‘Ryan, I think it was.’
‘So why don’t I remember him if he was my friend?’
‘You used to play with him when you were two – you were not quite three when he died – people don’t remember what they did at that age.’
‘So what happened?’
‘What happened? I don’t remember exactly.’
‘When did he drown?’
‘I couldn’t say, but it was soon after Christmas – about two years after we came to live in Vermont. You would have been three that January.’
‘Was I involved?’
‘Involved – no, why should you have been?’
‘I just don’t know why this face I see – if it’s his face – should evoke such a feeling.’ Marianne walked to the window. I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills. She watched as the evening sun decorated the distant summits with tints of pink and yellow leaving heavy shadow in the foreground, a lake of darkness across the valley. Could she see that face now if she concentrated? She wasn’t sure.
‘Was it because of the accident that they moved?’
‘I don’t know. Perhaps.’
‘I remember the house and the pond – but not very well. When did we move?’
‘Really, Marianne, why are you asking me all these questions? I can’t remember exactly. It was when your father started to work in Burlington. Before Claire was born. I suppose you were about eight or nine.’
‘So what happened exactly? How did the boy – Ryan – drown?’
‘I have no idea, I don’t think anyone knows – now come and sit down.’
Marianne sat at the table and helped herself from the dishes which her mother had set out. Usually they would find things to talk about while they ate but this time they chewed in silence. Her mother seemed to be lost in thought and Marianne was sure she knew more than she was letting on.
‘Maman, I’m sorry but I still think there is more to this than you are telling me.’
Her mother looked up, confused, as if she had been in another place. ‘More to what, Chérie?’
‘To the drowning of Ryan – and how it relates to me.’
Her mother said nothing, but a frown came over her face and she looked away from Marianne as if she saw something on the kitchen wall behind her, something perhaps in the montage of family snaps taken at different times over the years: Marianne making a snowman in the back garden, carrying baby Claire in her arms, skiing between her father’s legs.
‘Look at me, Maman. I am hardly a child. I am fifty. If there is something to tell, then for God’s sake let me hear it.’
‘You may be fifty but you are a post-war child,’ said her mother, suddenly more animated and looking intently at Marianne. ‘You didn’t live through what we lived through. Amnesia is a blessing. I couldn’t live if I had to remember all the bad things that happened. Forgetting has been my way of survival – it’s nature’s way to heal us and I am convinced it’s the best way.’
‘We are not talking about the war…’
‘This modern obsession with rummaging in the cupboard for old memories,’ her mother continued, ignoring Marianne’s intervention, ‘dusting them down, examining them under a microscope, adding a dash of imagination – a touch of fantasy – to what is barely a memory at all, and then worrying how these best forgotten events might be affecting your life today; it’s a terrible mistake. Leads to nothing but unhappiness.’
‘Maman…’
‘In your case, you don’t actually remember so it’s pointless to speculate on what may have happened.’
‘If I had no memory at all then I might agree with you. But I do have something: the face and the terrible feeling which goes with it – it’s been with me all my life and I need to understand. It might help…’
‘The truth is I don’t actually know…’
‘But you know more than you’ve told me?’
‘Yes.’
‘So?’
‘It won’t help you, Marianne.’
‘Please, Maman, just tell me.’
‘Pour me another glass of wine and I’ll try to tell you. The truth is I’ve done my best to block out the memory myself, so I can’t be sure what I really do remember.’
Marianne refilled her mother’s glass and waited.
‘As I said, it was a few days after Christmas. The weather, which had been very cold, had thawed somewhat and there was wet slush on the ground.’
‘In the morning?’
‘Yes, the morning. You know, we regarded the garden as a safe place, so by the time you were nearly three we weren’t necessarily watching you all the time.’
‘Was Ryan there?’
‘Please don’t interrupt all the time, Chérie – no, Ryan was not there. Do you remember the layout of our house and the O’Connors’ – later on, the Johnsons’ – next door?’
‘More or less. There was a pond at the bottom of the garden which somehow went through to their house as well.’
‘Yes – both houses had gardens which backed onto the same pond. Naturally, with a small child in the house we had the pond securely fenced off.’
‘What about their garden?’
‘I’m coming to that. They had also fenced the bottom of their garden but anyway there was a wooden picket fence between the two gardens – as well as trees and shrubs – so you couldn’t just walk through. When we wanted you two to play together we – or the O’Connors – would lift one of you over the fence.’
‘So, what happened that morning?’ said Marianne, knowing that she should let her mother tell the story in her own way, but desperate to get to the heart of it.
‘I was doing something in the house – I can’t remember quite what – when I heard you crying and found you at the back door, wet to the skin and shivering with cold. I was mystified as to how you had got so wet but sometimes there were big puddles when the snow was melting so I thought you might have rolled in one.’
‘My God – so I might have been in the pond as well?’
‘At that moment I didn’t think of the pond – I knew it was safely fenced off, and my main concern was to dry you off and comfort you. Then… well… the phone rang and it was Margaret O’Connor sounding agitated and wondering whether we had Ryan. I said no, but I would come downstairs and check. I met her in the garden and we spoke over the fence. A couple of minutes later, she discovered that the ice was broken on the pond and she became hysterical, screaming Ryan’s name. I climbed over the fence into their garden and ran down to where she was.’
Marianne watched, transfixed, as her mother took another sip from her wine glass. Why have I never heard this before? she thought. How can I be hearing this for the first time now?
‘The wire fence at the bottom of the O’Connors’ garden was quite high,’ her mother continued, ‘too high for her to climb over, but Margaret just launched herself at it, fought it like a mortal enemy, and somehow broke it down enough to get to the pond. She tried to walk on the ice to where the broken area was – about ten yards in – but the ice wouldn’t support her weight and she was floundering up to her waist in the water, trying to break her way through the ice. I could see it was hopeless so I ran back to the house and called the police and fire service.’
‘So what was I doing while this was going on?’
‘I couldn’t say exactly but when I got back to the house you were sitting silently at the top of the stairs holding one of your dolls. Of course, I tried to question you, how did you get so wet, did you go on the ice, did Ryan fall in, did you fall in? But you wouldn’t answer. In fact, you didn’t speak for the rest of the day.’
‘And the police came?’
‘Yes, the police came and… well, I don’t know exactly how long it took, but they found little Ryan’s body at the bottom of the pond – under the ice.’