Quarter Past Two on a Wednesday Afternoon (41 page)

Has Anna ever said that before?

‘It’s
not
all right!’ It’s as if someone else is speaking for her, shouting, relishing the freedom of being allowed out. ‘Don’t treat me like an invalid. I need to get away from it all! I’m going to Australia and no one’s going to stop me—’

‘But why Australia, Mum? Why Sydney?’

‘Because that’s where she lives! Zanna!’ She snaps it out as if they ought to know.

‘When did she go there?’

‘Sixteen – sixteen years ago she left. You can blame me for everything else, but you can’t blame me for that.’ Tears are threatening again, her voice wavering. ‘It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t what—’

‘Mum,’ says Anna quietly. ‘Did you know that Rose left because Zanna came back? Have you known that, all this time?’

‘Zanna didn’t want that! She didn’t! All she wanted was to see the house, a quick look. She was horrified when – when she knew—’

But her thoughts are roiling, one surfacing, then another; she can’t grasp them, make sense of them.

‘All right, love. All right.’ Don is looking down at his lap, not at her, but he’s talking again in that oddly quiet, controlled voice. ‘You’ve been keeping so much to yourself. I don’t think I know the half of it yet. And neither do you.’

‘What d’you mean? Half of what?’ Cassandra says sharply. Fear clutches at her stomach. A body found, remains, a note. It’s the dread that never leaves her. Everything’s her fault, no matter what she’s been yelling just now.

‘Go on,’ says Don, turning to Anna. ‘Tell her.’

‘Shouldn’t we—?’

‘Go on.’

She feels Anna’s hand on her arm. ‘Mum. I know where Rose is. She’s all right, she’s – she’s fine. I’ve met her, talked to her.’

Chapter Twenty-eight

On Saturday, in the last afternoon light, Anna was standing in Rose’s bedroom.

All seemed calm, her mother asleep, Don tidying the kitchen. The house had changed since her last visit. This wasn’t a shrine to Rose any more; it was simply the room Rose had left behind.

Anna remembered sitting on the bed beside Rose, with a big atlas open across their knees. ‘Look, Anna,’ Rose said, jabbing a finger, and Anna would peer at a tiny blob that meant nothing to her. ‘Here’s where I’ll go. Irkutsk. Murmansk. Odessa. Here, then here.’ The names had a kind of magic. But Rose hadn’t proved to be much of a traveller after all; she had rooted herself in a place too small to feature in the atlas even as the minutest dot.

I should have known, Anna thought, long ago, that she’d head for the sea.

‘It was a different world back then,’ Don said, in the kitchen. ‘I mean, nowadays girls have babies on their own and no one gives it a second thought. Then, well, it was seen as shocking. Even in the swinging sixties.’

The phrase, to Anna, conjured psychedelia and the Beatles, Woodstock, the pill, an explosion of youthful energy. But she knew from reading and films that it hadn’t been all freedom and tolerance; attitudes lag behind fashion, at some distance. Now, learning about her mother’s teenage years was like watching one of those faded but exuberant films that provoked such nostalgia for the sixties, even for people who hadn’t been there.

‘You’ll be all right, Dad, won’t you?’ Anna asked.

Don looked mildly surprised. ‘Me?
I’m
not the one we need to worry about.’

‘But you’ve had a shock. A double shock.’

‘At least. Triple, even. But there’s Rose. Soon as Sandra’s up to it, we’ll go down and see her.’

‘If Mum had told you about Rosanna, when you first met,’ Anna asked, ‘what would you have done?’

‘I don’t know, love. I’d like to say it wouldn’t have made the slightest difference, but the fact is it’d have made a lot more difference then than it does now. All I know is – well, I’m not going to hold it against her, am I? I’m relieved, to tell you the truth. It starts to explain all this strangeness. When we lost Rose – no wonder it hit her so hard, after losing her brother, then giving up her first baby as well. It’s not surprising a few cracks have started to show. But what I’m finding really hard is that she never told me about Rosanna coming to the house that day. She let me think Rose was dead.’

‘Oh, Dad. But – she didn’t know herself, did she? Didn’t know that Rose wasn’t?’

‘I haven’t quite got my head round it yet. I just wish – it would have given me something to hold on to. Something to make sense of.’

‘So she’d been meeting Zanna in secret, till Zanna went to Australia? It was amazing she could manage that, without letting on.’

‘That’s right, love – it was a bit garbled, but I think I’ve got this straight. Soon after our Rose left, this was. Rosanna married an Ozzie and settled in Sydney. Sandra hasn’t seen her since, but they’ve kept in touch by email. Now Rosanna’s expecting a baby, after years of trying, apparently. That’s what – you know – that business about the shoes was all about. She must have been looking forward to her first grandchild, but with no idea how she’d ever be able to see him, or her.’

‘Did Mum say—’ Anna wasn’t sure she should ask this, but did: ‘Zanna’s father. Who was he –
is
he? Did she say?’

‘Yes,’ said Don, ‘I asked. That’s another thing that’s brought this to the surface. She didn’t expect to see him ever again. Now he’s turned up at the health centre, and that’s what threw her into panic. Chap called Phil, the physio there.’

‘The one who phoned? The friend of her brother’s?’

‘Yes, love. He was Roland’s best friend, apparently.’

‘And Mum’s boyfriend?’

‘Looks like it. But after this happened – after she got pregnant – she never saw him again.’

‘So does he know – about Zanna, I mean?’

Don shook his head. ‘This is where things get completely muddled. She’s got it into her head that somehow he does, and that’s why he’s turned up at Meadowcroft, with the idea of broadcasting it to everyone. But at the same time she thinks he
doesn’t
know, and she ought to tell him. From what I could make of it, he had no idea. Quite likely still hasn’t. The pregnancy was hushed up – her parents saw it as a disgrace. They sent her away to some kind of institution, and when she came back they all pretended it had never happened.’

‘An institution?’

‘Home for unmarried mothers, in Maidstone. The baby was taken away as soon as it was born.’

‘It sounds awful. Like a punishment.’ Anna took this in. ‘And in the
sixties
– I thought it was all flower-power and Jimi Hendrix and peace, man. We’re not talking about Victorian times, for God’s sake!’

‘I know. Seems incredible, now.’

‘And this was
Gran
! Granny Skipton, and Grandad, who sent her away …’ Anna’s head swam with the knowledge of another adjustment to be made. ‘And Mum told you all this? She didn’t rage at you, like yesterday?’

‘No. We just talked, and she’d say one thing, then another, but I didn’t probe too hard. She’ll tell me in her own time, I expect. Isn’t it amazing,’ Don said, ‘that you can live with someone for years, day by day, and not have the faintest idea what’s going on in their head?’

‘So much covering up. It’s not surprising she’s started to – to behave a bit oddly.’ Anna didn’t want to give voice to the words that presented themselves as explanations. ‘Do you think she’ll get over this?’

‘I think it’s a kind of breakdown, love. Not what you’re thinking. I wanted to call a doctor today, but she wouldn’t – I’ll make an appointment on Monday. Who knows? Having this out in the open might make a big difference. Shock can be the tipping point, I know that. Shock, stress, bereavement.’

‘But this is the opposite of bereavement,’ Anna said. ‘People coming back, people appearing from nowhere.’

‘I know, I know.’

They looked at each other with the air of survivors marvelling at their escape. Don sighed, and went to put the kettle on.

‘She can stop pretending now,’ he said. ‘No more secrecy, after all these years of being sick with worry that I’d find out – she thought I’d turn on her and throw her out of the house. It’s – it’s awful to realize that the person she’s been afraid of is
me
. Why couldn’t she trust me? That’s what really hurts. There was a time, years ago, when I convinced myself she was having an affair, meeting someone. I had it out with her, asked if there was another man. She said no, there wasn’t – and that was true. But I could tell she was frightened of something, and that made me sure she was lying.’

‘I had no idea of any of this,’ Anna said.

‘No, well. Things were pretty cool. It was something we had to sort out between us – I’d have hated you to know. But we never did sort it out.’

The phone rang, and Don answered.

‘Martin! Hi. Yes, we’re OK, thanks. Yes, Sandra’s home, a bit worn out, but none the worse.’

Anna felt herself flushing. She busied her hands with mugs and tea bags.

‘Did Anna tell you? No? You’re more than welcome to come down this evening – yes, she’s here. I’ll pass you over.’

Reluctantly, Anna took the receiver. She didn’t want to talk to Martin in her father’s presence. Didn’t want to talk to him at all, in fact.

‘Hello,’ she said cautiously. ‘Where are you?’

‘At the flat. It feels a bit empty. Why didn’t you tell me what was going on? Why did you shut me out? I only know about this from Ruth and your dad.’

‘Oh – lots of reasons.’
You were always too busy
, she would have said, but couldn’t, with her father in earshot.

‘Anna,’ he said, and his voice seemed to reverberate through her. ‘Look – d’you want me to come down? I’ve got something on, but I can cancel.’

‘No – thanks, but we’re OK.’

She rang off; her father was looking at her in concern. ‘Is everything all right, love?’

‘Yes! Fine, thanks,’ she said brightly. ‘Are there any biscuits?’

‘Well,
I
think she sounds like a complete cow,’ said Bethan, over lunch on Monday. ‘She must have
known
. How could she leave you all in the lurch like that – never a word, never even a note? I mean, there’s such a thing as being a bit of a drama queen, and then there’s being completely self-obsessed.’

‘I don’t know.’ Anna felt compelled to support Rose. ‘There’s something fragile about her. Or perhaps I mean brittle. Something still lost.’

Bethan thumped down her glass. ‘Yes, and that bloke of hers seems to have done nothing but indulge her. He should have made her get in touch with your parents. Why didn’t he?’

‘He did try. But, see, you’re using common sense and logic. There’s nothing common-sensical about Rose. Probably never was.’

Anna found it hard to convey what she felt: that when she’d been with Rose, for less than a day, she’d been under Rose’s spell again, as she always had been. All her negative thoughts had seemed ungenerous, unsympathetic. She should have been happy; if she wasn’t, it was another failure.

‘Will you go down there again?’

‘Yes, and soon. Honestly, I’ll be skint by the end of the month, all this train travel and car hire.’

‘And …’ Bethan made prompting gestures. ‘You and Martin?’

Anna shook her head. ‘There’s no me and Martin any more. But I’m not going to talk about that, Beth. I told you I wouldn’t.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning it’s over, and that’s that.’

‘Anna, you’re mad. You know you are.’

‘I’m not mad. It’s best this way. I’m going to look on this as a new start, not an ending.’ Anna was trying to catch the waitress’s eye to order coffee. ‘Anyway! That’s enough about me. How are you? And how’s sprog-in-waiting?’

On Friday, finishing work early, Anna made the long journey to Cornwall again. She was drawn to Rose by her feeling that there must be more, that another meeting must make up for the reticence of the last.

As the train left Paddington, she checked her mobile and found a voicemail message from Martin. ‘Anna, you left your painting behind. You can’t have meant to, so I’ll bring it over to Rowan Lodge tomorrow. OK. Bye.’

Shore!
Anna felt a stab of loss. How could she have forgotten? She saw the figure blurred in haze; the impress of footprints along the tide’s edge. She wanted to look at it again, with her new insights. And she wanted the assurance that she’d been considered promising, once, and might be able to resurrect any talent she’d had, and build on it.

Tomorrow would be one of Martin’s days with Liam; he’d be at Ruth’s to collect him, and again later, bringing him back. Not trusting herself to speak, she sent a text message back:
Not at RL – on way to Cornwall. Easier to leave at Ruth’s? Thanks.

She replayed the voice message twice more, wondering if she could keep it indefinitely, and whether there would be a time when she could no longer recall the unique blend of sounds and inflexions that made up Martin’s voice. A memory came to her of both of them looking at the
Shore
picture, soon after they’d met. He was standing behind her, a hand on her shoulder; she had propped the painting on a bookshelf to show him. ‘You’re good,’ he said, his mouth so close to her ear that she felt his breath like a caress; ‘really good. Why did you stop?’

How much she had wanted his approval, then; how much it meant to her, even though he knew little about art. She hadn’t told him that the girl was meant to be Rose. Perhaps she should have.

‘It shouldn’t be shut away in a cupboard,’ he said. ‘Let’s hang it in our bedroom.’ But they never had. Maybe he’d only been flattering her.

Michael met Anna at Penzance station and drove her to Trelissick Lodge. As it was so late, she wouldn’t see Rose until next morning. Michael was the one Anna felt she could confide in, rather than Rose. As they drove along dark lanes following the swathe of headlights, she asked about a possible visit for her parents, how it could best be arranged. Michael would have to be the one to persuade Rose.

‘Perhaps it had better be on neutral ground, the first meeting,’ he suggested. ‘Lunch at the Morwenna Hotel, perhaps? I could book them a room there. Then, if it goes well, we can invite them home. Will you and Martin come too? Would that make it easier? Or should it be your parents on their own?’