Turn Us Again (23 page)

“No.”

“Oh come on, Dad. She knows everything.”

“Would it be possible to get another piece of that wonderful Bakewell tart, Madelyn?”

She felt inordinately pleased and cut him a huge slice.

“I brought the little fellow a jingly ball.”

“That's so kind. He doesn't have many toys.”

“Are you all right then? Do you need anything?”

“We have all the essentials…” Madelyn hesitated, wondering how to phrase it so it wouldn't sound like she was greedy, but without repulsing any generosity this nice, rich old gentleman might be prepared to extend. Sam leaped into the pause.

“We have everything we need. I'm working full-time, you know. Harder than I've ever worked in my life.”

“But these are primitive quarters for a family with a young baby. Is there a toilet?”

“The quarters are fine. Millions of people live like this. The toilet's just outside.”

“Well if you're sure you're okay…” Frank said in a subdued voice.

‘Oh Lord,' Madelyn thought to herself, ‘don't give up so easily. You're appalled by our destitution. Why don't you hand your daughter-in-law a nice little cheque and see how gratefully she'll accept it?'

But Frank seemed eager to accept Sam's verbal assurances, despite his obvious unease at their circumstances.

“There's a nice little pub down the road where we sometimes go to get a pint, Father. Shall we?”

They ordered the usual stiff brews of draft cider, and Madelyn jiggled Gabriel on her lap while he whined. She couldn't concentrate on anything when he was restless. His distress absorbed her mind like a magnet, and she felt how impossible it was to make a good impression on Frank with the baby so unhappy.

The publican came up unbidden with another round. When the pub was half-empty he enjoyed busying himself in this way, popping outside for a little chat with a new round of drinks.

Madelyn took a big gulp of her new drink for courage and nearly choked.

“Uggh, what's this?”

“I've been meaning to tell you,” said the publican. “Draft cider is the reason that baby cries so much.”

Madelyn hadn't known he cried more than other babies, and she didn't want Frank to know it either. “He only cries here, it's a bit chilly for him.”

“Ah. He cries because he's swallowing too much draft cider in his milk. I'm switching you to stout.”

“I don't like stout.”

“Ah. That's what you're getting at this pub. For a bit.”

Frank, who had been listening with interest, piped up, “You're quite right. What an excellent idea — switching to stout. Of course the baby is imbibing everything through its mother's milk. So it's vital you nourish yourself well, Madelyn.” He turned to Sam with the anxious expression returning to his face.

“You have sufficient means for your wife to eat properly, don't you Sam? Lots of fruit and things like that?”

“Of course we do!” said Sam in an outraged tone, silencing his father.

Outside the pub Frank took his leave, embracing his son and shaking Madelyn's hand warmly.

“I am so pleased to have met you, my dear. I feel that Sam could not have chosen a better wife.” He leaned down to brush her cheek with his lips and whispered “You have the potential to be so happy together. Please make him happy.” When he straightened up, there were tears on his face. Madelyn's compassion rushed to the surface and she nodded at him, trying to invest a world of reassurance in her smile.

“What did you think of my father?” Sam asked as they walked home.

“I didn't expect him to be gentle. I always imagined that your family was imposing. He seemed rather sad, somehow.”

Sam pressed her arm, “Did you feel that? Your intuition always amazes me. You have an uncanny ability to understand people, which I lack. I know my father well, and I felt something wasn't quite as it normally is. You have hit the nail right on the head — he was sad.”

“Yet he felt reassured about our marriage, which must have been troubling him. He saw we had the potential for happiness.”

“His intuition is also correct. We are happy, Mummy. You are the heart of the union, and I am the head, and together we make a perfect whole.

And at that second, it did seem as though they were a perfect fit.

That night, Gabriel didn't wake up once.

Madelyn never drank cider again.

NINETEEN

F
armer Brown surprised them with a goose at Christmas, and Madelyn made a feast with mashed potatoes, Brussels sprouts and turnip, which Sam trumped with a bottle of wine. Afterwards, they lay in bed with Gabriel between them, and Madelyn taught Sam all the Christmas carols she could remember. They belted them out together until late in the evening, to the great delight of Gabriel. Afterwards, when Gabriel was asleep, Madelyn mentioned that she would like to visit her parents and show off her new baby to the relatives and friends.

“How will you explain his premature birthday?”

“I'll put it forward a couple of months. Or I'll pretend he's younger than he is. He's pretty small, after all.”

“Deception comes so easily to you, Mummy.”

“Well, I don't deserve to be banned from my ancestral home forever for my transgressions. Do you think you'll be okay?”

“How long will you be gone?”

“Two weeks.”

Sam sucked the air between his teeth. “That's a long time. Why don't we make it ten days?”

Madelyn felt relieved. She had been worried he'd kick up a fuss. “Fine. I'll stock up with bacon and eggs.”

“I did manage on my own before you came along,” he said huffily.

Madelyn smiled to herself. He had managed on his own in the student dining hall at Cambridge, fortifying himself with steaks whenever he could. Steaks he excelled at, but alas, they could no longer afford them.

The nine-hour train ride to Newcastle was horrendous. Toting Gabriel in one hand and a heavy case in the other while changing trains, Madelyn developed an agonizing neck pain that prevented her from moving her head. She sat miserably by the window of her carriage, trying to cover herself with a blanket and maneuver Gabriel into the right position for nursing without actually bending her head to look at him. Sharp pains stabbed along her shoulder. ‘What if I die?' she thought. ‘Do I have any identification on me that binds me to Sam? Who would know where Gabriel comes from?'

Tears coursed down her cheeks at the mere thought of Gabriel in distress, searching for his mother and finding strangers. The other travellers looked at her with sympathy, and several leapt up to grab her case and carry it onto the platform when they reached Newcastle. And there was her mother, standing in her little pillbox hat, waving a handkerchief in one hand.

Newcastle was exquisite after the lonely life of Evercreech. Madelyn took endless hot baths — such a luxury — and a stream of visitors brought gifts for her and the baby. There is something about a baby which makes people feel joyful and positive (so long as it is born in wedlock), and Madelyn felt that all the smiles bestowed on her were genuine.

She didn't want to go back so soon and dashed off a telegram to Sam on the eighth day.

Having lovely time. Staying for two weeks returning Jan 10
th
instead of Jan 6
th
. Big kisses
.

“I think I'd like a baby,” Cathie said wistfully, as they sat in their usual pub perched at the bar, Gabriel safe with his grandmother.

“Babies in small quantities are an undiluted pleasure. But living with them full-time is a different story.”

“Well, of course, more responsibility and all that. But they love you so unreservedly. Every morning they greet you with a grin of pure pleasure.”

As always with her friend, Madelyn had a strange urge to paint her life in kaleidoscope colours, to insinuate that no woman was complete without a child and therefore that she, Madelyn, was more complete than the childless Cathie. She tried to think back to see if that was what she had been told. No doubt about it. A married woman with children was simply viewed in a different light, just like rich and poor were viewed differently, educated and ignorant.

‘Deception comes so easily to you,' Sam had said.

“There's more to it than the soppy coo-cooing you seem to be imagining. Like listening to them screaming night after night. A baby heralds the end of a decent night's sleep, which I dimly remember taking for granted once upon a time.”

“Oh come on, Anne. They sleep for about fourteen hours a day, don't they?”

“In one-hour increments, at least at the beginning. Then they wake up and have a little cry and then slip back into slumber, while you're lying awake for hours trying to recapture your dream in the hopes that it will pull you under again.”

“One hour increments? He was sleeping for at least three hours the other day.”

“During our walk? Oh yes, he sleeps whenever I'm in motion. It's when I lie down that he wants some entertainment. Take my word for it, Cathie, it's exhausting and full-time without a break. You'd hate it.”

“You've always been a negative type of person.”

Madelyn sucked her breath in: the injustice of such a statement, when she was trying to be honest. “Fine, live in coo-coo land regarding babies. One day you'll see that I'm right. It'll be especially hard for you, regulated to the back seat, no longer number one. Even your own body betrays you when you're pregnant. Not eating enough calcium? Well, we'll just have to take it from your teeth, to ensure baby gets enough. It's like being chucked out of the Garden of Eden without appreciating that you were there in the first place. One just takes it for granted that oneself is the centre of the universe. Having another person's needs and wants drummed into you every second starts with a husband. But when the baby comes, everything conspires to put you in second place.”

‘What a weird way of seeing it.”

“I've just thought about it like that now, talking to you. I must write it in my diary.”

Cathie lifted her hand to attract the bartender's attention.

“Another gin and tonic and … a stout. Ugh, I can't believe you're drinking stout.”

“That's the least of my sacrifices.”

Cathie still looked sceptical, and walking back to her parent's house, Madelyn reflected that it was impossible to convey the feeling of being alone with a small baby during a time when you were not alone. Everything changes when a second person enters the picture. You no longer agonize over every moue of discomfort crossing the baby's face, because there are two of you to talk about it, if indeed you even notice the discomfort in the first place. When Sam came back from work in the evenings it was so much better.

‘If only I could live close to my mother, so she could look after Gabriel every day,' Madelyn thought.

She boarded the train taking her back to Evercreech with a heavy feeling in her heart. No more baths, no more cooked meals waiting for her in the kitchen, no more breaks from Gabriel. She stuck her head out of the carriage and spoke to Mary standing on the platform under the window, “One never appreciates one's mother until one becomes a mother.”

Mary gave a brief smile of pleasure before her familiar look of anxiety returned, “But you are okay, aren't you Anne? It's not too hard?”

“No, it's fine, Mum. Sam is a wonderful father. And I'm not dreading this trip half so much as the last one because he's meeting me partway.”

“That's thoughtful of him.”

“You come and visit me soon. And I'll come back often. I miss you!' she called as the train started to pull out of the platform, “I love you!”

She arrived in Bath at around nine o'clock, but Sam was not waiting for her. The porter helped to drag her luggage into the waiting room, and she sat down in one of the hard little seats, with Gabriel sleeping at her feet.

She tried to read snatches of a book, but her anxiety was too acute. Every now and then she popped out to walk back and forth along the platform, leaving Gabriel in the relative warmth of the waiting room. Obviously Sam would look everywhere as soon as he arrived, including the waiting room, but the activity relieved her incredulity at his absence.

“You haven't seen a tall man with a curly red beard?” she asked the porter. “My husband was supposed to meet the nine o'clock train.”

“If I see any male person at all, I will tell them about the pretty young lass waiting in the lounge,” the porter said with a wink that irritated her. “Do you have a place to stay in Bath?”

“No, we were supposed to catch the next train to Evercreech. It's gone now.” Madelyn felt absurd tears pricking the back of her eyes.

“There's another one at twelve-thirty. I could carry your luggage on if he doesn't show up.”

“Thank you, but I'm sure he'll be here by then, unless something has happened.”

Madelyn returned to the waiting room and sat engulfed in tension, tapping her foot on the ground. Maybe something had happened. Maybe a tree had fallen on him.

Her eyes filled with tears at the thought. Everybody would be sorry for her, a widow so young. She would accept their condolences with grave dignity.

‘If he's dead, I can go home and live with my parents, who will be kind and sympathetic. But will anybody marry me, now I have a young child? Maybe this time around I won't hanker so much after the married state.'

Eventually she dozed, jerking her head back every time it hit her chest, opening an eye to ensure Gabriel was still sleeping.

A hand on her shoulder brought her to her feet, grinning like an idiot until she realized it was the porter.

“It's twelve-twenty lass. You should be getting on that train, unless you want to stay here all night.”

Madelyn grabbed the sleeping Gabriel while the porter took the case. He put her in a nice corner carriage, without any other occupants, and tipped his hat to her in farewell. She thought she saw a look of pity cross his face, and she responded with haughty thanks.

Nobody was waiting in Evercreech either, not that Madelyn expected it. Still she couldn't help looking about as though there might be. ‘Thank God I had the sense to put a bit of money in my pocket,' she thought, and hailed a taxi.

Sam was sitting at the table eating his breakfast when she walked in. For a minute she stood, staring at his back and wondering what excuse he could give her, since he wasn't maimed or dying. ‘Shall I be graciously forgiving, or exact my pound of flesh in fury?' she thought.

Sam got up and stood in front of her, looking at her steadily. “That'll teach you,” he said. Then he walked out the door to go to work.

That bastard. That fool. There are so many ways I could revenge myself on him, if I chose. His happiness depends on me. He worries all the time about whether I still love him, although he pretends he doesn't care anymore. He's always following me with his little eyes, like a dog wanting love. A dog who wants to be master.

So what should I do? Should I ignore him, plopping his burnt dinner down without looking at him?

Or should I scream and shout. No, not that. He will scream and shout back and will get the upper hand, having much more experience in the screaming/shouting department.

So, I'll ignore him.

That'll show him.

Show him what? I can imagine him sitting here, desperate for me to come home, lonely and depressed. He has no idea what it's like to travel with a child. As far as he is concerned, he simply didn't come to meet me.

I should talk to him, let him know how it really was. Why is communication so difficult?

That night they went to the pub as usual, sitting with the nice neighbours who welcomed Madelyn back with affection.

‘Lucky that they're here,' she thought, ‘or I don't know how I could have spent the evening with him.'

She drank as much as she could, setting the pace by finishing her drink before anybody else, chatting to the neighbours while Sam watched in silence.

At first she allowed her eyes to flow over him as if he didn't exist as an entity, but as the drink took over Sam as a whole receded. She focused on parts of him, his generous hands clasped around his drink, his full lips which travelled her body with such reverence. She remembered how much he loved her, much more than she'd ever loved him. ‘He is unhappy,' she thought, ‘and I can end it. All I have to do is smile at him, stroke his hand, and he will burst forth in joy. After all, what is more important, to maintain a rigid silence until he breaks down and asks forgiveness for his behaviour (which might take months of unhappiness for us both) or end it now? Do I want to promote unhappiness, or peace and joy?'

Madelyn looked around the table at the faces turned towards her and was filled with benevolence.

“We are all beautiful people,” she said.

“Don't talk such rot,” Sam snapped in an unpleasant voice.

Madelyn was silent, shocked by the disparity between their innermost thoughts. They didn't exchange another word, and that night he did not turn towards her or curl himself around her back in the fetus position like he usually did. She felt miserable, then angry, and spent the next few days slamming doors and venting her rage in other childish ways. Fearing that the negative feelings swirling in the air might affect Gabriel, she handled him with extreme gentleness. After a vicious slam which managed to break one of the door hinges, she whispered in his ear, “Isn't that a funny noise? It's fun to make loud noises sometimes, isn't it?”