Page 77 - WTP Vol. V #1

Her demeanour suddenly changed. “I would pre- fer a simple funeral. As simple as possible. You are right. He and my mother will share a grave. A simple interment. As for now— now I’ll go and make some coffee. Come down with me.” She spoke quickly. “Come on. Let’s go down to the kitchen.”
was a thoughtful accompanist. Music was just about the one thing—”Jane gave another sigh,
a reprise of her first, but deeper. “I think she would have left sooner or later anyway: father was always finding fault with her and pulling her work apart. Poor Hannah. She was an orphan; she spent her childhood at Saint Ursula’s. She had no family of her own.”
“I’ll wait here, Jane.”
Then the espresso machine was on the hob, the plain white demitasses and saucers were on the table and there was nothing more for her to do; she suddenly became still, resting her well-shaped hip against the sink, looking at me, her arms folded. “We’ll have it in the breakfast room,” she said.
“No, Leo. Come down with me,” she said. It was the first time she had used my first name. For some reason she paused in uttering it. “I want to make coffee for you. There’s nothing for you to do here.” Her voice was urgent; even impassioned. “You can do nothing further.”
She pulled me by the hand. Her grip was strong. Well, her grip was irresistible.
It was good coffee, strong and well-prepared. We sat at either end of the table looking at each other. We were content to sit in silence. It was companionable, this silence. Then Jane stood. She folded The Telegraph and placed it, together with her father’s half-glasses, on the sideboard. Reconsidering, she opened a sideboard drawer, took out a spectacle-case, placed the half-glasses within, shut the case with a snap, and replaced
So we went down to the kitchen, our footfalls echoing in the stone Infirmary stairwell, Jane still holding me by the hand, she deciding the rapid pace. We walked quickly across the hall, almost at a sprint, and down the service corridor to the kitchen, Jane’s footfalls clipped and echoic.
it in the drawer with an air of firm finality. She pushed the drawer shut. She collected the demi- tasses, the saucers and the single plate and took them through to the scullery. She washed them in a primitive fashion under the cold tap, looking back at me from time to time, perhaps to see if I were still there.
Jane immediately ran the tap and began the rite of making coffee, hand-grinding the beans, filling the kettle and placing it on the hob, taking up an Ital- ian espresso machine. She did not let up and there was not the slightest pause between any of her actions. “Oh, I’m glad you have come down with me,” said Jane, under her breath, her tone of voice passionate, darting a glance at me.
“I suppose we had better be going back upstairs,” said Jane, looking at me with an air of finality in her intelligent eyes. “To his bedroom.”
Then she said, “You know, we used to have a maid, years ago, when I was a girl. Hannah Ber- rins; a nice woman. She was actually my best friend. Well, my only real friend, if I’m truthful. I was sixteen when she was suddenly dismissed. A week’s notice, given by a curt note from my father. I found her crying one morning; a morning rather like this. She showed me the note.” Jane paused. “Hannah played the piano well—she was taught by a parish deacon who saw her potential—and she used to accompany my cello: I miss that. She
I could still taste the fragrant bitterness of the coffee as we returned upstairs and opened the door of Mr Shanks’ bedroom.
The silence of the room — and the impression of emptiness — were immediately apparent, though it took a second for us to realize that Mr Shanks had stopped breathing. The furnishings quickly quenched the echoes of our entrance.
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