Barbara Erskine - Encounters

Her hostess moved with deceptive rapidity in spite of her eighty years and Victoria found herself almost running to keep up with her as they cut through the shrubbery and found themselves on another unkempt lawn. Beyond it a high yew hedge separated them from the church.

Opening a gate in the hedge Lady Penelope glanced at Victoria. ‘I hope you’re strong, I think you are.’

She set off up a path between huddled gravestones, overgrown with nettles, some of them lost beneath moss and lichen. One of them had been recently cleared. They stopped in front of it.

Stephen John Cheney

Born 20 June 1894. Died 24 August 1918

in God I trust

‘I remembered the name when you mentioned it on the phone.’ Lady Penelope poked at the grave with her walking stick. ‘I came up yesterday to see if I was right, and cleared the stone. Then I went back to the records. We still have the nursing home ledgers in the house. My son found them years ago. I suppose they got overlooked with all the other stuff at the end of the war. Stephen died two days after they amputated his arm.’

‘No.’ Victoria stared down at the grave. ‘No. You don’t understand. I saw him. I spoke to him.’

‘There is no Stephen Cheney now, my dear.’ The old lady’s voice was gentle.

You and I were lovers once, in a land, long ago.

‘It’s not possible.’ It was a whisper. ‘He gave me a rose.’

‘Everything is possible.’

‘Perhaps it was his son – or his grandson,’ Victoria said uncertainly.

The old lady shrugged. They both stood, staring down at the mossy tombstone. Both knew somehow that Stephen had had no son.

‘I learned the names on all these stones, walking to church every Sunday over the years,’ Lady Penelope said slowly. ‘My family have lived in this house for more than a century. We had to move out during the last war, just as we did during the first one. But they didn’t use the place as a hospital again. The last time round it was the home guard. I brought my husband here in 1940, but we never lived here. He was killed in 1941, before our son was born.’ She paused for a moment. ‘The house is too much for me now. And my son doesn’t want it. So, sadly, it must go.’ She smiled. ‘Are you all right? Do you want to sit down?’

Victoria was fighting back her tears.

‘I’m sorry. It’s such a shock.’

‘There was no gentle way to tell you.’

‘You must think I’m mad.’

‘Oh no, my dear. I don’t think you’re mad. Far from it. On the contrary. I’ve heard their music from the old gramophone. I’ve smelt the Lysol in those wards. But I‘ve never seen any of the boys. You are lucky.’

‘Am I?’ Victoria tried to smile through her tears. ‘Why did I know him? Why did he know me?’

He had touched her; given her a rose. She could hear his voice … see his eyes. She stared down at the grey stone, seeing it swimming through her tears. ‘How?’ she whispered. ‘How?’

There was a long silence. Lady Penelope was staring across the churchyard into the distance where, through the trees, they could see the hazy mountains bathed in the afternoon sun. ‘Maybe you knew one another in a previous life,’ she said at last. ‘Maybe you should have known each other in that life – his life – but he died too soon and you missed one another on the great wheel of destiny. Who knows? If it is still meant to be, you’ll have another chance. You both stepped out of time for a few short minutes and one day you’ll find each other again.’ She put her arm around Victoria’s shoulder. ‘When you reach my age you know these things. Life goes round and round like the records those boys used to play endlessly on those hot summer afternoons. Once in a while the needle slips; it jumps a groove. That’s what happened when you walked out through that door onto the terrace. You and Stephen heard the same tune for a while – then the needle jumped back. If it is meant to be, you will see him again one day.’

‘You really believe that?’

‘Oh yes.’

‘But it won’t be in this life, will it?’

‘You have a lover in this life, Victoria,’ Lady Penelope pointed out gently.

‘You mean Robert?’

‘If he is your lover as well as your husband.’

‘Yes, he is my lover as well as my husband.’ How could anyone doubt it? How could Robert have doubted it? She had left him alone, his face a tight mask of misery. But he had made no further attempt to stop her coming.

‘Then don’t hurt him.’ It was as if the old lady knew what had happened. ‘Stephen has had his life; now you must live yours.’

‘How does it work? How could I see him? Was he a ghost?’

Her companion shrugged. ‘It doesn’t matter what he was. He was real. For you. And for me.’

They were both looking down at the grave.

‘He told me he was afraid they would take off his arm,’ Victoria said sadly. ‘He was so frightened. I wish I’d said something to reassure him.’

‘Your being there reassured him.’

‘Did it?’ Victoria bit her lip. ‘Do you mind living in a haunted house?’ she asked after another long silence.

Lady Penelope smiled. ‘Every old house has its ghosts, my dear. You grow used to them. I’m fond of mine. But that poor boy from the agents hates it here. He doesn’t understand.’

‘Why did you say we couldn’t buy the house?’

Lady Penelope smiled. ‘If you hadn’t seen Stephen, it wouldn’t have mattered. But you have and you recognized him. You cannot live in a house with two lovers, Victoria. It wouldn’t be fair to your Robert, or yourself. Or to Stephen for that matter.’

‘But fate must have brought me here.’

Lady Penelope smiled. ‘There are times, my dear, when we have to turn our backs on fate. For the sake of our sanity. Always remember that.’ She glanced towards the house. ‘I’ll go on back, my dear. You catch me up when you’re ready.’

Victoria stood looking down at the grave for several minutes after the old lady had gone. She made no attempt to reach him. Her mind was a blank. The churchyard around her was empty. There were no ghosts there now. Wandering on down the path she passed a wild climbing rose, scrambling over some dead elder bushes. Picking one perfect bud she took it back and laid it on his grave. Then she turned away.

As she walked back across the lawn she glanced up at the windows of the west wing as they reflected the late afternoon sunlight in a glow of gold. One or two of them were open now, she saw, without surprise. And, faintly, she could hear the sound of music. But the gardens were empty.

‘You know, I’m not sure that I do want to see you again after all, Joe.’ I leaned back, beginning to enjoy myself, and shifted the receiver to the other hand. ‘How long did you say it was?’

‘Oh, come on, Pen. Don’t be like that.’ His voice was starting to sound the tiniest bit tetchy.

I hoped the smile on my face didn’t come over in my voice. ‘OK, then. As it’s Christmas. You can come for the night. Spare room.’

‘Spare room?’

‘Spare room.’

I put down the receiver and stood up. Twenty minutes, he had said. Twenty minutes to tidy up, fix my hair and nails, slip into something infinitely casual and arrange to be very, very busy when he arrived. I glanced out of the window. The village street glistened beneath the dusting, melting snow. Rather as it had been when he walked out on me three years before. I had sworn I would never see the swine again.

Well, three years and a couple of morale-boosting affairs can do a lot for resolutions like that one. Anyway, I was curious. What had happened to my Joe in the last three years? I put a couple of logs on the fire and poured myself a drink.