The Ghost Road (10 page)

She went into
the kitchen. Cynthia, glancing timidly from one to the other, sat down on the
edge of the sofa. Billy pulled Sarah's drawers out of his tunic and threw them
across to her. Cynthia squealed, bunching her clothes between her legs like a
little girl afraid of wetting herself. Sarah calmly stood up and put the
drawers on, while
Prior
fumbled with buttons beneath
the Bible.

Ada came back
into the room. 'You missed a good show,' she said. 'Mrs Roper had to be carried
out. Still, no doubt you've been better employed.' She indicated the Bible.

'I was just trying to find the bit about the warhorse to show Sarah.
But it's all
right,
I know it off by heart.' He looked
straight at Ada. '
He
paweth in the valley and rejoiceth in his strength: he goeth on to meet the
armed men. He mocketh at fear, and is not affrighted; neither turneth
he
back from the sword. He saith among the trumpets, Ha, ha;
and he smelleth the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains, and the
shouting.'

He got up and
replaced the Bible, aware of three faces gawping at him.
An
odd moment.
'And now if you don't mind,' he said, 'I think I'd like to
lie down.'

Sarah was
allowed to go to the railway station with him unaccompanied. They stood on the
empty platform, exhausted mentally and physically, obliged to cherish these
last moments together, both secretly, guiltily wanting it to be over.

He picked up her
hand and kissed the ring. 'Don't worry, Sarah.'

'I'm not
worried.' She smiled.
'This time next year.'

He hadn't
thought about the actual marriage at all, once she'd made it clear she didn't
want a quick wedding. Next year was a lifetime away. Perhaps even a bit more.
He watched a pigeon walk along the edge of the platform, raw feet clicking on
the concrete. 'Come on,' he said. 'Let's walk along.'

They stopped
under the shelter of the roof, for there was a fine rain blowing. White
northern light filtered through sooty glass. Sarah's face pinched with cold.

'Write as soon
as you get there,' she said.

'I'll write from
London. I'll write on the train if you like.'

She smiled and
shook her head. 'I'm glad you told your mam anyway.'

'She was
delighted.'

She was
horrified.

—Marrying a factory girl not that it matters of course
as long as you’re happy but I'd've thought you could have done a bit better for
yourself than that.

His father was
incredulous.

—Married?
You?

—Oscar Wilde was
married, Dad
, Prior had not been able to resist saying.

But then his
father had come to the station to see him off—first time in four years—
and
he'd to get out
of bed to do it, because he was on nights,
and
he was wearing
his Sunday suit, he'd shaved,
and
he was sober. Jesus Christ, Prior had thought, all we
need is the wreath.

A small hard
pellet of dismay lodged in his throat.
Premonition?
No-o
,
nothing so portentous.
A slight sense of pushing his luck,
perhaps.
This was the fourth time, and four was one too many.

'I expect
they'll invite you over.'

Sarah smiled. 'I
think I'll wait till you get back.'

He glanced
covertly at his watch. Where was the bloody train? And then he saw it, in the distance,
crawling doubtfully along, trailing its plume of steam. No sound yet, though as
he stepped closer to the edge of the platform he felt or sensed a vibration in
the rails. He turned to face Sarah, blocking her view of the train.

She was looking
up at the rafters. 'Have you seen them?'

He followed her
gaze and saw that every rafter was lined with pigeons. 'The warmth, I suppose,'
he said vaguely.

The roar of the
approaching train startled the birds. They rose as one, streaming out from
under the glass roof in a great flapping and beating of wings, wheeling,
banking, swooping, turning,
a
black wave against the
smoke-filled sky. Prior and Sarah watched, open-mouthed, drunk on the sight of
so much freedom, their linked hands slackening, able, finally, to think of
nothing, as the train steamed in.

CHAPTER SIX

After tea he
took Kath's photograph album up to her room, he usually brought snapshots of
family and friends with him on these visits, because he knew how much pleasure
they gave her. She was sitting up in bed, faded brown hair tied back by a blue
ribbon, a pink bed jacket draped around her shoulders. Blue and pink: the
colours of the nursery. He took the tray off her lap and gave her the album and
the photographs.

She seized on a
group of staff at the Empire Hospital. 'You've got your usual
I-don't-want-to-be-photographed expression,' she said, holding it up to the
light.

'Well, I
didn't.'

She was already
busy pasting glue on to the back. 'Is it true the natives think the camera
steals their souls?'

'Some of them.
The sensible ones.'

She pressed her
handkerchief carefully around the edges of the photograph, catching the seepage
of glue. 'It's a good one of Dr Head.'

'Oh, Henry isn't
worried, he hasn't got a soul.'

'Will.'

He looked at the
tray. 'You haven't eaten much.'

'I'm glad
Ethel's having a break. It's been a shocking year.'

Ramsgate had
been bombed heavily, a great many civilians, mainly women and children, killed.
As a result Kath's health, which had long given cause for concern, had
dramatically deteriorated. Ethel, who'd looked after their father in his old
age, and then after
this invalid younger sister, had
begun to show signs of strain herself, and the brothers had decided something
must be done. A holiday was out of the question, ruled out by Ethel herself—she
could not and would not go—but she
had
agreed to stay with friends for a long weekend.

'I think that's
the car now,' Rivers said. 'I'd better get the suitcase down.'

He found Ethel
in the hall, pinning on her hat.

'Now,' she said,
unable to let go, 'you've got the telephone number?'

'Yes.'

'You're sure
you've got it?'

'Yes.' He pushed
her gently towards the door.

'No,
listen,
Will.
If you're
worried, don't hesitate, call the doctor.'

'Ethel, I am a
doctor.'

'No, I mean a
proper
doctor.'

He was still
smiling as he went back upstairs.

'Is she gone?'

'Yes, I had to
push her out of the door, but she's gone. Have you finished sticking them in?'

He took the
album from her and began turning the pages, pausing at a photograph of himself
and the other members of the Torres Straits expedition. Barefoot, bare-armed,
bearded, sun-tanned, wearing a collection of spectacularly villainous hats,
they looked for
all the
world like a low-budget
production of
The Pirates of Penzance.
The flower of
British anthropology, he thought, God help us. He turned a few more pages,
stopping at a snapshot from his days in Heidelberg. What on earth made him
think those side whiskers were a good idea?

'I knew you'd
stop there,' Katharine said. 'It's her, isn't it?
The stout
one.'

'Alma? Of course
it isn't.' His sisters had teased him mercilessly at the time, because he'd
happened to be standing next to Alma in a snapshot. 'Anyway, she wasn't stout,
she was... comfortable.'

'She was stout.
We really did think you were going to marry her, you know. She was the only
woman we ever saw you with.'

'That's not true
either. Remember all the young ladies mother used to invite to tea?'

'I remember you
sloping off upstairs to get away from them. You were just like Mr Dodgson. He
used to do that'.

Kath sometimes
combined with childlike innocence a child's sharpness of perception.

'Like Dodgson?
God forbid.'

'You didn't like
him, did you?'

He hesitated.
'No.'

'You were
jealous.
You and Charles.'

'Yes, I think we
were. Ah,
this
is the girl I'm looking for,' he said, holding up a
photograph of a little girl in a white dress. Even in faded sepia it was
possible to tell what an exceptionally beautiful child she'd been.

* * *

Light from the
standard lamp fell on the side of Dodgson's face as he opened the book.

'S-shouldn't we
wait f-for K-K-K-Kath?' he asked, the name clotting on his tongue.

Sitting on the
sofa beside Charles, Will thought, That's because it's the same sound as hard
c. C
was Dodgson's
worst consonant.
F
and
m
were
his.

'No, I think we
should start,' his father said. 'It's not fair to keep everybody waiting, just
because

Kath's late.'

'She'll be here
soon,' Mother said. 'Her stomach's a good clock.'

'Aren't you
w-w-w-w-w-woorr...?'

'Not really. She
knows she mustn't leave the grounds.'

Will intercepted
a glance between his parents. Mother shouldn't have completed Mr Dodgson's
sentence for him like that. You were supposed to let people flounder, no matter
how long it took.

Mr Dodgson
stammered less when he read. And why was that? Because he knew the words so
well he didn't have to think about them? Or because, although his voice was
loud, he was really just reading to Ethel, who sat curled up in the crook of
his arm, where she could see the pictures? He never stammered much when he was
talking to the girls. Or was it because these were
his
words, and he
was determined to get them out, no matter what? It certainly wasn't because he
was thinking about the movements of his tongue, which was what father said you
should do.

'The rabbit
hole,' Mr Dodgson read, or rather recited, for he was not looking at the page
but at the top of Ethel's head, 'went straight on like a tunnel for some way,
and then dipped suddenly down, so suddenly that Alice had not a moment to think
about stopping herself before she found herself falling down a very deep—'

Kath burst in,
hot, dirty, dishevelled, trailing her hat by its long blue ribbon, raspberry
stains round her mouth, grubby hands streaked with cuckoo spit. She went
straight to Mr Dodgson and gave him a bunch of flowers whose stalks had wilted
in the heat and flopped over the back of her hand.

He took them
from her and sat looking stupid, not knowing where to put them, when his
attention was caught. 'Look,' he said, 'you've g-g-got
a
l
-l-l-
ladybird in your
h-hair.'

Kath stood,
breathing through her mouth with concentration, as he teased the stands of hair
apart and persuaded the insect on to the tip of his finger. He showed it to
her, then carefully stood up, meaning to carry it to the window, but the
scarlet shards parted, the black wings spread, and the insect sailed out, a
dark speck on the blue air.