The Sisters: Part 5

As expected, Betty was standing outside her front door dressed in her ‘best’ summer raincoat and glowing nut-brown brogues. She stood as straight and proud as a plane tree and held her head high. A small neat suitcase sat obediently next to her on the doorstep. Betty looked like a brave, good girl, summoned to her headmistress to receive instructions for a top-secret mission.

‘You look very smart, Aunt Betty,’ Esther commented as she squeezed Betty’s case into the boot amongst her university books and files. Betty blushed. Compliments made her uneasy. Frivolous people (like some she could mention) gorged on compliments like leeches fed on blood, swelling themselves monstrously. That was not Betty’s way. Esther opened the passenger seat for her aunt. Her eyes were drawn again to the lustrous brogues. She wondered how many hours had been spent last night polishing and pressing and polishing again in preparation for the trip with Aunt Rose. Betty noticed Esther’s look. ‘What’s the matter? Is my slip showing?’ she asked nervously.

‘No. I was just admiring your lovely shoes, that’s all. Get in the front and make yourself comfortable. There’s something going on in Twelfth Street. A police car. Lots of people in the lane watching. Do you want to drive past and have a look?’

‘I do not. It will be drugs, no doubt. It usually is these days. Anyway, I’d be happy never to see Twelfth Street again. Had all I could stomach of the place when Arthur was alive.’ Esther noticed how Betty’s voice wavered slightly at the mention of Arthur’s name, but she clicked her seat belt in place and thrust her head higher, galvanising herself for the battle ahead. ‘Come on then girlie. Let’s get this over with. The Dowager of Delphinium Drive awaits. By the way, Esther,’ Betty said, her face suddenly illuminated with piratical delight. ‘You will tell Vivien Leigh what you saw in Twelfth Street, won’t you. You know how she loves to be reminded of where she came from.’

Esther switched on the spluttering engine and smiled to herself. She was grateful that Aunt Betty was there. She would make the weekend tolerable. 

‘If you think she’d be interested, Aunt Betty, I’d be happy tell her. Just as a sort of public service announcement, you mean? To keep her updated?’

‘Exactly that. Exactly that. A public service announcement. Quite right.’

Esther pulled on to the main street and was astonished to see that in a matter of minutes the slumbering community had exploded into life. Small clusters of people gathered outside houses and shops murmuring, their faces twisted into caricatures of dread and disbelief. One man, still in his dressing gown and slippers, rushed from group to group gleefully passing on his terrible news. Each gaggle of people he left seemed electrified by what they had heard. It was as if war was being announced by a game of Chinese whispers. The street seemed to pulse and throb with a terrible energy. 

‘Aunt Betty?’ Esther whispered, ‘What’s going on?’ But Betty was too busy rummaging through her handbag, oblivious to the deadly virus spreading and multiplying in front of them. Suddenly, swooping down the hill, came three more police cars. Their blue lights pulsed, yet their sirens were chillingly silent. The cars turned in the direction of Twelfth Street. Esther shivered. Aunt Betty shrugged. ‘Drugs. Again,’ she closed her handbag with a determined snap and thrust a wrapped sweet in Esther’s lap. ‘Here, have a barley sugar. You look like you need one.’

 

‘Are you okay in the back there, Aunt Rose?’ Esther asked, glancing in the rear-view mirror. Rose’s lips were pursed tightly. She had not complained about being squashed in the back seat, but still managed to radiate a frosty disapproval. ‘Midsummer night tonight,’ Esther breezily continued, trying to squash the image of the police cars out of her mind. ‘Time for magic and ritual. Aunt Betty, I hope you’re not going to be dancing naked under the stars with a crown of wildflowers again. It’s really become quite tiresome.’ 

Betty tittered wickedly. ‘Naked, Esther? How dare you. How can I be naked if I am wearing my flowery crown?’ 

Aunt Rose sighed disapprovingly. ‘You too, Aunt Rose. No animal sacrifices by the light of the moon. I’ll be counting Aunt Dina’s cats before we leave to make sure they are all present and correct. I’ve heard stories about you, you know.’ Betty cackled delightedly. Rose checked her teeth for lipstick stains in a silver compact.

As she drove from the clutter of the colliery to the lush, green countryside Esther felt as if she were a swimmer bursting through the surface of a leaden sea, emerging into fresh air, space and sunlight. They headed inland through hedgerows tangled with flowers, and soon the chilly, salt tang of the sea dissipated and was replaced with air scented with the sweetness of clover and dog roses. Lulled by the rhythm of the car engine and the heady warmth of the day, the aunts were unusually silent. Esther too had the sensation that she was being hypnotised by the shimmering green light that surrounded her. Her mind drifted lazily from memory to memory, like a leaf being borne down a slow, silver stream. She thought of lovely Miss Finch, who had moved away to teach in a village school in Northumberland. She thought of her mother’s golden-brown hair and remembered the sensation of being held in her soft, freckled arms while they read together at bedtime. She thought of James, her last boyfriend, who adored her and whom she adored in return. She wondered why she had pushed him away, as she had all the others. She could not hold on to people. She didn’t have the knack. It was a life skill, like reading and writing, holding a knife and fork or crossing the road - and one she had never learnt. People trickled through her fingers like grains of sand. Even the weighty ones, the important ones, the ones she longed to hold tightly on to – all she could do was watch them fall. She wondered, as she often did, how the death of her mother had altered the course of her life. Who was she now? Who would she have been if her life had not been blighted by sadness and loss when she was so young? Was this persistent sadness a watermark that would run through every page of her life?

 She was roused from self-reflection by Aunt Rose’s ringing voice; she had her manifesto to share before they arrived at their destination.

 ‘Girls, I do hope you’ll both support me in persuading Dina to move from that big old house. I know it’s beautiful but what does she need with acres of land, seven bedrooms, a greenhouse? She’s rattling around in there like a pea in a drum. It is not healthy.’ 

Betty glanced at Esther. She raised her eyebrows with all the meaning and purposeas she could muster and then stuffed three barley sugars into her mouth. Betty and Rose were unequal combatants; it had always been so. Betty had no intention of challenging Rose on her ridiculous proclamation. Esther must take the lead on this. She was university educated and had a way with words. After all she spent all her time studying them. Betty was a supporting act only. Frustratingly though, Esther seemed oblivious to the reality of the situation. Esther remained silent. The girl needed encouragement. Betty gave her arm a sly but firm nip. 

‘Ouch! Aunt Betty, what the . .’ Esther looked at Betty. The old lady was staring straight ahead, arms folded furiously across her chest. Her mouth was bulging with boiled sweets. She looked like an angry anaconda. Esther sighed. It was down to her, she understood. ‘I know you must be worried about Dina, but the vicarage is her home, Aunt Rose. Dina loves it there. She’s got help with the housework and the gardens. Why shouldn’t she stay? If I lived in such a lovely place, I would never want to leave.’

‘That’s true,’ Aunt Betty said enthusiastically. ‘Very true, she does have help.’

Aunt Rose tutted. She was not one to give up so easily. ‘It’s not just the work though. It’s the loneliness. The isolation. The safety. All alone in that big house surrounded by nothing but trees.’

‘Ouch,’ Aunt Betty had nipped her again, even firmer this time. ‘But Aunt Dina’s anything but lonely. I always thought she had loads of friends, her art group, the church, the other volunteers at the National Trust.’

‘That’s right, Betty chorused. ‘She’s got The National Trust. Good point, Esther.’

Aunt Rose set her tone to shrill exasperation, ‘Why she could be bludgeoned in her bed and no one would hear her cry! She’s a woman alone!’

Esther didn’t wait for the nip this time. She got in first, like a well-trained dog. ‘But would she be safer anywhere else? If she moved to a bungalow in a town, she’d still be a woman alone.’

‘She would. She’d be a woman alone regardless. Yes. That is certainly true.’ Betty agreed. She had finally swallowed the barley sugars and suddenly saw an opportunity present itself for mischief. ‘I mean, there were rum goings on in the colliery this morning, Rose. Police everywhere. Isn’t that right, Esther? Nowhere’s safe these days. Which street did you say it was, Esther?’

You truly are a marvel, Aunt Betty, Esther thought. An utter marvel.‘Which street? Well from what I could see it was . . .’

‘But it’s not just that,’ Rose blustered on, clearly furious at this two-pronged defence of Dina. ‘I hate to say it, but Dina has revealed some rather alarming things in our recent phone calls. In her grief for Peregrine, her mind has become quite addled.’

Betty sat up, like a hare sniffing the march air, she quivered with anticipation. For once, her innate nosiness had defeated her fear of Rose’s wrath. ‘What sort of alarming things?’ 

‘Well, there’s that Dilys she’s moved in for one thing. Sounds like quite the wrong sort.’

‘Dilys?’ Betty and Esther asked in unison. 

‘Yes, you’ll meet her, I’m sure. She’s bound to be there. And then there’s the rather unsavoury turn her painting has taken. I’ll say no more about that. Do not bully me so. All will be revealed when we arrive, I am sure, and then you will see I am right.’

Esther and Betty exchanged glances. The tawdry drama unfolding on Twelfth Street was squirreled away for another time and anyway, they had arrived in Dina’s sleepy village and were turning into the meandering driveway of the vicarage. The sounds that Esther loved so much, the sounds of endless childhood summers washed over her. She felt her heart was dissolving in their potent evocation: the gracious crunch of tyres on gravel and the call of a wood pigeon hidden within whispering woodland. Then, as the car left the avenue of ancient oaks lining the driveway like military guard, the house came into view, tall and symmetrical, rendered the colour of thick yellow cream.