Death be Not Proud (5 page)

 

The air stung straight from the east, the light breeze cold and sharp. I wrapped Matthew's scarf around my face and drew the collar of my coat up to my ears, the zip holding the combination together like the bevor on a suit of armour. I found the narrow passage that led to the old High Street and regarded the tide of humanity in front of me before stepping into the current. Apart from the brief encounter in the computer shop and the hospital, it had been weeks since I'd been among people outside the confines of the college, and the assault on my senses left me unprepared. I felt a stranger, although the blood of my ancestors stained the streets, and their money had built the walls of the old stone houses around me. I knew each cobble, every stone, the smell of the market stalls in Red Lion Square, the familiar voices – teeth gritted against the biting wind – yet I found no comfort in them, cast adrift on an ocean of faces. Out of sorts; out of place; out of time.

My sister's coffee shop lay off the High Street, its Georgian windows at odds with its medieval origins. I pushed open the heavy glazed door with a mixture of anticipation and relief as the crowds gave way to the coffee-scented sobriety of the interior. The hour still being early, only a handful of caffeine addicts decorated the warm, mocha-coloured room. Embedded in deep leather sofas set in alcoves, they spread wide their newspapers in defiance of the morning. A few faces looked up as the frigid air made me an unwelcome visitor, stirring the static pages and diluting the heady aroma of freshly made coffee. I walked quietly across the stripped-wood floor which bore the accumulated scars of several centuries of life, to where weak sunlight, the colour of winter, bleached the tones of the oak counter curving seductively towards the back of the shop. Behind it, the back of a tall, skinny man in his early forties, dark floppy hair greying at the edges, stooped as he wrestled with the filter mechanism of the shiny Italian coffee machine. He yanked at the black handle and the filter jerked free, scattering dark coffee grounds across the floor. He swore under his breath.

I unwound my scarf and drew the zip of my coat down far enough to reveal my face. “Hi, Rob, how's things?”

He jumped, spinning round, grinding a circle in the damp coffee under his shoe.

“Emma! Good grief! Where did you come from?”

His soft Scottish accent seeped through his precise articulation, as it always did when he was surprised. He came round the end of the counter, wiping his hands on the cream apron around his waist, and enveloped me in a cautious embrace.

“Beth's feeding Archie – she'll be out in a moment. Now, what've you been up to?” He held me at arms' length,
inspecting me as he did so, taking in the cast on my arm and the hollow wanness of my face.

“So what's happened to the vermin who did this to you?”

I shrugged, not wanting to go into details of the attack again.

“They've got him banged up somewhere.”

He took the hint. “They should've fed him to your dad; let him sort the scum out, like he did Guy.”

“Oh, you heard about that, did you?”

I wondered what exactly he had been told about my father's confrontation with Guy – not the full story, I bet. He grinned, his smile lifting high cheekbones, and his face looked no longer severe.

“I heard enough to know I wouldn't want to be on the wrong side of his temper – or yours. There's laws against terrorizing university staff in the States, you know, Emma. They won't let you back in the country if you persist in molesting academics.”

An image of Staahl's face, screwed in terror moments before Matthew released his grip on him, intervened briefly. I recovered, punching my brother-in-law on the arm as hard as I dared. He was the only person I knew who could get away with making a comment that cut so close to my quick. He gave me another brotherly bear hug, reminding me of a leaner version of Matias Lidström. “Yes, well, I'm glad to see you're in one piece; Beth's been worried sick about you.”

A flurry of feet from the back of the room and the high-pitched clamour of children's voices broke through the muted tones of the adult conversations around us, as my nephew and niece sprang out of nowhere, launching an attack of hugs around my waist. Heads – one curly haired and bright gold, the other straight and dark – looked up at me expectantly.
I kissed the tops of their heads, returning their embraces as best I could amid the wriggling.

“Hello, you two – my, how you've grown! Shouldn't you be at school? Christmas is coming, and I hope you've been
good
little children. Are you eating your greens?”

My fingers ruffled their hair stiffly and the twins creased up with giggles at the familiar greeting. Flora's pretend pout lasted for all of two seconds.

“It's
Saturday
, Emma, and there's no school at the weekend, but Daddy says we should be in school
every
day and Christmas Day, and he says he's going to talk to Mrs Abbot about it 'cos
she's
the head teacher and she can tell the teachers they've got to teach us and Amy's mum says we don't because it's the law we have holidays and Daddy says he'll get the law changed and have you brought us any presents?”

“Slow down, slow down, my little river of words, one thing at a time!”

I laughed at my irrepressible niece, her eyes sparkling and her curls bouncing as she jumped up and down in front of me. “And no, I'm very sorry, but this time I didn't bring any presents. Do you forgive me or shall I leave and never come back?”

She flung her arms around my waist again, managing to nudge a rib in the process.

“Don't go, we forgive you. But you have to do better
next
time,” she smiled impishly.

I felt a tentative hand on my arm and looked down at my nephew, pale and shy with the dark, soft hair of his father – the opposite of his twin.

“Does your arm hurt, Emma?”

I bent down as far as I could, and brushed his hair out of his thoughtful eyes, gentling my voice.

“No, Alex, it doesn't hurt any more, but thank you for asking.
How's the coin collection going? Any new acquisitions?”

The little boy's face lit up. “I've seen a Hadrian sesterce on eBay, but it's too much money already, but Daddy says he'll take us to Bloody Oaks at Losecoat Field if the farmer'll let us. James' dad found a groat there last summer.”

I smiled at the light in his eyes and made a mental note for a Christmas present.

“Your great-grandfather used to take us to the battlefield when I was your age; that's where my arrowhead came from; do you remember it?”

Alex nodded eagerly, making his hair flop back into his eyes. “Will you come too, Emma, please?”

“Yes, please, Emma, please, please,
pleeeease
,” Flora chanted.

There was almost nothing I would have liked to do more. Almost.

“Perhaps, babes – I'll have to see.”

Flora started to pogo up and down in front of me again, winding herself up for a full-on begging session, but her father intercepted just in time.

“All right, you two, the DVD's set up, if you want to watch it; give your aunt room to breathe.”

I relieved my muscles of their awkward posture while he shooshed his offspring towards the back of the shop, where they disappeared in a cloud of exuberance through the staff door, passing my sister as she came out. Beth saw me and pulled her dark-blue jumper down over her bottom with her free hand, hiding her white T-shirt in the process. She balanced eleven-month-old Archie on one broad hip, his chubby legs swinging; he was full of milk and good humour.

A deep crease formed between her eyes as she took me in, reminding me of our mother, and I bridged the gap between us in a few steps, kissing her on one cheek.

“Beth – how are you? Mum said you've been over; I'm sorry I didn't see you.”

“Dad said you couldn't see anybody, not even me; he said you were too… ill.”

She transferred Archie onto her other hip and put her arm tentatively around my back, wordlessly holding me close. I breathed in her warm, familiar scent of motherhood and soap. She stood back, wiping the back of her hand across her eyes.

“I'd never have forgiven you if you'd got yourself killed,” she whispered. The baby kicked his legs against us, then thrust his curled fist into my thick plait and tugged it like a bell-pull. I gently disengaged his hand and kissed his dimpled fingers.

“Hello, Archie.”

He regarded me soberly with huge blue eyes, broke into a half-smile, frowned, then his face crumpled and a thin, siren-like wail filled the coffee shop. I cringed apologetically as the patrons stared as one.

“Sorry, I'm not good with babies,” I said helplessly, backing away.

“How would you know until you've had one? Babies cry, Em; it's what they do.”

Beth shot me a glance as she swept Archie up and around to face her. He stopped crying immediately, tears drying on his red cheeks, and he chuckled as his mother rubbed noses with him, the overhead lights giving him a halo through his wispy, red-gold baby hair. The customers retreated into their newspapers and cups.

Archie's head swivelled as the door shouldered open and a woman in a bright red jacket edged through it, dumping bags bulging with vegetables from the market on the floor, and looking expectantly at Rob.

“Go into the back and I'll bring you both coffee in a minute,”
he said to us, indicating the rear of the shop with his elbow, and moving towards the woman in red, pad and pen poised.

I followed Beth through to the family's private area at the back of the shop where a large, saggy, carroty-coloured sofa faced a TV with a cacophony of brightly coloured plastic toys scattered in front of it. The twins were already ensconced, lounging at various angles off the sofa with their eyes fixed on the screen. A limb occasionally waved abstractly as they gave their total concentration to the garish moving images. Expertly clearing a path through the toys with her foot, Beth eased herself down on the sofa with Archie still firmly attached, grasping his mother's jumper with determined fists and revealing her creamy skin. She pushed a twin off the other end so that I could sit down, and tucked her leg under her, shuffling until comfortable.

I removed a well-chewed teddy bear before I sat on it; it grinned lopsidedly up at me, one of its ears coming unstitched at the corner. I recognized it as one of Beth's from a lifetime ago, and clasped it to me as I sat down gingerly, feeling the springs of the old sofa protesting. The noise from the film was overwhelming in the small room.

“Here.”

Beth unceremoniously deposited Archie on my lap as she retrieved the TV remote control from under a pile of colouring books and turned the volume down. The baby considered me cautiously, then reached out a little hand and scrabbled his fingers against the rough surface of the cast on my arm, his mouth the shape of an “o”. I smiled at him hopefully, but his head pivoted away from me as he heard his mother sit down beside us, and a beam crossed his face.

“Babies are a complete mystery to me; how do you communicate with them if they can't talk?” I said, probably
sounding more spinsterly than I intended. Beth rearranged her jumper, the knit baggy after years of being washed and dried contrary to the care label.

“You're not born knowing what to do, Em, and you can't get it all from books; you've just got to get on with it and learn on the job. It helps if you get pregnant first, of course.”

“There's not much chance of that,” I said, answering her unspoken question. She leaned forward and picked a crumpled square of muslin off the floor, draping it over my shoulder.

“You might need this; he's just had a feed and he's a bit possety at the moment.”

She made no attempt to take Archie off me and I couldn't lift him to give him back, so I resigned myself to ensuring that my writhing nephew didn't throw himself backwards unexpectedly – or throw up all over me. In the light from the window behind us, his hair shone. I touched the fine wisps.

“He has the same colour hair as Grandpa, Beth.” My heart lurched unexpectedly and she looked at me curiously. Archie stuffed his hand in his mouth and gummed it, dribbling.

“Well, you knew him better than I did, Em – I don't remember him that well, but I recall Nanna saying something like that.”

There was an awkward silence between us, filled with a gabble of raucous cartoon voices. Flora rolled onto her back, oblivious.

“You look well, Beth; is Archie sleeping through the night now?”

It sounded like the sort of thing my mother would ask.

“He's been doing that for months, except for the odd night, but thanks for asking anyway. I'd look better if I had your frame and I could shift a few stone, though.”

She wrinkled her nose at Archie who rumbled a laugh back. “You look like crap, by the way.”

“Gee, thanks Sis,” I moaned.

“At least you have an excuse; I don't.” Archie bounced on my lap, and I put a protective arm out to prevent him from launching at his mother. “You're skinny, like Mum and Grandpa – you lucky wench. This is what three kids and two mortgages does for you.” She thwacked her thighs, bound tight by her jeans like over-stuffed sausages. Beth had always been comfortably stocky, like our father, and there had been an undercurrent of resentment for the genes she had inherited.

“Yeah? Well, who ended up with the ginger hair and freckles, then?” I reminded her, trying to make light of it and regarding her perfectly even, milk-white skin and glossy, dark-brown hair that did what it was told.

She pursed her lips. “You did; what I wouldn't have done to have
your
hair!”

“Since when?”

“Since forever. You had all the attention, Em; boys only ever talked to me because they wanted to get to know
you
. Remember Jack?”