Winter Solstice (34 page)

“I must go and see him.”

“No. He asked me to tell you no. He’s doped and frail, and already has the look of a man on his way out of this world. But he asked me to send you his regards and to say how grateful he was for your kindness.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“You did: And you were there when he most needed a friend.”

Oscar kicked, with the toe of his boot, a smouldering twig into the heart of his fire. For a moment, remembering his reluctance even to speak to old Billicliffe, dodging around street corners in mortal dread of meeting him, he hated himself.

He said, “Did you speak to the doctor in the hospital?”

“Yes. When I’d said goodbye, I tracked the consultant down, and he confirmed what I already knew.”

“What can I do?”

“Little, really. Perhaps write him a note. Send him a card. He’d like that.”

“It seems a bit tame.”

“He really is quite peaceful. Not struggling, not distressed. Sleeps most of the time, but when he did open his eyes, he recognized me, and we spoke and he was perfectly lucid. I think, accepting.”

Oscar sighed hugely.

“Well, I suppose that’s it, then.” He thought of practicalities.

“I’m down as his next of kin.”

“They’ll let you know. Or myself. We’ll keep in touch.”

“Thank you for telling me.”

“I knew that you would want to know. Now I must be off, and leave you to your bonfire.”

Oscar laid down his rake.

“I’ll come with you to the gate.”

They walked down the path in single file. At the gate, Peter paused.

“There’s something else. It occurred to me that perhaps you might be missing your music.” He felt in the pocket of his red golf jacket and produced a small brass key.

“The church is always open, but the organ locked. I have discussed it with Alistair Heggie, our organist, and he is happy for you to use it any time you feel so inclined. Here….” Before Oscar could protest, Peter had taken his wrist and pressed the key into his outstretched palm, closing his fingers about it.

Oscar said, “Oh, no….”

“You don’t have to. You might not even want to. But I’d like to think that you can, if the impulse takes you, and if you feel it would help.”

“You are too kind.”

“Just put it somewhere safe.” Peter grinned.

“It’s our only spare.” He turned as if to go, and then turned back again.

“I think my brain is going soft. I very nearly forgot. Another of the reasons I came in search of you. Tabitha says would you all like to come up to the Manse for a drink and a mince pie on Tuesday evening at six. Everybody’s welcome. Nothing formal. Don’t dress up. Our children will probably be around….”

“Tuesday.” Oscar, still holding the key, made a mental note. He must not forget to tell Elfrida.

“Tuesday at six. I think we’d like that very much.”

“Splendid.” Peter went through the gate and latched it behind him.

“We’ll see you then.”

“Have a good round. And thank you for coming.”

On Monday morning, when Lucy descended from her private eyrie in the attic, she saw, on the first-floor landing, that Carrie’s bedroom door was closed. Her first thought was that perhaps Carrie had overslept, and wondered if she should wake her up, and then, fortuitously, decided against it.

Downstairs, she found only Oscar and Elfrida in the midst of breakfast. This morning Oscar was eating sausages, and Lucy hoped there would be some for her. Sausages for breakfast was one of her ideas of heaven.

“Lucy.” As she appeared through the door, he laid down his coffee-cup, and smiled.

“How are you this morning?”

“I’m fine, but where’s Carrie?”

“Carrie’s really not well.” Elfrida got up from the table to collect Lucy’s sausages from the hot plate “I don’t think she’s got flu, but she certainly isn’t throwing this horrible cold off. Two sausages, or three?”

“Three, please, if there’s enough. Is she still in bed?”

“Yes, I looked in to see her, and she said she’d coughed all night, and hadn’t been able to sleep, and was feeling thoroughly fed up with herself. I took her up a cup of tea, but she doesn’t want anything to eat. When the Health Centre opens at nine, I’m going to ring Dr. Sinclair and ask if he’ll come around and have a look at her.”

“Does he make house calls?”

“The Health Centre’s only across the road.”

Lucy sat down to her sausages.

“In London, doctors never do house calls. You have to go and sit in the waiting room with all the other sick people. Gran always says you come out with more things wrong with you than when you went in. Do you think she’s going to be all right? Carrie, I mean. She must be all right for Christmas.”

“We’ll see what Dr. Sinclair says.”

“Can I go and see her?”

“I shouldn’t, until we know what’s wrong. It might be frightfully contagious and then you’d come out in spots. Or running sores. Like poor Job.”

Lucy ate her sausages, which were delicious, and Elfrida poured her a cup of coffee. She said, “It’s really disappointing, because we’d planned a long walk on the beach this morning, with Horace.”

“No reason why you shouldn’t go.”

“Will you come, Oscar?”

“I can’t, this morning. I’ve got a lot of letters to write, and then I’m going to get my hair cut. After that I’m going to the bookshop to order two books, and then I am going to pick up the meat from the butcher.”

“Oh, I see.” It was hard not to sound downcast.

He smiled.

“You can go on your own. Take Horace. He will guard you. You can be a lone explorer.”

Lucy brightened.

“Can I?”

“Of course.”

She mulled over this new prospect of freedom while she ate her sausages, and found that she was rather taken with the idea of setting out, with the dog, all by herself. For obvious reasons she was not allowed to go for long, solitary walks in London, and if she did have some arrangement made with Emma, her mother always had to know where she was going, and when she would be back. But here, in Creagan, it was obvious that such precautions were not necessary. Elfrida and Oscar didn’t even lock their front door. In the town, cars and lorries drove very slowly, and shoppers quite often walked in the middle of the road, stopping from time to time to chat, and on the streets and pavements there always seemed to be unaccompanied children skateboarding or otherwise flocking around in gangs. The day that Oscar had taken her as far as the beach, she had seen youngsters climbing rocks, riding bicycles, and not an adult in view. As for sinister men in raincoats, drunks, or drug addicts, they simply didn’t seem to exist in this wholesome climate. Perhaps, like germs and mildew, they did not flourish in the cold.

The back door opened and slammed shut.

“Mrs. Snead,” said Oscar, and in a moment she was with them, bursting into the kitchen, wearing a pink track suit and a dashing pair of trainers.

“Oh, it’s ‘orrible again,” she told them.

“Black clouds. Looks like snow to me.” She saw Lucy. “

“Ullo, what are you doing ‘ere? Come to stay? Where’s your auntie?”

She had a head of tight grey curls and wore pink glass earrings to match her track suit.

“She’s in bed. She’s not well.”

“Oh, that’s too bad. Seen the doctor, ‘as she?”

“Elfrida’s going to ring him up and ask him to come.”

“Well.” Mrs. Snead gazed at Elfrida.

“What a turn-up for the books. I mean, ‘having an invalid. And only just got ‘ere. That’s bad luck. You’re Lucy, aren’t you? Mrs. Phipps told me about you. What do you think of your room? We ‘ad a lovely time doing it all up for you. It was just an empty old attic before.”

“Have a cup of tea, Mrs. Snead,” said Elfrida, and Mrs. Snead said that would be very nice, and proceeded to make herself a mug, with a tea-bag, and then settled down at the table to drink it.

Lucy knew that Gran would disapprove violently of such familiar carryings-on, and, perversely, liked Mrs. Snead all the more.

The morning progressed. Mrs. Snead Hoovered, Lucy and Oscar washed up the breakfast dishes, and Elfrida went off to telephone the doctor. At ten o’clock, the doorbell rang, and Lucy ran downstairs to let him in, but he had already done so, and she found him wiping his boots on the front-door mat.

“Hello, there,” he said when he saw her. He had a very Highland voice, but he was quite young, with a wind-burnt face and gingery eyebrows, like caterpillars.

“Who are you?”

“I’m Lucy Wesley. I’m staying here.”

“That’s nice. Now, where’s the invalid?”

“She’s upstairs….”

Elfrida was hanging over the banister.

“Dr. Sinclair. You are a saint to come.” He climbed the stair, but Lucy did not follow him. Instead, she went back into the kitchen, where Mrs. Snead was sorting laundry for the clothes washer. That the doctor come? I ‘ope it’s not serious.”

“I thought it was just a cold. She felt rotten flying up, I know. It’s so miserable for her.”

“Oh, cheer up, she’ll be all right. Now, would you like to do something for me?

“Op upstairs and bring down the towels in Mrs. Phipps’s bathroom. And then I’ll give you the clean ones to put in their place.”

Dr. Sinclair did not take long. He and Elfrida went into Carrie’s room, and Lucy, collecting towels, heard their voices behind the closed door. It was reassuring to have him here, but she hoped that he would not diagnose some sinister bug, an illness that would demand antibiotics and two weeks in bed. When he had finished with Carrie, he and Elfrida did not at once come downstairs, but went into the drawing-room, to talk to Oscar.

Lucy, having finished her laundry duties, hung about for a bit in the hall, and then could wait no longer, and went to join them. The three of them were sitting on the window-seat, talking about somebody called Major Billicliffe. Major Billicliffe, it seemed, was in hospital in Inverness and very ill. They all wore rather long faces. And then Elfrida turned and saw her standing in the open door, and smiled.

“Don’t look so worried, Lucy.”

The doctor got to his feet.

“Is Carrie all right?” Lucy asked him.

“Yes, she’ll be all right. All she needs is a bit of rest. Sleep and lots of drinks, and I’ve left a prescription for that cough. Leave her in peace, and she’ll be up and about in a couple of days.”

Lucy was much relieved.

“Can I go and see her?”

“I’d leave her for a moment.”

Elfrida said, “Why don’t you take Horace for his exploring walk?”

“Where are you going, Lucy?” the doctor asked.

“I thought along the beach.”

“Are you interested in birds?”

“I don’t know their names.”

“There are beautiful birds on the beach. I’m calling in tomorrow to see your aunt, so I’ll bring my bird book with me, and then you can look them up.”

“Thank you.”

“Not at all. Not at all. Well, I must be off. We’ll be in touch, Mr. Blundell. Goodbye, Mrs. Phipps.”

And he was away, running downstairs, letting himself out, slamming the front door shut behind him. Lucy, looking from the window, saw him get into his car and drive off to his next call. There was a dog on the passenger seat, gazing from the window. A big springer spaniel with floppy ears. And she decided it must be nice, being a country GP and having a dog in your car.

Mrs. Snead was right. It was a daunting sort of day, though not actually raining. Which was odd, because the weekend had been so soft and still, and Oscar had been able to have his bonfire. With Horace on his lead, Lucy let herself out of the Estate House, went through the gate, and set off across the square, and then turned up the road that led to the Golf Club. There were not very many golfers around, and only a few cars in the park. The right-of-way led across the links, curving up and over the natural undulations of the land, and when she reached a shallow summit she saw the whole horizon, cold and still as steel, and a great arc of sky, grey with low cloud. It was half-tide, and small waves washed up onto the shining wet sand. Far away, she could see the lighthouse, and when she reached the little car-park, flocks of kittiwakes were pecking over the rubbish bins, as though expecting crusts or stale sandwiches. Horace saw them and, of course, barked, and they all fluttered off, pretending to be frightened, flew around for a moment, and then settled down again to their scavenging.

Lucy unclipped Horace’s lead and he ran ahead of her, down the ramp and onto the sands. In the shelter of the dunes the sand was deep and soft and difficult for walking, so she went out onto the wet hard sand, and looking back, saw her own footsteps, with Horace’s footpads circling them, like a line of stitching.

There were rocks, and small rock-pools at the point, and then the big beach, curving northwards. Ahead, a long way off, the hills folded in on each other, grey and forbidding, and dusted with snow. The sky beyond them was dark as a purple bruise, and she felt the light wind on her face, so cold it was like opening a deep freeze.

She was alone. Not another soul, not another dog on the beach. Only birds skimming over the shallow breakers.

In this enormous, empty, airy world, she saw herself tiny as an ant, reduced to total unimportance by the sweep and size of nature. A nonentity. She rather liked the feeling of being without identity, of knowing that nobody knew exactly where she was, and that if she met somebody, they wouldn’t know who she was. So, she belonged to nobody but herself. She walked hard, keeping warm, pausing only every now and then to pick up a scallop shell or a particularly eye catching pebble or shard of glass worn smooth by the sea. She put these treasures in her pocket. Then Horace found a long piece of seaweed, which he carried in his mouth like a trophy. Lucy tried to get it from him, and it turned into a game, with Horace running and Lucy chasing. She found a stick and flung it into the waves, and Horace forgot about the seaweed and dropped it, and went galloping into the water, only to discover that it was too cold and wet for comfort before beating a startled retreat.

The beach ended at another outcrop of rocks, with pools and crannies of pebbles, and there was a strong reek of seaweed. Lucy paused to get her bearings. Hillocky dunes separated the beach from the golf links, and as she hesitated, trying to decide which way to go next, Lucy heard the sound of a motor and saw, above the rocks, a tractor come trundling towards her, over a rise. The tractor pulled a bogie, so it wasn’t moving very fast. But clearly, there had to be a sort of road. She decided that she would walk home that way, and with some difficulty hauled her way up a sandy cliff and into the dunes. Horace bounded ahead of her, and out of sight. The dunes made a little hill, thick with rough grass and rushes, and reaching the summit, she saw the track.