If Ursula had allowed Maurice the little knitting doll, made of unbreakable wood, then the crinoline lady would have been saved.
Bosun, soon to be dead of distemper, nosed his way into the room that night and laid a weighty paw on Pamela’s coverlet in sympathy before groaning into sleep on the rag rug between their beds.
The next day, Sylvie, reproaching herself for her heartlessness towards her children, acquired another kitten from the Hall farm. Kittens were in continual abundance on the farm, there was a kind of kitten currency in the neighbourhood, they were bartered for all kinds of emotional regret or fulfilment by parents – a doll lost, an exam passed.
Despite Bosun’s best attempts to keep a guardian eye on the kitten, they had only had it a week when Maurice stepped on it, during a vigorous game of soldiers with the Cole boys. Sylvie swiftly scooped up the little body and gave it to Bridget to take elsewhere so that its death throes could take place off-stage.
‘It was an accident!’ Maurice screamed. ‘I didn’t know the stupid thing was there!’ Sylvie slapped him on the face and he started crying. It was horrible to see him so upset, it really was an accident, and Ursula tried to comfort him which only made him furious and Pamela, of course, had moved beyond all notion of civilization and was trying to rip Maurice’s hair from his head. The Cole boys had long since scarpered back to their own house where emotional calm was the general order of the day.
Sometimes it was harder to change the past than it was the future.
‘Headaches,’ Sylvie said.
‘I’m a psychiatrist,’ Dr Kellet said to Sylvie. ‘Not a neurologist.’
‘And dreams and nightmares,’ Sylvie tempted.
There was something comforting about being in this room, Ursula thought. The oak panelling, the roaring fire, the thick carpet figured in red and blue, the leather chairs, even the outlandish tea-urn – all felt familiar.
‘Dreams?’ Dr Kellet said, duly tempted.
‘Yes,’ Sylvie said. ‘And sleepwalking.’
‘Do I?’ Ursula asked, startled.
‘And she has a kind of déjà vu all the time,’ Sylvie said, pronouncing the words with some distaste.
‘Really?’ Dr Kellet said, reaching for an elaborate meerschaum pipe and knocking the ashes out on to the fender. It was the Turk’s-head bowl, as familiar somehow as an old pet.
‘Oh,’ Ursula said. ‘I’ve been here before!’
‘You see!’ Sylvie said, triumphant.
‘Hm …’ Dr Kellet said thoughtfully. He turned to Ursula and addressed her directly. ‘Have you heard of reincarnation?’
‘Oh, yes, absolutely,’ Ursula said enthusiastically.
‘I’m sure she hasn’t,’ Sylvie said. ‘Is it Catholic doctrine? What is that?’ she asked, distracted by the outlandish tea-urn.
‘It’s a samovar, from Russia,’ Dr Kellet said, ‘although I’m not Russian, far from it, I’m from Maidstone, I visited St Petersburg before the Revolution.’ To Ursula, he said, ‘Would you like to draw me something?’ and pushed a pencil and paper towards her. ‘Would you like some tea?’ he asked Sylvie, who was still glaring at the samovar. She declined, mistrustful of any brew that didn’t come out of a china teapot.
Ursula finished her drawing and handed it over for appraisal.
‘What is it?’ Sylvie said, peering over Ursula’s shoulder. ‘Some kind of ring, or circlet? A crown?’
‘No,’ Dr Kellet said, ‘it’s a snake with its tail in its mouth.’ He nodded approvingly and said to Sylvie, ‘It’s a symbol representing the circularity of the universe. Time is a construct, in reality everything flows, no past or present, only the now.’
‘How gnomic,’ Sylvie said stiffly.
Dr Kellet steepled his hands and propped his chin on them. ‘You know,’ he said to Ursula, ‘I think we shall get on very well. Would you like a biscuit?’
There was one thing that puzzled her. The photograph of Guy, lost at Arras in his cricketing whites was missing from the side table. Without meaning to – it was a question that raised so many other questions – she said to Dr Kellet, ‘Where is the photograph of Guy?’ and Dr Kellet said, ‘Who is Guy?’
It seemed even the instability of time was not to be relied upon.
‘It’s just an Austin,’ Izzie said. ‘An open-road tourer – four doors though – but nowhere near as costly as a Bentley, goodness, it’s positively a vehicle for hoi polloi compared to your indulgence, Hugh.’ ‘On tick, no doubt,’ Hugh said. ‘Not at all, paid up in full, in cash. I have a publisher, I have money, Hugh. You don’t need to worry about me any more.’
While everyone was admiring the cherry-bright vehicle, Millie said, ‘I have to go, I have a dancing exhibition tonight. Thank you very much for a lovely tea, Mrs Todd.’
‘Come on, I’ll walk you back,’ Ursula said.
On the return home, she avoided the well-worn shortcut at the bottom of the garden and came the long way round, dodging Izzie speeding off in her car. Izzie gave a careless salute in farewell.
‘Who was that?’ Benjamin Cole asked, skidding his bicycle into a hedge to avoid being killed by the Austin. Ursula’s heart tripped and skipped and flipped at the sight of him. The very object of her affection! The reason she had taken the long way round was on the unlikely chance that she might engineer an ‘accidental’ meeting with Benjamin Cole. And here he was! What luck.
‘They lost my ball,’ Teddy said disconsolately when she returned to the dining room.
‘I know,’ Ursula said. ‘We can look for it later.’
‘I say, you’re all pink and flushed,’ he said.
‘Did something happen?’ Did anything happen, she thought? Did anything happen? Only the most handsome boy in the entire world kissed me and on my sixteenth birthday. He had walked her back, pushing his bicycle, and at some point their hands had brushed, they had blushed (it was poetry) and he said, ‘You know I do like you, Ursula,’ and then right there, at her front gate (where anyone could see), he had propped his bicycle against the wall and pulled her towards him. And then the kiss! Sweet and lingering and much nicer than she had expected although it did leave her feeling – well, yes … flushed. Benjamin too, and they stood apart from each other, slightly shocked.
‘Gosh,’ he said. ‘I’ve never kissed a girl before, I had no idea it could be so … exciting.’ He shook his head like a dog as if astonished by his own lack of vocabulary.
This, Ursula thought, would remain the best moment of her life, no matter what else happened to her. They would have kissed more, she supposed, but at that moment the rag and bone cart appeared round the corner of the lane and the rag and bone man’s almost incomprehensible siren moan of Enraagnbooooooone intruded on their budding romance.
‘No, nothing happened,’ she said to Teddy. ‘I was saying goodbye to Izzie. You missed seeing her car. You would have liked it.’
Teddy shrugged and pushed The Adventures of Augustus off the table and on to the floor. ‘What a load of rot it is,’ he said.
Ursula picked up a half-drunk glass of champagne, the rim of which was adorned with red lipstick, and poured half of it into a jelly glass that she handed to Teddy. ‘Cheers,’ she said. They chinked their glasses and drained them to the dregs.
‘Happy birthday,’ Teddy said.