Sister, Ellen, in thick grey tweed, sat knitting. She said: 'Oh Jack, there you are, we are all here at last.'
Jack sat. Cedric sat. They had to arrange their feet so as not to entangle in the middle of the small floor. They all exchanged news. The main thing that had happened to the three of them was that the children had all grown up.
The grandchildren, eight of them, knew each other, and had complicated relationships: they were a family, unlike their parents.
Mrs Markham brought tea, of the kind appropriate to this room, this town: scones, butter, jam, comb honey, fruit buns, cherry cake, fruit cake. Also cream. She left, giving the three a glance that said. At last it is all as it should be.
Jack asked: 'Have you seen him?'
'No.' said Cedric a fraction of a second before Ellen did. It was clear that here was competition for the perfect disposition of this death. Jack was remembering how these two had fought for domination over each other, and over, of course, himself.
'That is to say,' said Ellen, 'we have seen him, but he was not conscious.'
‘Another stroke?' asked Jack.
'He had another before Christmas,' said Cedric, 'but they didn't tell us, he didn't want to worry us.'
'I heard about it through Jilly,' said Ellen. Jilly was her daughter.
And I through Ann,' said Cedric. Ann was his.
Jack had now to remind himself that these names represented persons, not samples of pretty infancy.
'He is very close to Ann,' said Cedric.
'He is fond of Jilly too,' said Ellen.
'I suppose there is a nurse in there?' asked Jack. 'Oh of course, there must be.'
'There is a day nurse and a night nurse, and they change places at dawn and dusk,' said Ellen. 'I must say, I am glad of this tea. There was no restaurant on the train.'
'I wonder if I could see him?' asked Jack, and then corrected it: 'I shall go in to see him.' He Knew, as they spoke, that all the way on the train he had in fact been waiting for the moment when he could walk into the little bedroom, and his father would smile at him and say — he had not been able to imagine what, but it must be something that he had been able to imagine what, but it must be something that he had been waiting to hear from him, or from somebody, for years. This surely was the real purpose of coming here? That what he had in fact been expecting was something of coming here? That what he had in fact been expecting was something like a 'deathbed scene', with vital advice and mutual comfort, embarrassed him, and he felt that he was stupid. Now he understood that embarrassment was the air of this room: the combat between elder brother and sister was nominal; they skirmished from habit to cover what they felt. Which was that they were in a position not allowed for by their habits of living. Jack had a vision of rapidly running trains — their lives; but they had had to stop the trains, had had to pull the emergency cords, and at great inconvenience to everyone, because of this ill-timed death. Death had to be ill-timed? It was its nature? Why was it felt to be? There was something ridiculous about this scene in which he was trapped: three middle-aged children sitting about in one room, idle, thinking of their real lives which stagnated, while in another room an old man lay dying, attended by a strange woman.
"I'am going in,' he said, and this time got up, instinctively careful of his head: he was tall in this low-ceilinged room.
'Go in without knocking,' said Ellen.
'Yes,' Cedric confirmed.
Jack stooped under the door-frame. An inappropriate picture had come into his mind. It was of his sister in a scarlet pinafore and bright blue checked sleeves tugging a wooden horse which was held by a pale plump boy. Jack had been scared that when Ellen got the horse a real fight would start. But Cedric held on, lips tight, being jerked by Ellen's tugs as a dog is tugged by the other dog who has fastened his teeth into the bit of meat or the stick. This scene had taken place in the old garden, for it had been enclosed by pink hydrangeas, while gravel had crunched underfoot. They must all have been very young, because Ellen had still been the classic golden-haired beauty: later she became large and ordinary.
What he was really seeing was his father sitting up against high pillows. A young woman in white sat with her hands folded, watching the dying man. But he looked asleep. It was only when he saw the healthy young woman that Jack understood that his father had become a small old man: he had definitely shrunk. The room was dark, and it was not until Jack stood immediately above his father that he saw the mouth was open. But what was unexpected was that the eyelids had swelled and were blue, as if decomposition had set in there already. Those bruised lids affected Jack like something in bad taste, like a fart at a formal meal, or when making love of a romantic sort. He looked in appeal at the nurse, who said in a natural voice which she did not lower at alclass="underline" 'He did stir a moment ago, but he didn't really come to himself.'
Jack nodded, not wanting to break the hush of time that surrounded the bed, and bent lower, trying not to see the dying lids, but remembering what he could of his father's cool, shrewd, judging look. It seemed to him as if the bruised puffs of flesh were trembling, might lift. But this stare did not have the power to rouse his father, and soon Jack straightened himself — cautiously. Where did the Church put its tall old people, he wondered, and backed out of the room, keeping his eyes on the small old man in his striped pyjamas which showed very clean under a dark grey cardigan that was fastened under the collar with a gold tie-pin, giving him a formal, dressed-up look.
'How does he seem?' asked Ellen. She had resumed her knitting.
Asleep.'
'Unconscious,' said Cedric.
Jack asserted himself — quite easily, he saw with relief. 'He doesn't look unconscious to me. On the contrary, I thought he nearly woke up.'
They knew the evening was wearing on: their watches told them so. It remained light; an interminable summer evening filled the sky above the church tower. A young woman came through the room, a coat over her white uniform, and in a moment the other nurse came past them, on her way out.
'I think we might as well have dinner,' said Ellen, already folding her knitting.
'Should one of us stay perhaps?' corrected Cedric. He stayed, and Jack had hotel dinner and a bottle of wine with his sister; he didn't dislike being with her as much as he had expected. He was even remembering times when he had been fond of Ellen.
They returned to keep watch, while Cedric took his turn for dinner. At about eleven the doctor came in, disappeared for five minutes into the bedroom, and came out saying that he had given Mr Orkney an injection. By the time they had thought to ask what the injection was, he had said that his advice was that they should all get a good night's sleep, and had gone. Each hesitated before saying that they intended to take the doctor's advice: this situation, traditionally productive of guilt, was doing its work well.
Before they had reached the bottom of the stairs, the nurse came after them: 'Mr Orkney, Mr Orkney...' Both men turned, but she said 'Jack? He was asking for Jack.'
Jack ran up the stairs, through one room, into the other. But it seemed as if the old man had not moved since he had last seen him. The nurse had drawn the curtains, shutting out the sky so full of light, of summer, and had arranged the lamp so that it made a bright space in the dark room. In this was a wooden chair with a green cushion on it, and on the cushion a magazine. The lit space was like the detail of a picture much magnified. The nurse said: 'Really, with that injection, he ought not to wake now.' She took her place again with the magazine on her lap, inside the circle of light.