Second Chance (13 page)

‘Yes. And he told me that he and my mother intended to get married. It was a complete surprise to me, but I hope I didn't let him see it.'

‘Your mother had been to see me about the wedding. It was to be soon, but she didn't set a date for it. I think she wanted to find out when you were free.'

‘Why didn't you tell me that when I came to see you on Tuesday? It would have saved me the shock of finding out from poor old George.'

‘You seemed very upset on Tuesday. I didn't think you could take it.'

‘What makes you think I'm any better today?'

‘Don't make it more difficult for me, Miss Rivers. I've come to ask if I may mention their wedding plans in the funeral service. I think it would please George Williams. According to another of my older members, he and your mother were childhood sweethearts. And though your mother looked elsewhere, he remained devoted to her, and unmarried.'

‘Mention it, of course. It's very moving. There won't be a dry eye in the house.'

‘Don't be... hard, Miss Rivers. I shan't be giving a theatrical performance. I shall refer to it only as an instance of a faithful love which reflects in a small way, the infinite love of God.'

‘I shall look forward to the service. I'm sorry if I sound cynical. The thing is, I've never managed to discover much about the nature of love. But perhaps there's still time.'

‘I do hope so, Miss Rivers. Thank you for the whisky.'

Although Annabel and Selena despised me, they'd always got on well with my mother. They didn't have a grandmother, so she became something in between a substitute grandmother and a retired nanny. They patronised her but seemed fond of her at the same time. I'm not quite sure what she thought of them. ‘They're very pretty,' she used to say, ‘but, you know, I'm afraid they may be consumptive. There was a girl in my class at school, June Roberts her name was, the same build exactly, and she died in a sanatorium. Do they drink enough milk, say?'

‘Am I getting deaf?' she'd ask at other times. ‘I'm afraid I never understand much of anything they say. Their English is very strange surely. Is it a Crete accent they've got? Or is it just posh?'

She'd sometimes let them style her hair and put make-up on her face. They'd sit her in a chair, put a towel round her shoulders and give her the full treatment; moisturiser, foundation, blusher, eyeshadow, liner and lipstick. I'm not sure whether she was submitting gracefully to their ministrations or enjoying it; when they brought the hand mirror to show her what they'd accomplished, she'd look at herself in a bemused way and then look at me. ‘You're very beautiful,' I'd say. ‘I used to tell the girls at school that you were a famous model.' She liked that and so did Selena and Annabel. Occasionally they dropped their guard and seemed not to dislike me too much.

She used to knit for them. She'd done a great deal of knitting when she was young, but during her breakdown years it seemed to have gone completely out of her mind. But when she was working for Mrs Bevan and found herself helping her with some unrecognisable purple garment she was trying to finish, all her forgotten skill came flooding back and after that she was seldom without some piece of knitting. She used to make endless cardigans and jumpers and scarves and shawls for herself and Mrs Bevan, but I would never accept anything; knitted things being completely out of fashion when I was young.

But they were very much in vogue and very expensive eight or nine years ago, so that Annabel and Selena were always hanging over the back of her chair waiting for her to finish the little tight, sleeveless tops with plunging necklines they got her to knit for them. She thought they were vests and was very pleased to make them a couple each. ‘They're sensible little girls, Katie, but you really should teach them to talk properly. You had el-o-cution in school, didn't you? I remember how you used to shout out poetry in the garden. You could talk like a preacher, you could.'

One Boxing Day she and the girls went to see
Swan Lake
. The previous year Paul and I had taken them to
Giselle
and had been amazed at how moved and thrilled they were. Yes, eleven year olds love ballet, but as they were always determined to be different, far more sophisticated and worldly-wise than other children, we'd been delighted by their reaction. The following year I was in a play in the West End, so Paul had arranged to take them. At the last minute, though, he persuaded my mother to go instead.

He took them to the theatre, bought them a programme each, ordered ices for the interval and went home to put his feet up and watch
Morecambe and Wise
on the telly.

When I got back, they were already home.

‘I don't think that was any great success,' Paul told me in the hall. ‘The girls were in tears all the way home and your mother wasn't much better. What's the matter with them? The bloody thing finishes happily, doesn't it?'

The girls looked pale and exhausted. Yes, they'd enjoyed it, it was even better than
Giselle
, brilliant really, but they didn't want to talk about it, just wanted to go to bed. And no, they didn't want a sandwich or even drinking chocolate, thank you. ‘And what about you?' I asked my mother when they'd gone upstairs.

‘It was too beautiful,' she said. ‘I never want to see anything like that again. Too beautiful and too sad.' She looked very young that night, but there was a deep yearning in her eyes. She was only twenty-four or five when my father left her.

What a lovely person she was; kind and simple and guileless. To his credit, Paul was always very fond of her.

I should try to think about Paul. My partner in life. He is kind, generous, civilised, urbane. And totally unexciting.

Whereas Rhydian has opened me up again to the huge tides. After tomorrow I'll never see him again. Oh God, what am I to do? He has a wife and three children and a baby on the way, he couldn't be more committed. He belongs to them, I know that. But his eyes say he's free, that he's mine. For one moment last night I'd looked at him and his face had been laid bare, had been naked with desire.

No, I'm simply confused. I'm in a state of shock. I'm in mourning. I'm not myself.

I'm sick of being myself, docile and wifely. I've been faithful to Paul for ten years and I'm tired of it.

It's three-thirty and Lorna Davies knocks at the door. ‘I thought I'd look in on you since I didn't see you this morning. How are you feeling now? Any better?'

‘Not much, to tell you the truth. But I'm sure I'll be better when tomorrow's over.'

‘Of course you will. How soon will you be going back to London?'

‘Straight after the funeral, I'm afraid.'

‘In that case I'd better tell you now. There's a rumour in the village that your mother was going to marry George Williams. Someone said that Hilda Griffiths had it from Lewis Owen himself. She said that he said that she said…'

‘It's quite true, Lorna. I found a letter she was writing to me on Sunday just before she was taken ill.'

‘Oh, so you already know about it. That's all right, then. Only I didn't want you to have another shock tomorrow. Hilda – she's a cleaner at the hospital, you know – was telling my mother-in-law that George Williams was up here last Sunday afternoon when she had the stroke and it was him phoned for the ambulance and went with her to the hospital. Did you know that?'

‘No. I'm afraid I took it for granted that she was the one who'd phoned. The hospital only told me she'd arrived by ambulance just before three and that she'd died almost exactly twelve hours later. They phoned me at eight on Monday morning. They didn't contact me on Sunday because they hadn't realised how ill she was till she had the second stroke in the early hours.'

‘ Only my mother-in-law was wondering whether George Williams could have upset her in any way.'

‘I'm sure he didn't. He seems a very gentle, kind man and devoted to her. He came up here to see me yesterday.'

‘That's all right then. Only my mother-in-law doesn't get on with George's sister, Mali, they haven't spoken for years, so she thought you ought to know about this rumour so you could have it out with George. But if you're happy about the whole thing, that's fine. My mother-in-law will be disappointed, though. To be honest, there's nothing she likes more than a really hearty row.'

‘I'm sorry I can't oblige her.'

‘Don't worry. She'll get busy now on Edwina Williams' affair with John Parry, the chap who owns The Flower Basket in Vaynor Street in town. I'm not sure how she got wind of that, but she certainly won't let it rest. She's been on about it all day today. “Oh, these modern women!”'

‘I think Edwina'll be a match for her, though, don't you? Cup of tea?'

‘Yes please.'

There's still a tidal wave of misery about my heart, but Lorna's gossip and her loud cheery voice help pass the time. I manage to keep her talking until five.

What am I going to do for the rest of the day? Tomorrow will be easier. Paul will be with me. He'll say kind, thoughtful, comforting things about my mother. He'll squeeze my arm through the Reverend Lewis Owen's doleful service. He'll protect me from being too heartbroken about poor George Williams. He'll stand by me as I drink tea and eat a ham sandwich, and, Oh God, a slice of cold quiche. He'll hand over cheques to Maggie Davies and Edwina's heart-throb florist, knowing to the penny how much to tip. He'll also know, as if by magic, the exact moment when we can decently, unhurriedly leave. All that.

But will he be able to protect me from the spell of the eldest of the savage Gorsgoch boys; he of the midnight-dark eyes, lazy voice and rough farmer's hands?

I suddenly started thinking about my father, a thing I hadn't done for years. Some people, I know, will go to endless trouble to find out exactly who they are and where they've come from. Possibly because I'm an actor, I've always been more interested in the person I can become. I'd never had a passionate urge to discover every detail of my father's life and death; he'd always been a shadowy figure and I was satisfied with that. In old Welsh myths, it was the mother's brother who was responsible for the young hero's upbringing, not his father: he could be sure of his mother, not so certain, perhaps, of his father. That has nothing to do, I'm sure, with what I felt, but all the same, it's an interesting fact.

I'd been told that my father was slight, fair-haired and very quiet. I imagined that fairly soon after marriage he'd discovered his homosexuality and had been determined to escape before it engulfed him. I liked to think that he'd once intended to make contact again, at least to the extent of making some financial commitment, but hadn't had time to get it done. The date of his death hadn't been accurately assessed, but was definitely in the same year that he'd left us.

He must have been a bright lad. I shouldn't think many boys from Barnardo's got to a grammar school at that time, or did well enough to get a decent job in a bank afterwards. He must have been serious and hard-working at school. As I was. I found it strange to think of traits I'd inherited from him.

It seemed the right time to sort through some of my mother's papers. I'd surely find a snapshot or two, if nothing else. Perhaps an account of their wedding from the local paper. If I took my time, it might well get me through most of the evening.

There were three cardboard boxes in the glass-fronted cupboard next to the fireplace, large chocolate boxes with garish chocolate-box country cottages – very different from ours – on the covers. I knew they contained my mother's souvenirs, though I'd never been invited to look through them.

My hands were shaking as I undid the ribbon on the top box. I found that it was full of newspaper cuttings; my entire career from the earliest appearances in school plays to the latest television series, every one carefully dated. I'd had no idea that she collected them. I was moved, of course, and even more so when I discovered that she'd bought copies of
The Times
as well as her usual tabloid when any review was due. And she'd kept every single notice of every single play I'd been in, whether I was mentioned or not, had saved even the unkind ones. ‘Kate Rivers gives her usual breathy performance.' ‘Kate Rivers expresses distress, anger and fear with the same glassy-eyed stare.' I read through them all; more good than bad, but none ecstatic. Ah well, it was as I thought, I was a competent actor, but no more.

The thought came to me unbidden: I could give it up and not be missed.

I made myself a meal, egg-bread and baked beans, one of our favourite suppers years ago, though not as good as egg-bread with mushrooms – field mushrooms, which had the added advantage of being free. ‘Fry the mushrooms till they're black,' my mother would say. ‘It takes away the taste of horses.' I didn't care what the taste was. I loved it. Cultivated mushrooms are probably safer to eat but have next to no flavour.

I finished the meal with three cups of strong tea. It was half-past seven. In three and a half hours I'd have a stiff whisky and go to bed.