Angels and Men (13 page)

She stood cursing herself and hoped he would not remember and realize she had been eavesdropping. She waited for him to laugh. He laughed.

‘So you think I'm practising my pastoral skills on you?' She made no reply. ‘You seem to have a very low opinion of yourself. Unless' – he put a finger under her chin and tilted her face up till he was staring down into her eyes – ‘you have a very high opinion of me. Which would be a big mistake, sweetie.' She jerked away in scorn. ‘Come on,' he said, ‘I'll buy you another drink, and you can tell me about the stars.'

They're all picking on me! wailed a little voice inside her. She snuffed it out in disgust. I sound like Joanna, she thought, as she let him lead her away.

That's why I dislike her so much, Mara realized as she stared at the photograph. She uses tactics I don't allow myself to use. I could cry and say ‘Johnny, Johnny, help me', except that I never would. The people we hate most are always shadows of our worst selves. She put the photographs back in the drawer and tried once again to concentrate on her work. The others would all be at Rupert's party by now. Rain pattered on the window and she sighed.

CHAPTER 9

There was a promise of snow in the air. Mara turned her back on the station lights and began to walk the two miles through the dark to her parents' house. From overhead came the small shiftings and whisperings of the trees that lined the road. The world was holding its breath for the coming snow and for Christmas.

Christmas. Red and gold. Green and white. The holly with its berries in the vicarage garden. White candles in the dark church, and the gold of chocolate pennies or angels' wings. With each homeward step a childlike excitement mounted in her, as though she believed it could all be as it once had been. Sitting in bed hugging her knees, Hester in the other bed, her eyes shining as their mother read them
The Tailor of Gloucester
. The little mice sewing away at Christmas as the tailor lay ill. And in the church tomorrow night the congregation gathering for midnight Mass. She saw the dark-robed figures in the chancel silhouetted against the glowing reredos, moving silently, their hands raised as they lit the candles one by one in the candelabra overhead. One flame and another and another, black figures on gold. And in the vestry her father would be standing in his robes glancing into the mirror, the light sliding over his white cope and the secret gold of the lining gleaming and vanishing as he moved. She had not been home for Christmas for three years, but she knew that the next few days would be full of the old hostilities. They ran like cracks from foundation to rooftop, and her mother with all her skill would never paper over them. There would be silences like loaded weapons or words like biting steel. And worst of all, Hester's absence, which no one would mention.

I can't do this, she thought. I can't bear it. She dropped her bag and pressed her hands over her mouth to stop herself crying out loud. I should have stayed at college. The City loomed in her mind as she had seen it from the departing train, with its buildings rising up out of the freezing fog. The whole of the north had been clenched in a bitter frost, and the fog had worsened until she could see nothing from the window. The train could have been travelling down an endless white tunnel. She stood now under the trees. The branches stirred a little and she remembered the coming snow. Then some words appeared in her mind like a framed sampler.
Try To Be Nice
. Her mother's motto. It had hung invisibly on every wall of her childhood, and she had tried. She had been nice enough to burst a blood vessel, only nobody had ever noticed. Hester's niceness eclipsed hers, just as her prettiness had done, and in the end Mara had been driven to nastiness just so that she would not vanish altogether. But Hester would not be home this Christmas. Is that what I'm trying to do – take Hester's place? The thought stifled her. It would be like wearing Hester's clothes – too small, too short. A scream welled up in her. It was pointless. Her father's study door would remain closed against her. I've never been able to please him. I've tried and tried. I was never able to displease him, either. He didn't care enough. He's never cared about me. It was always Hester. She pressed her hands against her mouth so hard she began to taste blood. Then first flakes began to fall. Well, I'm here now. No point going back. Why not
try to be nice
? She picked up her bag and began to walk again as the snow floated down.

The vicarage was empty. Mara had been picturing her mother's greeting – the smile, and ‘Darling you're home! You should have phoned. We'd have collected you from the station.' After a moment's thought she was glad to have the house to herself. It gave her a chance to make it her own again. She put a kettle on the Aga and stood warming herself. Tomorrow the smells of Christmas would fill the kitchen. Even now everything would be standing ready in the larder. She went to look, as she had always done as a child.

There was the turkey defrosting on the large willow-pattern platter. Two pheasants hung from a hook. The Bart had been, then. The traditional gift of dead wildlife from gentry to clergy. The shelves held rows of bottled fruit and jars of jam. Things to give away. Did the postman ever eat those apricots in brandy? Did the dustman mutter, ‘More bloody marmalade' as he trudged down the path? ‘Why don't they just give money?' And on the floor stood the ranks of bottles which people had given to her father. Port, ginger wine, whisky, brandy. Why? Some received wisdom that all clergy from fat prelate down to humble priest are wine-bibbers and gluttons? But her father seldom drank. Maybe there were pewfuls of Johns ancestors forbidding it. He gave the bottles to rural deans and archdeacons when he was invited out to dinner. And they in turn probably gave them to deans or bishops. She saw the bottles slowly ascending the church hierarchy until at last they found their way to the Archbishop of Canterbury.

There on the fridge was the Christmas cake, already iced and decorated. It stood like a little snowy landscape – house, trees, a robin (bigger than the house) and Santa Claus stuck on to his sleigh with a blob of icing. The sleigh was being pulled by an odd assortment of reindeer of different sizes and colours. They formed a chain which ran halfway round the cake. Mara smiled. This was how she and Hester had always done it, taking turns, adding one decoration at a time. Her mother had done the same as though it were a sacred family tradition.

The kettle began to boil and Mara turned and left the shadowy pantry. She stood with her coffee thinking about the cake. Snow was brushing the vicarage windows now. It must be getting quite deep. She put down her empty mug and went to the sitting-room, where the French windows opened on to the garden. She unlocked them and stepped out.

Behind her the brightly lit room shone out on to the lawn. She stood in a doorway of light with her face upturned. All around the snow sifted down, filling the spiky holly leaves, muffling the whole world. The flakes burnt as they melted on her cheeks and lips. Another shadow joined hers in the snow. She turned. It was her father. He must have been in his study all the time. They stood together in the silence watching each other. I will talk to him. I will really try. But she could find no starting place.

After a while he spoke: ‘Did you have a good term?'

‘Yes.' How short her answer sounded, as though in her anxiety she had snipped it off. ‘Yes,' she tried again. ‘It was OK.'

‘Good.' They might have been speaking into nothing at all. The world and its sounds lay deep in snow.

‘Well, it's a beautiful city.' He spoke formally, as though she were a parishioner.

‘Oh, yes,' she agreed.

‘And your course is going well?'

‘Yes. I think.'

‘And you get on well with your tutor?'

‘Yes, thank you.' Silence. The sky shed its snow. How could she talk to him now, after more than ten years of hiding from him everything she thought or felt?

Suddenly she said: ‘I'll miss my friends.' There was no mistaking the significance of this simple statement.

‘Fellow students, are they?'

‘Yes.'

‘That's good.'

‘Some are undergraduates.'

‘Mmm.'

‘And some are training for the ministry.'

‘At Coverdale?'

‘Yes.'

Silence closed round them again. Then from behind them in the house came the sound of the front door opening.

‘I'm back, Morgan!' Her mother came into the room and caught sight of Mara. ‘Darling! How long have you been here?' They came in from the snow, and Mara went to hug her mother.

‘You smell of oranges,' Mara said.

‘I know. We've been making Christingles for the crib service. The vestry is awash with orange juice. Have you eaten? I'll make you an omelette, and you can tell me all about your term. Have you had a wonderful time?' Mara's father left without saying anything. He doesn't want me here. She felt that old hollow desolation, like homesickness, except that she was at home. She followed her mother to the kitchen, but as she went, a thought struck her: That's what I do. I walk out without saying anything. ‘Goodbye, Mara,' her friends would chorus pointedly. And what if her father had been thinking, She doesn't want me here now her mother's home?

Mara watched her mother as she cooked. She was so young-looking that people often mistook them for sisters. She had married early, and in some ways she seemed not to have grown up. Her policy was that life should be fun. No matter how grim one's existence was, fun would be had. Mara felt old and crabby by comparison. Her mother talked as she chopped the onions and mushrooms. Her conversation was like her letters, and required about as much response. This is why we are friends, thought Mara. Our relationship relies on her saying a lot, and my replying occasionally; the conversational equivalent of a postcard. This shed light on her friendship with Maddy and May. Mara ate while her mother talked about Grandma Flowers.

‘She's as cheerful as ever, but she gets so confused. Oh, I meant to say she's coming for Christmas lunch. I'm picking her up before church. She's worked out that she's in a nursing home now, and not a hotel, so in some ways she's improved, I suppose. They've been trying to assess the extent of the damage done by her last stroke. And they ask questions to see if she's going senile – what year is this? who's on the throne? and so on. She knows all that, but she's no idea why they're asking. She said to me the other day, “That young Doctor – such a pleasant young man – but do you know, he
did not know
the name of the prime minister!” And the psychiatric nurse has been checking for aphasia by showing her everyday objects and asking what they are. But she – the nurse – is Indian, and Grandma thinks she's forgotten the English for “teaspoon”.'

Mara finished eating. She pictured Grandma helping the medical staff with their basic English vocabulary.

‘She said to me, “It's perfectly all right, you know. They know the names of all the medicines.” I shouldn't laugh. It's all been rather difficult, though. At least the house has been cleared.' And just for a moment Mara thought her mother seemed old. One day I will be looking after her and saying, ‘It's all rather difficult.'

There was a silence, and then Mara said, ‘I wore the black dress.' Her mother's face lit up.

‘Wonderful! It fits you? When? Where? You went to a party?'

‘The college ball.'

‘Darling – you said you were washing up! Oh, you joined in afterwards? Did you have a marvellous time? Who was your partner?'

‘I just joined a group of friends.'

‘Well, I hope you've got a photograph, so I can see what you looked like.'

‘Somewhere,' said Mara vaguely.

‘Well, find it, darling!' And Mara went straight to the pocket of the bag where she knew she had put the photographs, and handed them over with a smile.

‘Darling, who
are
they?' She watched her mother's eyes flicking from one to the other, overwhelmed by this embarrassment of male splendour. Mara suppressed the urge to say, ‘I've no idea – I just stopped the two best-looking men I could find and asked them to pose with me.'

‘Well?' Her mother looked up. ‘The dress looks wonderful,' she added a shade too late.

‘They're both students at Coverdale.'

Her mother nodded brightly. Nothing wrong with marrying a parson. ‘What are their names?'

‘The fair one's Rupert Anderson.'

‘Anderson. Not Gordon and Jean Anderson's son?' she asked, as Mara had known she would. She nodded, ‘They were good friends of ours when your father was training. Gordon was curate at the university church. My, my. What a good-looking youth. Still, his father's terribly attractive. And who's this?'

‘Johnny Whitaker.'

Her mother was stumped. He was nobody's son that she knew of. She had noticed the slight blush, however, and knew which one to praise. ‘What extraordinarily handsome friends you seem to have. I think I prefer the dark one. He looks like a rogue. Is he a bit of a rough diamond?'

Honestly
, mother. And this is Mara's fiancé – something of a rough diamond, but we're terribly fond of him. ‘Well . . . I suppose . . .' began Mara.

‘Oh,
wonderful
. I do like unsuitable men. It's the raggle-taggle gypsies syndrome, I suppose. Oh, what care I for a goose feather bed, with the sheets turned down so bravely-o,' sang her mother.

‘When I can sleep on the cold hard ground, along with the raggle-taggle gypsies-o,' thought Mara, her eyebrows rising in astonishment.

‘Your father was
deeply
unsuitable, of course. Which is why I ran off with him. You look shocked, darling!'

‘No, no.' Yes.

Mara had never before delved into the mystery of her parents' attraction to one another. A startling answer to this unasked question now suggested itself. She straightened her knife and fork on the plate. Good God – didn't they know that the only function of parental sex is procreation? This recalled something Mara had been meaning to say, knowing it would amuse her mother.

‘Do you realize that you wrote in your last letter that this will be your twenty-second wedding anniversary?'

‘Well?'

‘Well, I'm twenty-two in May.' She looked at her mother, waiting for the penny to drop.

Her mother looked back at her with a smile, as though she were standing in front of another slot machine waiting for a different coin. Then the truth burst in. Mara's mouth fell open.

‘I thought you knew,' said her mother. ‘It's not supposed to be a secret.' Mara smoothed her hand over her hair, unable to meet her mother's gaze. ‘I'm sorry, darling. I honestly thought you knew.' No you didn't. You never told me. ‘We weren't trying to keep it from you.' Mara could think of nothing to say. At this point her father entered the kitchen. Mara blushed. There was silence. He looked from one to the other.