The brake lights of the car gleam red as they pull out of the drive. It’s raining again. Beth and I stand and wave like idiots until the car is out of sight. Our hands drop, in near-perfect unison. Neither one of us wants to turn back to the house now this event is past. Christmas. The preparation of the house, the feeding and entertaining of Eddie, of our parents. Now what? No deadline, no timetable. Nothing to guide us but ourselves. I glance at Beth, see tiny drops of water beading the stray hairs around her face. I can’t even ask what she wants for lunch, can’t even impose this small future on us. The house is bursting with leftovers, ready to be grazed.
“Eddie’s so great, Beth. You’ve done so well there,” I say, needing to break the silence. But there’s a chilly, sad edge to Beth’s eyes.
“I’m not sure how much of it comes from me,” she says.
“All the best bits,” I say, taking her hand, squeezing it. She shakes her head. We turn and go inside again, alone.
When she is this quiet, when she is this pale and still, like a carving, I think of her in the hospital. At least I didn’t find her. I’ve only got Eddie’s descriptions, making pictures in my head. She was in her bedroom, lying on her side, bent at the waist as if she had been sitting up and then tipped over. He couldn’t see her face, he told me. Her hair had fallen right over it. He says he doesn’t know how long he stood there before going over to her, because he was too afraid of moving her hair, of seeing what was underneath. His mother, or his dead mother. He needn’t have touched her at all, of course. He could have just called an ambulance. But he was a child, a little boy. He wanted to make it right himself. He wanted to touch her and find her sleeping, nothing more. What courage he must have found. To do it-to push back her hair. I am so proud of him it hurts.
She had taken a lot of sleeping pills and then tried to cut her wrists-with the short-bladed paring knife that I had seen her use more than once, slicing banana onto Eddie’s cereal-but the conclusion drawn was that she had hesitated. She had hesitated-perhaps because the first cut, deep enough to look bad but not deep enough to do any real damage, had hurt more than she expected. And while she hesitated the pills sank into her bloodstream and she passed out. She had cut her wrist the wrong way. Horizontally, across the vessels and tendons, instead of parallel to them as any serious suicide, these days, knows is best. The doctors called it a cry for help rather than a genuine attempt, but I knew different. I clattered into the hospital, waited while they pumped her stomach. Opposite me in the corridor was a window, blinds drawn. My reflection stared back at me. In the greenish light I looked dead. Lank hair, face drooping. I fed money into a machine; it expelled watery hot chocolate for Eddie. Then Maxwell came and took him away.
When she woke up I went in to see her, and I had no idea until I got to her that I was angry. So angry with her. Angrier than I have ever been.
“What were you doing? What about Eddie?” These were my first words. Snapping like a trap.
A nurse with hair the color of sand scowled at me, said, “Elizabeth needs her rest,” in an admonishing tone, as if she knew her better than I. There was a bruise on Beth’s chin, purple hollows around her eyes, in her cheeks. What about me? I wanted to add. Hurt, that she would want to leave me. The same feeling as when she ran off with Dinny, snowballing down the years. She didn’t answer me. She started to cry and my heart cracked, let the anger run out. I picked up a matted length of her hair and began chasing out the knots with my fingertips.
It’s been a long time since I spoke to my Aunt Mary, let alone telephoned her. I am still reluctant to, but I have got a ball rolling now. I have started to learn things, started to uncover secrets. If I keep going, sooner or later I will get to the ones I am looking for. I shift uncomfortably in the chair as I wait to hear Mary’s voice. She was always mousy, quiet; so mild and meek that half the time we didn’t even notice her. A pink-skinned woman with pale hair and eyes. Neat blouses, tucked into neat skirts. It was a shock to hear her scream; to hear her shout and cry and curse in the aftermath of Henry’s disappearance. Then when that stopped she was even quieter than before, as if she’d used up all the noise she possessed in that one burst. Her voice is fluting and quiet, as precarious as wet tissue paper.
“Mary Calcott speaking?” So timorous, as if she’s really not sure.
“Hello, Aunt Mary, it’s Erica.”
“Erica? Oh hello, dear. Happy Christmas. Well, I suppose it’s a bit late for that now. Happy New Year.” There is little conviction behind these words. I wonder if she hates us, for surviving when Henry did not. For being around to remind her of it.
“And to you. I hope you’re well? You didn’t come down with Clifford, to collect those bits and bobs you wanted from the house?”
“No, no. Well, I’m sure you understand that Storton Manor is… not an easy place for me. It’s not a place I like to think of often, or return to,” she tells me, delicately. I can’t warm to her. To put losing her son in such limp terms, as if it was an embarrassing incident, best forgotten. I know how unfair I am being. I know she’s not a whole person any more.
“Of course.” I struggle to find more small talk, fail. “Well, the reason I was calling, and I hope you won’t mind me asking, is that I wanted to pick your brains a little about the family research you did, the year before last.”
“Oh, yes?”
“I’ve found a photo of Caroline, you see, dated 1904, and it was taken in New York…”
“Well, that certainly sounds right. She came to London in late 1904. It’s hard to be absolutely sure of the date.”
“Yes. The thing is she has a child with her, in the picture. A baby that looks about six months old or so. I just wondered if you had any idea who the baby might have been?”
“A child? Well. I can’t think. That can’t be right.”
“Was she married before, in the States? Only, the way she’s holding the baby… it just looks like a family portrait to me. She looks so proud… It looks to me like it’s her baby, you see.”
“Oh, no, Erica. That can’t be right at all. Let me just get the file down. One moment.” I hear rustling, a cupboard door creaking. “No, I’ve got a copy of her marriage certificate to Sir Henry Calcott here, and it clearly says, in the ‘condition’ column, that she was a spinster. A spinster at twenty-one! Hardly seems an appropriate label, does it?”
“Could she have… got a divorce, or something?” I ask, dubiously.
“Goodness me, no. It was very rare in that day and age, and certainly not without it being well talked about. Or mentioned on the occasion of her subsequent marriage. The child must belong to somebody else.”
“Oh. Well, thank you…”
“Of course, Caroline was always rather reticent about her early years in America. All anybody could discover was that she had grown up without any close family and had come to England to make a fresh start when she came into her money. She married Henry Calcott very soon after meeting him, which, I have always thought, perhaps shows how lonely she was, poor girl.” Twice now, she has said his name.
“Yes, it does sound that way. Well, thanks for looking it up for me, anyway.”
“You’re welcome, Erica. I wonder whether I might ask you to send me the photograph? To add to my presentation files? Early pictures of Caroline and her generation are so very scarce.”
“Oh, well actually, my mother has already asked me to give her any pictures I find. But I’m sure she’d be happy to send you copies of them…”
“Of course. Well, I shall ask Laura when I next see her.”
There’s a pause and I can’t quite bring myself to say goodbye, to admit that this piece of information was all I was after, and that I do not want to talk to her. There is so much to say, so much not to say.