The Insistent Garden (35 page)
He moved closer. “What's wrong with his life?”
“He. . . worries too much.”
Harold gazed back up at the wall. “Christ, Edith, how do you live like this?”
“It's not as bad as it seems. . .”
He gave me a long look then walked over to the lamp sitting on a side table and ran his fingers through the tassels hanging from the shade. “Is your father in?”
“No.”
His neck seemed to relax and he sat down on the sofa and folded his hands carefully over his knees. I sat beside him, aware of the smell of mildew coming off the carpet.
“Would you like a cup of tea?” I asked.
“No thanks.” He glanced round.”What do you
do
in this room? Where's the television?” He glanced round further. “And where do you keep your books?”
I struggled to think. The backs of my father's ankles were the only picture that came into my head. “We're usually in the kitchen. It's warmer there.”
“I can imagine.”
The sound of a teaspoon dropping against a saucer echoed from another room.
“I should get going.” Harold stood up, then delved into his pocket, pulled out a book and held it towards me. “As you hadn't been to the shop for a while, I decided to bring you these poems. I thought you'd enjoy them. I'm sorry I called without warning.”
I took the book and held it in my hands. Not heavy, but the cover was made of cloth and I could feel the weave beneath my fingers. “Thank you.”
“It was nice to see you again, Edith.”
“You too.”
He came towards me â that smell again, fruity and spicy; it lodged in my nostrils. “I hope you'll come to the bookshop again soon. And â” He glanced at the wall. “If you ever need me, you know, for anything, some warmth in a cold room, you know where to find me.”
I lay the book down on the sideboard and attempted an outside smile. “Yes, thank you, I do.”
Shadows are silent. Shadows fall on the ground, yet this shadow â did I imagine it? â didn't quite fall; it came from behind and hovered in the air.
“Who was that man?” said Vivian, back in the doorway, her hands sunk into the flesh around her waist.
“Harold Jones,” I said. Lies take time. Good lies take a while to prepare.
“And who is Harold Jones?”
“He works in the bookshop.”
“What bookshop?”
“The one on Adlington Street.”
Her eyes widened, a single eyebrow twitched. “What's he doing here?”
“I. . . I've been to the shop a couple of times, while I was waiting for our heels to be done, and we got talking â”
“What about?”
“Well. . . books.”
“That doesn't explain what he was doing here.”
I hesitated. “I bought a book and then forgot it. He was visiting his mother on the next street so he brought it round.” I held it towards her, the tip of a title lay beneath my thumb.
“That's all?”
“Yes, that's all.”
She didn't move, just watched me as if waiting for me to speak then she turned and disappeared into the kitchen.
A good lie; perhaps it doesn't take that long after all.
It wasn't until the church bell had broken my sleep three times that I remembered I'd left Harold's book downstairs. After the strain of avoiding Vivian for the last part of the day, I'd gone to bed early with my mind full not of the book but of Harold, of his astonished face, of the backdrop of flowers and stampeding animals and of the uncomfortable shift in us. I'd forgotten all about his gift to me, lying on the sideboard. I was making my way down to the living room when I saw someone was already there â an outline â a man and a darkened room melded into one. I hovered on the bottom stair as the outline, silently and slowly, re-assembled itself. My father, bent forward, the light from the street reflected off his face, a book cradled in his hands.
34 Ethrington Street
Billingsford,
Northamptonshire
August 24th 1969
Dear Gill,
Ooh, Gill, this creepy man turned up today. Spent ages with the pickles, reading the ingredients, turning the jar round ever so slowly, and looking at the door as if expecting someone to come in. He had a book under his arm â at first I thought he'd pinched one of our Mills and Boon (have you got through âThe Unwilling Bride' yet?) but then I saw it was some poetry mush and let it go. He looked like a man on a mission to me; he bought ciggies and Old Spice aftershave (large bottle) and slunk out of the door before I got a chance to properly look him over.
Seems to be a lot more people in the street these days, what with Vivian and that fake aunt of Edith's, the one who keeps talking about flowers. They both went by the window only this morning. Not together of course. I can't imagine those two sharing a couple of Babychams at the pub, can you? Even the woman with all the fags keeps popping into view. She doesn't come in so much but she often gives the shop window a really funny look as she goes by. It's like a little play out there sometimes what with Bobby Slater shaking his fist at those boys that nicked the washing off the line and Mrs. O'Dyer turning up out of nowhere with a bruise on her eye the size of a Victoria plum. And all the while I keep seeing the window cleaner cycling along the horizon like a man possessed. I saw Edith's dad today again too. Blimey, has he got a lot on his mind. When I passed him on the corner he didn't even glance at that new lipstick I had on. It's supposed to âmake men's heads turn' â even weathered old blokes like him. Talking of â how'd it go with that new bloke of yours up at the pub the other night? Can't wait to hear.
Jean
I missed Archie. I missed seeing him launch his body across the low wall. And I badly missed our walks round the garden, the way he absorbed every detail as I showed off the flowers, never rushing, never wanting to move on to the next plant. But most of all I missed having someone with whom I could talk.
We still had occasional contact, a cheery wave flashed from the end of his garden or a ripe tomato left innocently on the top of his wall, and sometimes he joined me on the way to the shops, popping out from behind a hedge then telling jokes all the way back up the hill. He left notes too: â
The geraniums are thirsty,
' squeezed into a loose joint in his garden wall or â
Don't forget to smell the jasmine at midnight
' hidden beneath a clump of flowers. I even found a poem, a two-liner, slipped inside the pocket of my dress as it hung upside-down on the washing line. He denied it, of course. He had never used the word âriparian' in his entire life.
I was thinking about Archie when a rustling sound drifted in through my bedroom window. Gentle, the sound of someone wrapping presents. I sat bolt upright, unable to remember where I was. Then I saw the clock, threw back the sheets and rushed across to the window.
A late summer's day was being born: shadows sneaking across the garden, birds shouldering into lines on the branches of the oak tree; a woman perched on a ladder. I rubbed sleep dust out of my eyes and looked again. Vivian was halfway up the wall, her heels hanging precariously over the third rung, the side of her skirt tucked into her knickers. She held a pair of shears in hand.
“What are you doing. . . with that plant?” I asked, sauntering up to the bottom of the ladder.
“Cutting,” she replied, not looking down.
“Is that plant in our way?”
Our.
“Yes. Your father can't get to the wall, it's crumbling in that bit over there.”
I looked at the patch of newly mortared bricks. “Perhaps I could just trim it for you?”
“No. It's nearly off.”
Her heels had been recently mended at the shop. Complacent sort of heels. I felt an urge to pull the ladder out from under her. I could do it. I had the strength. All I needed was to shove it sideways when she least expected it. Then a question poured from my lips, spilt, like milk from a jug. “Why do we have to hate Edward Black?”
Vivian climbed slowly down the ladder. “We don't talk like that in this family.”
“Why don't we?”
She raised her eyebrows, pencils of brown that emphasized the slant of her brow.
“
He
might be listening.”
“Even inside the house?” I felt a flannel of heat on my throat.
“Walls have ears, whether they're in or out.”
I thought of the living room, the racing animals, the layers of paper, the powdery paste.
“But why do we hate him?”
“Because he hates us.”
“And Edith,” she added, suppressing the other âwhy' that was forming on my lips.
“Yes?”
“That man who came to the house the other day â how did he know where you lived?”
“What man?”
“The man from the bookshop.”
“Oh. . . he. . .” I pulled courage from the air. “He came to my mother's funeral.”
I heard it before I saw it: a high-pitched cry followed by a thump. My breath quickening, I cracked open the living room door and saw the signs of fear; bird shit streaked the wallpaper, splattering it white and grey and purple and green. I widened the crack until I could see the cause of the mess â a small bird, wretched with despair was perched on the back of the sofa, poised to launch yet rooted to the spot. I opened the door another inch and the bird dived across to the window â that tantalizing view of trees and sky â smacked into the glass, then dropped to the floor. The room fell quiet, yet I thought I heard a heart pumping. I edged towards the window but the bird flew up, straight up, then veered sideways and cracked straight into the glass. I felt panic in my throat â the contagious panic of the little bird â then ran to the window, shoved it open, dashed back to the hall and closed the door behind me.
“What are you doing?”
Vivian stood in the hall, a rolled-up newspaper in her hand, a terrifying truncheon of print.
“There's a bird in the living room,” I said. “I opened the window.”
Her lips quivered. “A bird?”
“Yes, a sparrow. It must have come down the chimney.”
“Kill it!” she said, squeezing the end of the newspaper.
“I can't. . . kill it.”
She gripped my arm. “Edith, kill it or get rid of it, now!”
The room was draughty when I went back in, the carpet cold beneath my feet. Vivian hovered in the background.
“It's gone,” I said.
She pulled her cardigan across her chest. “Are you sure?”
“I'm sure.”
“Make sure it doesn't happen again.”
“I'll. . . try.” I watched her back as she returned to the kitchen. Vivian's step was faster than normal. Her shoulders were taut. Vivian was scared.
I couldn't stop thinking about the animals coming into my house. I made up pictures of them in my mind, the fox searching the fridge for eggs, the bird nesting in the airing cupboard, and the spider, gathering up his legs and squeezing through the hole in the bathroom wall. Even the fly, its throat blocked with milk, might be lying somewhere, alone, quietly waiting to dry.
