there at the desk in Holborn covered in all her silver and turquoise Moroccan jewelry and thinking, What could we do to draw Mary back into things? But the idea now of putting any kind of passion into a job that involves persuading journalists to write about old paintings or vases, well frankly it makes her want to laugh.

When she tells Graham about the e-mail, she expects him to
laugh too. But he doesn't. He tells her she should consider taking Lynn up on it.

“Isn't it time you started to think about doing something?” he says.