The Talisman (82 page)

‘Oh, sah, it’s bad news, it’s bad news.’

Edward patted his shoulder, and walked slowly up the stairs.

‘It’s all right, old fella, I know. You don’t have to say anything.’

Edward caught the first train, and Allard met him at the station. He gave a brief nod and bent almost double to squeeze himself into the car. There were dark circles under his eyes from lack of sleep, and the inevitable cigar was clamped between his teeth. Allard muttered obscenities as they crept up the steep hill towards the Hall, convinced they were not going to make it. The only time Edward spoke was to remind him that he had a first gear . . . The car jolted and, with smoke streaming from the exhaust, they eventually made it over the top. Crossing the small humpbacked bridge, they coasted through the village of Helmsley and on to the Hall.

Jinks was waiting, sitting among stacks of furniture.

‘Hello, sweetheart,’ was the only greeting Edward gave her as he followed Allard into the kitchen. ‘Kitchen always was the warmest place in the house.’

Jinks followed them and leaned against the door.

‘Congratulations,’ Edward said to her. ‘It’s something to be offered places at both Oxford and Cambridge. Have you made up your mind yet?’

‘I don’t think this is either the time or the place to discuss that,’ she replied. ‘Did Allard tell you about the arrangements? She’s to be cremated. We couldn’t really have a coffin here with the state the place was in so Mr Postlethwaite – he runs the funeral parlour – he’s got her . . . she’s at his farm. He has some sort of morgue, where he keeps . . . Oh God, it sounds awful . . . Is Uncle Alex coming?’

Edward appeared completely unaffected by his wife’s death. He blew on his hands for warmth. ‘No, they’re busy, wouldn’t you know. They’ll probably send an ornate wreath.’ He found it difficult to meet his daughter’s eyes. It had been a long time since he had seen her. She looked older than her seventeen years, with her thick glasses and her thin, pointed nose pink from the cold. Edward tried to make conversation, huddled by the fire in his great fur coat.

‘Right, what’s to be done? Have you arranged everything?’ Somehow he just knew she would have, he could tell.

Jinks found it hard even to talk to him, he dominated the kitchen and her. She didn’t mean it, but her voice sounded brittle, unforgiving. ‘We all go to Mr Postlethwaite’s and follow the hearse to the church. The vicar’s arranged the ceremony, two o’clock, and afterwards we drive to the crematorium. It’s quite a way, almost to York.’

Edward looked at his watch and suggested they get a bite to eat before they left. Jinks declined and said she would wait for the car. He still could not look at her. ‘Fine, I’ll see you later. I’ll walk to the Feathers, be there if you need me.’

As he opened the kitchen door, Jinks blurted out, ‘It was an accident, she never meant to kill herself.’

‘Yes, you said on the phone . . . Be back at a quarter to two.’

He strode out into Harriet’s vegetable garden. The line of tomato sticks looked like a miniature army lined up for inspection, and he walked slowly past them. He stopped – attached to one of the rods was a piece of paper, flapping in the wind. He trudged across the frozen soil and looked at it. ‘Edward’ – his name was printed clearly in Harriet’s thick, bold writing. He glanced at the house to see if anyone was watching him, then unhooked the note. There was only one line, in the familiar hand: ‘You were never unkind, just the wrong time of year for lettuce – Harry.’

Pocketing the note, he stood for a long time in the bitterly cold garden. He knew it was no accident – she had just walked out across the fields to die. He lifted his eyes to the horizon, remembering the hunched figure so many years ago, striding off into the night – the night she had taken a shotgun to her horse.

‘He’s still there, he’s still standing there.’

Puzzled, Allard looked at Jinks and she got up, walked across to the window. Her father stood with his back to the house, like a giant, his fur coat flapping in the winter wind. She rubbed her cold arms and asked Allard, ‘What do you think he’s doing, he must be frozen?’

His usually crisp, camp voice was soft. ‘I think he’s saying goodbye to her in his own way.’

Jinks wanted to go to her father then, wanted to feel his arms around her, but instead she stared at him through the dusty window.

The car pulled up outside Mr Postlethwaite’s barn, which also served as a morgue. The elderly bearers, in their black morning coats and toppers, carried the coffin to the equally elderly hearse. As they pushed the coffin in, their feet slid on the icy ground. Mr Postlethwaite murmured to the men that they were going to have a hell of a job getting up the hill, it was hard enough just to stand up straight.

Allard was squashed in between Jinks and Edward in the back of the hired Rolls. Nodding wisely, he said to Edward, ‘It’ll never make it up that hill, any money on it?’

The procession moved off, following the hearse, which seemed bowed beneath the weight of Alex and Barbara Barkley’s ‘floral tribute’, an enormous display of white lilies. Edward and Allard couldn’t help but smile. The hearse’s gears began to grind . . .

‘What did I tell you, it’s in trouble,’ Allard crowed. Jinks gave him a cold stare to shut him up.

Halfway up the hill, the hearse came to a halt and slowly slid backwards until it bumped into the Rolls. Edward started to laugh, and Allard, his hands over his face, tried desperately not to join in. Their chauffeur reversed frantically, then grabbed the handbrake, but the Rolls rolled on and struck the following car, containing the vicar and three of his parishioners, whose faces looked terrified as they slithered downhill . . . The parishioners screamed in unison, like three little balding birds . . .

Three times the hearse attempted the hill, only to slide back. Coats were removed and laid under the back wheels, much to the chagrin of Mr Postlethwaite, whose best tails would bear the tyre imprints forever after. But the hearse steadfastly refused to climb the hill. Allard was now laughing openly, and Edward was wiping away tears of mirth.

Jinks, who had tried so hard not to find humour in the situation, biting her lip until it bled, finally caved in. Edward smiled through his tears, ‘That’s it, sweetheart, you know Harry’s engineered this whole thing – she’s up there roaring with laughter. Can’t you hear her?’

Indeed, Harriet would have split her sides if she had seen her last journey, the coffin tied eventually to the roof-rack of Mr Postlethwaite’s new Morris Minor. The hilarity of the journey was echoed halfway through the delayed funeral service when a wedding party arrived. The vicar took their advent as a cue to speed up the service. The poor organist, his frozen fingers struggling with the keyboard, pumped the bellows desperately for the rendering of ‘The Lord is My Shepherd’. He was mortified when his precious organ began to emit what could only be described as a deep, resonant fart.

The bride and groom stood aghast as the coffin was carried from the church, followed by mourners in a state verging on hysteria. Allard, beside himself, had to lean on the door to get his breath, declaring loudly that it was better than any revue he had ever seen.

By this time the hearse had made it to the top of the hill, and Harriet was driven more sedately on the last leg of her journey to the crematorium. In the confusion between wedding and funeral, someone had tied a silver horseshoe to the coffin. It trailed behind, but no one laughed. They were all very quiet, subdued, and the bouncing horseshoe somehow reminded them that they would never hear Harriet’s wonderful laugh again.

That night they drank more brandy than they should have, sitting in the freezing Hall. They all needed sustenance, and the vicar had to be helped home as he had already overindulged at the wedding reception. Jinks took the opportunity to excuse herself when he departed, and went up to her room. She had only just closed the door when her father knocked.

He was wearing his wolfskin coat, and carried the ashes in a small urn. He had tied the horseshoe to it.

‘I wondered if you would like to say goodbye to her? I’m going to the chapel, and I’d like it if you came – would you?’

They walked apart to begin with, Edward carrying the ashes under his arm. Twice Jinks stumbled, and in the end he tucked her arm in his. He knew the way, never stopping once, and he guided her to ensure the branches didn’t slap her face.

‘Okay, we’re here . . . You all right?’

She nodded, and he pushed the door open. Jinks hung back slightly as he moved further into the dark, broken-down chapel. He bent down and brushed the dead leaves from the small stone slab.

Jinks whispered, ‘She carved his name, she told me all about him.’

He looked up at her and smiled gently. She could see his eyes were brimming with tears. Sitting back on his heels he opened the urn, held the contents in his hand. He trickled the soft ashes between his fingers, spreading them over his dead son’s grave, then rubbed them until they were part of the stone, part of the scratched name, ‘Freedom’.

Jinks walked slowly to her father and stood behind him. He turned, wrapping his arms around her, and cried like a child in his own child’s embrace. He broke her heart as he said her mother’s name over and over . . . said it so softly, with such tenderness, that she knew he still loved her.

Jinks and Edward travelled back to London together on the fast morning train. He sat opposite her, and when she looked up from her book she found him scrutinizing her. ‘You know, without those bloody glasses you’d be a smasher. Do you have to wear them? Take the damned things off and let’s have a look at you.’

Jinks would not meet his eyes as he removed her spectacles. ‘Shouldn’t this be in a movie? “Good God, Miss Jones, you’re beautiful . . . ”’ She smiled at her own joke, but he saw the way she avoided his gaze, the embarrassed flush spreading up her cheeks.

‘Untie your hair.’

‘Oh, Daddy, please don’t, people will start looking.’

‘I don’t care – it’s about time someone took you in hand. It’s all right, don’t look so startled, I’m not saying it should be me. But you know,’ he said reassuringly, ‘you look terrible . . . Your mother never had much dress sense, but one time she came back from Paris and my God did she look a cracker . . . hair, outfits . . . You got a boyfriend?’

‘No I haven’t, and please give me my glasses . . .’

Edward held them away from her and peered through the lenses, then back at his daughter. ‘Are you long- or shortsighted? Contact lenses would be better than these. Here, don’t get all panic-stricken, put them on, go back into hiding.’

She put them on and looked around quickly to see if any of the passengers had noticed. Then she gazed out of the window and whispered, ‘Got rather a long nose, and if that wasn’t bad enough I’m cross-eyed, my left eye . . .’

‘You are not.’

‘I am.’

‘Look at my finger . . . Come on, look at my finger and I’ll tell you if you’re bloody cross-eyed or not – that was your mother . . . My God.’

‘See, I told you.’

‘No . . . you don’t understand – Miss Jones, you are beautiful – you are beautiful!’

Jinks laughed, and he loved the deep, throaty sound of it. She put her hands up to cover her face . . . She needed to be cared for, given confidence in herself. Suddenly he knew who could do it . . . His daughter looked plain, dowdy, but with the right help she could make the best of herself . . .

Barbara replaced the telephone receiver and tapped it with her perfectly manicured nails. Edward had rarely, if ever, called her over the years. He had said little about why he had suddenly contacted her, just that his daughter needed her help. They would be driving past her house on the way to Greenwich, and Barbara could think of no reason to refuse. Jinks, on the other hand, had been furious with her father.

‘What? Auntie Barbara? I’m not going! How could you, you know Mother detested her.’

‘You don’t have to like the woman, for Chrissakes, just use her. She knows just about everyone, and she’s got great style.’

Jinks was waiting for her father outside the station as the car was brought up from the parking bay.

‘Barbara’s brought up two daughters of her own, and she has contacts. You’ll like her, once you get over her duchess act.’

Jinks sat moodily at his side. ‘She was always foul to Mother, didn’t even come to her funeral, and now I’m supposed to go round and see her. Well, I won’t. I don’t need her, I don’t need anybody.’

‘No? Grow up, sweetheart. You look like a frump, and you could do with someone to give you a hand. Don’t think because you’ve got brains life is going to be an easy ride.’

‘Oh, I see! It’s a bit late, isn’t it?’

Edward braked sharply to a stop and turned towards the glowering, petulant girl. ‘Maybe I am too late for you to care about what I think or feel, but it’s not too late for you to make the best of yourself. Stop behaving like a spoiled brat, a stinking rich kid! You want to get out? Well? Yes or no?’

She turned away from him, shrugging her shoulders. Edward restarted the Rolls and it surged forward. She had one hell of a stubborn streak in her, and he could see the way she clenched her hands as she fought to control her temper. He reached over to pull her closer, but she resisted, and in the end they continued their journey to Mayfair in silence.

Barbara was waiting for them in the small drawing room. She looked as immaculate as ever, and viewed Jinks with a critical, almost professional, scrutiny.

‘Dear God, you should have brought her to me before. My darling girl, don’t you realize what most women would give to have a figure like yours? Clothes, darling, are designed for you – not that I could recommend the ones you have on, but with those long legs you’ll be a dream to dress. Have you ever been to the Paris collections?’

Jinks wouldn’t look at Barbara. She mumbled that she had been to Paris with her school; then, suddenly, she tossed her head back and squinted at Barbara through her glasses. ‘Besides, I’ll be going to university, not frightfully interested in Paris, or clothes.’

‘Yes, darling, I can see that.’ Barbara cocked her head to one side, then flicked a half-smile to Edward. ‘God, she’s like her mother . . . which university?’