They reached the ward after the usual squeaky walk along the polished linoleum floors and brick-lined corridors. When they got to the bedside Grace muttered that Uncle Les was asleep. She almost pushed her mother into a chair and said she would be back at half past three. Evelyn opened her mouth to protest, but changed her mind. It might not be such a bad idea if Grace took herself off, since she was clearly in a nasty mood. She didn’t quite trust her not to make a scene and that was the last thing anyone wanted, especially around sick folk lying in a hospital ward.
After a minute or two, Uncle Les woke up. Evelyn knitted away, addressing remarks to him, which he answered sleepily. She was quite content not to have to make too much conversation, and she wondered to herself how many more Wednesday visits would be required. She noticed that his voice sounded stronger and he hardly coughed at all. There had been mention of a convalescent home in the countryside for a month’s recuperation, which would certainly be a difficult journey for her and Grace by bus.
When Uncle Les drifted off to sleep again she tap-tapped her way with her white stick to the end of the ward where, as she expected, a nurse came out and greeted her. Yes, she confirmed, Doctor was very pleased with Mr. Hibbert and fully expected that another week should see him strong enough to leave hospital. A spell of convalescence in a wellrun establishment such as the Maud Braddock Memorial Home for Invalids would be just the thing. A few more weeks of fresh air and not overdoing things would put him properly back on his feet. Evelyn nodded and turned to go back, waving her stick in front of her.
“I’m just due to do my rounds,” the nurse said.“Here’s my arm, if you’ll allow me?”
Without waiting for a reply she took Evelyn’s arm and tucked it cosily under her own, and led her slowly back up the ward. As they went, she spoke in a gentle voice to Evelyn about the flowers placed here and there. Mr. Crowe had orange chrysanthemums, but the lovely scent came from the simple lilies of the valley in a little vase on Mr. McIntyre’s bedside table. His wife had brought them from the garden. Evelyn squeezed the nurse’s arm.
“I had lilies of the valley for my wedding posy. Over twenty years ago. Oh, I can see that posy now! Lovely, it was.”
The nurse murmured sympathetically.
“Aye, and the wallflowers in the gardens out yonder,” Evelyn went on, “they’ve a grand smell, too. I walked past them from the gate.”
“Yes, I saw they were out. Lovely colours.”
“Aye, they’re bonny-lookin’. As I remember.” She turned and smiled at the nurse, her eyes brimming with tears.
“Oh, dear, I am sorry!” the young nurse said. “I’m so thoughtless. Only with you coming every Wednesday, I got to thinking if I couldn’t see, what I’d want would be somebody letting me know what there was to see. Then I might sort of see it in my head. Only maybe it’s not like that at all. Oh, I’m ever so sorry if I’ve offended-”
“Nay! Nay, go on with you! You’ve got it spot-on. I’m not used to it, that’s all, somebody thinking about it that way. My Grace, now, she…” Evelyn fished her handkerchief from her sleeve and wiped her eyes. “She’s just not a big talker, I suppose. Well, thank you, lass,” she said. “Thank you ever so.”
They had arrived back at Uncle Les’s bed and the nurse helped Evelyn back into her chair. “You’re right welcome. You’ve another fifteen minutes,” she said. “We’ll miss you when Mr. Hibbert goes.”
Evelyn beamed. Then the nurse leaned in close and whispered in her ear. “Sister was saying your smile lights up the whole ward. You’re an inspiration, you are. Take care now.”
It seemed impossible to Evelyn that she might inspire anyone, but she went on smiling at the compliment, and turned her attention again to entertaining Uncle Les with snippets of news.
When Grace arrived back sullenly at a quarter to four, Evelyn was waiting for her under the porch of the entrance to the ward. It had begun to rain. Grace marched back to the bus stop so fast that Evelyn had to call out to her to slow down. Not a word was exchanged on the journey home. On the bus, Evelyn pondered the words of the nurse, wondering about the sympathy that had come from the young woman so naturally, as if she were filled with it and it overflowed. Where did it all come from? She knew it was wrong of her, but she couldn’t help hoping that even a little of something similar was lodging somewhere deep in Grace’s heart, and would come out one day. Then she immediately felt guilty. The nurse probably had a mother waiting at home ready to notice that her young daughter looked tired or troubled, or had done way, or had a new glow about her. It wasn’t Grace’s fault.
Sleep came in the end. It always does. It’s not sleep itself that’s the problem, it’s when you sleep; Arthur and I both knew well enough by now how determined people were to prevent us from sleeping at times it was inconvenient to them. But of course they couldn’t stop us any more than we could stop the dreams that came when we did.
That first night alone and waiting for him, I had a dream that began in water, dark water flickering with iridescent, darting fish, though on reflection it might have been a dark sky alive with butterflies. Whether air or water it was warm, and in it my breath softened and slowed and I swam or floated towards a bumpy-looking ledge that turned out to be the distant line between a lake and a sky just beginning to blaze with light; as I came nearer, the horizon split against the rising dome of the sun.
The dream woke me as if a torch had been shone into my eyes. I got up to get a drink of water and I stood in the kitchen listening to the kind of low noise all kitchens make, not really a sound at all. Every kitchen’s undercurrents are the same and different, and kitchens smell the same and different. Here it was milky, sweetish. I wandered out to the back garden. The fresh air rushed at me and I plonked myself down on the terrace steps. It was so cold and lovely.
I was shivering. I was in need of food, too, I realized; my stomach began to grumble. Though I knew I should go in and get warm and find something to eat, I went on sitting there, looking up at the sky. I wondered what it would be like to be in a house near running water and surrounded by mountains so that every night would be filled with flows and echoes. I could hear the emptiness up there, and it made me think of flying, not with great flapping wings but in the way the gift of flight is bestowed in a dream or by magic, when the wind streams under you and you soar without effort simply because you have been granted the belief that you can. I closed my eyes and felt myself flying close to the top of a hillside invisible in the dark but there all the same, rising from a gleaming stretch of water.
Before it grew light, and now thinking practically of Arthur’s return, I went back upstairs. I chose quickly from the wardrobe, not taking time to assess its contents carefully. The clothes were obvious, anyway: sensible, not ugly but certainly not alluring or attractive. There was something so habitual and plain about them it seemed impossible they had ever been bought new, or chosen at all, never mind with pleasure; it was difficult to discern anything in them that would cause them to be selected from among others. I put on olive green slacks, a cream sweater, and some slip-on shoes. I looked like nobody, or anybody. I didn’t mind. For years I had been heading the same way myself, towards a capitulation to the expectation that women past a certain age dress only for weather, convenience, and disguise. It was obvious to me that it had been decades since Arthur had either been asked for or offered an opinion of Ruth’s appearance.
I didn’t know when to expect him, of course. My safest course was to wait out each day in my usual way, but with extra caution; probably he would not return alone and they might barge in while I was asleep. So when dawn came, I made my way up to the attic. The air was pleasantly thick and warm. I was so tired I could have bedded down on the bare boards but I was pleased to find a pile of curtains and some rolledup rugs. I arranged them into a kind of nest and settled down, dragging a dusty white net curtain around myself so that it covered me completely. I held it to my face until it was wet and salty. Then I opened my eyes and pulled the cloth right around my head and held it taut so I couldn’t blink. I stared through its gauzy whiteness. The sun from the skylight glimmered through, a cloudy bright rectangle in the flat, milky shadow of the sloping ceiling. I breathed in and pretended I was in the countryside in a field full of flowers, looking up at the sun just after it has rained. Over the white nylon I ran a finger down my nose and over my cheeks and across my lips, which were smiling now. My musty smooth curtain was a new white skin come to cover me up so nobody would know what I was like underneath. I fell asleep, and the day passed.