When Nights Were Cold (22 page)

The carpet smelled musty and the door creaked when I pushed it. I turned on the light and went to the chair. I sat on it and stared through the window. The clouds were piled thick and low in the sky, resembled hazy mountain peaks. I imagined that they were some fragile version of the Alps and sat for some time, blinking, sometimes almost slipping into sleep – perhaps I did sleep for a time – for what happened next was a kind of half-dream. I found myself sitting on the summit of a mountain, one I had never seen before, with Hooper at my side. She was on the same rock, one heel tucked into a ledge. Strands of her hair flicked and twisted in the wind. She scooped them away from her spectacle lenses with her fingertips. I asked her how she was and she told me that she was very well, thank you. She didn't seem angry, or sad. I missed her, I said, and promised that I would never stop thinking about her. She smiled, kept her eyes on some distant point. Of course, I knew she was not there. She was not a ghost and I was not mad. It was something I imagined because I could not help it and afterwards I felt better because of it.

In the following weeks, I began to go to the attic more frequently. I could still hear Mother, if she needed me, but it was nicer to be at the top of the house where nobody came. Sometimes I remembered old conversations with Hooper and I ran over them in my head. We were always side by side on our rock, though the views and the weather changed, and I spoke aloud to her, about the climb, our equipment, the plants and animals. Hooper never said much in return, but I knew she was listening. Sometimes, as I spoke, she grew sad. Then her body would fade into a girl-shaped cloud and she was gone.

Mother became suspicious that I was searching for another house, trying to sell ours, and interrogated me when I went to take her food or medicine.

‘What are you doing all the time? You're up to something.'

‘I'm thinking, writing letters. I'm looking for a job.'

‘You can't sell this house, you know. Only I can do that.'

‘I'm not thinking of selling the house. It was a suggestion, that was all.'

‘It's in my name and I'm not dead yet.'

‘I can see that. We'll all stay here then, but Catherine will get worse.'

‘As long as she doesn't go out or meet people and bring shame, we'll manage. You need to make yourself more useful about the place. Never mind finding a job. You have work enough looking after us. Put the tragedy behind you and stop trying to change everything. There is nothing at all wrong with things being the same tomorrow as they were today.'

It was around this time that I paid a visit to Mrs Kenny. She was about the same age as Mother and we had known her for years. She was a witty, friendly woman who always made Mother more humorous. She had often popped over to share gossip or borrow some book or cooking utensil, but had rarely come since Mother shut herself away and refused calls. Her husband was in hospital and she invited me to drop by one afternoon and play cards, share some stories and cheer her up. It was a welcome diversion from my routine and I was glad to accept the invitation.

However, as I closed the front gate and twisted round to prevent my skirt catching in it, a movement in one of our upstairs windows caught my eye. I glanced up to see Mother settling into an armchair which was pulled right up to the pane, apparently so that she could watch me cross the road. Our eyes met and she glowered. It occurred to me that she was preparing to sit there, eyes fixed on the Kennys' house, until I emerged. Either she could not bear for me to have a few hours to myself or she did not trust me. I pulled a rose from a bush near the gate, crushed the yellow petals in my palm as I walked away, threw the broken bloom onto the pavement. It was a childish and pointless act which only pricked my hand and spoiled a fine rose, but it felt good to squash the life and beauty from it. A ruby of blood rose in my palm and I was satisfied.

I did not stay long with Mrs Kenny. I could feel my mother's eyes trained on the house even as I shuffled a pack of cards. We played one or two games of cribbage and I learned a little news about the neighbours. The Jacksons' daughter, whom I had known at school, had become a nurse and now worked at the hospital where Mr Kenny was being treated. Mrs Kenny lowered her eyes and said that she hoped Matilda Jackson was not treating Mr Kenny, for that would be most uncomfortable for all concerned. She did not tell me the nature of Mr Kenny's ailment or injury – suffice to say that homeopathy would not cure it – but blinked the subject away, flicked efficiently through her cards ready to make her next move. After playing it, she mentioned that a doctor's family, all Fabians, were to move into the big house at the end of the road and they were known to be very respectable and sociable, so that was pleasing. Then Mrs Kenny asked me if I knew of Frank Black from round the corner.

‘A little. He's a family acquaintance but we haven't seen him for a long time.'

‘Well, he has caused quite a scandal.' She smiled as though it were something delicious. ‘Mind, it is only a rumour and may not be true so don't tell anyone but – '

I thought that she was about to announce his engagement or marriage and, God forbid, to Catherine.

‘ – he is said to be having an affair with Mrs Granger-Dawes.'

‘Mrs Granger-Dawes?' I had heard of her, the wife of a wealthy industrialist, but I knew little except that she must be forty, at least. Somehow the news did not hit me very hard so much as it surprised me. ‘Are you quite sure?'

‘They met at an artist's party and he has been seen with her on several occasions. A couple of times someone saw her emerge from his flat in the morning. And I don't know but I heard that when it's warm she sleeps in the garden with her two babies because she believes that moonlight, or starlight – I'm not sure now – shines goodness on their souls. She stands on her head for half an hour every morning and I've even heard that she walks in front of her windows,' Mrs Kenny leaned forward,
‘nude
.' She nodded for emphasis and a faint blush spread across her nose and cheeks. ‘Her husband must rue the day that he met her.'

‘Good heavens. And Frank Black?'

‘Besotted, they say. And perhaps that is so, but I suspect he saw an easy opportunity and took it.'

‘I thought – well, I thought better of him.'

‘Grace, let me tell you something that your mother may not tell you. It's no bad thing for a man to have some experience when he marries. I'd go so far as to say that it is the best thing for both husband and wife, as long as it is all over before the engagement. Frank will want to marry within a year or two so I don't blame him. It's all to the benefit of his future wife. What to think about Mrs Granger-Dawes is another matter.'

I could hardly consider myself betrayed by Frank but somehow I did.

‘Mrs Kenny, I am trying to remember Mrs Granger-Dawes but I can't picture her. What does she look like? Is she a beautiful woman?'

‘Very handsome. She has fine bones and dark, deep-set eyes. Men fall for her charm but what always strikes me are her beautiful lips and teeth. She has a melodious laugh.'

I imagined Frank with this modern beauty and was curious. He was not, after all, the same person Catherine dreamed of marrying or, indeed, the man I had almost fallen for. He was now much more exciting.

Mother was still at her lookout when I returned. She spotted me and pressed her hands and face to the pane. I considered heading off in another direction but really had nowhere else to go. I laughed aloud. The sound was not melodious at all.

‘Goodnight, Grace,' says a black and white vision of Catherine in the doorway.

I try to stop her. ‘Don't leave yet. We'll have something to eat. Cherry cake? Pork chops from the butcher? A ginger nut? Boiled eggs and kippers? A tin of treacle with a large spoon, perhaps. And I have pictures to show you. The piano will be tuned and the tone will be so sweet, so – so just right that you can play all day and all night. We need never leave the house again. Mabel will do the shopping and suchlike. If you wanted to venture out, just sometimes, I would try to come with you.' I gaze at the window. ‘Do you see how I need you?'

But she has gone. She was not there but in my head.

The front door opens, shuts. The quiet feet of Mr Blunt pad through the hall and reach my door, seem to stop as though he has just noticed that the light is on. I don't know where he has been at this time of night and I don't much care but—

Ah. No. We have had Mr Blunt. He went to the attic and has not come down again, unless he keeps a rope ladder up there and has used it. Somebody else is in the hall and it is surely not Miss Cankleton, who goes to bed at nine o'clock. I tread softly to the door and listen. I wait for several minutes. Nothing.

Chapter Seventeen

It was November or December 1912. I was sitting at Mother's window watching the children playing with a ball. It was a pleasing, bright red thing and bounced from one side of the street to the other, as three boys and a girl chased it along, taking it in turns to give it a kick. Mother was wheezing in her sleep and I had been in my position for half an hour, too bored to move. I had visited my old school in the hope of taking a little work but Miss Ladbroke had passed away and the new headmistress did not know me. There were no vacancies at present, she told me, but she would let me know if the situation changed. The ball came over our garden wall, as it often did, and then a pair of hands reached up to catch it. I leaned forward to see who was in our garden – we did not expect visitors – and it was Frank, right in the middle of the path. He tossed the ball back to the children then caught sight of me upstairs, squinted and shielded his eyes to see me better. He waved and raised his hat. I opened the window.

‘Hello.'

‘Good afternoon.' His face was fuller than when I had last seen him. He had put on a little weight and it made him seem more grown-up. He wore a grey morning suit with a pale silk cravat. A silver watch chain glinted from his waistcoat and he beamed at me.

I remained there with my head out of the window, conscious that my mother was stirring.

‘Are you visiting us?' I asked stupidly.

‘I'm in Dulwich for a few days, seeing the old family. Thought I'd drop by.' He took a step back to see me better, let his hands drop to his sides. I thought he seemed nervous but pleased to see me. ‘Though you'll be the one to drop if you're not careful.'

I laughed. ‘How lovely. But Catherine's at a church meeting.' I said this because I was not all sure which of us he had come to visit.

‘Is she? It would be nice to see you both but—'

‘Just a moment. I'll come downstairs. Ring the bell and the maid will let you in.'

My mother sat up with a snort. The bed springs twanged and pinged. ‘What's all the noise? Why's the window open? You're frightening me.'

‘It's nothing. Go back to sleep.'

I dashed into my room, powdered my face, saw that I had overdone it and wiped most of the powder onto my hands and then my skirt.

Frank stood at the drawing-room window. In his right hand he clasped his gloves, flicking them gently against the side of his leg.

I called his name. Father's portrait gazed down, neither approving nor disapproving.

‘Grace.' Frank sighed. ‘Oh, Grace.'

‘Catherine mentioned that she saw you recently. But you don't live in Dulwich?'

‘I did see Catherine a month or two ago. I had forgotten that. No, no. I have a flat in Russell Square, but I come to see my parents.' His voice lowered and he looked at me kindly. ‘I heard about your terrible time in the Alps. I was very sorry to learn about poor Miss Hooper.'

Hooper and Catherine were clambering over each other in my mind, trying to catch my attention, and here was Frank, who had been there all along, just leaning against some post or pillar, biding his time.

‘I suppose you read about it in the newspapers.'

‘I saw one or two things. They were nonsense, entirely. I took no notice.'

I nodded my gratitude, stuck my fingernails into my palms so that I would not cry.

‘Frank, what do you – I mean – do you still paint?'

‘Oh, well. Work takes up most of my mind so there isn't much room for hobbies these days. I get the brushes and easel out from time to time, splash the paint about a bit. I want to make it into parliament in a few years' time, you see. You can imagine, it requires a certain amount of manoeuvring, not to mention sucking up to people.'

‘And the ideals of your youth? You haven't lost them, I hope.'

If I sounded a little cynical it was because I remembered his abandonment of Catherine when she lost her chance to be a concert pianist.

‘Yes, well – no. I shall always have ideals, I hope. I mean, I'm a Liberal, you know, and always shall be. No, it's just that my ambitions these days are tempered with realism. I want to paint but not to the exclusion of everything else. And, you know, you're partly responsible for this change in me.'

‘I am?' Mrs Granger-Dawes, with her pretty eyes and teeth, popped into my mind and tipped back her head to let out a melodious laugh. Two years or so had passed since I had seen Frank and I should not expect him to be the same person, nor to like me in the same way as before.

‘I long to travel. I want adventures, like the ones you have, and for that I'll need, well, a certain income, a career.'

‘True.'

Frank rested his eyes on me, assessing me, working me out. He tilted his head, half-smiled.

‘The whole truth, Grace, is this. I'll never be good enough to make a living from painting. It was a schoolboy thing. I've spent time with artists and writers recently and I know that I'm not one of them. They have a fire, a certainty that nothing else matters, and I don't have it. I thought I did but it turns out that I don't.'