Marcia Talley: All Things Undying

For the exchange all those years ago, Robert and Sally Gardner (now retired to Ludlow) had moved into our home on Prince George Street in Annapolis, and we’d taken over their spacious Victorian on Dartmouth’s Vicarage Hill. ‘I’m teaching Robert’s courses, living in Robert’s house, and driving Robert’s car,’ Paul had quipped at our first drinks party. ‘And this,’ he had added, throwing his arm around my shoulder, ‘this is Robert’s wife.’

Men! Jon Hamilton had laughed so hard he’d dropped a Pringle into his sherry, until Alison’s evil eye silenced him in mid-guffaw. Alison and I have been friends ever since. So when an email arrived from the Hamiltons urging the Ives to consider a return visit, it had not been a question of when, but how soon.

Alison and I wandered into Baxter’s where I pawed through a basket of ceramic buttons, selecting interesting shapes and designs for a sweater I planned to knit for my granddaughter, Chloe. Alison sought out my opinion on a colorful Chas Jacobs print of the Dartmouth boat float ( Fabulous, you must have it! ) then I gathered up my purchases and wandered over to the register. To the buttons I added a whimsical Lynn Antley rabbit pin with a red heart for a tail that the savvy shopkeeper had displayed all too temptingly next to the till.

‘I like your hair,’ the shopkeeper said as she toted up my purchases.

‘You do?’ I felt a blush coming on, thinking that the highlights had been a good idea after all.

Alison slapped my arm playfully. ‘Your hare , Hannah! The brooch!’

I burst out laughing. ‘Lifts, bonnets, boots, lorries, braces, and now hares. George Bernard Shaw was right. Two countries separated by a common language.’

‘Two friends separated by an ocean,’ Alison pouted as she reached out and gave me a one-armed hug.

Carrying our neatly wrapped purchases we moseyed along Foss Street to the Kitchen Shop where I browsed for gadgets I couldn’t live without. Herb scissors! Milk frother! Lemon-saver! A canned tuna fish drainer! Who knew? ‘I’ll worry about how to pack them later,’ I told Alison. ‘Another thing charity shops are good for. Second-hand luggage at rock-bottom prices.’

At Simon Drew’s gallery Alison and I were greeted by the black-hatted, white-bearded artist himself, resplendent in a pair of khaki shorts, and wearing a red and gold vest – what the Brits would call a waistcoat – over a turquoise shirt. A neon yellow bow tie completed the ensemble. Through spectacles that rose like bat wings over his eyes, Drew twinkled like Santa Claus as he introduced us to Rabbit, the black and white sheepdog eyeing us lazily from a prone position under a display case.

Alison stooped to give Rabbit a good scratch behind the ears, then checked her watch. ‘Crikey! Where did the time go? My daughter’s got a bridge game, and I agreed to watch the kids. If I don’t hustle, I’ll be late.’ She kissed the air next to my cheek, promised to call me around teatime the following day, and vanished through the door.

From the great man himself, I bought two ‘Cat-a-Tonic’ coasters, a ‘Prawn to be Wild’ tea towel, half a dozen greeting cards, and a pack of playing cards that featured some of Drew’s most popular drawings. After admiring the ceramics on display in all three of the gallery rooms, I thanked the artist, bid him a cheerful goodbye, and wandered further along Foss Street to the Dartmouth Canvas Factory. I was staring into the window admiring a cleverly designed six-pocket canvas beer bucket that I thought would make a great birthday gift for Paul, when I sensed someone standing close behind me. Without turning around, I refocused my eyes, and peered at the reflection in the window.

‘Excuse me?’ the reflection said.

I turned, expecting to have a hand thrust in my face, wrapped around a charity can decorated with dogs, cats, horses, foxes, maybe even anchors. But instead of begging for donations to the animal rescue league or some aged sailors’ home, the owner of the reflection said, ‘You don’t know me, but my name is Susan Parker. I’m a medium and clairvoyant.’

One might expect such a conversation-stopper out of the mouth of some fresh-faced, gauzy-skirted New Age flower child wearing her hair in dreads, but with the exception of a single purple lock that quivered gently over her left eyebrow as she talked, Susan Parker, Medium and Clairvoyant, looked perfectly normal to me. She wore an embroidered jacket over a crisp white blouse tucked into the waistband of slim black slacks, and a pair of fashionable, sling-back, low-heeled sandals. ‘I don’t know whether you believe in mediums or not, but when I saw you standing there just now, I just had to speak to you. Do you have a minute?’

‘Do you always stop people on the street like this?’ I asked.

She answered me with a grin, not at all spoiled by a slight gap between her two front teeth. ‘It’s what I do.’

I had plenty of experience with mediums like Susan Parker. When my grandson was kidnapped, psychics crawled out of the woodwork like termites fleeing a burning building. It would be interesting to see where this was going. Since I didn’t have anything in particular that I needed to be doing, I introduced myself and said, ‘I guess I can spare a minute. Maybe even two.’

‘It’s just that there’s an aura around you,’ Susan began. ‘I see a female figure. A sister. No, wait a minute…’ Her eyes darted away, focusing on a spot somewhere beyond my right shoulder. She shook her head. ‘No, not a sister. A mother.’

Everybody’s got a mother . So far, I was unimpressed.

‘She passed away, didn’t she?’

Bullseye . Yet that, too, could have been a lucky guess. In spite of my new youthful do, I was no spring chicken. ‘Yes,’ I said, struggling to keep my face blank.

Susan raised a hand, palm out, and cocked her head as if she were actually listening to someone. ‘Your mother’s apologizing. She says she’s sorry for not being around when you needed her.’

I nodded dumbly. Tears pricked the corners of my eyes.

Once again the medium glanced away. Listened. Nodded. I followed her gaze, by now so unnerved that I half expected to see my mother posing in the shop window wearing one of their handmade fishermen’s jackets. I shook off the feeling. It was an act, had to be, but a good one. And the envelope goes to… Susan Parker, Best Performance by a Medium Conversing with the Dead.

‘Does the name George mean anything to you?’

My father’s name is George! But before I could recover my breath and answer in the affirmative, Susan squinted through the shop door, as if having a conversation with someone standing just inside. ‘Thank you!’ she chirped, then turned back to me. ‘Not George. Georgina.’

I stumbled back against the window glass, grabbing the sill for support. Georgina was my baby sister back in Baltimore. How could a total stranger an ocean away in England know about Georgina?

‘My sister,’ I stammered, instantly buying into this woman’s act one hundred and one per cent. ‘Georgina is my sister. Is she all right?’

Susan touched my arm, squeezed it gently. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to alarm you. But your mother is here with me, and she has a message for your sister. She’s saying, “Tell Georgina it’s not her fault.” Does that mean anything to you?’

I nodded, too stunned to speak. Oh, it meant something all right.

Suddenly Susan winced. She inhaled sharply, pressed one hand tightly against her chest, then let her breath out slowly. ‘I’m feeling pressure. Here. In the chest area. Did your mother die of a heart condition?’

Again, I nodded. This was getting too weird for words. If Susan Parker wasn’t talking to my mother, she had to be reading my mind.