Mothers & Daughters (14 page)

Perhaps she'll be happier when the baby arrives. God help them both if she isn't
.

We took the Beavers down to Blakemere Moss every year for orienteering and mapwork practice, but it meant an afternoon preparing the ground. This was my fourth year tying ribbons to saplings and laying twigs on the grass to make arrow shapes; the first time I'd ever carried out the task assisted by David and Matty.

The afternoon was damp and cool. By evening there would be a mist over the lake.

‘Were you a Girl Scout?' asked David.

‘Nope. My best friend spat on Brownies and Guides, so I never pursued it. Were you ever a Cub?'

He shook his head. ‘I was a school prefect, briefly. Till I got demoted. Look, I'll do the ribbons if you like. It's easier for me to reach.'

‘No, you hang onto Matty for me. I can't tie them very high or the Beavers won't be able to spot them.'

On the end of his toddler reins my grandson strained after ducks, water, freedom. I cleared a space of leaves till the soil showed, and aligned my lengths of wood so they pointed down the right path.

I said, ‘It worries me she has no pattern, no model for a good marriage.'

David reached out a hand to help me up. ‘For that matter, neither does Ian. It wasn't something either you or I chose, or can go back and change. Shouldering extra blame's not going to help anyone. I'm sure you did your best.'

‘I tried.'

‘Well, then. And Ian wasn't without maternal figures when he was growing up. He was very close to my sister at one time, before she moved to the States. I've had partners he's been fond of. Not so much Jacky, they never really hit it off, but some of the others. He still gets birthday cards from a couple. Here, let me hold that while you sort out your ribbon.' He took the clipboard from me and brought the map into focus, squinting. ‘We're going round as far as the car park?'

‘That's right.'

Matty pulled towards the lake, attracted by the swaying bulrush heads. I snapped a length of juncus for him and put it into his hand, and he was instantly satisfied.

‘Does Ian get on well with – your new girlfriend?' I ventured.

‘She isn't really a girlfriend, and they've not met,' said David. ‘Did your flowers last?'

‘Flowers? Oh, ages. In fact, I only threw the last ones away yesterday.'

‘It's a decent florist. I've used them a few times.'

My spirits dipped a little. No woman likes to feel she's part of a bulk order.

We moved on, Matty stumbling between us on the ridgy mud. His frog wellies were already caked. They'd need sluicing before I handed them back.

‘How's Ian managing?'

David clasped the reins more tightly and frowned. ‘Doesn't talk much. Stays up late because he can't sleep, watches TV till the small hours. He's been very forgetful, forgot his coat one day, his briefcase this morning. Lost his watch last week and
couldn't remember where he'd left it. He was like that after his mother died. Without being overdramatic, I think I can say my son's in real distress. But you perhaps wouldn't pick up on those things if you didn't know him. He's like me in a lot of ways. Doesn't make a show of his feelings. Jaz is like you?'

‘God, no. She's just herself.'

For a while we walked in silence. The sky above the treeline was milky-blank and the vegetation on the far bank washed out and pale. We were coming to the timber bridge where the cotton grass grew; once Jaz had turned over a chunk of dead wood on this stretch and found a clutch of baby newts huddled underneath. When she'd touched them, they'd lain inert, like rubber animals. She wanted to take them home but I'd stood my ground that time. I didn't want their tiny amphibian deaths on my conscience.

‘We'd to come to the Moss every few weeks when Jaz was a girl,' I said, sliding my secateurs into my pocket. ‘For picnics, all sorts. Jaz used to love scrambling around and investigating.'

‘Ian used to like Delamere Forest. We went camping there on a couple of occasions.'

I couldn't stop myself. ‘You, in a tent?'

‘Why ever not?'

‘You're always so smart. I can't imagine you roughing it. This is the first time I've seen you not wearing a suit.'

David looked at me in mild surprise, then down at his jeans and walking boots. ‘I'm sure it isn't.'

‘It is. You think: the wedding, Matty's naming ceremony, the two or three meals we met up for to celebrate the engagement and make arrangements for the reception. I'm only saying, it's not a criticism.'

‘Oh good.'

‘Hang on, I need to post another marker.'

I spooled out more ribbon and clipped it to the right length.
The tree I'd lighted on was a rowan with thin, shivering leaves. In the autumn, Jaz used to pick the berries and wear them like earrings.

‘We really don't know each other very well, do we?' said David from behind me.

‘I know we're of the same mind. I know we both want to help.'

When I turned he was standing under a silver birch, his grey hair slightly dishevelled and the hems of his jeans flecked with mud, while my grandson –
his
grandson – poked at a puddle with his length of reed.

‘Ian's desperate to see Matty. This situation can't go on indefinitely.'

‘No, I know. She just needs a little bit of space. It's only till she's come to terms—'

‘How long will that be, though, Carol?' At the lake's end a flock of gulls took off, slopping waves against the banks, disturbing the peace. ‘I haven't told Ian where I am this afternoon. I did think about bringing him, just to meet up for half an hour, but . . .' He let the sentence hang.

I fixed my gaze on a ripple and followed it to the shore where ghost-Jaz crouched, skimming stone after stone across the water.

‘So the Hungarian, right, he's explaining these three states of matter, yeah? How you've got your solids, your liquids and your gas.' Josh's voice was full of enthusiasm as I negotiated the Blakemere roundabout.

‘Uh-huh. I know about those.'

‘Yeah, and he's talking about how the molecules are packed together, and then he drags out this swivel chair he always sits on, and he goes: “
This is a chair
.” And straight away the boy he really hates, he stands up and starts applauding.'

‘Ouch.'

‘It was brilliant, 'cause after a second or two some of the others did the same, and soon the whole class was on their feet, clapping. All clapping the Hungarian's genius in being able to correctly identify a piece of furniture.'

‘How did he react?'

‘Aw, he just totally lost it. His head exploded. There were literally brains everywhere.'

‘What, literally?' I indicated right and moved into the outside lane, ready for the traffic lights. ‘Was the boy all right, though?' I said while we waited for green. ‘Because the Hungarian can be vicious, can't he?'

Josh shrugged. ‘It was worth it. It was a blast.'

‘When I was at school we had a foreign teacher who could never keep control. Mr de Silva, his name was. Taught music. Don't know what he was doing in Bolton. The boys used to make his life hell.'

‘What did they do?'

‘Well, we had our singing in the hall, and it was a room with huge floor-length curtains down one side. The boys used to spend half of every lesson hiding behind these curtains. They'd wait till he turned to the piano, and then they'd sneak across, one by one, till there was hardly anyone left singing, just the girls. Mr de Silva must have noticed but I suppose he was too frightened to tackle us. Poor man. You'd see all these shoes sticking out from under the hem.'

‘Smart.'

‘Not that I'm giving you ideas.'

We pulled onto the main road; another minute and we'd be at the school.

‘Can you let me out here?' Josh said suddenly.

‘Here?'

‘There's someone I need to talk to.'

I took my eyes off the road for a second to glance across at him, and he was leaning forward urgently. When I scanned up and down the pavement, the only likely people I could see were a pair of girls far up ahead.

‘Ah,' I said.

‘So if you could?'

‘All right. Hang on.'

He was pawing at the door even as I was pulling in.

‘Man with a mission,' I said, smiling.

‘Something like that.' He reached for his bag.

‘Have a nice day.'

‘I won't.'

He set off walking fast. It wouldn't be fair to spy on him, but I let myself watch for twenty paces. His chin was set, his bag swung as he strode into the brightness of a new school day, and his loping, vulnerable gait reminded me painfully of Ian.

Which might have been what tipped me into action.

Matty concentrated as his father slotted two pieces of blue track together and hitched them to the existing layout. Thomas the Tank Engine's route would take him past the fireplace, under the coffee-table, across the carpet to the display cabinet and then alongside the radiator, where there was a junction that would either bring him back round to the hearth or up against a buffer. A plastic tunnel lay on its back like a giant green woodlouse, and next to Ian's feet was a polythene box of die-cast vehicles, ready for dispersal. Matty held the train.

‘This is not taking sides. This is not condoning what he's done. I can't stress enough how important it is that Jaz doesn't get to hear about it,' I said to David, who was standing with me in the living-room doorway.

‘I know. It's very good of you.'

Our eyes met and I could see at once he knew the score: if Ian was allowed to see his son, he was less likely to make some gesture motivated by spite. Desperate people sometimes did desperate things. The arrangement was about self-preservation, not charity.

That said, it felt nice to watch them together.

‘Don't they have some great toys nowadays?' I said, as Ian took Matty's finger and showed him how to push the start lever.

‘I'll say. I had a Hornby 00 gauge when I was a boy, but not till I was a lot older. This stuff's good. Chunky. Solid.'

‘I got the metal ones at a boot sale, thought I'd been very clever but they're the wrong scale, of course. I'm always doing things like that.'

‘You do very well, as far as I can see,' said David.

The train shirred past our feet. ‘Watch out, Thomas!' I called after it.

‘Gordon,' corrected the men in unison.

‘Gordon's an LNER A3. Thomas is a Brighton Line E2,' added David helpfully.

At the opposite corner of the room, Matty piled cars, a bus and a steamroller onto the track, then sat back to wait for the crash.

‘Catastrophe, that's what he enjoys best,' I said, as my grandson rocked himself with anticipation.

‘Not that we had a lot of toys back then,' said David. ‘We used to spend most of our time outdoors. Up trees, building dens, down the canal, wherever we fancied. I'd go out in a morning and I wouldn't come back for hours. We were never bored, I'll tell you.'

‘You couldn't do that now, though.'

‘Why not? Ian used to.'

‘Did he?'

‘Of course. I couldn't be watching him every minute of the day.'

The Gordon-train rounded the corner, trundled into the tunnel, emerged, and smashed into the roadblock. Matty's hands flew to his cheeks in mock horror. ‘Uh-oh,' he said. The engine lay on its side, pistons working busily. ‘Uh-oh!'

‘Emergency,' cried Ian, and leaned over to fish an ambulance out of the box. Their heads bent together.

I thought I might feel less complicit if I took myself into another room.

‘Let's leave them to it, shall we?' I said, detaching myself from the doorframe and stepping backwards into the hall. ‘Come through. We'll swap news.'

David settled himself at the kitchen table and folded his hands like a man about to say grace.

‘So, any movement at all from Jasmine yet?'

I flicked on the kettle and shook my head. ‘But it's good she hasn't mentioned solicitors or anything like that for a bit. I think she's keeping her options open.'

‘I'm quite sure she is,' replied David, rather acidly, and I realised how I'd sounded.

‘What I mean is, if she doesn't want to start legal proceedings, then it must be because she doesn't think the marriage is necessarily over. Which is good. At the moment she seems to want to keep the status quo.'

‘All right for her.'

‘I do appreciate that.' The kettle clicked off, and I turned away from him to pour the water. ‘It's not nice going behind your daughter's back, you know.'

Steam rose up around my face in a hot flush.

‘Carol?' said Ian from the hallway. ‘Carol, where do you keep Matty's changing stuff?'

‘In his room, under the cot. But look, I'll do it.'

‘No, you're fine. Stay where you are.' Ian was through the stair gate before I could argue.

I slotted the kettle back onto its stand and brought the cups across. ‘He's good that way, isn't he? A real hands-on dad.'

When he's allowed to be
, said David's expression.

The sun came out and lit up the kitchen. Twenty feet from the kitchen window, Mrs Wynne's cat leaped onto our fence and began to pick its way along the top.

‘Phil was useless, nappy-wise. He never soiled his fingers with anything so basic.'

David shrugged. ‘Different days, though, weren't they? I never changed a nappy either. Then again, I had my share of mopping up bodily fluids later on, with Jeanette.'

‘Yes, of course.'

Ian thumped back down with the changing mat under his arm and disappeared into the lounge.

‘He is a good father,' said David. ‘Whatever else he's done.'

I had a sudden memory of Bolton Central Library as it was when I was a child, and me weaving between the rows of towering shelves to find Dad. His face lighting up when he saw me, holding his hand out for the book I was carrying.
Now, what have you got there?