Moving House E-Book

Katharine Moore

• Herausgeber: Allison & Busby
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 243

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

Roberta Curling has lived her whole long life in the same comfortable Edwardian house. Now, following a serious fall, her anxious grandchildren try to persuade her to move to something more manageable. And as she prepares to leave, each thing she packs brings the past vividly to life again.

Leseprobe

Moving House

Katharine Moore

Contents

Title PageDedicationChapter 1Chapter 2Chapter 3Chapter 4Chapter 5Chapter 6Chapter 7Chapter 8Chapter 9Chapter 10Chapter 11Chapter 12Copyright

To Anne Dickenson

Although some incidents and places in this story are drawn from life the characters emphatically are not, the relationship between the heroine and her son and grandchildren, for instance, being entirely fictitious.

Chapter 1

CLARE CURLING was writing a letter, sitting in her suburban garden in the spring sunshine. Her three children, wholly ignoring each other, were playing round her. Patrick, the eldest, aged eight, was systematically beheading the daffodils; Becky, aged five, was whirling aimlessly round and round the lawn; Bertram, aged three, clad according to his latest whim in a cast-off pink muslin dress of his sister’s, was laboriously pushing a large toy car up and down in a straight line, up and down, “over hill, over dale”, like a bulldozer.

Clare, looking up and seeing the destruction of the daffodils, called out, “Stop that, Patrick! The poor flowers!”

“They’re enemy outposts – there’s a war on, I can’t reduce the invading force.”

Clare sighed and folded up her letter. “It’s lunchtime,” she said. “It’s so warm we’ll have it outside, come and help carry the dishes out.”

The two elder children came.

“And how have you been amusing yourself this morning, Mother?” enquired Patrick kindly.

“I’ve been writing to Granny. Bertram, come to lunch.”

“No,” said Bertram. It was the first time he had spoken to anyone that morning, but he could have been heard chanting to himself resolutely: “Two, twenty, three, ten.”

“He’s got to push his car one hundred times to and fro,” explained Becky.

“But he doesn’t know how to count up to a hundred,” said Clare.

“No,” agreed Becky, “he might go on for ever; we shall have to push food into his mouth as he goes along.”

“You could stop him, Mother,” suggested Patrick, but Clare only sighed again. She did not feel like a confrontation with Bertram that morning.

“You spoil that child,” said Patrick, but the subject did not interest him. “Which do you like best,” he continued, “Norsemen or Vikings? I like Vikings.”

‘Aren’t they the same?” said Clare.

“I hate Romans best,” said Becky, “I hate Romans much the best, don’t you, Mummy?”

Her mother made no comment – she was thinking about Bertram. She didn’t believe she spoiled him, she just couldn’t do anything about him. That dress, for instance; he’d tripped over it twice already and got a nasty lump on his forehead. Besides, she didn’t fancy having a transvestite in the family.

“Whatchildrenhaveyougot,MrsCurling?”

“Oh,aboy,agirlandatransvestite.”

Bertram was like his grandmother, she thought; you simply couldn’t influence either of them once they had made up their minds, and they were both always making up their minds.

“Are we going to stay with Granny soon?” asked Patrick. “Will she let me wind up the grandfather clock, do you think? She said I could next time we came, but she might not remember.”

“No, we can’t go just yet,” said Clare, “she’s had a fall and hurt her leg.”

“Well, I fell out of the pear tree and hurt mine, but I could see people while it was getting better.”

“But she’s old.”

“Oh, very, very old,” said Becky. “She’ll die soon, won’t she?”

“You shouldn’t say things like that,” said Patrick, who was fond of his grandmother when he had time to think of her. “There’s lots of people older than Granny who aren’t dead.”

Becky nodded, “There’s Mr Jackson – he’s very old; he hasn’t any teeth.”

“He’s only a toad in a book, silly,” said Patrick. “Toads aren’t people.”

“I hate toads best,” said Becky dreamily. “May I have Bertram’s tomato, please? I’ve eaten mine.”

But just then Bertram came up, silently climbed on to his chair and began to eat his peas one by one with his fingers. Clare pushed a spoon at him, but he disregarded it. It was surprising how quickly the peas disappeared.

Yes, thought Clare again, he’sjustlikeGranny–contra-suggestive.Andnowitlooksasthoughshe’sgoingtobeaproblem– shereallyoughtnottogoonlivingatthatplaceonherown,butIdoubtverymuchifshe’llhearreason.

Roberta Curling, the incipient problem, was in reality the children’s great-grandmother, but this fact was all but forgotten. She had made an early marriage, and her only child had done the same. Her son and his wife had died tragically in a road accident, leaving twin babies to be brought up by their young grandparents who had, in every sense but the literal one, been Mother and Father to them. When Patrick was born, Roberta had refused to be labelled a “great” and as she was both firm and active no one thought of her as such.

On this particular day she was also writing a letter, propped up in bed and fighting against the drowsiness induced by her pain-killer. “You will soon be hearing from Clare,” she wrote to her granddaughter in Austria, “perhaps you have already done so. This is just to say – don’t be worried, I am quite all right. I had a little fall and have damaged my knee, entirely my own fault, slipped on the basement stairs, too much in a hurry as usual, you will say, and you will be right, but it’s hard to change the habits of a lifetime. Anyway, no bones broken, and Nurse Higgins and dear Mrs B. are taking good care of me. Clare is certain to fuss, so don’t take any notice. She and Alex will be on at me more than ever to leave Rowanbank, but I don’t mean to. The question is, will you back me up? I am not sure of this.”

She lay back on her pillow, tired. No, she was not sure of Naomi. Alex she could fathom easily, but Naomi…. She thought of her with love, longing and irritation. Roberta shut her eyes and there she was before her, one of the many Naomis – this time a dryad disguised as a schoolgirl, absorbed and grave, and in her grandmother’s eyes utterly charming, playing her flute under the walnut tree. Naomi was musically so talented, and after her school-days were over the way to a promising career had seemed to be opening out. But she had gone off to Salzburg, inspired by a suggestion of a fellow music student. And she had fallen in love with Salzburg. “There’s a river,” she wrote home, “a perfectly useless river running through the very middle of the town – you can lie on its banks under flowering chestnut trees – and, in a park, another river of white tulips, miles long, that winds away among the grass and the towers, all different shapes and colours and the mountains in a circle all round.”

That was all very well; but next she fell in love with a young Austrian doctor, with a taste for music, though very much dedicated to his work, and they were married. Early and rather precipitate marriages did run in the family, Roberta grimly admitted. Then Naomi, without a struggle and apparently with complete content, had dwindled into nothing more than a wife. It was two years ago now since all this had happened and there were not yet even any children as an excuse for giving up her career. She still played, of course, but never professionally and she had only come back to England twice since her marriage and then with Franz, who couldn’t take much in the way of holidays, and Naomi would not leave him.

Still, thought Roberta resolutely, Imustnotrepine.Sheishappyandshemighthavediedthattimewhenshewassoillasababy.

A knock came at the door, it was Mrs Baxter from the cottage; it was always known simply as “the cottage” because it was the only one near and it had had Baxters in it ever since Roberta had known it. The current Mrs Baxter sailed into the room like a duchess. She had immense but comfortable dignity. She “did” for Roberta and obliged extra in emergencies.

“I’ll boil you an egg for your tea and I’ll leave you a thermos of coffee so you won’t do so badly till Nurse comes,” she said, “for I am that sorry I can’t stay this afternoon, as William’s not so well.”

“Oh, dear,” said Roberta, “you shouldn’t have had to leave him. I’m sorry to be such a nuisance.”

“Don’t fret,” said Mrs Baxter. “I’ll be back before he comes in, only I wanted to be there and have his supper ready and the fire bright for him.”

“I’ll soon be about again,” said Roberta. “I mean to hobble round the room tomorrow.”

“You must be careful, though,” said Mrs Baxter, “it’s falls that lie in wait for many when they’re getting on, and stairs especially. You ought to have asked me to fetch up those apples. I don’t hold with you going down into the cellar, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

Roberta, when left alone again, lay looking out of her window, watching the late pale spring sunshine filter through the interlaced branches of the walnut tree. She was wondering if she herself ought to hold with going down into her cellar any longer. It was stupid to have continued to keep the store of apples there, but there they had always been kept and she had never thought about any other place for them. When you had lived a long while in the same house, it was difficult to adapt even in details to the exigences of age.

She reluctantly allowed that Alex and Clare might have some reason on their side, for it was true that the house was not really suitable for her any more, in fact had ceased to be so years ago – an inconvenient rambling, servant-planned building, not even very attractive to look at, with far too big a garden but an incomparable view. Here, in the middle of a field, long ago, her mother had sat herself down and said to her father: “This is where you must build me a house.” He had gone straight off to bargain with the farmer who owned the field, leaving her sitting there in entranced contemplation, and in no time the house was built. Youcoulddothosesortofthingsthen, thought Roberta. Howspoilttheywere,thoseEdwardianmiddleclasses,untiltheirsonsweretakenawayfromthemtobeslaughtered. Perhaps after all her parents had been glad then that she was Roberta and not Robert; for she was a disappointment: they would have preferred a son and there were no more children.

The home was named “Rowanbank” because its site was bordered by an old hedge containing a rowan tree greatly prized by her mother – “A magic tree,” her mother had told Roberta, “full of power to keep evil away.” It had been of reasonable size at first and used only as a country retreat from Highgate but, as the years passed, a study library was added here, an extra bedroom there, in preparation for her father’s retirement.

Rowanbank became Roberta’s at his death and, as things turned out, she continued to live there after her marriage. Charles did not mind where he lived as long as he could paint, bless him, and there was plenty of room for that and for her mother to live with them. Here her son was born, her she had brought up his children and there was plenty of space for them too. She had never thought about the appearance or convenience of the house, it was simply home to her. The view miraculously had remained unspoiled. Beyond the garden, so lovingly planned by her father, whose hobby it was, stretched Kent hop gardens and cherry orchards, flanked by gently sloping wooded hills, then a stretch of marsh and on clear days the blue line of the sea. No buildings were anywhere to be seen, except a cluster of hop kilns, their white cowls cocked up into the sky like some curious land-locked sailing craft. One of Roberta’s bedroom windows looked out on this view, the other on to the walnut tree.

But it was too dark now to see out of either and her knee had started to ache quite badly. Willow, her large grey tom cat, who adored people in bed, had come in through the door left ajar by Mrs Baxter and, carefully searching out the injured leg, had settled himself heavily upon it. She was very glad to hear Nurse Higgins’s car.

Having let herself in and come up the stairs, Nurse Higgins asked: “Well, and how are we feeling this evening?’

Roberta wondered why double vision so often afflicted Nurse Higgins, but she accepted this odd fact without irritation, for her touch was gentle and she brought with her the benefaction of cleanliness and order.

The next day Roberta felt distinctly better and more able to cope with life, which that morning contained Clare’s letter, a succession of anxious chirps: “Do hope you are better, so unfortunate, knees are very tricky, wish so much I could come and look after you, but it is Patrick and Becky’s holidays still and they are at home all day and, even if I could find someone to look after them, I should have to bring Bertram with me, I am afraid, as he is going through a difficult stage just at present, am so glad that you have dear Mrs B. and that you find Nurse Higgins so helpful and the neighbours too. That is the best of living in a village, though of course Rowanbank is not really in the village and Alex and I both wish you were not so isolated except for Mrs B., in fact we do wish you were nearer to us. It would be so nice if we could have you living here with us at No. 30.”

Mayyoubeforgiven,Clare,youthinknosuchthing,poordear;andheavenknowsIdon’teither. Roberta paused in her reading of the letter at this point and lost herself in memories of Alex and Clare’s house. The recollection made her draw her bed-jacket close round her. Neither of them felt the cold, letting windows and doors stay perpetually open for the convenience of the children and Boffin the cat. She had long had a closed season from November to March for her visits there, but the English climate was no security for warmth at any time. Then the one small spare room had no space for clothes (the wardrobe and chest of drawers being filled with the family’s overflow) except for one peg and, with luck, one little drawer. As for the children, she was very fond of their company in small doses, but they seemed omnipresent from early in the morning, when both Becky and Bertram loved to invade her narrow bed, till late at night; like most children nowadays, they kept the same hours as their elders. There was a show of getting Bertram off earlier, but he never failed to reappear in his night garments to be greeted with resigned indulgence. There was no children’s room, so their games, toys and garments were everywhere. Roberta liked order and the haphazard ways of the household harassed her. Meals were at odd and arbitrary hours and very healthy, vegetarianism being one of the many “isms” Alex loved. He would soon have trouble with Patrick about that one though, thought Roberta, remembering an occasion when the boy had enquired suddenly: “Why is it wrong for me to eat meat but all right for Boffin to eat mice?”

Alex’s job as in town planning but he also served assiduously on many local committees – UNA, CND, gipsy welfare and Friends of the Earth – in all of which he was supported by his wife. Both of them were ardent idealists; however, whereas Alex devoted himself to his causes with something of the same pleasurable ardour as his grandfather had for his painting, Clare’s commitment was strained. She typed endless letters, arranged coffee mornings and put up in the little spare room various visitors, from respectable or near-respectable lecturers to down-and-outs.

The trouble was, thought Roberta, that she had been brought up from childhood to be too unselfish. This, unless you had a strong natural zest for life, was apt to get back on you. Clare had too low a level of personal enjoyment. Even with her family, although she undoubtedly loved Alex and the children deeply, she somehow seemed not to delight in them – or not often.

Roberta turned again to her letter:

But as our house is really too small to make you comfortable, Alex and I do hope, dear Granny, that you will think seriously whether you shouldn’t leave Rowanbank, for since this fall we are anxious about this. You know Alex is on the committee of a very well run Home for the Elderly at Penge. You would be within easy reach of us there and Alex wants to know if at least you will let him put your name on the waiting list. It is so popular that there is quite a long list always.

Your affectionately, Clare.

P.S. Patrick is writing to you – it is his own idea and he will not agree to enclosing it in mine, so I do not quite know when you will get it as he is always busy about something or other.

Roberta slowly pushed the letter back into its envelope. What a fuss about a silly little fall! No,no,mydears,notfor meyourHome,howeverpopular;IshallstayonatRowanbankuntiltheycarrymeoutinmycoffin. But her irritation was tempered by a little pleasant warmth, aroused by the postscript. She was touched by the fact that Patrick had thought of writing to her, even if he never actually finished or posted it. He was her favourite of the children. She liked him as well as loved him. He already showed signs of possessing more practical ability and common sense than anyone else in that family, and these were qualities that she valued.

When Patrick’s letter did arrive some days later it did not disappoint her. It said:

Dear Granny,

I am sorry you have hurt your leg. Is your grandfather clock keeping good time? I think I shall learn how to make clocks when I am older – they are most interesting. At present. I have invented a loom. I am making mats on it. I have made a green and red one and a blue and yellow, the fasteners off of them is not very good yet. When I get it right I will send you one and I think I will inclose a plan with instructions for making a loom like mine and if I were you I would try it yourself.

Yours faithfully, Patrick.

Roberta smiled and looked carefully at the plan for the primitive loom. She thought it neat and ingenious. Perhapshereallywasaturnforinvention–muchmoreusefulthantheartsthesedays.Isuppose,consideringhisbackground,thathehadtobeginwithlooms,butit’llsoonbecomputersandrobots,Iexpect.

She was downstairs again and getting about with two sticks, though the knee was still painful.

“I’m afraid it won’t be all that reliable in future,” said Dr Thompson. “Knees are tiresome. Still, you won’t want to be seeing me any more for the present. I’ll get the physiotherapist to look in and give you some exercises and Nurse will help you for a bit longer. But watch out on your stairs – it’s a long way up to your bedroom, isn’t it? Do you ever think you’d do better now in a flat or a bungalow?”

“No,” said Roberta, “I hate flats and bungalows and don’t intend to have another fall.”

“Well, well,” said Dr Thompson, assuming his best soothing manner, “I’m sure you’ll be careful, though it gets less easy to avoid trouble with advancing years, Mrs Curling.”

ThatmakesthreeJeremiahs, Roberta reflected to herself after he had gone, four, if you count Alex and Clare as two. I wonder who will be the next.

The next was her cousin Kitty who came down from London for the day to see her.

“Every time I come here the place looks larger and shabbier,” Kitty said cheerfully over lunch. “All the carpets are wearing out; you’ll trip over them next and they’ll cost a fortune to replace – there’s yards and yards of them. And as for the garden! Doesn’t William Baxter work for you any longer?”

“He’s been under the weather with his arthritis for quite a while now, poor fellow. It’s as much as he can do to get through his work on the farm; but he’ll do what he can for me once he’s better. It’s been such a wet spring. Yes – perhaps things are wearing out – what else would you expect? … But how can the house look larger?”

“Well, it does, I can’t think why you stay on here, Berta – it would give me the creeps. Aren’t you afraid at nights?”

“Why on earth should I be? What is there to be afraid of? Rowanbank isn’t haunted, it’s not old enough.”

“I’m not thinking of ghosts, silly – don’t you ever read the papers or listen to the news? Old ladies living alone are beaten up or murdered every night.”

“No, I don’t read the papers or listen to the news if I can help it, at least not that sort of news, though if I did I bet they’d tell me that far more people are killed on the roads than murdered in their homes, yet it doesn’t keep you out of your car.”

“But I’m forced to take that risk or I’d never go anywhere. You’re not forced to stay on here alone in this barracks of a place. Well, you always did know your own mind and I won’t go on about it … I only meant to help…. Let’s talk about something else – your view is as lovely as ever anyway.”

Roberta, who had been thinking how tiresome Kitty could be, melted at once; besides, she felt she had had the best of the argument and she was really very fond of her cousin.

After Kitty had gone the phone rang. It was Naomi.

“Is anything wrong?” enquired her grandmother anxiously – it was not yet time for her usual monthly call.

“No, I’m fine, but I’ve had your letter and Clare’s and really, dear, though I know she fusses, I do agree with her this time. Besides, it isn’t only her, it’s Alex too. Do think about it, don’t just refuse because they’re urging it.”

So, clearly Naomi was not going to back her. The very idea of moving from Rowanbank! She might have considered it if the place was really like an old barracks, as Kitty had called it, and therefore bare; but it was more like a furniture depository stuffed from top to toe with the accumulation of years, and everything encrusted with memories and associations.

She looked at her husband’s big oil paintings that covered the walls. They were workmanlike, very well painted, but old-fashioned in subject and treatment, faithfully representational; colour photography had really made them superfluous, she thought sadly. Still she loved them, not only because she, at any rate, thought them beautiful, but also because they reminded her of holidays they had spent together. Besides the landscapes that dominated the dining- and sitting-rooms, there were stacks of canvases in his studio – then there were all the books and her parents’ solid large Victorian and Edwardian furniture and the few antiques that she and Charles had collected….

Oh, no, it was hopeless, she and Mrs B. together could manage quite well, she felt sure, in spite of all this uncalled-for advice and admonition. Deciding not to bother any more, she went to sleep.

The real and decisive blow came some weeks later. Mrs B. was very late arriving – an unheard-of event – and, equally strange, she actually hurried as she came up the path to the kitchen door. As soon as she got in she sat down heavily on the nearest chair and began to weep. Roberta, who propped on one stick had been slowly stacking up the breakfast things at the sink, was struck with horrified amazement. There is something quite appalling in witnessing the breakdown of what has hitherto seemed an unassailable and blessed bulwark against misfortune.

“Oh, whatever is the matter?” she cried.

Mrs Baxter spoke between sobs: “It’s my William, he’s fell off a ladder almost as soon as he got to work. They came to tell me from the farm. His bad leg must’ve given way – it has been worse lately. They’ve brought him home.”

“But,” said Roberta stupidly, “you mustn’t stay here then, you must go to him.”

Mrs Baxter looked up at her, “Do you think I’d be here if he’d wanted me any more?” She was in command of herself now that the news was out and it was Roberta who was crying.

“You mustn’t take on,” she said. “It was God’s will.”

Roberta stifled a quick dissent; what was an outrage to her she saw was Mrs Baxter’s one comfort.

The funeral was a week later. William Baxter had been widely loved and respected in the village and the new grave in the old churchyard was heaped with the bright flowers of spring.

“Grandpa’s flowerbed is better than yours,” said Mrs Baxter’s youngest grandson, who had come with her to see Roberta the following day.

“You go and play with Willow, dearie,” said Mrs Baxter. “You can give him his dinner if you’re careful – it’s all ready on the kitchen table. He asked me what a grave was,” she explained when he had disappeared. “Someone had told him his grandpa was down in the grave now. I don’t want him to think like that, I said it was grandpa’s flowerbed and we’d come back and plant a rose tree on it later and now he’s going round saying his grandpa’s flowerbed’s the best in the village.”

The little boy’s mother was Mrs Baxter’s only daughter; she had two sons besides, one farming in Canada, the other in the navy. She was going to live with this daughter who kept a guest-house at Ramsgate and she had come to tell Roberta this.

“The cottage is tied, but you’ll know that. Mr Chittenden wouldn’t turn me out right now, don’t think that, but I know he needs it and I can be of use to Betty: her husband’s not up to much, though she won’t admit it, and there’s another baby on the way. I’m glad to go really, only I’m that worried about leaving you here all on your own, how will you manage?”

Howindeed! thought Roberta. Then something seemed to snap in her brain and she heard herself saying: “You won’t have to worry, Mrs B., for I’m going to make a move too – but that’s between ourselves just for the present.”

Mrs Baxter’s face cleared. ‘Oh, well, I am glad; fancy that now, it seems meant, doesn’t it? No, no, of course I won’t mention it to a soul and I’ll not be going myself yet awhile. There’s a deal to see to first, so I’ll be coming along as usual for the time being. I dare say it’ll be as long as you want me.”

Chapter 2

THE DECISION seemed very sudden set off by Mrs Baxter’s tragic news but Roberta realized that the skies had been gradually darkening since Kitty’s visit. For instance, she had begun to notice things – stains and cracks, pieces of rotten woodwork, some patches of damp and a general air of dinginess. You don’t see wrinkles and lines on a loved familiar face until someone from outside remarks on them, she thought, and then you seem to see nothing else.

She was now able to hobble round the garden. There, spring with its terrifying splendid growth had been this year left a free hand. Strong unpruned shrubs were thrusting aside the rarer timid plants, and the weeds! –