CHAPTER THREE
Anne opened her eyes, yawned and lay still, content to listen to the pleasant sound of rain splashing the huge bay window of the room where she had slept remarkably well, all things considered.
All things considered...
Events of the previous evening instantly flooded her senses, making her skin tingle and inviting her mind’s eye to watch a series of shadowy cameos revolving like figures on a roundabout. Suddenly, it stopped. The shadows lifted. She clearly saw a little girl with blond pigtails sitting on a beautifully carved wooden horse; the child was squealing with delight while clinging tightly to a pole. The roundabout began to move again to the sound of stirring organ music, now passing into heavy shadow beyond reach or sight, by which time Anne no longer found the noise of rain splashing the bay window at all pleasing on the ear.
A ray of watery sunlight found a chink in the curtains and targeted Anne’s face, causing her to blink furiously. She promptly flung back the bedclothes and strode resolutely to the window, tugging first at a cord on one side then the other, achieving a disproportionate satisfaction upon seeing the curtains glide open. In spite of some low cloud and obstinate rain, she knew instinctively that it would be a nice day. She proceeded to reflect on what she would do. Oh, she’d take a shower, dress and go down for breakfast…But what then? She might take a stroll through The Lanes if the rain had stopped. There was always a chance she might bump into Patricia. It has to be her. With any luck, mother and daughter (her granddaughter?) would be shopping alone. Men hate browsing shops. He will probably take himself off somewhere and meet them for lunch. Then they will all go on the beach and he’ll take the child for a paddle in the sea, maybe even teach her to swim. Tom, she recalled, had done just that with Patricia. Isn’t that what all adoring dads do with their children on holiday?
It was even possible, she supposed, that the family lived here in Brighton. More likely, though, they had only come for the day and she would never see them again. Yet, she reasoned anxiously, fate could not be so cruel as to steal her daughter a second time. Or could it...?
“No!” she shouted above the noise of the shower and proceeded to lather herself furiously with a lavender scented gel. This time it would be different, she was sure of it. So sure, that she began to sing…
Later, Anne was enjoying breakfast when the Briggs woman approached her table with an invariably sheepish looking Spence in tow. Anne struggled to conceal her dismay and summon a friendly disposition despite a sinking feeling in the stomach.
“Good morning Anne. You don’t mind if Spence and I join you?” Anne winced as the rich, booming voice swamped the entire room. Charley Briggs, seemingly unaware of causing any heads to turn or eyebrows to lift, sat down and addressed her companion. “Now, Spence, be a treasure will you? Get me a glass of grapefruit juice and heaps of cornflakes, but not too much milk and only the teeniest sprinkling of sugar. Oh, I say!” she waved at a passing waitress carrying a jug of steaming coffee, “Coffee here please. Will it be coffee for you too Anne?”
“I prefer tea at breakfast,” said Anne with a smile that was requiring less effort as the seconds ticked by. Whatever reservations she might have about Charley Briggs and her young man, she couldn’t help liking them.
“Spence is such a sweetie. I don’t know what I’d do without him. We care about each other a lot, you know. It’s not just a case of wealthy fat woman snaps up slim, handsome, toy boy. Spence and me, we’re…soulmates.” She beamed as the word sprung to her full, shiny lips.
“That’s nice,” murmured Anne and picked up her teacup, the better to hide her amusement. If the woman is so well off, what on earth is she doing in a humble Bed and Breakfast? She gave a guilty start. After all, she loved coming here. Yes, in spite of everything.
“I’ll say it’s nice!” Charley Briggs agreed and leaned across the table. “It beats having a husband, I’ll tell you that for nothing,” she confided. “I’ve had three husbands and none of them could hold a candle to Spence. Mind you, Briggs came close to it, bless him. He was my first. I was born a Spooner and ended up a Mulberry-Hart but I call myself Briggs because we were always broke, but as happy as Larry. I’ll say. It’s true what they say about money, you know. It doesn’t buy you love. Not that I’d be without it now, you understand. But it was so romantic, being broke all the time. You knew who your friends were, that’s for sure. Ah, Spence, that’s looks delicious.”
Spence placed a glass of grapefruit juice and a heaped bowl of cornflakes in front of her then returned to the breakfast buffet for his own.
A waitress appeared out of nowhere, dropped three menus on the table and rushed off again.
“They do a wonderful fried breakfast here, as I recall. Mind you, things change. It’s been a good few years since I was here with Briggs. August 1983, it was…” She stopped in mid-flow and a look of utter consternation crossed the kindly face. “Anne, I am so sorry. I completely forgot. How insensitive of me. I guess you don’t need any reminding about the date,” she murmured contritely and spooned a heap of cornflakes into her mouth.
“It’s not as if I can ever forget,” Anne agreed more tartly than she intended.
“As if…” the other woman mumbled, scooped up some more cereal in her spoon and guided it to her mouth. “You must think me so gross?”
The spoon vanished into the woman’s mouth and Anne recalled how her father would encourage her to eat as a baby by pretending the spoon was a train entering a tunnel. The memory gave her a start. It had been a long time since she had thought fondly about her father. “Not at all,” she said and meant it.
Spencer returned with a glass of orange juice and more cornflakes. A waitress homed in on him and poured coffee from the jug. An adoring smile sat prettily on her face until a dark look from Charley wiped it clean and she moved, huffily, to the next table.
To Anne’s relief, Charley and Spence tucked into their breakfasts and few words were exchanged between themselves or across the table. The shadow of a smile crossed her face upon realizing she had already begun to think of the other woman as Charley, no longer the Briggs woman. Spence leapt to his feet as she rose to leave.
“Have a nice day,” he said warmly and treated her to a dazzling smile.
“I’ll say!” said Charley Briggs between mouthfuls of toast, “Spence and me are heading for The Lanes just as soon as it stops raining. Maybe we’ll see you there and we can all have lunch together? I just love Brighton, there’s so much to see. Spence wants to visit the Sea Life Centre but I’m not so keen. Can you believe he wants to see the sharks? The very idea gives me goose pimples. I mean to say, they’re such dangerous things, sharks.”
“They can’t hurt you. They’re in an aquarium for heaven’s sake,” protested Spence good-naturedly.
“Even so, they still give me goose pimples,” Charley insisted.
“Sharks will only attack you if they feel threatened,” Anne pointed out.
“Like some people I could mention,” retorted Charley with such feeling that Anne now understood why she couldn’t dislike the woman. She recognized a kindred spirit. For all her loudness, Anne sensed intuitively that Charley Briggs had known more than her fair of suffering. She’s a survivor, like me.
“Come to think of it, people give me goose pimples too,” Charley added, “so maybe sharks aren’t so bad after all!” She roared with a raucous laughter that caused some guests to cringe. “So if it’s sharks you want, Spence, sharks you shall have.” Another roar of laughter brought a huge grin to Kirk Spencer’s handsome face. Briefly, he and Anne exchanged glances. She saw no hint of apology for his companion’s behaviour, which pleased her more than she might have imagined.
For his part, Spence had felt instinctively drawn to this diminutive woman with short grey hair whose very ordinariness struck him as quite extraordinary. There was more to Anne Gates then met the eye, he would have bet on it. Certainly, he saw nothing in the steady, smiling gaze to change his mind. So tragic to lose a child, he mused, especially in such awful circumstances. How does she cope, he wondered? But at least she must have some happy memories.
He sighed. For all her larger-than-life appearance and mannerisms, poor Charley had never really come to terms with the knowledge that she would never have a child of her own. Not for the first time, he wondered if that was how she saw him, as a substitute son. At the same time, he couldn’t help recalling, in graphic detail, the nature of their lovemaking. A mischievous grin on his face, he immediately retracted the child substitute idea. He had never met a woman with such a rampant appetite for sex or a talent for it to match.
“Hey, Spence, what are you chuckling about like a monkey hugging a banana?” Charley demanded. But she had to settle for a cheeky wink that caused her to reflect, as it always did, that she was a lucky woman.
Meanwhile, Anne decided she would lunch with Owen and his mother and called him on her mobile phone to confirm. Sceptical regarding Owen’s insistence that the old lady was looking forward to seeing her, she suspected Alice Shepherd would give her son a hard time if she failed to turn up. I might as well get it over with sooner than later, she told herself and made no attempt to suppress a long sigh.
If Alice Shepherd had always ruled Owen with an iron rod, she continued to do so even so from her sick bed. If he was but five minutes late home from work, she would call him on the mobile and demand to know what was keeping him. Before mobile phones became a necessary accessory nationwide and she could get out and about more, she would even come and look for him. Anne groaned. The poor man was in for a hard time if Alice ever caught him engaged in idle chit chat with a colleague or, worse, if they happened to be propping up a bar somewhere. Owen had once told her that his father was an alcoholic and had died of liver poisoning. No wonder, poor man, Anne reflected grimly, with a wife like Alice Shepherd.
Anne did not enjoy her leisurely stroll around The Lanes. Not only was it with growing desperation that she kept a lookout for the little girl and her mother, but lunch with the Shepherds also weighed more heavily on her mind than usual. In the past, she would have looked upon it as a cross she must bear for Owen’s sake. But this year was different. This year, she was dreading it. Nor was she able, for the life of her, to pinpoint why. If Alice Shepherd was something of a dragon, her fire was mostly spent. In recent years, their meetings had been manageable, almost bearable. Yet, Anne suspected that Alice could still be a force to be reckoned with as and when it suited her.
Anne pursed her lips. She and Alice had never been friends, however much Owen cared to delude himself otherwise. Nor would she put it past the old dragon to raise a flame or two on her deathbed. It was a disturbing prospect and, yes, better over and done with sooner rather than later. Consequently, she arrived at the Shepherd’s house a good twenty minutes before she was expected.
“Why, Anne, you’re early!” Owen predictably exclaimed upon opening the front door.
“You know how it is with buses,” she said but stopped short of apologizing, “Better early than late, eh? That’s what my father always used to say.”
“I suppose so,” responded Own grumpily. Anne found herself losing patience with the man. “So do I get to come in or are we going to chat on the doorstep until your mother starts yelling blue murder about the draught?”
“Oh, yes. Do come in. It’s just that I…”
“Prefer punctuality to a few minutes either side,” murmured Anne but if Owen heard, he gave no sign. She was immediately repentant. After all, wasn’t arriving on the dot something his mother had instilled in him since he wore nappies? She smiled as an image confronted her mind’s eye of baby Owen popping out of the womb, dead on time at his mother’s command.
“Would you like to come and see mother while I finish preparing lunch?” But he was already ushering her into a spacious room at the front of the house where a sharp smell of disinfectant instantly assailed her nostrils and made her feel slightly nauseous. Her first impulse was to rush to the window and open it but she resisted. Alice Shepherd, she recalled, did not believe in fresh air. Air was something dirty, polluted, cause rather than cure for most illnesses.
Alice Shepherd lay propped among pillows like a rag doll.
Anne hoped her expression did not betray her horror. The woman looked ghastly, barely recognizable. “Hello Alice,” she ventured in as cheerful a voice as she could muster.
“It’s Anne, mother. You remember Anne. You were asking after her only the other day. It’s August. Anne always comes to see us in August, doesn’t she?”
The rag doll merely let its head flop forward a fraction by way of a greeting.
Owen pulled up a chair beside the bed and Anne’s stomach heaved as she realised she was expected to sit in it. She did so with what she hoped would appear good grace, the fixed smile pasted on her face already starting to grate on her nerves.
“I’ll leave you ladies to chat,” said Owen and left the room.
Well might you run away, Anne wanted to say, but refrained and gave the sick woman her complete attention instead. So how are you Alice?” It struck her as a ridiculous question even as she asked it. “Another year gone, eh?” she added, as she always did.
The balding head flopped slightly forward again and seemed to take an age to revert to its place among the pillows.
“Owen looks well,” said Anne. The rheumy eyes held hers for an instant then made contact with a water jug on a table by the bed. “You’d like some water, is that it?” The ghastly parody of a nod implied agreement. Glad of the distraction, Anne poured a glass then saw that she would have to hold it to the cracked lips. No way, she realized, would the paper thin hands spread on the sheet be able to lift a glass. Indeed, she doubted whether they could lift themselves unaided. As she helped the woman drink, it crossed Anne’s mind that, for a dominant woman like Alice Shepherd, this must be purgatory.
After replacing the glass on the table, Anne turned to her old adversary with genuine compassion. “I’m sorry to see you like this, Alice. It must be so hard for you, Owen too. What can I say?” she gestured helplessly.
“There’s nothing to say. Can’t be long now though,” answered a reedy voice from the pillows. This time it wasn’t just the head but the entire frail upper body that attempted to edge forward. “I’m so frightened Fern, frightened for Owen.” The thin voice paused but continued before Anne could choke back tears sufficiently to contradict. “He’ll not cope without me. I’ve always been there for him, you see. I’m so frightened for him, Fern, so frightened,” Alice Shepherd kept repeating before the head fell back among the pillows and the woman’s eyes closed. But for a wisp of breath and a dribbling at the mouth, Anne might have been forgiven for thinking the old lady was dead.
The door opened and Owen entered carrying a tray bearing three bowls of soup. “Soup, in August…?” Anne could not contain her impatience.
“Mother likes soup,” Owen explained. “Besides, it’s all I can get her to eat.”
“I suggest we let her sleep for now. I think chatting to me has quite exhausted her. I had no idea she was so ill, Owen. You should have warned me.”
“Then you wouldn’t have come,” he said with such simplicity that her heart went out to him.
“Oh, my dear…” But even as she observed the hapless figure in the doorway, she found herself wondering about the mysterious Fern. She had never heard Alice or Owen mention the name before, not in all the twenty-three years they had known each other. Yet, it paled into insignificance against the poor woman’s obvious distress as to how her son would cope after her death.
Anne winced, realizing that it hadn’t just been disinfectant she had smelled earlier. The whole room reeked of death or, rather, its close proximity, to such an extent that she couldn’t help wondering how on earth Alice Shepherd still managed to cling to life? She was no stranger to death herself, had almost grown accustomed to the idea of mortality since the death of her parents. She had thought of her marriage as dead, too, long before she and Tom finally agreed to go their separate ways. Nor had she ever shied away from the possibility that Patricia might be dead. Now, though, she knew her darkest thoughts were unfounded. Death might fill the stuffy room where she sat but outside, waiting for her, was life…and Patricia. “We’ll have lunch in the kitchen, just the two of us,” she announced briskly and jumped up from the chair.
“If you say so,” murmured Owen and proceeded to return the way he had come without uttering a word of argument.
Later, over a cup of tea, Anne asked, “Who’s Fern?”
Owen’s reaction to her question was as shocking as it was unexpected. At first he stared at her, blankly, saying nothing. Then his jaw began to quiver. His whole body began to shake. For a moment, Anne was convinced he was about to have a fit and ran through various First Aid skills in her head. Suddenly, he leapt from the chair, the normally placid features contorted with rage. “Get out!” he yelled, “How dare you interrogate my mother on her sick bed? How dare you? Get out, now, before I throw you out. I thought you were my friend…” The rage began to subside and he began to sob, “I thought you were my friend,” he repeated tearfully.
“I am your friend,” Anne tried to reassure him, “and I barely said a word to your mother. But she seemed to think I was someone called Fern and I just wondered who she is, that’s all. You mustn’t upset yourself so, Owen. I can see how your mother’s illness is placing a huge strain on you, but…”
“You think I can’t cope, is that it?” he snapped, “Well, I can and will. Mother has always looked after me. Now it’s my turn to do the same for her. Doctors come by, you know, and nurses and neighbours. Everyone helps. They want to take her away, but I won’t let them. I will keep her with me to the end then…” His voice broke and he began to shake again.
“Sit down, Owen, and let me make you another cup of tea.”
“I will not sit down!” he shouted, “How dare you tell me what to do in my own house? You’re just like all the rest. You think I won’t be able to cope on my own, don’t you, when mother…passes away? Everyone thinks so. Well, they’re wrong. I will cope. I will, I will, I will…” His voice broke again and he began to cry.
“Oh, Owen…” Anne rose and went to put her arms around him but he pushed away.
“Go away!” he began to shout again, “Go away! I don’t need you. You’re not my mother! Go away, before I…” but he could not finish the sentence. Instead, he glared at her with such malevolence that she could easily believe she was having a bad dream. But she knew all about bad dreams. She could tell the difference between nightmare and reality, for all there was but a thin line between the two. Obviously, poor Owen was having some kind of mental breakdown. She knew all about that too, enough to know she should leave him, for now at least, to tackle his own demons in his own way.
“I’ll call you,” she said quietly. “Don’t worry, I’ll see myself out.” Once in the street, she found herself gasping for breath and had to sit down on a low wall for several minutes before she felt able to walk to a nearby bus stop.
Inside the house, Owen Shepherd swept an arm across the table, sending crockery and cutlery flying in all directions as well as the contents of a pink sugar bowl and a half full china teapot. Sprawling across the table, beating at the well-worn pine with clenched fists, he lifted his head and howled, demanding of the door panels behind which Alice Shepherd lay dying, “Damn you, mother, and damn you, Fern McAllister! Why does it always have to be like this? Why, oh, why does it always have to be like this?” he repeated and collapsed, sobbing, into a chair.
To be continued. on Monday.
