The Journey Home: A Novel (23 page)

To prove to me that his ideas about Ditton Hall were not just hollow words, Anthony began to send me advertisements for this and that which he considered it advisable to invest in. Of course, he meant well, though his ignorance was obvious. I’ve kept these advertisements along with the letters.

The modern Gas Cooker is equipped with every convenience for cooking
food scientifically and daintily,
said the first advertisement he sent me. The “Zero” Store Cooling and Ice Making Machine was an even more tantalizing phenomenon,
driven by electric motor,
steam, gas or oil engines. G. J. Worssam & Son Ltd.
I asked him to wait before purchasing these appliances and the others he’d sent me information about. Especially the Bradford’s “Vowel” Washer which he was under the impression was a brand-new gadget. However, those who had come anywhere near household chores at any time during the last quarter of a century knew that this washing machine had long been outmoded.

“There’s no question that he’s serious, the dear fellow,” said Father when he examined the cuttings. “Ice Making Machine, I say . . .”

“I’m so glad you’re feeling a bit better,” wrote Anthony in late September. “My friends at the Ministry of War Transport have half promised that you can get a passage to England with a cargo ship. They also pointed out that the ship you sailed with to Iceland—the
Bruarfoss
—is still sailing here . . . I know you don’t need to be told that the voyage could be risky.”

“Risky,” read Father, and frowned. “Hm.”

When we said good-bye in mid-November, I had the feeling that we would never meet again. I suspect he knew it too. But it still came as a shock when he didn’t even survive the war years.

It had started to rain while we were waiting down on the jetty for the boat, first a few drops, then a heavy drizzle turning to fog on the mountains. He was wearing the large, green waxed jacket which he generally wore for visiting patients, and he wrapped it around both of us. The day before he had returned from his third trip to Raufarhofn to check on the boy.

The boat approached, blue, its lights blinking in the fog.

“He’s doing well,” said Father. “They’re taking good care of him. He’s a strong, handsome boy.”

He remained standing in the same place as we sailed away. I watched him as he was left behind, darkening and growing smaller in the gentle drizzle, until I couldn’t distinguish him any longer from the mossy rocks above the shore.

The sound of the telephone wakes me.

I’m startled, but can’t hear anything except my own heartbeat and an owl hooting in the distance. The shadow of the poplar quivers on the wall, three branches, two horizontal and one pointing diagonally to the sky. It may be summer, may be winter; Christmas night and my head heavy with food and wine and my mind full of the memories of candlelight and church bells in the village. Or maybe it’s spring and a tentative dawn has begun to waken out in the meadow. Maybe it’s autumn with steam rising from the damp earth.

The sound of the telephone wakes me without warning as it did fifteen years ago when he was injured. He had been playing down by the jetty and a lorry driver had failed to notice him.

“He’s broken his leg,” said Dr. Bolli on the phone, “but he’s regained consciousness. He’s broken a couple of ribs too and has some bruising.”

It was autumn and there were raindrops obscuring the window, drawing a gray veil over the brook and Old Marshall’s cottage.

“Will he live?”

“He’ll live, but the next few months will be difficult.”

“I’m coming.”

Silence. A long silence.

“They’re both with him,” he said finally. “His parents.”

“His parents.” The people who had kept vigil over him when he was ill, seen him take his first steps, taken care of him. Given him a name. Helgi. Helgi Arnason.

My reaction was ludicrous. What did I think I could do? He didn’t even know me, didn’t know who I was and would no doubt have been frightened of me. Yet I was ready to go. I had to be tough with myself to avoid breaking down. I longed to hold him in my arms, to crush him against me and tell him how much I loved him. But eventually I pulled myself together, my heartbeat slowed and my breathing became regular again.

When the rain stopped, the plants in the garden tubs shook in a chill gust of wind. I moved slowly, the sun came up and the sun went down and the warmth of the embers in the kitchen was comforting.

And so the years passed, each night like an impending punishment, every dream an echo of the telephone ringing in days gone by.

“Tina, dear old lady, sit down here beside me and warm me up.” Soon the first rays of sun will stroke the mist from the meadows, gently as a mother caressing her child’s cheek.

The phone is silent.

Soon the danger will pass.

The sky suddenly darkened as we were about to take our seats at the table. I had been waiting for him in the lobby. We had no sooner greeted each other than it began to rain; we hadn’t even released each other’s hands, though we had begun to take the first steps in the direction of the dining room. We stopped automatically to watch the rain drumming on the road and on the lawns around the independence hero’s statue on the other side of the street, until old Bolli, my former employer, looked at his watch and said: “I hope it’ll clear up before the graduation ceremony begins.”

He’s aged, poor dear. After all, he’s nearly eighty, and moves slowly, though he’s not exactly unsteady. His hearing’s going, he says, but his voice is as quiet as ever.

“I hope it won’t last,” he repeats as we sit down. “It was such beautiful weather this morning.”

I remember the day I last saw him. It was the morning I sailed for England, November 18, 1941.

I had rung his office two days earlier to announce my arrival. I could hear in his voice that the last thing he’d expected was a call from me but nevertheless he agreed without hesitation that our conversation should be confidential. He welcomed me, his handshake as limp as now, his eyes as distant as ever. (Now there seem to be cataracts over them as if they are gradually being extinguished or even turning inward.) His secretary brought us coffee and we sat in deep leather chairs by the window. I glanced at a painting of him and two other men with graying hair, above the desk. He noticed and, half sheepish, said by way of explanation: “A present from the staff when I was fifty.”

A thick Persian rug on the floor, timber paneling on the walls, bookshelves by the door, silence. On the desk were a few papers under a silver-plate paperweight, while beside them perched a glaring stuffed falcon. On the table between us lay a few pebbles; he picked one of them up and turned it absentmindedly between the thumb and index finger of his left hand. I glanced outside. In the window there were eight panes, the lower ones were opaque but the upper ones admitted the light without hindrance. The cloudless sky was visible above the rooftops across the street.

When I explained my business and asked him to promise life-long discretion, he nodded after a moment’s thought. I had half expected him to try to evade my request with a smile or a few well-meaning words but perhaps he didn’t get the chance.

He nodded and sat without speaking while I told him about my relationship with his son Atli, the reading on New Year’s Eve (I didn’t mention that I’d snatched the papers before leaving 56 Fjolugata), the months at Kopasker, my little boy, and the fisherman and his wife from Raufarhofn who had adopted him.

He sat in silence, and stopped turning the pebble over between his fingers, stroking it instead with his thumb as if it were fragile.

“No one except my father knows who the father is,” I said. “You don’t need to keep an eye on the boy except from a distance.”

The sun shone through the window on his pale cheek. He screwed up his eyes and moved out of the glare.

“Why are you confiding in me?” he asked finally.

“My father is getting on,” I said. “And Arni is a fisherman . . .”

“I’m sorry?”

“His father,” I explained.

“Oh, yes. His father, yes.”

“And who knows what will become of me. Better safe than sorry.”

The coffee was cold; perhaps it hadn’t been sufficiently hot when his secretary brought it.

“So you’re sailing today.”

“This evening.”

“Sea air is supposed to be good for the health. I wish you bon voyage, Asdis.”

I had no choice but to trust him. Watching him now as he reaches for the sugar bowl and puts a white sugar lump into his mouth, I remember how I grew calm in his presence.

“I do hope it’ll clear up in good time,” he says. “It was such fine weather this morning.”

The waitress, whom I had advised to improve her English, seems a bit nervous as she approaches our table. I smile at her.

“I even miss the days when she was at her worst,” he says, breaking the silence. “You know she was fond of you.”

I’m not prepared for this and have to clear my throat before I can reply.

“It was mutual,” I say. “I often think of her.”

The rain drums on the road outside. We eat slowly. I’m not hungry but the food is edible. The girl doesn’t seem afraid of me any more.

“Five Hundred Useful Phrases for Waiters and Waitresses,”
I say to her when she removes our plates.

“William Forsythe,” she says archly.

“William P. F. Forsythe,” I add.

We stand up.

“Are you nervous at all?” he asks.

We set off hand in hand.

“I think I’ve made up my mind what to do,” I reply.

“Good. Good. That makes me feel better.”

Flickering silhouettes, a faint echo.

Lights ahead of me, a far-off glimmer, noise, roars of laughter. My former employer leans over to me and whispers something in my ear but I can’t catch the words. Through the open side entrance I can see sunshine on the damp lawn. I listen as I think I can hear a bird chirping incessantly now that the rain has stopped. It reminds me of the blackbird in my poplar early in the morning when the blue-gray light creeps across the fields and feels its way down the branches of the trees. I listen but then the old man leans over to me again.

“He’s a swimming champion,” he whispers. “Have I already told you that?”

He’s sitting between his parents diagonally opposite us. I saw them enter and bowed my head involuntarily, even though I’m sure they wouldn’t recognize me. Since they sat down I’ve been staring at him but have sometimes had to look away.

“Ladies and gentlemen. I would like to welcome you . . .”

The side entrance closes and the songbird is silenced. Before I go down in the morning and light the fire, Tina and I generally sit by the window watching the blackbird through the glass. She scratches politely at the door to let me know she’s there, and rubs up against me as soon as I let her in. We wait for the light to reach along the branches of the poplar and touch the wings of the blackbird. When it flies with the light up into the quiet morning air we stand up and go downstairs. And I say, “Daylight has come, Tina. A new day.”

I have to look away.

“He’s very like you, Asdis,” says the old man.

They come in hand in hand, he and his mother, his father walking a few paces behind, as bowed and as shy as ever. He stops all of a sudden as if he has got lost and come to an unknown turning, before continuing. When they sit down he runs a comb through his gray hair.

He smiles easily, my son. Tall, fair-complexioned and smiling. I see when he leans over to his father that he knows he’s ill at ease in this company. I see how fond he is of him.

“Ladies and gentlemen. No one knows what the future will bring but with this education under your belt . . .”

People rise, we move down to the lobby. The sky is still cloudless but I forget to listen for the songbird. A cloudless sky; the puddles on the pavement outside evaporating.

I see them come out of the hall behind us. His parents vanish into the crowd while he joins a group of his friends by the cloakroom. Dr. Bolli and I walk out and hail a taxi. The old man climbs in. I’m about to get in beside him, then ask him to wait for me for a moment.

“I have to see him once more,” I say. “Just once.”

I walk back in and squeeze through the crowd, half blinded after the sunshine. A tremor runs through me and I have to lean against the wall while I recover. He’s still in the same place with his schoolmates by the cloakroom. I approach, then stop. He’s happy. I can tell he’s happy. I stand motionless, watching him, and when he turns his back to me I walk further into the lobby so that I can see his face. My progress through the crowd is slow and just as I’m passing the cloakroom he turns round and walks straight into me. I jump and drop my bag on the floor. It opens and a couple of things spill out of it: my lipstick and the photo of him in my arms.

“Sorry,” he says. “I’m terribly sorry.”

He bends down first to pick up my bag and lipstick, then reaches for the picture. When he hands it to me, I take his hand. For a split second I hold his hand. He smiles.

“Thank you,” I say.

We drive away bathed in sunshine. I sit in silence because I don’t want to lose the sound of his voice. When I close my eyes I fix his face in my memory. He’s smiling.

I’m calmer. I’ve found him. From now on he’ll always be with me.

15

During the last few days I’ve been wondering whether the squirrels in the garden can sense a hard winter ahead.

I’ve been sitting in the conservatory and wondering, as they’ve been busy lately hoarding nuts and scampering away to hide them, two in particular, one of them a bit lame. I mentioned the squirrels to Anthony, and the crows which perch almost daily on a post down by the brook, hunched over their own shadows. He merely seemed surprised that I should already be thinking about the winter.

It’s still warm and sunny most days, showers are few and mild and the sunshine is merry in the green foliage. There is no sign of the heralds of autumn except perhaps in the early morning breeze or the song of the grasshopper at twilight. And yet my thoughts have turned to the winter and I’ve mentioned to Old Marshall that it might be best to prepare for it earlier rather than later this year.

This afternoon his daughter Lydia is coming round with her son. We’ve arranged that she should leave him with me for a few hours because he wants to have a game of cards and play with the train set I bought last year. He spoke to me on the phone yesterday and asked whether I would bake him waffles with cream and syrup. “I like them so much, Miss Disa,” he said. I’m so looking forward to seeing him.

Yesterday I received a letter from little Marilyn, which I didn’t deserve as I haven’t got round to replying to the one she wrote me while I was in Iceland. Anyway, it was nice to get her letter and I read it with pleasure on my way home from visiting Dr. Ellis and again when I woke up this morning. The envelope also contained a photograph of the two of us, taken when I visited her this summer en route to Leith. A lovely picture which I’m going to find a good spot for in the kitchen, probably on the shelf under my mirror. She’s smiling in the photograph and as I examine it better and read her letter more carefully, I get the distinct impression that our conversation that evening has done her some good.

For the last few days a wisp of cloud has hung in the top branches of the trees which encircle the fields. Today it’s glowing and in the evenings it catches the pale gleam of the moon. Sometimes I convince myself it’s a message to me, a tuft of wool caught on the Almighty’s barbed-wire fence. There it is for the fifth day in a row and I’m getting used to it. Old Marshall, on the other hand, distrusts it; I saw him standing outside his cottage for a long time yesterday, contemplating it.

During the day I carry on jotting down this and that to pass the time and cheer myself up. I have enough leisure for this, since I hardly go near the cooking anymore as my strength is failing. But I don’t feel unwell and I enjoy listening to the echoes from the tennis courts in the afternoon lull— dunk, dunk—like a clock that’s running down. I wait for Anthony to walk across the lawn when the game is over and drink a glass of lemonade with me. I told him yesterday that I trusted the girl absolutely to take over from me. “The girl,” I say, but ought to mention that she’s about thirty. We appointed her at the beginning of the summer at the instigation of a friend of mine in Lyon, once I saw that her attitude to cookery was the same as mine. She’s extremely able and, I must say, has even improved since she came here. I appreciate that Anthony’s begun to bear up better when the conversation turns to the future.

It’s still light but I go to bed early these days. When I close my eyes my son is always with me. His voice sounds in my ears, comforting me, and my hands are warmed by the touch of his palm. He’s with me, his complexion as bright as a spring morning. It wasn’t all for nothing, then, I tell myself. You did do something good.

At night I often dream the same dream. I’m standing out in the garden in bright moonlight. Tina is with me. On the other side of the brook there are two horses looking over at me. I think I can see the whites of their eyes. There’s frost on the grass but I’m not cold when I set off. I haven’t walked far when I realize I’m resting both hands on a slender moonbeam. This always takes me by surprise, and falling instinctively to my knees I draw a little songbird in the frost with the moonbeam.

When I awake, I have the feeling that it will burst into song with the coming of spring.