The Juniper Tree (8 page)

I told her that it was true; Stephen wasn’t Marline’s father and that I’d never said that he was. Actually her father was ‘a foreign gentleman’ who had returned to his country.

‘A foreign gentleman, but what kind of a father is that?’ she shrilled.

‘Don’t do that, mother,’ I said. ‘You’re spitting.’

‘Spitting! How can you tell if I’m spitting or not, you stupid girl? What about this foreigner? Is he paying for his daughter, I’d like to know.’

I told her that he knew nothing about his daughter. She’d been born months after he left the country. As for money, we were managing very well and didn’t need any. I was even saving.

There was silence for a moment and I could almost hear mother making an effort, then, ‘I must come and see this grandchild of mine. I’ll let you know when. Oh, and what kind of foreigner is the child’s father? Where does he come from?’

I hesitated, then said, ‘Brazilian.’ I knew there were a lot of very dark people in Brazil.

I hated lies and now I’d been forced to tell them two days running. When I tell lies I can feel my eyes flicking like a hen’s. It does not matter on the telephone, but it is a tiresome habit when one is face to face with a friend who would be happier not knowing the truth. Flicking eyes immediately make them suspicious. I can look them in the face when I lie but it’s the flicking eyes that give me away.

The first few days of June were very hot and the white petals from the chestnut trees on the Green fell to the grass like melting snow. At lunchtime young men lay on the grass without shirts as if it were a beach and mothers with young children in striped pushchairs sat under the trees while the elderly stiffly arranged themselves on the benches. All day the dedicated dog-lovers circled round, attached to their dogs by leads. Sometimes they were set free and a ball was thrown for their entertainment. At one end of the Green there was a much-used cricket pavilion and at the other a less-used public convenience – a good one people said – catering for men, women and invalids.

I watched these things from the shop window. It faced south and the sun came shimmering in, robbing the antiques of their mystery. In the harsh light every blemish was accentuated, the life went from the paintings, carved gilt looked tawdry and the antique furniture was heavily scored with cracks and marks and appeared more secondhand than antique. Recently I had cleaned the glass domes with some patent stuff to make them sparkle; but now I could see they were all marked with greasy streaks and the shop window was the same. I spent most of the day polishing. Fortunately there were few customers and I was able to work in peace – until a bright blue MG drew up on the other side of the road and out stepped Stephen and a long-legged girl, rather a beautiful golden girl. I watched them darting through the heavy traffic. At certain times it was controlled by a lollipop man, but this wasn’t one of them. They came into the shop with happy smiles on their handsome faces and there were introductions. Miss Longlegs was an American actress called Brit Bonner who had a small part in a new musical, so Stephen said. They had met at a publicity party only seven days ago and had seen each other every day since, so they were like old friends in a way. They chattered like excited birds, laughing and contradicting each other. I’d never seen Stephen so gay, more like a boy than a rather mean man of thirty years.

I closed the shop and we had tea in the garden, an early tea because Brit had to appear at the theatre. She told me that it was the first time she had acted in the West End or in any large theatre. Stephen said, ‘Show Bella your cuttings, pet,’ and out of her large handbag she produced some crumpled reviews of shows she had appeared in at small theatres in the States with favourable mentions of herself: ‘Miss Bonner is a bombshell’ or ‘Brit Bonner is an interesting newcomer’, and the more exciting ‘Beautiful Brit Bonner cracks the whip’.

I went through the motions of being impressed but as she returned the cuttings to her handbag she said wistfully, ‘I really want to be a serious actress, but have to take the parts I’m offered. I began by being the maid or even worse, the ASM.’ She asked to be shown over the cottage and Stephen rushed her round as if the place belonged to him and she was saying, ‘Fantastic, fantastic,’ all the time. Wherever she went she left a faint but haunting scent. In the garden I’d hoped it was my flowers but when I followed Brit into the house I knew it was her smelling so expensive. When they left the smell still lingered.

Chapter Ten

O
ne morning when I was returning from taking Tommy to the nursery I could hear the telephone ringing away from the other side of the road, so I dived in between the streaming cars, to the great annoyance of the lollipop man, who was waving his pole at me. By the time I had opened the shop door and seized the instrument it was giving a feeble last ring; but I’d caught it in time and Gertrude’s voice floated down the line. She wanted to tell me about a strange dream she had had; she seemed quite obsessed by it. In the dream she was walking on marble floors among tall pillars. Sometimes she was walking under a roof and at other times there was only the intense blue sky above, but always the pillars and in the distance white buildings. She was wearing simple, rather roughly-made sandals on her feet, but her dress was a kind of robe made of finely woven material, very pleasant to touch. She could still remember the feel of it between her fingers. She said she was searching for someone. It could have been Bernard, but at the time she had thought it unlikely because the dream was taking place two thousand years ago. I asked how she knew. Did she have a calendar?

‘No, nothing like that,’ she said vaguely. ‘But I just knew it was two thousand years ago. There was no sign of the 1980s anywhere. I sat on a marble bench that had been warmed by the sun and watched a little figure in the distance walking towards me and growing larger and larger and then I saw he had a large scroll under his arm that could have been a rolled painting and I thought that after all it really was Bernard I was searching for. I cried, “Bernard!” very loud and he answered, “Gertrude, hush,” and we were in our bed at home together.’

I said, ‘Yes, it was a strange dream, but rather lovely.’

‘Lovely in a way but extraordinary too. You see, Bernard was dreaming almost the same dream at the same time. He
was
the figure in the distance carrying the scroll, which was quite heavy, and he never got close to me although he could see me sitting amongst the pillars in the distance. I asked him if he was wearing robes or an ordinary suit. “Oh, robes, of course,” he said. Actually he’d thought he must be Julias Caesar until he saw me sitting on my marble bench. Then his one idea was to reach me, but however hard he walked, we were always apart. It was as if the ground were slipping beneath his feet, almost a nightmare really. What do you think it means? Have you ever heard of people sharing a dream like that?’

‘Well,’ I said thoughtfully, ‘I don’t think I have. But you and Bernard are so close, much closer than most married people. You may have had another life together two thousand years ago.’

She was quiet for almost a minute, then said, ‘Yes, you could be right. Bernard and I may have lived together two thousand years ago and even at other times too. It is certainly very weird. The dream was beautiful in a way and I’ll never forget it, but I wouldn’t like to share dreams every night. Would you?’

‘No,’ I said, ‘but it couldn’t happen to me. I’ve no one to share my dreams with.’

I replaced the receiver because someone was entering the shop. Then I saw it was Miss Murray, all dressed for summer in a pure silk dress with a matching cape to hide her curved back. She was carrying a basket containing slightly damaged china she thought I might care to buy cheaply. ‘I can put up with the rivets, it’s cracks I can’t stand – and as for chips, they really disgust me. Look at this Rockingham poodle with a nasty little chip on his blue cushion and this Minton jug quite ruined by a chip on its lip, and as for cracks, look at that,’ and she held out a Crown Derby dish. It had a minute crack on its rim and some of the gold had been washed away – with strong detergents most likely. ‘You can have that for nothing. I can’t bear the sight of it.’

She emptied her basket and asked if I’d seen anything of the Forbeses lately. It was some time since they had visited her shop and she had some heavy gilt frames that might interest them. I told her about their shared dream, but she was sceptical and put it down to pregnant fancies. ‘Women get very strange at these times, you know. They are not normal at all.’

I said I supposed so, although I didn’t agree. I was convinced that Gertrude and Bernard’s dream was something very special that could only happen to people who were as close as they were. All the day their dream kept creeping into my mind and it was as if I’d shared in it as well.

Now July had come I’d sit in my walled garden listening to cricket being played on the Green – the crack of the ball being hit and sometimes a gentle clapping – and, when the stream of heavy traffic thinned, pigeons could be heard cooing. I was usually alone after Tommy went to bed. Stephen seldom came to see us now he had Brit and, when he did, he talked about nothing but her and his fear that the musical was coming to an end, already empty seats were casting shadows on his happiness. He’d ask me what he was to do if Brit returned to America. He had already asked her to marry him but she couldn’t make up her mind. Not that she didn’t love him, only for the time being she felt she must put her career first; later on, when she was more established, things would be different, and so on. I’d say more or less what he wanted me to say, agreeing that she was beautiful and tremendously talented, that she obviously loved him very much and that it was likely she would be offered good parts in West End theatres, although I knew little about the theatre world and had only met Brit once. At least I did know she was beautiful and seemed to be in love with Stephen, so I could talk convincingly about that. I really liked what I’d seen of the girl, but it was boring sitting out there in the dusk talking about her non-stop. The tobacco plants were smelling so lovely too. I didn’t really care for Stephen any more. All the same we were friends and I would have liked him to take a little interest in me and my life as he did before Brit came. It wasn’t quite so boring when he brought wine.

Saturdays were more of a problem than they used to be because Tommy wasn’t content to play with odds and ends in the shop. She fretted to be in the garden and wanted to drag all her toys out of the toy box. One afternoon there was a fearful acid smell of burning coming from the kitchen and I remembered I’d left a pie in the oven. I left a trusted customer in charge of the shop and hurried to the kitchen to save my pie only it wasn’t a pie burning in the oven but a plastic toy piano and ten little men Tommy must have put there. I took them out and held them under the running tap although the piano would never play again and the men looked as if they had been hit by an atom bomb, their faces all warped and their limbs twisted.

I think it was the same Saturday Tommy roasted her toy piano that Mother at last appeared to inspect her grand-child. I remember that as soon as she opened the shop door she shouted above the ring of the bell, ‘What a strange smell! I don’t like it at all.’ There stood mother with her darting eyes and Mr Crimony, with a nervous half-smile on his face, standing behind her.

I was serving a rather valued customer at the time, but she said she would come again and melted away like a snowflake leaving me there with my hands filled with Victorian door handles all decorated with hand-painted flowers. I awkwardly held them out to mother and said, ‘Pretty, aren’t they?’

But her eyes were fixed on Tommy and she never glanced at the door handles. ‘So this is the daughter of a foreign gentleman,’ she said bitterly. ‘Mr Crimony, just take a look at this child. How could she be related to me in any way.’

Tommy, who had been watching the children and dogs playing on the Green, left the window and ran up to Mr Crimony and, laughing, snatched his repellent hat away from his hand and put it on her own head, then danced round the shop singing to herself.

He watched her for a moment and said soothingly, ‘No, I can’t say she takes after you in any way, but she’s a nice little girl and takes after her dad I expect.’

The hat dance finished. Tommy handed it back to Mr Crimony and stood beside him looking at his face hopefully. He fumbled in his pockets but all he could find was a cough drop. ‘See how she’s making up to you, sly little creature. Well, one thing’s for certain, she’s never coming to my house.’

I said coldly, ‘Don’t worry, mother, I have no intention of taking her to your unhappy house. There’s no love there, only bitterness.’

I replaced the door handles in the window and hung the notice ‘Closed’ on the door and calmly asked mother if she were staying for tea. ‘I expect I’ll be accused of bitterness if I don’t,’ she said ungraciously, looking at Tommy all the time and pretending she wasn’t. Then in an unnatural voice she called the child to her and Tommy, looking for reassurance, slowly walked towards her. ‘So you’re Tommy Marline,’ Mother barked and, not knowing what to do next, she took her right hand and shook it, which made Tommy laugh.

‘I’m Marlinchen in my home over there,’ and she pointed to nowhere in particular.

‘Now Tommy or Marline or whoever you are, I’ve brought you a little present. Two presents in fact,’ and mother fumbled about in her bag and produced a small, rather pretty doll wearing a hat, and a mechanical clown who somersaulted about the carpet. Tommy was delighted with her presents and mother said quite cheerfully, ‘They are better than a silly old cough drop, aren’t they?’

Mr Crimony, looking quite sad, said, ‘But you didn’t tell me we were bringing presents. I’d have brought the little girl something if I’d known. What would you like me to bring the next time I come, Tommy?’

And without hesitation she answered, ‘A violin,’ which was strange because I didn’t know if she had ever seen one.

We sat in the kitchen eating a family tea, Mr Crimony stuffing away on an iced lemon cake I’d made for Gertrude and mother asking questions: Had I seen Stephen lately? and that kind of thing, speaking to me but looking at her grandchild. She said, ‘I would have quite enjoyed a grandchild if it had been a normal one but illegitimacy combined with colour is too much for me. It’s unnatural.’