Coming Home (146 page)

Unchanged. Just the same. The same smell. It was a bit chilly, perhaps, despite the logs which smouldered in the huge hearth, but an arrangement of chrysanthemums and autumn foliage stood, bright as flames, in the middle of the round table, where still lay the dog leads, the Visitors' Book, the small stack of mail waiting to be collected by the postman.

No sound. Only the ticking of the old clock.

‘Where is everybody?’ Jess whispered, sounding a bit overawed.

‘I don't know. We'll go and look. Upstairs first.’

On the half-landing, they heard the faint strains of the nursery wireless floating along the passage. The nursery door stood ajar. Judith pushed it gently open, and saw Mary, intent on a pile of ironing. She said her name.

‘Oh,
Judith.
’ The iron was put down with a thump, and Mary's sturdy arms opened for her. ‘I can't believe you've come back to us. And that you're really
here
again. It's been so long! And this is Jess? Hello, Jess, it's lovely to meet you. Look at your heads, you're soaking. Walk down, did you?’

‘Yes. All the way. We've only got one bike. Where's Loveday?’

‘She'll be here directly. Walking down from Lidgey with Nat. She had to help Walter pen a couple of calves.’

‘How is Nat?’

‘He's a holy terror.’ Mary had a bit more grey in her hair, and a few more lines on her face, and she was thinner too, but in a funny way it rather suited her. There were darns in her blue cardigan, and the collar of her blouse was a bit frayed, but she still smelt of Johnson's Baby Soap and fresh ironing.

‘Seen Mrs Carey-Lewis, have you?’

‘No. We came straight upstairs to find you.’

‘Then let's go down now, and tell her you're here.’

Pausing only to switch off her iron, turn off her wireless and put another log on her little fire (‘Good thing we've got plenty of trees on this place, otherwise we'd all be dying of cold’), she led them out of the nursery, back down the stairs, and along the hall to the door of the small sitting-room. She tapped on the panel, opened it a crack, and put her head around the edge of the door.

‘Someone to
see
you!’ And, dramatically, she flung the door wide open.

And there they were, sitting on either side of the fireplace, Diana with her tapestry, and the Colonel with the
Sunday Times.
At his feet, old Tiger lay asleep, but Pekoe, who had been dozing on the sofa and now suspected robbers, sat to attention and let loose a cacophony of barks. Diana looked up, snatched off her spectacles, cast aside her sewing and sprang to her feet.

‘Pekoe, be quiet. It's only Judith. It's
Judith.
’ Pekoe, deprived of pleasure, sunk sulkily back onto the cushions. ‘Judith. Oh, darling. It's been a thousand years. Come and let me hug you to bits.’ She was slender, tall and as lovely as ever, despite the fact that her corn-coloured hair had faded to silver. ‘You've come back, my precious third daughter. And you're looking utterly wonderful! And you've brought
Jess.
Jess. I'm Diana Carey-Lewis. We've heard so much about you, and this is the very first time we've ever met…’

Released from Diana's embrace, Judith turned to the Colonel, who was now standing, patiently awaiting his turn. He had always looked older than his years, and now it seemed as though time had caught up with him. And, as well, his clothes, which hung in shabby fashion on his lanky frame — a very elderly tweed jacket, and a pair of washed-out corduroy trousers in which, in the old days, he would not have been seen dead.

‘My dear.’ Formal; as always, a little shy. She took his hands in hers and they kissed. ‘How pleased we are to have you home again.’

‘Not nearly as grateful as I am to be here.’ Now Tiger, ever courteous, had heaved himself into a sitting position, and Judith stooped to fondle his head. She said sadly, ‘He's looking old.’ He was too. Not fat, but heavy and arthritic, and his dear muzzle was quite grey.

‘We're none of us getting any younger. I should start looking for another Labrador puppy, but somehow I haven't got the heart…’

‘Edgar. Darling, you must say hello to Jess.’

He put out his hand. ‘How do you do, Jess? I must introduce you to my dog, Tiger. This is Jess, Tiger.’ He smiled, his gentle, charming smile which no child could ever resist. ‘You've come a long way. What do you think of Cornwall, eh? Doesn't rain like this
all
the time.’

Jess said, ‘I actually remember Cornwall.’

‘Do you, by Jove? That's going a long way back. Why don't we sit down, and you can tell me about it…here, on this stool by the fire…’ He pushed aside some magazines and papers. ‘How old were you when you left?’

‘I was four.’

‘I didn't realise you were as old as that. Well, of course you have memories.
I
can remember when I was two. Sitting in my pram, and some other child pushing a bit of butterscotch into my mouth…’

At this moment, Mary, raising her voice slightly, announced that she was going to go and put the kettle on for tea, and everybody agreed that this would be a splendid idea. When she had taken herself off, Diana sank back into her chair, and Judith sat on the end of the sofa that Pekoe was not occupying.

‘Darling, what a time you've had. You look thin. Terribly elegant. Are you all right?’

‘Of course I'm all right.’

‘Loveday's dying to see you and show you her wicked Nat. They'll be here in a moment. And little Jess! What a brave child. Such experiences. Biddy telephoned the moment she got the cable from Bob. She'd already told us that…’ Realising what she had been about to say, and with Jess in earshot, Diana stopped. She glanced at Jess, sitting there with her back to them, deep in conversation with the Colonel. She mouthed
Jess was dead.
Judith nodded. ‘…then, to
hear.
To be told it wasn't true. You must have nearly died of joy.’

‘It was pretty exciting.’

‘And, darling, so dreadfully sad about your parents. Unthinkable. I was going to write, but you didn't give me time. Biddy told me all the awful things, but before I could put pen to paper, we learned you were on your way home. What sort of a voyage did you have?’

‘Scarcely a voyage. More an endurance test. The boat was packed. Three sittings for meals. You can imagine.’

‘Ghastly. Talking of meals, the Nettlebeds send their love and say they'll see you soon. They have the whole of Sunday off now, and they've gone to Camborne to visit some ancient relation in a nursing home. Was it heaven to get back to The Dower House? Isn't the garden looking pretty? I gave Phyllis some cuttings…’

Brittle with excitement, she chattered on, and Judith sat and tried to look as though she was listening, but wasn't. She was thinking about Gus Callender. Was now the moment to tell Diana and the Colonel that Gus was alive? No, she decided, it wasn't the moment. The first person to be told, and in private, was Loveday. Later today, somehow, somewhere, Judith would do this.

‘…where is little Jess sleeping?’

‘In Anna's room. There's plenty of space. Anna's gone in with Phyllis. Just for the time being.’

‘And what plans have you made for Jess?’

‘I suppose I'll have to go and see Miss Catto, and see if she'll take her at St Ursula's.’

‘But, my darling, of course she will. Oh, isn't it too extraordinary how life goes full-circle. Oh, what am I thinking of? I haven't told you about Athena. She's going to have another baby. In the spring, I think. Too exciting. I can't tell you how we missed them when they went. The house was totally empty without a child in it…’

No sooner were the words out of her mouth than,
bang
on cue, could be heard the piercing tones of Nathaniel Mudge, on his way from the kitchen, and in full spate of argument with his mother.

‘I don't want to take my boots off.’

‘You've got to. They're covered in mud.’

‘They
not
covered in mud.’

‘They are. You've trodden mud all across the kitchen floor. Now come here…’

‘No…’

‘Nat…!’

A howl. Loveday had clearly caught him and was forcibly removing his boots.

Diana said faintly, ‘Oh dear.’

A moment later, the door burst open and her grandson catapulted into the room, bereft of footwear, his cheeks scarlet with indignation, and his bottom lip sticking out like a shelf.

‘What's this all about?’ Diana asked, and Nat told her in no uncertain fashion.

‘Mum's taken my boots off. They're new boots. They're red. I was wantin' to
show
them to you.’

Trying to placate, ‘We'll see them another time,’ Diana told him soothingly.

‘But I want you to see them
now.
’

Judith got up from the sofa. As she did so, Loveday appeared in the open doorway. Looking exactly the way she always had, a ragamuffin teenager, and not in the least like the mother of that formidable three-year-old. She wore trousers and an old pullover and a pair of red socks, and her hair still bounced up from her head in dark, lustrous curls.

There was a pause, while they simply stood there, grinning at each other. Then, ‘Well, look who's here,’ said Loveday. ‘God, it's good to see you.’ They met, and hugged and kissed perfunctorily, just the way they always used to. ‘Sorry we're a bit late, but…Nat, don't put your fingers near Pekoe's eye. You know you're not allowed to.’

Nat glared at his mother with defiant brown eyes, and Judith, for all her good intentions, dissolved into laughter.

‘You seem to have met your match.’

‘Oh, he's a horror. Aren't you, Nat? You're very sweet, but you're a horror.’

‘My dad says I'm a little bugger,’ Nat informed the company in general, and then catching sight of Jess, another stranger, he fixed his gaze upon her and stared without blinking.

Jess, clearly amused, said, ‘Hello.’

‘Who are you?’

‘I'm Jess.’

‘What are you doin' here?’

‘I've come for tea.’

‘We brought chocolate biscuits in a bag, my mum and me.’

‘Are you going to give me one?’

Nat considered this, and then said, ‘No. I'm going to eat them all myself.’

He then set about clambering onto the sofa and commencing to bounce, and for a moment it looked as though the entire afternoon was about to break up into mayhem, but Mary bustled back to save the day, to tell them that tea was on the table, to scoop Nathaniel out of the air, mid-bounce, and to bear him, shrieking, with what one hoped was glee, in the direction of the dining-room.

‘She's the only person,’ said Loveday, with a sort of hopeless pride, ‘who can do a thing with him.’

‘What about Walter?’

‘Oh, Walter's worse than he is. Come on, Mummy, let's go and eat.’

So they all trooped through to the dining-room, the Colonel pausing to put the guard in front of the fire, and bringing up the rear. There, the tea-table had been laid, and set with all the remembered nursery treats, of jam sandwiches and Marmite sandwiches, a fruit-cake baked in a ring, and the chocolate biscuits provided by Loveday.

It was a much diminished table from the one that Judith recalled from the old days. All the leaves had been removed, and what remained looked strangely small and inadequate in the middle of the huge, formal room. Gone was the heavy white damask table-cloth, and in its place, humble but practical, blue-and-white-checked seersucker. As it was nursery tea, Mary sat at one end of the table, in charge of the big brown teapot (Judith remembered that all the traditional silver had been put away at the beginning of the war), and with Nat alongside her on a high chair. Nat didn't want to sit on the high chair. Each time he was put onto it, he slid off, until finally Mary set him down with such a thump on his bottom that he heeded the warning and stayed where he was.

The Colonel, facing Mary, had Jess on his left hand. ‘Would you like a jam sandwich or Marmite?’ he asked her politely, and Jess said that she would like a jam, while Nat banged on the table with a spoon and announced to the assembled company that what he wanted, and wanted now, was a chocolate biscuit.

But finally he was shushed, fed with a Marmite sandwich, the pandemonium subdued and normal conversation was able to continue. Mary poured tea. Cups were handed round. Diana, warm and charming, and ever the perfect hostess, turned to Jess.

‘Now, Jess, you must tell us all the lovely things that you and Judith plan to do, now you're home again. What's the first excitement?’

Jess, with all eyes upon her, became a bit embarrassed. She hastily swallowed a mouthful of jam sandwich and said, ‘I don't know, really,’ and across the table caught Judith's eye, a clear signal for help.

‘How about the bicycle?’ Judith prompted.

‘Oh yes. We're going to buy a bicycle for me.’

‘It might have to be second-hand,’ Diana warned. ‘They're terribly difficult to get. Like cars. You can't buy a new car nowadays, and second-hand ones cost more than the new ones do. What else? Are you going to go and look at your old house in Penmarron? Where you used to live?’

‘We thought we'd go take the train one day. And go to Porthkerris too.’

‘What a good idea.’